11/15/15 Featured Arkansas Landscape Photography–Autumn afternoon at Pinnacle Mountain State Park
Taken with a Nikon D800e, Nikkor 24-120 lens @ F8, ISO 100. Image taken in 3 parts and stitched together in PtGui and Photoshop.
This was just one of those days. I had been out a few times previously, but the conditions did not equal this afternoon. You have to wait until around 2:00 pm to get this shot as you want the sun over the back of your shoulder. The light was perfect and Little Rock had a much better fall than other locations in Arkansas. But the clouds, oh the clouds. They started out as just some small swirls but as I continued to shoot they grew into this massive line that was turned upwards. To get this type of a panorama, even with a 36Mp camera, I knew I would need to stitch. However since my subject (main subject) was all off in the distance, I did not worry about a tripod, or setting my nodal point. I didn’t need to, just aimed and shot. I was using the Nikon 24-120, and was in the 90mm focal range. The colors that afternoon were perfect also, but I did add a circular polarizer to help pop them some more and cut the glare. You can clearly see the exposed part of the trail heading to the summit. Pinnacle to me is best photographed from below as the view from the top is impressive, but surround by homes, roads and the like.
To make this image happen, I first converted the raw files in Adobe Lightroom, then opened them up in PtGui, (a panoramic stitching software). The image came together perfectly and at first I thought I was done. But on closer inspection, I found that during the stitching I had allow for blur on the center image. It was only on the right edge and looked like a VR user error. VR is Nikon’s vibration reduction that is built into some of their lenses. If you are panning you have to be care with VR as you can confuse the system and it will not be totally finished. When you take a picture like that the blur looks more like a rolling issue as some of the file will be fine but usually towards one edge you will pick up some vibration induced blur.
So I had to manually go back to another image and pull that one part back to this stitch. It was not as hard as I thought it would be and the overall came out fine.
Little Rock Sunrise from the Junction Bridge–05/14/15 Featured Arkansas Photography
- At May 14, 2015
- By paul
- In Featured Arkansas Photography
- 0
Taken with a Canon 5D MKII and Canon 24mm TS-EII lens iso 100, F8. The Junction bridge in Little Rock, which is now only for foot traffic, offers a great view of downtown Little Rock. I love to catch the early morning sun on the buildings. This is best done right before the sun has risen so that the glare on the glass is not extreme and it also allows you to still get the pre-morning blue sky off to the west. The Junction bridge is lit up at night and I made a point of getting this photograph taken before the lights were off. I took this shot in a series of images to stitch together later. I used a 24mm TS-E lens, but did not shift as the shifted portion of the image was not enough to capture the full panorama look I wanted. Instead I found the nodal point of the lens, and rotated it through 3 different locations and bracketed the exposures with each. Canon’s cameras have excellent color, but pretty poor dynamic range even at the base iso, so if you don’t want a lot of noise in your shadows, it’s always best to bracket your exposures. The lens I used, the 24mm TS-E is by far the best lens in this class, and has excellent details to the corners even at F 4.5. After working up each segment, I then used Ptgui to stitch the scene into one large panorama.
October Sunset on the Buffalo River at Roark Bluff–02/24/15 Featured Arkansas Photography
Taken with an Nikon D810, Nikon 14-24 lens @ 14mm F8, iso 64, 1/3 of a second in a single exposure.
This is one of those images that you have to work on a while, then come back to and work it some more and then again and again. I took this shot while on a sunset/night shoot with Chris Kennedy from Russellville. We were just setting up for the night, on 10/04/14, knowing that we were way to early for the maximum fall color display, however I wanted to work with the best moonlight for later on that evening. You can barely see some pretty strong color up on top of the bluff, and the trees on the right bank were showing a bit of yellow. I have been to this spot hundreds of times and sunsets here are hit and miss. I have one other shot that is similar taken over 2 years ago, where it was also dead calm and the clouds started to get illuminated by the sun.
On this evening it started out with nothing, then as the sun crept down the left side of the frame, a bunch of high clouds rolled in. I started immediately for a spot further down the river, where I know one of the best reflections can be taken from. You have to watch this spot when certain photographers are “teaching” as they will all line up here and block the river. However it was still a bit early for this particular photographer and his minions to flock down the river. Chris decided to stay up higher and go for a different shot, but I wanted the full bluff reflection. If there is no wind on the river the reflection here will be as sharp as looking in a mirror, which on this evening it was.
As the sun set, the light on the bluff and clouds just got better. The sun hit the far right side of the bluff and turned it yellow and the afterglow on the middle of the bluff took on a wonderful rose color. The fact that there was no wind offered one great reflection of both the bluff and the clouds. I started to shoot this series with the Nikon D810, and really was not paying much attention to my histogram. I was a bit more concerned about the trees and such in the foreground and forgot to look to see if I was blowing out the sky. I was right on the line of 255:255:255: as it turned out, but somehow manged to get 5 or 6 frames that were no blown. I really attribute this to the Nikon D810’s amazing range of dynamic range at the base iso of 64. Normally I would have setup a bracketed series of exposures, but the light was changing so fast, I just shot as fast as I could and manually tried to change the bracketing but I did not really change the exposure enough to really protect the sky. The D810 is bit more tricky on highlight recovery than the D800 was and I was still shooting with the D800 mindset.
I knew from memory just how dramatic the light was that evening, so I worked this image up about 3 different times and attached different aspects of it each time. One time the sky, then the bluff, then the shadows on both banks. My main goal was to capture the amazing play of light on the bluff, from the rose color to the bright golden color on the far right. I then had to work up the reflections and make sure that the colors matched.
This shot was totally worked up in Lightroom and Photoshop. I ended up going back and forth several times before I got the image the way I wanted it. I then tweaked the colors with Topaz Clarity, which is final step I use now on pretty much all my shots.
Overall, the end result is shown here and once again it shows just how beautiful the Buffalo River and it’s bluffs can be.
Moonset in Boxley Valley on the Buffalo National River–02/18/15 Featured Arkansas Photography
Taken with a Canon 5D MK2, Canon 24-70 lens at F5.6, iso 400 for 40 seconds.
This photograph was taken in early January 2009, back in the good old days for me at least, (if you know me well, you know what happened in February of 2009). I was on a trip to photograph Elk in the Boxley Valley and this was my first field use of my new Canon 5D MK2. Before I purchased the Canon 5D MK2, I had been using my older Canon 1ds MKII, which just did not have a very good higher iso range. On this morning, I came around the last bend of Hwy 21 as it drops down into the western end of the Boxley Valley and saw this view of the moon setting over one of the larger mountains that surround the valley. What caught my eye was how the shadows played with the fence row in the foreground. The old oak tree provided a nice touch also as I framed the shot between the branches. You can see just a very light layer of clouds or fog that was starting to rise up over the mountain in the background.
When you view this photograph up close, you can also see all the frozen dew drops on the grasses and fence posts. If you have never taken a trip to the Boxley Valley, which is on the western headwaters end of the Buffalo National River, it’s well worth the time.
Nighttime skies over Havana Arkansas revisited–02-09-15 Featured Arkansas Photography
Taken with a Nikon D800e, 14-24 Lens @ 15mm and F 3.5 in a series of stacked exposures. This shot was taken in February of 2013 on a very clear night from the summit of Mt. Magazine. The view is directly to the south looking over Havana Arkansas. In the distance you can see Blue Mt. Lake and Blue Mountain itself. I believe that Blue Mt. is the on the left. It would be a tall mountain if not for Mt. Magazine as Magazine dwarfs Blue Mountain.
This is one shot but it was composed by taking around 30 or so stacked exposures of 45 seconds. I had a 3/4 moon that night so the illumination down into the valley is all from the moon. I did some light painting on the tree on the left as the moon light was not going to get there until much later. I did not want to wait that long as by the time the moon would provide that illumination it would also be causing both flare and over exposure issues. This night there was quite a bit of traffic down in the valley along Hwy 10, but it just adds to the overall effect to me. I am always amazed when I look down into this valley during the day it’s hard to see any building of significant size, but at night even the smallest light will show up.
I first worked this shot up back in 2013 and thought I had a good version. Recently when viewing that shot, I realized that I had not been very accurate with the star trail work, and in fact I had a dip. This happens when you just slightly move the camera. It doesn’t take much to offset the trails. The best bet is just don’t touch anything until you are done. I say that, but I usually have to stop the series somewhere in the middle to see if I am getting some damaging flare. The Nikon 14-24 will flare with any amount of light that hits the outer element from the side and the flare can be very destructive and next to impossible to correct in post processing work. Flare tends to totally shift the blue of the sky to a red or yellow hue and tend to have a very hard demarcation which makes removal quite difficult.
Here is my first version of this work, and I greatly prefer the new one. I was able to pull out a lot more of the details in the valley. I also re-worked each of the images to try and pull out more of the trails on the left side. In this location the moon will pass from the left side to right and thus makes an even exposure pretty hard to obtain. However working in Lightroom and with some filters I have I pulled out more definition from the faint trails on the left side.
Old Home near St. Joe Arkansas–01/31/15 Featured Arkansas Photography
Taken with a Nikon D800e, Nikon 24-120mm lens, at around 35mm F5.6 iso 100 single exposure. This is one of the places I have driven by many times on the way to Woolum Ford on the Buffalo River. The home itself is in a total state of disrepair, but if you look closely at the front the woodwork there is most impressive. I would love to go up closer, but this is on private land. The weeds that have grown up around the front bothered me at first, but then after looking at the shot, I felt that they just added in. I love that fact that there are no power lines running to the building as they can be a pain to work with in post production. Someone spent a great deal of time on the decorative wood work on the front and most of it is still in place. One of the many old wonders in Arkansas.
09/28/14 Featured Arkansas Landscape Photography–Midnight at Haw Creek Falls
Taken with a Canon 6D, Canon 16-35 lens, at F4, iso 400, 2 hour time lapse photograph. This photograph was obtained by taking a series of 2 minute exposures from 10:00 pm to 12:15 am at Haw Creek Falls in the Arkansas Ozarks. I used a Canon 6D and a focal length of 18mm to take a series of 2 1/2 minute exposures. Each exposure was taken as raw file and developed in Lightroom, then I stacked them in Adobe Photoshop to capture only the motion of the earth over 2 hours which created the “trails. The blue color to the sky is from the moon, which was just a bit past 1/2 waxing. The moon adds both excellent ambient illumination to the night sky, giving it a blue hue, and also greatly adds to the landscape portion of the photograph. There was no light painting used on this photography, it’s all the light from the moon. I prefer this greatly over using artificial lighting, by painting as the moon just works better. You can read more about this technique in an article I wrote: Stacking for better nighttime photography. This photograph was taken in April of 2014, and spring was very late this year as can be seen in the trees on both banks of the creek.
I been working for a shot like this from Haw Creek for over 3 years. Catching the conditions all together can be harder than you think. You need a good flow of water, but not too much, as was present in March. The moon needs to be waxing for this shot, not waning or you will be up way to late waiting on the moon to appear. A clear sky is needed, with no clouds if possible and this does not always work out, as over 2 hours it’s quite common to see a front blow in. Also it work best if there is little to no wind. But since I am stacking I usually can find one of the stacks that has less wind noise than the rest.
This shot has it all, as you have great water, running over most of the ledge, and excellent play of shadows on the foreground. I am looking to the northwest, you can barely see where the north star is up in the upper right corner of the shot. It’s not very easy to get a good shot of the falls and the north star from below the drop, but the wide angle lens I was using did grab a nice portion of the sky. Of all the photograph I work with, nighttime stacking takes by far the greatest amount of time, both in the capture of the images and post processing, however I love the look of what I can create.
08/11/14 Featured Arkansas Photography–October day on Richland Creek
Taken with a Phase One IQ160, Arca rm3di and Schneider 35XL lens, F11 for 1 second, Image created by shifting the back for 3 separate images and then stitched together in post processing. Both a polarizer and neutral density filter were used. Richland Creek, which heads up in western Newton County, then runs eastward before running into the Buffalo River, is one of the most unique spots in Arkansas. The creek has hundreds of photogenic spots but the best photography will be from the forest service campground, upstream for the next 5 miles. Don’t just stop at Richland falls, which is a creek wide waterfall, but instead hike up stream for at least 2 more miles as some of the best spots are in this stretch. This photograph was taken in October of 2012, after a good rain had fallen a few days before. Richland is usually very low in the fall and when you can catch a clear day with good water it’s a rare but special day. The creek is lined with hardwoods, that produce some amazing displays of color, and most years, they don’t disappoint. Even if the water level is low, there should be some larger pools that will offer great reflections which won’t be there in the higher water times. On this day, I had the best color display I have seen in years on Richland, the only tree that had already dropped it’s leaves was the large sweet gum on the upper right of the the photo. In the fall, the water tends to be clear so you can see down to the bottom in even 4 to 5 feet of water.
08/06/14 Featured Arkansas Photography–Autumn afternoon on Richland Creek
Taken with a Nikon D800e, Nikkor 24mm 1.4 lens at F 5.0, for a 5 second total exposure. The autumn in Arkansas can be one of the most beautiful times to be out photographing the state. The Ozark mountains are cut by thousands of small creeks and hundreds of larger ones like Richland. Richland however is by far one of the most scenic creeks in the state. It is the 3rd largest tributary of the Buffalo National River, after the Little Buffalo River, and it has 6 miles of sheer wonder to hike. The best times to hike this creek are the early spring and early fall. The color display along the creek can offer some of the most variety in the state as you can expect to see hickory, oak, maple, gum and dogwood with hundreds of lessor species of tree. If the creek has water in the fall, it just adds to the overall great effect. On this day in 2012, there had been a heavy rain about days before so I only caught the later half of the water, but it still had a lot to offer. This rapid is called Maytag is the last major drop on Richland before the campground. The large rock on the upper right of the photo is “maytag”. The color along the creek on this day was more green and yellow but there were a few dogwoods starting to show up. I love it when I can catch a small whirlpool eddy which is showing up on the lower left of this shot.
06/30/14 Featured Arkansas Photography–Summertime sunset over Pinnacle Mountain
- At June 30, 2014
- By paul
- In Featured Arkansas Photography
- 0
Taken with a Canon 1D MK IV, Canon 24-70 Lens @F11, iso 250, Multiple exposure technique used to create photo. In the summer months it’s often very easy to catch a late afternoon thunderstorm rolling in behind Pinnacle mountain. On this evening the light had started out with just a bright sun with very few clouds, but as the evening approached, bank of thunderheads rolled in to the left of Pinnacle. The wind seemed to die down quite a bit, so since I was using older Canon equipment with a very limited dynamic range, I went ahead and shot a 4 shot bracketed exposure. I was able to catch the sun just as it was starting to roll down behind the ridge behind Pinnacle. The contrast between the dark thunderhead and the high cirrus clouds was impressive and I stayed around for as long as could before it got too dark.