Wordless Wednesday
Star Tours, Hollywood Studios, Walt Disney World
Category Archives: photography
Stopping Time
Monorail Monday
Future World, Epcot, Walt Disney World
Every image is really about stopping time but some images show it more than others. This image especially conveys that stoppage due to the reverse waterfall and the frozen in time look. Normally I like my waterfalls looking smooth but this was captured before I had filters for my Olympus lenses.
On The River
Remember
Impressions of Canada
Sunset Blues
Delta Lake State Park
Today’s image is from the end of my photography adventure on Saturday. I was able to get out and capture both the sunrise and the sunset, with this sunset being at my old stand-by Delta Lake State Park. The water level in the reservoir is always low during the winter so I was able to walk out quite a ways toward this familiar point to capture the sunset light reflected in the layer of ice.
Currents
Lock 20, Barge Canal
As I mentioned in yesterday’s post my adventure for a sunrise began at Lock 20 on the Barge Canal. The morning light combined with the clouds was creating some beautiful colors. On the downstream side of the lock the canal was no longer frozen although there were ice floaties… yes, that is a technical term. LOL
Due to the ice layer further down the canal an upper level current was swirling the floating ice pieces. My trick was to get the right amount of time on the exposure to show this current (like a star trail in a night sky photograph) without blowing the highlights near the horizon. The moments just prior to sunrise and the cloud cover allowed a 15 second exposure. As you can see in the bottom of the image, there is a very cool dynamic with the current.
Waiting on the Arrival
Union Station, Utica, New York
Saturday morning was a mad dash around the county for me. I wanted to get out early and find a nice sunrise image. I then was going to move some furniture I no longer needed and maybe find some time to go out for the sunset. The dashing part came in mostly in the morning.
I headed down to Lock 20 of the Barge Canal since I knew there would be open water in the canal below the lock. I could use that water to ‘catch’ the morning colors. That was successful and I am happy with what I captured. Next, I hopped over to North Utica for some gas.
As I was coming into Utica on my way to pick up the van I was borrowing, the sun just started to break the city skyline. It was a spontaneous decision to swing down to the train station and grab some images along the tracks. That worked out well for me!
I picked up the van, moved the furniture, had a great burger for lunch and went home to relax before the sunset. Just as my daughter headed to work I gathered up the camera and headed to Delta Lake for the sunset. Another good decision as the sun was reflecting off the clear portions of ice that had formed on top of the frozen lake. The recent warm weather created nice conditions for sunsets at the beach.
Selecting the image for today was tough with so many good choices. I went with the train station as it is a little different from my normal landscapes. I also really liked how it turned out with the sunburst at the end of the tracks and all the sight lines leading right to it. I wasn’t going to complain about that sky either!
There was another reason for me to choose this image. I successfully used a technique I learned about from Jimmy McIntyre from Shutter Evolve. This technique can be used when capturing images that have strong light sources in the view. Typically the lens will reflect the light internally and create spots in the image. Previously I had to decide if I wanted to move my camera position to minimize or remove those spots. Sometimes that would change the composition to something less desirable.
The technique I learned, which really could be called a hack, is to capture your image then capture a second image using your thumb to cover up the light source. This will remove the spots from the image and then you can use an image editor to paint out the spots using the second image.
Here are my original two images…









