Underbelly | Surf City, North Carolina
Facebook | Twitter | Flickr | 500px | Google+
I recently took a day trip to Wilmington, NC and back up the coast with a friend, Joe Sadlo of Silverstream Photography. We stopped off at a couple of beaches including this one, at Surf City. The Surf City Pier is one of the more narrow ocean piers that I’ve been to and judging by the broken off pillars sticking out of the sand, it’s been through a little hurricane damage over the years.
If you couldn’t tell by the amount of them I shoot, piers are one of my favorite things to shoot in HDR. I used my 8mm lens for this one and the extreme wide angle really makes this pier look like it goes on forever! The purple sunset sky was really nice on this cloudy evening and I wanted to really be sure not to screw up the sky. I did a lot of layer masking to retain the detail and realism there.
The Shot: Nikon D90, 8mm Rokinon lens. Tripod held, remote fired. 3 exposures, merged in Photomatix, tonemapped file masked with the 3 original exposures in Photoshop. A little touch of Nik Color Efex Pro and an Unsharp Mask to finish.
As it nears crunch time for gift buying, please consider some prints for your loved one! Visit www.uprootedphotographer.com/prints to view the galleries. Make sure to order soon to ensure delivery by Christmas! Use code WEB25 to recieve 25% off your entire order, only until the holiday!
‘Marsh Rays’ | New Bern, North Carolina
Yesterday was pretty much cloudy, dreary and rainy all day long- or tous photographers, the perfect day to be on the lookout for a sunset. I’ve grown to dread cloudless, sunny days. I’m always on the lookout for clouds in the forecast. Particularly lately, as cold fronts have moved into the area with the arrival of fall, we’ve had some pretty neat sunsets. There’s nothing better than the light that is created during those brief moments when the setting sun pokes through those clouds.
I don’t typically shoot landscapes in a portrait orientation, mainly because I don’t think they look as good on a widescreen or in print. However, I found that the best way to portray this scene was to shoot that way. I was right at the edge of the marsh and the only way to get the reflection in the water was to turn my camera. I really like the way the tops of the marsh grass are illuminated by the warm light of the sun’s rays here; they’re actually the reason I shot this scene. I scouted it out a few evenings earlier and knew the next time we had this kind of sunset, I’d be there!
The Shot: Nikon D90, tripod mounted and remote fired. 3 exposures, tonemapped in Photomatix and masked back with original layers in Photoshop. Tweaked the image a bit with Nik Color Efex and Viveza. I then used the sharpening method I’ve described before (still need a name for it) in which I’ll convert the image to black and white using Nik Silver Efex with a yellow filter. Then change the blend mode of that layer to ‘Luminosity’ and mask as needed. Finsihed with a very slight Glamour Glow and exported.
-Join me on my other social networks:
Black, White & Sunny | Cape Lookout, NC
I recently took another ferry ride over to the Cape Lookout lighthouse to shoot it against a dramatic sky, but once again my plans were foiled. It seems like there are never clouds in the sky over there. Good for vacationers, but not for me. A few weeks ago conditions were similar, but I was unable to get a single usable shot because of unforeseen debris on my sensor. All sunflares were useless. This time, sensor cleaned, I shot a few brackets against the spotless blue sky. Those of you who are into HDR know that it’s pretty pointless to try to HDR a sky like this, but I was doing it for the flare. In fact, the lighthouse and the rest of the image are a single exposure masked in. It was just ‘ok’ in color, but I found the black and white conversion really brought out the diamond pattern on the lighthouse and drew a lot of attention to the sun rays pointing at it. The plain blue sky was just over powering, and that’s why black and white worked best.
The Shot: 3 exposure HDR merged in Photomatix. Middle exposure sky and lighthouse were masked back in using photoshop. Finishing touches were made using Nik’s Color Efex and black and white conversion was done in Nik Silver Efex Pro.
©2011 Zach Frailey
First Light | Assateague Island, VA
After a few days’ hiatus, I’m finally getting back into the swing of things. I spend a long weekend at Chincoteague Island, VA with my family and wife as we celebrated our wedding anniversary. My family has been going on vacation to Chincoteague since I was too little to walk, so I never miss a chance to meet up with them on the island. This visit wasn’t as ‘eventful’ as last year’s (read the blog post here) and that made it just about perfect.
Before making the short four hour trip up the coast, I made a shot list of the things I wanted to photograph while on Chincoteague. Right up at the top was a sunrise. So, at 5:00am I set out across the island to the adjacent barrier island, Assateague, to get my shots. Much to my surprise, my mom and dad came along with me. It’s always nice to have company when out shooting photos, especially when it’s my parents who I rarely get to see. We shot the sun cresting up over the ocean and then we headed back down the road to this spot. Those of you familiar with the National Wildlife Refuge on the island will recognize this cluster of trees along the Wildlife Loop trail. I don’t know why, but these trees are synonymous with Assateague Island for me. I guess I’ve just seen them so many times that they have buried themselves in my mind.
The Shot: Nikon D90, shot at 18mm. This is a three exposure HDR, shot from a tripod and remote triggered. Merged in Photomatix Pro, finished in Photoshop CS4 with Nik Color efex Pro and Nik Viveza pro plug-ins. In post processing, I added a pretty pronounced blur to the water in the foreground at the very end. The heavy detail in the water seemed to take away from the serenity of the whole scene. Now, it all flows together.
©2011 Zach Frailey
