Autumn Rays | Kinston, North Carolina
Driving down a particularly long, straight and boring stretch of road, I noticed some interesting storm clouds blowing in from the West over the cotton fields in my rear view mirror. At the next opportunity, I pulled a u-turn across the median and found a nice dirt road that cut through the fields. Stepping out of my car and feeling the breeze and humidity, I could tell it was going to storm very soon. I was only able to capture a few frames before the sun was covered by the incoming dark clouds. This was the last frame I shot and thanks to those quickly approaching clouds, I really like the way the sun is showing a few rays, but mostly casting great diffused light across the sky. The colors in the foreground are about as close to fall foliage that I’ve seen in our area (thanks to countless pine trees) and it shows very vibrantly thanks to the sunlight’s brief bathing of the foreground. Storms coming in like this often are a very frustrating time to shoot. On one hand, the clouds and changing conditions around the sun make for some of the best lighting. On the other, conditions often change so quickly that you only get one chance to make the scene. It’s important to always be ready when you’re out shooting during weather conditions like this— you never know when you may need to make a u-turn and snap that scene!
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The shot: 3 exposures, hand held (no time to get out the tripod). Merged in Photomatix Pro, finished in Photoshop CS4. Very little other work- I really liked the feel and softness of the sky.
Union Point Sunrise | New Bern, NC
I thought this image would be a fitting way to get back in the swing of things this morning. As many of you know, Hurricane Irene made landfall nearby on Saturday morning and things have been pretty crazy ever since. We finally regained power on Tuesday night and I feel waaaay out of touch with everyone and have a lot of catching up to do!
This is Union Point Park in downtown New Bern, North Carolina. The sun was rising and went behind one of the few clouds in the sky to make for some really inspiring rays of light. It certainly was a great way to start a new day. As the saying goes, “there’s always sunshine after the rain.”
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©2011 Zach Frailey
Spires in the Sky | Pittsburgh, PA
Despite living there for 23 years, I can say without bias that I love Pittsburgh, PA. There is just a feel about the city and the people there that I haven’t gotten anywhere else. I can also say that in the two years since moving to North Carolina, I have spent more time in downtown Pittsburgh than I did in the 23 years I was there. Weird, huh? I guess the saying is true, ‘you don’t know what you have until it’s gone.’ I didn’t realize how truly great the city was until I moved on and went out into the “real world.”
This is a three shot HDR image of PPG Place in the heart of downtown (or dah-tahn if you speak Pittsburghese). The security here is pretty big on kicking out tripod toting folks, so I shot this handheld and moved on. I guess I looked touristy enough. It was merged in Nik HDR Efex Pro, which is different for me. I have been toying with it a little more lately and I still have the same thoughts on it. Merged images seem a lot flatter than they do when using Photomatix (my #1 choice in tonemapping software), but with the aid of some contrast adjustments in Nik Color Efex and Viveza this image seemed to come out better then my Photomatix version. The jury’s still out on the Nik’s HDR software in my mind.
©2011 Zach Frailey, please do not use without permission.
