It Snowed A LOT this Year!

Here's a picture out my front window.  I should have put a black shirt on, instead of my white one, before taking this to cut back on the reflections.

1/320 sec, f/5.6, ISO ~100, hand-held, polarized filter, taken Feb 26, 2011.  This is a composite of five photos stitched together with Hugin.

Snow

1/320sec, f/5.6, ISO: 800, 18mm

1/800 sec, f/5.6, ISO: 800, 18mm

Snowy Forest

1/200s, f/9.1, ISO 200, 18mm (29mm eqv.), polarizing filter

1/100s, f/9.1, ISO 200, 55mm (88mm eqv.), polarizing filter

1/100s, f/8, ISO 200, 18mm (29mm eqv.), polarizing filter

First Snow 2009

It snowed for the first time this season a few days ago. Didn't stay long though.

At the Lake

Did some camping a week or two ago by a lake, here it is. First at late afternoon then again at about 10:30pm.

Back to Spring and then Winter Again

Where were we? Oh yeah, we went from spring back to winter, then a bit of summer. While I was out there were a couple days of spring again, the tulips are starting to poke their heads up, but then we went straight back to winter. Crazy weather!

Winter Again!

After a beautiful weekend of Spring, we get buried again in 32 cm (a little over a foot) of snow.

Polarized Filter

I got a polarized filter for Christmas. For those who may not know what a polarized filter is or what it does, here are some examples.

There are many uses for polarized filters. Here are two:

1. Bring out the contrast between the sky and clouds
The first picture was taken without the filter. The second and third were taken with the filter, but with it rotated 90 degrees.




2. Reduce reflections or glare on glass, water, or anything wet or shiny. This is the reason many sunglasses are polarized. Note the reflections in the window. Both of the following pictures are with the filter, but with it rotated 90 degrees.



The only editing I did on these ones was scaling so they fit in this space. No colour adjustments.

The Moon Looks Bigger and Brighter than Normal

There's good reason for that. Last Friday night (Dec 12 '08) the moon was at the closest point to the Earth on it's orbit and it was full. Those two things together aren't due to happen again until 2023! I was quite disappointed Friday when I saw that it was raining and therefore, cloudy. But when I got up Saturday morning to shoot the sunrise again the clouds were mostly gone and the moon was still out. I couldn't find a spot where I could see them both at the same time. There were trees on the very top of the hill that I was on with a clearing on either side. So I'd take a few shots of the sunrise and then run down a short path to the other side to get the moon and then run back again. I kept warm.

Another Try at the Sunrise

This one worked out a little better, I think, there were clouds this time to capture and reflect the light, which makes it much more interesting.

Up until now I haven't put much/any time into editing or enhancing my photos, but I'm slowly learning more about it. I've attempted to liven up the colours a bit using the Levels and Curves tools in the GIMP. I also adjusted the saturation for yellow and blue on some of them and I tried sharpening the last two. And I added my name to them just to copy the professionals (does that make me a dork?). Let me know what you think. Is there something else that I should be doing? Should I just leave them alone?

Sunrise

Got up early Saturday morning to get some sunrise pictures. It went all right. I went to a near by hill that overlooked the city. It would have been better if there were more clouds I think.

First Snow!

It snowed for the first time this season a few days ago so I had to rush out and get some shots. It was cold, but I love the snow!