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Another from Napa in the Copia vineyards.
Tip: One a different note, checkout Colors in Life for photo inspiration and web site design inspiration. I was contacted by the author/web designer, Masroor Iman. He asked permissions to use some of my images in his web site. After seeing how wonderfully he presented my images, I need to give my blog an overhaul.
Another macro shot from the Copia vineyard in Napa. Decided that I liked this one better in black and white rather than color.
One more macro from my recent visit to Napa. This is another shot from the vineyards at Copia winery.
One more from my recent visit to Napa. This is from an apple tree in the vineyards of Copia.
This is a fisheye shot of the pond at the Reynold winery in Napa. I did not polarize and the colors just popped when I started processing. I did crop heavily because there were bright spots along the left-hand side that were distracting.
This is a shot of the pond at the Reynolds Winery in Napa. This is a small family owned winery with excellent wine. They graciously allowed a group of us to shoot photos. I was not interested in shooting the vines because the pond was there beckoning me. This is an overview shot and if you look close, you can see the grape vines at the upper right of the shot. The colors looked very bold with my polarized sunglasses but seem even stronger in my shots.
Over the course of the next few days, I will post more shots of this pond made at the same spot so you can see different viewpoints.
Yesterday, I visited Napa on an outing with Aphra and the camera club. This is from the Copia winery where we all met and then dispersed.
I have started processing my raw with Pixmantec's Rawshooter. Even at a short time, I am starting to prefer it to Photoshop's camera raw. I can get much closer to my final output in Rawshooter. I like the sharpening, separate highlight and shadow contrast, and vibrance (just in premium version) controls to name a few. It is also easy to copy and paste settings when I shoot a panorama.
One last picture from Uvas Canyon visit on the weekend. This is taken on the hill just above the parking lot. I thought I needed a high dynamic range image but this dappled lights was within range for the infrared camera.
One more from our visit to Uvas Canyon. Originally this image and Uvas Canyon were part of a horizontal panorama of 5 images. When I reviewed the images on the back of the camera, I decided that these two images were stronger than the whole.
Originally, this was an almost successful shot of the aspens in the Santa Fe National Forest. I flipped and merged the image and applied about 30 filtering layers. Photoshop hung and I lost the image. This is the reproduced version.
One more infrared shot from Alameda Creek. The reflections are totally eliminated. I think it is a combo of the polarizer and the infrared.
Today, Chip and I went out to Uvas Canyon. Right now, Swanson creek is barely running and it is very dry and brown. After a few more rain storms, Uvas Canyon should have the magic back.
One more from my recent Santa Fe trip. We wanted to visit this museum in Santa Fe but it was closed when we arrived. Instead we visited the nearby art fair and had a wonderful time. This was a grab shot made by sticking my camera through the fence.
Tip: When traveling by air, do not leave your Allen wrench for your tripod in your carry-on luggage. Mine was confiscated in Albuquerque.
After a long dry spell, I finally made it out to Sunol for a quick photo adventure. Of course, I arrived about noon. I recently read an article about Red-Eye Reeves' infrared photography. So, here is a infrared detail from Alameda creek. I did get a wet foot for this shot but I am happy with the results.
This is an overview shot of the Pueblo cliff dwellings at Bandelier Monument. You can hike up along the cliff edge and some of the dwellings have ladders that you can climb and see up close.
One more of the Aspensin Santa Fe. Again, this is a high-dynamic range image. I had to reduce saturation during processing.
Another shot of the atrium of the La Fonda Hotel.
One more from my recent New Mexico visit. This is from a side street of Taos. As you can see, it was a gray, rainy day.
One more street scene from out visit to Santa Fe['s Art nite.
This is a small section of the ancient Pueblo village of Tyuonyi located in the Bandelier Monument National Park. This section is located on the flatland below the cliff dwellings. It is a circular village forming 400 rooms. Each root was maybe 4x5 feet. Too little to laydown and fully stretch out.
Sena Plaza is a small plaza in Santa Fe that is just off the main plaza. It is lushly planted and very charming. We did not get to explore much but hopefully next visit.
The quote for the picture is "Now, that is a good cup of coffee!". I blew this shot because I wanted to focus on Mother's face and clipped the top of her head. However, I would say that the cup of coffee is 'conspicuous'.
The La Fonda hotel sits at one corner of the Plaza in Santa Fe. My guidebook says that the hotel is a meeting place for locals and tourists. Actually, it is the only place around the Plaza that has a public bathroom. The hotel has a beautiful lobby with many shops as well as a lovely restaurant in its central atrium. Mother and I stopped for lunch and then walked up to the balcony of the atrium. Here is a shot of the restaurant area.
These sunflowers were blooming everywhere in Santa Fe and Taos. We saw them growing in vacant lots, along the highways and railroad tracks. I converted this image to black and white using the Nik Old Photo filter. It provides a nice colorizing and a lot of grain.
Here is another shot from my recent visit to Santa Fe. In Santa Fe, the first Friday evening is art nite. Ma
ny of the galleries around the Plaza are open in the evening. Manitou gallery was one of the best galleries that we visited. They had several sculpture pieces and some gorgeous paintings inside.
On our second day in Santa Fe, we decided to drive up to the Aspen Vista Trail. This is located in the Sante Fe National forest. To our delight, the aspens were still glorious. The aspens appeared to glow in the sunlight. I learned that aspens are really one organism sharing a large root system. Aspens love sunlight. These aspens are the result of an 1880 forest fire that burned the pines giving sunlight to the aspens. Eventually, these aspens will be shaded out by the pines and go dormant.
Given this was taken right in the middle of a sunny day, I tried out using high-dynamic range image to try to keep the glowing yellows with detail in the pines.
Just got back from my visit to Santa Fe. For some reason, there were a lot of Indian Head or Buffalo nickels for decoration. This is a close-up of a nicket studded into a belt that my Mother bought. Santa Fe is a MARVELOUS place and I hope to return to soon.
I am going on vacation for a week to Santa Fe. I am taking my camera gear but do not know how many shots I will get. Hopefully, I will have many images to post when I return. Here is one from the archives taken in Scottsdale last spring.
This week's Photo Friday theme was difficult for me. Darkness conjures up negative emotions which is not what I want for my photography. So, I decided to try a nite shot. This is my first attempt at nite photography. Chip came as a chaperone to Lake Elizabeth. There was a car that kept cruising by, we were sprinkled, and the lights kept flicking on and off.
One from our visit to Guadalupe River Walk last weekend. I have not been feeling very energetic this week so have not been out shooting recently. I fiddled this one and tried out the Nik Mignight Green filter.
