Picture of the Day

[kwscore]

Nikon D4 14-24mm

You Don't Need Telescope
by kwscore on Flickr

[BenchZowner]

I don't like the color work on this one.
Technically pretty good as usual.

Based on your sky and love for night shots, I could easily warrant a nice filter combo purchase ( Deep Sky Filter + Hydrogen-Alpha filter ) for photographing the Milky Way, m31 ( Andromeda galaxy ) and various nebulae.

[hokiealumnus]

Over Thanksgiving, we lit our first fire of the year so of course I took a couple photos of it to see how it would turn out.

f/5, ISO 200, 1/4 sec, 42 mm, no flash



This second one is a crop from another photo that wasn't great, but this particular flame was cool looking.

f/5.6, ISO 200, 1/4 sec, 120 mm, no flash


(This is the one from which it was cropped.)

[@rne]

Lake Tahoe


tahoe-08043 von ArneM. auf Flickr

[[XC] Oj101]

I don't like the color work on this one.
Technically pretty good as usual.

Based on your sky and love for night shots, I could easily warrant a nice filter combo purchase ( Deep Sky Filter + Hydrogen-Alpha filter ) for photographing the Milky Way, m31 ( Andromeda galaxy ) and various nebulae.

Astrophotography is something I'm really getting into, could you elaborate on this a bit? I'm considering looking for a second hand Canon 20Da but they're really hard to find.

[BenchZowner]

No need to go nuts seeking for a dedicated camera for astrophotography.
If you're really that dedicated you can send the camera to a service center to remove the IR ( infrared ) filter, but that's going to mess your daily shooting quite a bit, or force you to purchase extra filters to have a camera functional for both astrophotography & normal day photography.

You can get the same job done without modifying or buying a special camera.

The Deep Sky Filter is a multi-band blocking filter, blocking the frequencies of the typical street & city lights, thus making your sky darker, allowing you to take shots you wouldn't be able to take without traveling lots of miles away to a secluded location.
The Hydrogen-Alpha filter acts as a transmission reduction filter, reducing every light frequency by 40-50-60-70% ( depends on your filter rating ) except the IR frequencies such as the red light emitted by the nebulaes and other deep sky objects.

The Deep Sky filter costs around $100-250 ( depending on brand & size ) and the Hydrogen-Alpha filter costs around $150 ( again depending on brand & size it can go as high as $350 ).

Combine these two filters with a good location... and you have the ability to capture amazing photos of the Milky Way, Andromeda galaxy ( m31 ) and quite a few nebulaes, even some close to earth planets ( such as Mars & Jupiter )

[Darakian]

Slick pic RNE! Is that a cloud or a comet in the sky?
@Oj, don't bother with an old astro camera. Check out IR filterless rebels if you want a camera specifically for astro work.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw...d&_sacat=31388

[hokiealumnus]

You can get a Canon 60Da (the "a" is for astrophotography) at B&H, but it's not cheap. Being the very frugal type, I'd go with BZ's filter tips before springing fourteen hundred bucks on a dedicated astro camera. It would be SO limiting without an IR filter for daily use...I can't see spending that much unless you plan on making money off the shots; or if you just have money to burn, that works too.

[kwscore]

[BenchZowner]

forgot to remove the car... anyway

[hokiealumnus]

Very nice; was that hand-held?

f/4.5, ISO 1600, 1/25 sec, 38 mm, no flash, -0.7 ev

[BenchZowner]

Very nice; was that hand-held?

Nope, my tripod manned up :p

EXIF:

116s exposure
f/8
ISO 200
WB Fluorescent
Matrix Metering
12mm focal length

[hokiealumnus]

Wow 116s, I wouldn't have guessed that; it doesn't even really look like a dead-of-night shot. Nice.

[BenchZowner]

It wasn't pitch dark, but pretty dark.
Time was 6:57pm
Sunrise time there was 5:12pm.

[hokiealumnus]

Here's another from the same night as the one above.

f/4, ISO 1600, 1/30 sec, 24 mm, no flash, -0.7 ev

[BenchZowner]

That's a nice place Jeremy.
Looks ideal for a portrait shot of a nice girl at a long focal length with the given background providing some nice bokeh

[hokiealumnus]

That's a great idea. I'll see good portraits and think 'gee, I wish I could think of good places to take subjects like that' without even realizing what's already a good place that I frequent. The familiar is often dismissed simply for that fact! Durham, NC has several repurposed tobacco warehouses/factories; that one is the American Tobacco facility.

Here are a few more from that night; for the most part, all shot at ISO 1600 since the T3 starts getting too noisy at 3200.









....and speaking of portrait-with-bokeh, here's the kiddo watching a juggler.



This was my first real night event with this camera & lens. Night shooting is hard, but it didn't turn out too poorly for a first try. The only thing I didn't set manually was shutter speed. It was so darn dark I had to manually focus even, which made for quite a few missed shots; but those that worked seemed to work pretty well.

One of the biggest, most counter-intuitive lessons I've read about night shooting is that the camera freaks out trying to find more light and you have to set negative exposure to compensate. Most of these (maybe all of them) were shot at -0.7 ev.

[BenchZowner]

Part of what you said is the reason why I tend to use Manual metering & focusing at night.

The last shot with the kid gets pretty close to what I'd imagine doing with the xmasy scenery.
A facial with the colored lights xmas tree in the background with 85mm+ focal length for a nice bokeh would be my starting shot

You'd get something like the photo below, just more colourful ( which is nicer )

[BenchZowner]

Somewhere under the waterfall...

[hokiealumnus]

f/5, 1/40 sec, ISO 3200, -0.3eV, 47mm, No flash

[kwscore]

Sunset Landscape by kwscore on Flickr


Darkest cloud by kwscore on Flickr

[[XC] Oj101]

I'll upload later, but tell me what you expect: almost full moon, 20 second exposure, ISO 200, f/3.5

[BenchZowner]

dull sky, but what can do ?



and pretty good fb quality degradation on this one

[Darakian]

Just got back from vacation. More to come

_MG_1009 by Darakian, on Flickr

[BenchZowner]

and I was wondering where the hell you were man!

Now I know!

Nice, and keep them photos coming!