It’s been a long while since I’ve posed to my blog, and a lots been happening. I’m aiming to get more regular updates and articles up, in the mean time, here is a picture I took last week.
Long exposure with 10 stop, I got the timing just right to capture the clouds when they lit up, 2 mins either side and it would have been rather dull.
Hobart Town Aquaduct 2 HDR, originally uploaded by BrendanDavey.
These aquaducts are some of, if not the oldest in Australia. Built to carry the water to Hobart from Mount Wellington. Built by convicts in the 1840’s. The history of the pipeline is a little sketchy, with the oldest known document of the water system, a tracing of an original document entitled “Map of the Proposed Line of Aqueduct for Supplying Hobart Town with Pure Water, 1841”.
The pipeline walking talk, follows the original path of the old pipe system from Ferntree to the waterworks reserve.
I used a hard ND grad parallel to the top of the aquaduct to cut they sky down a fair bit…
Ok, this is the last Lauderdale shot for a while. I’m hoping to shoot the Iron Pot at dawn Soon. 🙂
I’m hoping to get another shot from this location using a 10 stop filter. It should really bring out the colour. I’m just waiting for the right weather, it’s been very overcast at the wrong times for the past week.
Just how good is the weather sealing on the Canon Cameras?
Well I’m not really sure, but I do know that when I took this shot it was pouring with rain. I had arrived early at Cemorne Beach to take some pictures and had setup my camera and started to take some long exposures. However it was becoming very apparent that it was very likely to rain with a rather black cloud slowing making its way accross the landscape behind me. Eventually the sky opened up and rain came pouring down. I had no umbrella and had to make the choice to either pack up or continue to shoot.
The Canon 5d mark 2 is water resistant right? So I decided to just go with it and stay. With no wind I was getting little or no rain on the lens and I managed to get some good shots. The camera got very wet but did not miss a beat, and it’s still going strong a month+ later (after I took it straight home to dry off).
I guess the bottom line is that a lot of people see their camera as a large investment, trying to look after it for resale value or somehow to prolong its life. When in reality it’s a tool. How many shots have been missed because they did not want to get their camera wet or dusty. If you camera is well manafactured with a metal body and weather sealing, take the risk, get the shot I say, or at least have equipment to mitigate the risk like an umbrella or rain cover 🙂
I recently purchased a secondhand 70-200mm f4 IS L. So for the moment I’ve been shooting more portraits and less landscapes. One could say I’ve taken up bird watching.
I test drove the f2.8 II, and it was awesome, much better contrast and sharpness, however the price tag was an extra $2000…. so the f4 IS will have to do for now.
I’m still learning the best way to use it and I want to get an tele-converter, but so far it’s taken some excellent shots. I’m finding best results when stopped down a little and in good light, you really need to be on the ball and “focusing” to get a really good shot, especially with moving targets.
It’s that time of the year again for snow, Mt Wellington has had a few good dumps over the past few weeks, so I thought I’d head up and take a few shots at sunset. Some bettter light would have been better, but still ok.
This was my first official outing with my new 17-40mm f4 L, and it works great :). Nice and sharp.
LED Orb Art, No Photoshop.
I friend of mine showed me some LED orbs he created the other day, and we decide to go out and shoot some more. The shot above was a 2 minute exposure, involving myself and chops to create the 3 LED Orbs. I’m still experimenting and I’m hoping to have a shot not to far away that has 4 orbs of different colors soon, including a “split orb”. Once I’ve “mastered” the technique I’m going to post an article on how you can create your own cool orbs.
More Orbs can be viewed at my flickr page, link below.
This morning I saw the best sunrise we have had for a few weeks, I’ve been waiting for just the right amount of cloud and light. I shot a few good shots, and could not decide which ones to upload. So I’ve uploaded 2.
I’m really missing my wide angle lens, but the 24-105mm is serving me well. It’s certainly not as sharp as my old 16-35mm. Most of the exposure were long in low light, so complete manual focus and no IS. At 24mm it’s not to bad, and you can still fit a fair bit in the shot, but I’m really looking forward to my new 17-40mm. I could see myself with a 24mm TS-E in the future for sure.
Sometimes you look at a picture and you think, “It’s okay, but nothing special, I wouldn’t hang it on my wall”. Occasionally these shots can be converted to Black and White with fantastic results. This picture has a very rich blue sky and when converted to B&W it was possible to change the hue and saturation of the blue to make the sky really “pop”. The effect was created in Lightroom, and I suspect better results could be achieved with Nik Silver Efex Pro.
