I kind of made up this technique spur of the moment. Apparently, it worked. The camera came through the ordeal with flying colors!
A photography blog covering: Digital, Film, Reviews, History, Cameras, Images, Technique, Stock Photography, and pretty much anything else photography related that comes to mind...with special coverage of Fujifilm X, Nikon, Sony, and Leica cameras.
Monday, August 21, 2017
The eclipse in Florida with a Fuji X-T2
This is the moment of totality of the recent eclipse as it appeared in Florida. I took the photo with a Fuji X-T2 and 18-135mm Fuji zoom stopped down to f/22. I also used a 4-stop ND filter. This combo allowed me to work at a shutter speed that was fast enough not to burn out the camera. I collected a series of images from 1/125th second to 1/4000th second and chose to combine just two of them to achieve this image. I also worked the lens at the wide angle end and cropped the image later. This minimized the amount of magnification of the solar rays hitting the camera.
I kind of made up this technique spur of the moment. Apparently, it worked. The camera came through the ordeal with flying colors!
I kind of made up this technique spur of the moment. Apparently, it worked. The camera came through the ordeal with flying colors!
Sunday, August 6, 2017
Loxahachee Everglades with the Fuji X-T2
Today I made my first, brief trip to visit the Florida Everglades. I plan to do a number of special photography trips through the Everglades and Florida Keys including some aerials. Today's mission was just a brief foray into a local section called Loxahachee. I had several lenses and both my X-T2 and X-Pro2 with me, but for the photos below I used only the X-T2 and the 18-135mm zoom. One of the things I wanted to show was the relationship of the weather to the Everglades.
During the summer it is extremely hot and thunderstorms pass through the area almost daily making for some interesting cloud formations against a deep blue sky. I was shooting both RAW and jpg at the same time, as I always do, and had the camera set for Acros with a red filter to add drama to the sky by darkening the blues. I also shot to darken the shadows and increase the highlights. The results of the jpg files were still not dramatic enough so I processed the RAW files in Photoshop to enhance the images further. I began by using the same Acros with red filter profile in Adobe Camera RAW, but deepened the blues even more because I wanted the sky to go almost black in its darkest places.
I had considered adding a polarizing filter to darken the sky further, but that would have also killed the reflections on the water so in the end I voted against it.
During the summer it is extremely hot and thunderstorms pass through the area almost daily making for some interesting cloud formations against a deep blue sky. I was shooting both RAW and jpg at the same time, as I always do, and had the camera set for Acros with a red filter to add drama to the sky by darkening the blues. I also shot to darken the shadows and increase the highlights. The results of the jpg files were still not dramatic enough so I processed the RAW files in Photoshop to enhance the images further. I began by using the same Acros with red filter profile in Adobe Camera RAW, but deepened the blues even more because I wanted the sky to go almost black in its darkest places.
I had considered adding a polarizing filter to darken the sky further, but that would have also killed the reflections on the water so in the end I voted against it.