Picture of the Day

[uglymoney]

Welcome. We've prolly crossed paths at some point.

[powdork]

had a date with a doggie this weekend


then he had a date with a doggie


i had one too. not a doggie

[Chainsaw_Willie]

Went to the Silverthorne Ice Castles last night, really like this self portrait shot.

That's pretty sweet!

If you don't mind my totally amateur opinion - I'd crop it tighter on the right side to get rid of the yellow/orange trees & lights, maybe a 4x5 aspect ratio. Maybe right up to the edge of the ice castle then clone out the remaining bright light. Yeah, you wouldn't be in that "rule of thirds" area of the frame but I think it would still work better.

[BigDaddy]

That is an amazing shot, Ednar.

This pic made into the book, The Wrath of Irene, about the flood in Vermont:



I'm on the back cover and the 6th chapter title pic. It's Joe Schenkman crossing the temporary RT 73 bridge in Rochester, VT. I'm stoked to be in it, and glad the sales all go to helping victims.

[Edgnar]

That's pretty sweet!

If you don't mind my totally amateur opinion - I'd crop it tighter on the right side to get rid of the yellow/orange trees & lights, maybe a 4x5 aspect ratio. Maybe right up to the edge of the ice castle then clone out the remaining bright light. Yeah, you wouldn't be in that "rule of thirds" area of the frame but I think it would still work better.

That was my first inclination too actually. This is what I did with my first edit. I don't like it as much, but it might be the other things I did to the colors.



And I definitely do not claim to be a pro of any sort. I am proud of myself for coming up with a pretty cool idea though and getting it to work out like it did.

[Chainsaw_Willie]

^^As you should be! That's a bitchin' shot either way it's presented though I personally like the more tightly cropped version better. No accounting for taste, eh?


BigDaddy, congrats on getting published! That's a great shot too.


Powdork - always love Nacho pics.

[The AD]

Some swimming stoke.



Shot this one at the NCAA Championships which were in the Seattle area over the weekend.

[powdork]

looks very leroy neimannesque

[SchralphMacchio]

Willie - awesome comp and light for Chair Peak! Lucky bastard!

uglymoney - great shots. Wonderful portrait of your girl!

[AKgeoSkier]

Couple from Valdez last year. Obviously less rock sticking out this year....

[mtcham]

^^^ Nice shots Ak

This past weekend I went to a Wireless Flash workshop led by Nikon's Paul Van Allen. Lots of good stuff covered. Highly recommend it if he comes to one of your local stores.

Some shots from the class.
1

Wireless flash workshop-4905 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

2

Wireless flash workshop-4932 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

3

Wireless flash workshop-0571 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

4

Wireless flash workshop-4898 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

I bought some gels and messed around tonight. A bit harder than having it set up and you just shoot it.
5

Water drops and gels-5518 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

[icb12]

Spine lines? Yes Please.


Different strokes for Different folks.


South Facing=no go. Put it on the hitlist for next season

[splitter]

all of those are pretty darn cool mtcham, this one stands out to me...

Wireless flash workshop-4932 by jrmorris-mt, on Flickr

[Chainsaw_Willie]

Yeah, I really like that #2 as well.

I would love to go to a workshop like that, will have to keep my eyes open for one. I have not been happy at all with the results from my flash and I know that has everything to do with the fact that I have no idea what I'm doing with it...

[uglymoney]

uglymoney - great shots. Wonderful portrait of your girl!

Thanks! Love, love that shot of Sage. Captures her personality perfectly.

A while back I watched the movie Melancholia and for some reason it totally freaked me out. Ever since I have been fascinated by the sky and it has been a fantastic winter/spring for planet watching.

Venus is at its greatest elongation from the sun at 46 degrees so it hangs out long after sunset. The farthest is can go ever from our perspective is 47 degrees so tonight is pretty cool from that angle. A look out from my garage this evening showed three of the brightest objects in the sky - the moon, venus, and jupiter with the Tamrom 17-50 at 17mm. Loving the gradient filter on Lightroom. I kind of blew this shot out but fkit, still fun, and someday I'll figure this Lightroom thingy out.

[AlexC]

Flying high:

[Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer]

mtcham - awesome shots! Wow - those are amazing.

[dfinn]

spent a long weekend in moab

[supermodel159]

Only two weeks left

[single]

That's a really great shot super.

[FreakofSnow]

[Tuckerman]

I like your dog FOS

[Fuzz]

single, congrats on the publication!
Chainsaw, that Chair Peak shot is sharp enough to cut!
mtcham, very cool shots - I've always wanted to learn how to shoot that kind of stuff.

After an 18-month hiatus, I finally did some astroshots this past weekend. Hate to say it, but I never tried any astrophotography since getting my 5D2. Took a while to get my bearings around all the calibration, focusing, shot capture settings, etc. Messed up a few things. Didn't want to complicate things more by shooting with the telescope, so just tried out the 70-200 f/2.8L on the 5D2.

Calibrating, stacking, and editing the shots was another re-learning experience. Still don't have it down yet (partly because I don't have all the proper dark, flat, and bias calibration frames with the 5D2). But still happy with only 20 minutes under a moon-lit sky. And I must say, the 5D2's high-ISO performance is amazing -- very little noise reduction required on this shot. And the 70-200 f/2.8 once again proved to be a winner - even at f/2.8, the stars came out sharp.

[Tuckerman]

Fuzz that great, is that one long exposure? How do you get the stars to stay put?

[Fuzz]

Fuzz that great, is that one long exposure? How do you get the stars to stay put?

The camera is mounted on a tracking mount (Sirius EQ-G), which when calibrated and aligned correctly, tracks the movement of the stars. With the camera mounted on it, the camera also follows the stars. However, no mount is perfect, so the length of time you can track perfectly without any star trails differs (on the alignment and calibration, wind, vibrations, temperature, etc.).

For this, as noted at the bottom, I took 20 shots at 1 minute each and stacked them together.

On good nights (when everything is perfect), I've been able to get up to 2-minute exposures. For even better tracking, I use a guiding system (guiding = computer-controlled fine-tuned tracking corrections), which allows me to get up to 10-minute exposures (but it's a lot more complicated to set up, so I use it only when shooting faint objects (which require such long exposures)).