Murrays Mill
Murray's Mill
Even though it was still cold (30's) it seemed to be warming up from earlier in the morning. But, the water didn't help with the cold.
We were shooting "Long Exposure" shots, that means the shutter is open for 1,2,3 or more seconds. To do this in anything other than very dark conditions you need a Neutral Density Filter on the camera's lens. This is like a pair of sunglasses for your camera. They come in a lot of different #'s of the shade. From 2-10 or more. I was using (2) of these. a 4 - kind of not as dark as sunglasses, and an 8 - very dark, to allow me to take what would have been a 1/300th of a second shot and slow it down to 2 seconds, without it being just a white image.
Roy and I moved around trying to get a good angle on the mill and the water.
Murray's MillStill not the right angle
Murray's MillJust not the right angle
These angles just didn't work for me.
Decided to move the tripod (have to use a tripod to do 2-3 second shots, or you would have nothing but a blur) out into the stream.
Standing on a rock, and having the camera about 1 foot or so from the water, was able to get this 2 second shot.
Murray's MillMuch better angle, like the rock in the foreground
The thing I love about water and long exposure shots is how it "smooths" everything out. If you notice the white streaks, those are just bubbles moving along with the water. So, in 2 seconds they have moved about 1-2 feet.
Here is a closeup of the mill wheel and water, to give you an idea of how this smoothing looks up-close.
Murray's Millclose up of the water and wheel
It almost looks like writing on the water. The mill wheel was not moving r it would have been a blur too. In this case it helped a lot with the look of the shot.
One thing I was not happy with was the sky, it was overcast and cloudy. This helps when shooting these long exposure shots, but it doesnt do much for the appeal of the image. So, with a little help from photoshop i used a stock sky (just an image of the sky i received with another editing program) and inserted it into the photo, but putting it "under" the image, and erasing the parts of the image where i wanted the sky to show through. Its not a perfect thing, but it does look a lot better than the orig. (Right?)
Murray's MillColor balanced, cleaned up some, then added a new sky
You might not have caught i, but i also used a blue tinted "brush" to change the color of the water in the reflection to match the blue of the sky.
Little things like this get noticed. It also helps to sell the idea that the sky really was blue.
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I liked this look, but it just didn't "pop" for me. If you have noticed I like oversaturated looks (lots of color) and more of a painting style.
Took the image into Topaz Glow and added some "fur and feathers" (yea its strange but it seems to work for me) to the image. Never use 100% of the effect, more like 20-25 at most as it will distort things a lot after that level.
After some playing with settings, I applied the effect and imported it back into Lightroom. once there i always check the white balance, and tweak the color, brightness, etc., till i get the look i want.
Final Image: (you can click the image above and purchase a print)
Here is a close up of the same close-up from above, allows you to see the difference from the orig.
Murray's Millclose up of the water and wheel with the Topaz effect
What do you think?
Do you like these kinds of posts?
Thanks for taking the time to read my blog.
David
Mill House
Old Mill House
Walking around Murray's Mill, checking out one of the old houses. This will be a breakdown of my process from beginning to end.
I started with the tripod setup and the camera set to do a (3) shot HDR. Normal / 2 stops down / 2 stops up.
Here are those (3) shots.
Orig PhotoOOC (Out of camera) shot
Original Shot
HDR-Light2 Step Lighter Exposure for HDR
Light Shot - (2) Stops UP
HDR-DARK2 Step Darker Exposure for HDR
Dark Shot (2) Stops Down.
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These are merged together in a program called Photomatix, the result is an image with more uniform brightness and shadows. Allowing you to see more details in the image.
HDR Merged(3) Shot HDR Merged Shot
After HDRHDR with some lightroom adjustments
AFTER HDR Import back into Lightroom, with a little LR adjustments for color (or less), some brightness, contrast, etc.
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Wanted a different look for this, more like an old painting, or charcoal look. Took it into Topaz Impression, with Charcoal III preset, made some tweaks to the defaults.
You can see on the right some other preset options you can choose from.
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Once back into Lightroom, I decided i wanted the trees to be a little darker, so I used LR's Adjustment brush to "paint" a darker shadow and exposure onto the trees (the green shows what i painted).
LightRoom - Adjustment BrushUsing the Adjustment Brush to darken the trees
Once this was done, wanted to put a little more emphasis on the outlines of the trees and house. Took it into PS and duplicated the Layer called it Sketch. Took this into Topaz Glow, and selected a Sketch Preset, tweaked that some. Brought this back into Lightroom (turned off the main photo so you can see just the "sketch" layer). Dropped the opacity of this layer to about 40%, merged them back to lightroom.
Topaz Glow SketchUsed this as an overlay to darken the edges on the house and trees
Once this was back in lightroom, I made a few more adjustments to light, shadow, etc. To end up here:
Final Mill House ImageAfter all the edits
This whole process took me about 20-30 mins. But I like the final image look.
What do you think? Questions on the steps? Do you like this kind of post? I'm still learning here what to post, and how.
Thanks!
David
Covered Bridge
Never Know what you will find.
My photo buddy Roy and I decided to take a ride up to the Bunker Hill Covered Bridge in Claremont, North Carolina. [map]
On our way up we were coming out of Statesville along Hwy 70 just before Hwy 10 we passed this wild looking old building, and had to turn around and go back.
We grabbed a few shots, not sure if anyone was around, or if someone would come out and start yelling at us, or who knows what. Some of the things we have to deal with as photographers.
Love old buildings and things like this are just great to shoot.
Covered Bridge
Left shooting at the old building and headed the few miles up the road to the Covered Bridge. As we pulled in, Roy goes "well, this isn't the bridge i was thinking about". As I had never been there before and had looked it up on google maps (do this a LOT as its a great way to see what a place looks like before spending time driving there) we decided to check it out anyway. We parked in a pretty wet parking area, got out and realized it was still pretty darn cold out there (20's to 30 or so). We walked along a little stream to where the covered bridge is located. Well, it was pretty underwhelming. They have fenced all around the area so there was no way to get down to the stream to shoot backwards to the bridge. We about gave up, but decided we were here, lets see what we can get.
The Fence was ugly, the bridge was very bland, just brown, in a sea of brown bare trees. We found a gate and were able to get a shot from down a little ways toward the stream below. Still didn't really like the look, was just kind of blah.
With the tripod setup, decided to do a (3) shot HDR (High Dynamic Range) Shot. The camera takes (3) Different photos with different exposure. One normal, one 2 steps down (dark) and one 2 steps up (bright). (The image above is the "normal" shot). The tripod is important, as you need to minimize camera movement.
I take these (3) photos into a program called Photomatix, from there you can do all kinds of things to the image. Some can be VERY strange. But using this to add some depth to the image was what I was after.
You will see (or not) that there is more depth of light, brighter in the foreground items, etc.
Still was NOT happy with this image, I wanted to shoot a typical Red Covered bridge. In Lightroom, you can take and add a color tint with a brush. Did this to the bridge to get a better look.
Almost there, I liked the red, but I wanted a little more of a painting look. Took the photo into Topaz Glow to add a little effect to the image. Used "fur and feathers" as it seems to be the one preset i like the most. It gives the trees some punch, and adds details to the edges of items.
I think this worked. Still not super exciting, but I like the red bridge look. Here is another angle, using pretty much the same technique as above.
For this one I wanted a little more snow than what was actually there. Used PS to go in and clone the existing snow to expand its reach just a little.
As you can see getting the shot is just the beginning. Where you take the image from there is up to you.
Always take one more shot!
As we were packing up to head out, I was shooting back through the bridge, trying to get a feeling for the inside of the bridge.
The look was just kind of blah. But as I was taking this, Roy started walking toward me and I snapped a quick shot.
I liked this, having something (or someone) in the photo changed the whole look. I asked him to stop there for a min, and took another (3) shot HDR image. Took and made some changes to the image with several different editing programs. I wanted it to be Black and White as the color of the wood was just distracting from the overall feeling.
I zoomed in a little to get things centered a little better. I liked how Roy was off center from the image as i hate centered images. I work with the "rule of thirds" a lot.
So, what do you think? Comments? Questions? Problems?
Winter's Day
A Cold Winters Day in NC
Went out with a fellow photographer to see what we could shoot. We were hoping for some ice, or snow, but as we live in the south, it’s not always that easy to come by.
Water over the dam
We started off at a local town (Mcadenville, NC), hoping to shoot some ice covered water or rocks at the spillway next to an old mill.
We were only able to shoot from a nearby bridge, as the area around the stream and spillway was posted with no trespassing signs. Didn't feel like going to jail that cold morning.
Was in the very low 20's with a wind that made your teeth chatter, and hands hurt. We took a bunch of photos using our ND (Neutral Density) Filters. These allow you to use a slower shutter and get what we like to call a “smooth water” effect. This makes the water look like its more fluid than a normal fasts shutter that stops the water in mid-fall. After 20-30 mins we were too cold to keep at it here, so we packed up and headed off.
Into the woods
We drove to Kings Mountain state park trying again for an “ice over the dam” shots. We took a wrong turn and ended up going down a little side road (more like dirt path). At the bottom of which was a little brick bridge and stream. We stopped to check it out and saw that parts of the stream were iced over. Hoping to get some good shots we took off down into the woods and out onto a little island (we were not sure it was even solid till my friend stepped on it). Shooing up and down the little stream, I was not really happy with the shots. Then I happened to lower my camera down to my knees and noticed at that angle I could see the bridge’s reflection in the water. Lowering it more I could see even more. I ended up with my camera sitting on some ice at the edge of this little mound of dirt (island) to get the shot below.
If you look close at the bottom of the above photo you can see some of the ice and rocks the camera was sitting on top of.
Have not tried blogging like this before, Will see if anyone reads this or comments on it, before i decide if I will continue.
Hope you enjoyed my little blog post.
David