Thanksgiving 2011 - National Harbor

This Thanksgiving we spent the Friday night at the National Harbor in D.C. After a nice dinner we took a stroll at the marina, waiting for a big Christmas tree to be lit and subsequent fireworks. It took too long though and it was quite chilly so we headed home before the tree lighting ceremony and the fireworks took place.
Nevertheless, I got some nice night time pictures of the waterfront and the Gaylord Convention Center. This was my first time to take high dynamic range (HDR) pictures at night, so this was a fun experiment for me. Some of the photos turned out very beautifully.

Here we go:

 Waiting for the Christmas tree to be lit. Many people came out this night and a small orchestra was playing Christmas songs (wayyy too early for my taste). Can you see the big man lying in the sand?

A photo of the waterfront and the Gaylord Convention Center in the background. The picture has an interesting feel to it, because I blackened out the sky completely. My first experiment with night time HDRs taught me that background noise in the night sky, especially from the overexposed images, is greatly amplified during the tone-mapping process. Most of the pictures would look terrible if one wouldn't post-process the sky in some way after the tone-mapping process.

Another angle at the water front with the still unlit Christmas tree in the background. I love the strong colors the HDRs produce at night. In this picture the sky was not so much of a problem, however the water had to be darkened severely. Much as with the sky, the tonemapping will brighten the water to a muddy brown color and greatly enhance background noise, dirt, and floating objects, which has to be corrected.

A photo of the atrium of the Gaylord Convention Center and Resort. They had a great lightshow and a Christmas Market in the atrium, together with many attractions and events for children.

Canadian Rockies - Personal TOP 10

In summer 2010 we went hiking in the Canadian Rockies. We stayed in a small town in Yoho National Park, but also visited Banff National Park and the south edge of Jasper National Park.
Although this vacation was my first big vacation with the DSLR camera (kind of my rookie vacation ^^), the landscape pictures are some of my favorites and probably will be for a long time. The nature in the Canadian Rockies was stunningly beautiful and we were mostly lucky with the weather. Since we traveled in the end of June, there was still snow and ice in high elevations, while the lakes in the valleys turned a beautiful turquoise through the minerals they received from the snow melt.
Below are my TOP 10 favorite landscape pictures of our vacation.

Here we go:

Lake Agnes, up on the mountain above Lake Louise and right on the state border of Alberta and British Columbia. I love the partially frozen surface of the lake and the green color of the water underneath. On the right you can see a steep mountain ascent with a quite challenging alpine hike. In the background is a warm and comfortable tea house.

A panorama photo shot from the Banff Skywalk. In the foreground you can see a valley with the city of Banff, surrounded by mountain ranges on both sides. In the background is the western end of Lake Minnewanka. The sheer vastness of this open landscape is still breathtaking when I look at this picture.

This photo shows the opposite side of the Banff Skywalk. One can see the bow river and the mountain range called Sawback. Strong contrast in the clouds on the left and a warm split toning give this picture a fairytale, Lord-of-the-Ring-ish atmosphere.

A panorama shot from an elevation above Lake O'Hara. The hike from Lake O'Hara up to Oesa Lake has truly been the best hike of my life so far. The trail was very diverse and the multitude of panoramic views left a strong impression of beauty and serenity.

This picture shows Lake O'Hara from ground elevation. Unfortunately it was quite windy and the ripples on the surface prevented a nice reflection of the mountains in the background. Nevertheless, Lake O'Hara showed it's sunny side in this picture.

A beautiful view of Emerald Lake with a near still surface showing reflections of Mt. Burgess and neighboring mountains. Behind the trees you can see Lake Emerald Lodges with a nice restaurant which had a delicious wildlife platter.

One of my absolute favorites is the view of the Icefield Parkway, a long road with plenty of stunning vistas and touristic sites. In this picture you can see the far reaching fingers of Mt. Saskatchewan on the right and Mt. Cirrus on the left. The shape of the slopes clearly shows how glaciers ate their way through the landscape in ancient times.

 

Our destination were the Columbia Icefields, more specifically the Athabasca Glacier. The glacier can be accessed by foot during a guided tour, or by a specialized passenger transport vehicle, a so called "snow coach". Don't be fooled by the small appearance of the glacial tongue in between the moraines: we were told the ice is as deep as the Paris Eiffel Tower.

Located off Icefield Parkway is one of the most scenic vistas the Canadian Rockies have to offer.  A view of Lake Peyto. When we arrived back in the guest house on this evening and I realized that I had forgotten to use the circular polarizing filter (which cancels out the bright reflections of sunlight in the lake surface) I was really mad at myself. What a rookie mistake! The picture is one of my strong favorites nevertheless.

Needless to say, the next day I had my circular polarizing filter ready. On our last day we had a short hike around Moraine Lake which had a bright and lively turquoise color.

Autumn Leaves

For more than a week now I was planning to take photos of some autumn leaves. I just enjoyed the change of color from green to yellow to orange to red. Sometimes one can find all the colors at the same time on one tree. This made me search for leaves which exhibit a gradual change from yellow to red. However, I forgot about it for nearly a week and all the leaves that I collected previously dried and the colors faded a bit.
Today at work I discussed with a friend about capturing details in images. This reminded me to attempt the leaf shots today, but instead of focusing on rich colors I tried to achieve the greatest detail possible (for me anyways) in some of the pictures (particularly the first and second images below).

Here we go:

  High contrast black&white, showing great detail

High contrast color with moderate split toning

A beautiful red leaf, natural color and contrast

Nice color gradient, natural color and contrast

A handheld shot taken with low f-stop and fairly narrow depth of field

University of Maryland Campus - HDR

These are my first attempts on high dynamic range (HDR) photography.
HDR basically strives for a more uniform exposure of bright and dark areas in a photograph. This is done by taking multiple photos of the same scene with different exposure times (i.e. exposure sets) and using a software (I use "Photomatix Pro 4.1") to combine these sets to a single image. In simplified terms, the software will increase the brightness of the darker areas (such as a dark hallway in the foreground) and decrease the brightness of the bright areas (such as a bright sky in the background), which will increase detail and allows to project a wider range of the original radiance of the scene. This process is called tone mapping.
The strength of this effect can be adjusted in the software and can lead to dramatically different results, anywhere from an interesting surreal "plastic" kind of look (which often reminds me of computer game graphics) to beautiful natural looks with vibrant colors and added detail.

Here we go:

Sundial in front of McKeldin Library

Testudo, the University of Maryland's diamondback terrapin mascot

Maryland Terps Football Stadium, heavily back-lit

The Background Story

Since I was a little child I always liked taking pictures. For most of my life I was not interested in photography itself, I just liked the act of taking pictures. I guess with age the demand on the quality of these pictures grew and two years ago (2009) I bought my first digital SLR and a lens. This is where the adventure started.

As I am currently a student, I work on a student's budget and use mostly entry level equipment. Nevertheless, I try to constantly improve on composition, camera handling, new techniques, and post-processing.

All my pictures are taken during family hikes/vacations/city visits. I therefore have only as much time to compose and take a shot until my family will run off without me (approx. anywhere between 2-20 seconds). I almost never carry my nice sturdy steel tripod and cannot persuade my wife to carry it for me. I know this limits the quality of the photos somewhat, but for now these limitations are perfectly fine.

Adobe Lightroom 2 is used for post-processing and I am still learning the ropes. Since I always shoot in raw format, all photos in this blog are post-processed. Most of the photos need cropping, white balance adjustments, exposure and lighting fixes, contrast enhancements, sharpening, and occasional split-toning and vignetting. As I don't use Adobe Photoshop (except Elements 6 for panorama stitching), I don't add or take away any elements of the original image. I started experimenting with high dynamic range photography (HDR) and use Photomatix Pro 4.1 to tonemap the HDR images.
With the student budget in mind, below is a list of the equipment I am currently using:

- Canon EOS 450D (or Rebel XSi)
- Tamron SP AF Aspherical XR Di LD 28-75mm 1:2.8 Macro
- Sigma DC HSM 30mm 1:1.4 (which, when used with the
   APS-C size sensor of the EOS 450D , performs like a 48mm)
- Canon Close-up Lens 250D
- Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2.7, Photomatix Pro 4.1,
   Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 (for panorama stitching)