Re-post May 2011
It was a nice clear night and I was looking for a good shot of downtown Chicago. We walked below the Michigan Ave. bridge crossing the Chicago River. This is a 5 exposure HDR. Initially shot in color, I prefer it in black and white. I hope to return to Chicago soon, it’s my favorite city to travel to.
I find it exciting to follow my little girl around. She’s always searching for something new.
ISO 160 1/500 f.95 50mm
I think this one explains its self.
ISO 160 1/30 f/2.8 28mm
Re-post June 2011
I drove into Des Moines tonight for a meeting and thought I would capture some pictures. Des Moines is one of my favorite cities. Since graduating in 2005 from Des Moines University there has been a significant amount of renovation to the downtown area. I love the architecture and it’s always a great place to take pictures.
Iowa’s State Capitol sits on the east side of downtown (immediately behind me in this picture). There is a lot of sidewalks and landscape to its west. It also sits up high in comparison to the remaining downtown which allows for some great cityscapes. Also, I love how Locust street ends in front of the capitol thus allowing for a unique perspective.
This shot was taken at dusk using my Leica M9 and 90mm summarit-m. As Leica owners know, summarit is considered their “affordable” lens (most would disagree). Anyway, I’ve been very happy with its sharpness and have taken many great pictures with it.
Anytime I’m walking around big cities I’m always looking for good reflections. I came across this building with a nice reflection, only thing missing was a dramatic sky.
ISO 250 1/250 50mm
Re-post from July 2011
A few days ago I decided to travel the local country side to look for interesting structures to take pictures of. It was in the middle of the afternoon and is typically the worst time to take pictures because the sun light causes very harsh shadows and typically the camera cannot compensate for the amount of exposure. Besides HDR photography there are other ways to fix this problem. One way is to use a neutral density filter.
Neutral density filters are either colorless or grey and reduce and/or modify the intensity of light without harming color rendition. This allows photographers to shoot in situations that typically wouldn’t allow them. These filters come in different intensities, which allow for different shooting techniques.
I recently purchased B+W ND 3.0 at B & H Photo for my Leica 21mm Elmarit lens. It allows me to shoot in very bright light, thus allowing proper exposure. It can also be used to create a time lapse picture which shows the motion of clouds or objects in front of it. As I was driving around I came across this old school (built in 1896) that appeared to be on its last leg. You can see in the pic, the motion of the clouds in this 4 second exposure.
We are almost there! One month to go!!!
ISO 160 1/90 f/2.8 28mm
My wife and I have always been big movie people, going to the movies at least a couple of times a month. Obviously, we don’t get to go much anymore because of our baby girl (that’s not a bad thing). Last summer we were anxious to see the last Harry Potter movie. We hopped in the truck and drove to the drive-in. I caught this picture when I was walking back to the truck.
ISO 800 1/30 f/1.4 50mm
Re-post July 2011
Last year when traveling to the Outer Banks in North Carolina I was able to get a lot of good pics. One morning I decided to get up and drive to the Avon Pier. I walked around the pier trying to find the best place to setup for some great sunrise shots. I initially was standing up on a mountain of sand hoping it would give me a great vantage point but as soon as I could setup, the owner of the pier came out yelling at me telling me to get off. She explained that they are there to help protect their structures during hurricanes, and they cost a lot of money. After I told her what I was doing she was then nice enough to allow me to go up on the pier for few pictures. Here is one of those pics.
Almost a year ago my wife and I were sitting in our living room and I looked out the window and noticed a beautiful cloud formation. We rushed into the car and drove west. I was able to capture this with my 35mm summicron.
ISO 160 1/750 f/2.0 35mm
