Rudy Lopez Photography » Uncategorized

In Focus: “Ft. Morgan Grocery Store” by Rudy Lopez

Rudy Lopez — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 01:23:39 +0000

One of my favorite shots

HDR Tutorial – Part 1 of 2. Getting the shots

Rudy Lopez — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 21:53:14 +0000

High dynamic range (HDR) photography is a process used to widen the boundaries of traditional digital photography. With traditional photography, the tonal range of a given photograph is limited by the light available and the physical characteristics of the lens and camera. In other words, if the foreground in a given scene was bright and the background was dark (see figure below), you would need to choose which element you want to be rendered in the final photo, since the limitations of the camera will not let you capture dark and light areas simultaneously. By making a composite image of several high resolution photographs, we are able to utilize the tonal ranges from all five photos into just one. This tutorial is geared towards people that are comfortable with the manual mode on their camera. You can learn more about manual mode here.

There are two parts to HDR photography: capturing the series of shots, and processing the separate shots into a single HDR. This figure explains the concept behind capturing the shots.

As you can see, the combination of the five images makes for an impressive photograph even before bringing it into your editor for additional processing.

In order to get results like this, you need to know how to shoot five (or more) shots with different exposures quickly, without changing composition. This is where bracketing comes in.

Bracketing

Read your camera manual for instructions on how to engage bracketing mode on your camera. On the Nikon D300, the bracketing is set by holding down the function button (near the lens barrel) and simultaneously rotating the index finger wheel near the shutter release button. I have my camera set for five shots that cover two stops over and under the meter setting. On a bright day, I am able to shoot at ISO200 without a tripod. You do not want to increase your ISO any higher than 400, noise becomes a serious issue with HDR images, so carry a tripod if its cloudy or a dark location.

Just a few tips:

Shoot everything as HDR from now on. I bracket everything except shots of people. Even if the dynamic range of the scene is within normal limits, sometimes you can get a different tone if you process it as an HDR.
Be efficient and consistent. If you start bracketing, bracket all the way through the day. The last thing you want to do is spend your time fishing for single shots in a sea of bracketed images. Plus, the photos will be easy to identify when it comes time for HDR processing if they are all in groups of five.
You will have to deal with at least five times more data than you are used to, and it can get away from you very quickly. The next part of the tutorial will cover handling a lot of new data, but being smart while shooting is key. In order to keep things easy for myself, I do not delete photos while shooting. No matter how ghastly the shot is, it remains on the card until I get home. I can then deal with it in my regular work flow. Not only will you stay more organized, you will be more careful about composition since you have limited card space.

By the end of your HDR shoot you should have a ton of images. The next step is to organize them. The we process and edit them. The next tutorial will cover these steps in detail, and by the end you will be shooting in a whole new way.

Free Wallpaper

Rudy Lopez — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 00:14:51 +0000

This is a shot from 11/29, about 40 minutes after sunset near Akron, Colorado. The train tracks gleam against the almost black foreground.

Click image to enlarge, then right click to save.

Travel Log: Revisiting favorite scenes, Nov14th

Rudy Lopez — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 20:39:03 +0000

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It was especially nice to hit the road after a intensive week of daddy duty. There were several locations that I wanted to visit during a winter-like day. I left Denver at 1230 or so on Saturday, headed east on I-70. The weather was cold and windy, temps just above freezing. A large snow storm was on the way, and the low clouds around Denver were a clear sign of what was on the way. Since the storm was primarily a foothills and mountain event, the plains would be windy and cold with low, broken clouds filling the entire sky. I headed east on I-70 then exited at Bennett. The plan was to drive east on US36, then south on Hwy71, ultimately ending up in Limon.

GPS Track

The first location I returned to was an old Quonset hut on off US36, west of Strasburg, that at one time had been used for farming, but has since been left to serve as a dump ground for the locals. There is a fiberglass boat and lots of graffiti, tons of garbage, not to mention an impressive amount of owl shit. The shots feel cold and windy, which is entirely appropriate.

Hut and Boat

From there I moved east on US36, the clouds became wavy due to the upper level winds. Approximately 10 miles west of Last Chance, a large trailer and a couple of pieces of farm equipment decay quietly next to a dusty road. Interesting scene, but hardly unique. The sky is very large around this location, so the weather plays big part with getting good shots. During the previous visit, a distant thunderstorm took up a good portion of the SE sky. On this visit, it was all about the low clouds and texture of the equipment. The shots came out with a sort of rusty sadness, a common vibe out in the middle of nowhere. I shot for 15 minutes, then moved on.

On Hwy71, about 5 miles south of Last Chance, there is a location that is one of my favorites. The house sits on the rim of a small valley, set back from the road only about 50 feet. The entire property seems to have been several acres. A corral, a few old trucks, and some collapsed grain silos dot the landscape on the other side of the basin. The house itself is large and in very bad shape. It seems to have been abandoned relatively recently, perhaps sometime in the last 10 years. Like the Quonset hut from the previous location, the locals use the property as a dump. There are appliances of every type strewn about. Looking through the windows, I could see that the furniture had been abandoned along with the home. It is also possible that couches and chairs that had been dumped on the property were dragged into the house by teenagers with not enough supervision. Either way, there is furniture everywhere, and it has all been turned over.

Red Tractor

As with many abandoned structures, there is a thin film of bird poo on every surface. The feeling of location is more dread than sadness. The place just feels unpleasant. I worked my way around the perimeter of the house, trying to take advantage of the gloomy sky, I wanted to express the feeling of dread in the shots.

The big reason that this location is one of my favorites is because it incorporates my two favorite subjects: abandoned places and rusty cars. Along with the exceedingly creepy house, there are three beautifully rusted cars on the west side of the property. There is an old 30′s era truck with old equipment and rusty wheels on its bed, a 70′s era truck looks like an old dog that has settled for the night, and a 40′s era truck with its rusty door swinging in the breeze. The fifteen minutes I spent shooting these trucks were the best of the day.

I climbed back into the car and headed to Limon, for a quick stop and then back to Denver to enjoy my family and the gathering snow storm.

Shooting Info:

Nikon D300, RAW format
Sigma 12mm Nikkor 18-70mm
All images shot as HDR, five frames over two stops.
Processed by Photomatix Pro

Shots from the day

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