Crescent Moon Sunset – Seattle

09. July 2012 · Comments Off on Crescent Moon Sunset – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

I was in Seattle the other day down by the water front, like you do, and the sun was setting, like it does, and it kind-a looked really cool.  So I thought I’d take a picture, and the pictures looked, well just OK.  I think what grabbed my attention for a picture was the sunset and the moon high above, but in all my pictures I didn’t really get the right shot, principally because I was shooting in landscape, not portrait.  So I turned the camera on its side and captured the shot below.

Now there are advantages and disadvantages of shooting in portrait orientation.  I think the image I wanted (and got) worked really well in this format.  I really like the layers in the image; you have the calm water at the bottom, then that beautiful sunset with fluffy clouds, then above that some darker mottled clouds and finally some clear sky with the waxing crescent moon (I had to look that up).  The layers for me really make this image.

Unfortunately I don’t think portrait images work that well on the blog site (hence I don’t post them very often), but on a positive side, I now have a new phone lock screen image.

Yesterday Master Chief got to meet Carters horse, not to be out done, he got his ride out today.

Harbor – Seattle

28. June 2012 · Comments Off on Harbor – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

This is my last picture from the harbor in Seattle – well at least for now, I can’t promise I won’t go back.  I posted the the ferris wheel the other day and that was on the left hand side of the pier.  This shot was taken on the right hand side, looking back towards Seattle.

The boats moored at dock are vessels from the Argosy fleet right next to pier 55.  The boats were rocking from side to side and you can see this as the mast of the sail boat has a lot of motion blur.  This happened as it was getting dark so I had a longer than desired exposure.

In the far distance is Centurylink Field which is the stadium that’s the home of the Seattle Seahawks and Seattle Sounders (that’s an American Football team and a American Soccer team for any Brit’s who read this).  Just out of shot past Centurylink Field is Safeco Field the Seattle Mariners stadium – our baseball team (I figured I should mention that too so people know we have all three).

While I was there a few people came onto the peer to take pictures too.  It was kind of funny as I’m there set up with my tripod and huge camera bag taking loads of pictures and people walk up, pull out their iPhone, take a snap, look at it and say “awesome” and then walk away!  They must think I’m nuts as I was there for ages.  There was one other guy there with a camera on a tripod who was there when I arrived and was still there when I left.  His camera was pointing in the same direction the whole time and he was sitting there waiting – I’m not sure what for but I couldn’t be bothered to wait and see or ask him.  I was happy with my 150 pictures.

Anyway, tomorrow I’ll move onto something else.

Master Chief decided he didn’t know his seven times table, so Carter was helping him with flashcards.

Royal Argosy – Seattle

26. June 2012 · Comments Off on Royal Argosy – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

If you ever visit Seattle and take a trip down to the city water front on Elliott Bay, you may be tempted to take a boat trip out in the bay and do a tour of the city from the water.  Alternatively you might want to jump on a boat, go through the locks at Ballard and get into Lake Washington and do a sightseeing tour there (who knows you may see Bill Gates in his house in Medina, Bellevue).

Well if you want to do either, you will have to take an Argosy Cruise.  This company provides all sorts of cruises out of Seattle and they all start from Pier 55 on Alaskan Way right down on the waterfront.

Now I have done most of their tours over the years (some multiple times as it’s a great place to take friends and family who visit), but I’ve never done one of their Dining Cruises.  They actually have a few different types including a lunch cruise, a dinner dance cruise and even a murder mystery dinner cruise (I’d like that one).  All of these take place on their largest vessel the Royal Argosy.

It just so happens that when I was there shooting the other night, the Royal Argosy was coming into dock after one of it’s dinner dance cruises.  The ship was beautifully lit and when it docked hundreds of people came off all dressed up in the best evening gowns and tuxedos.

I took this picture from the end of the pier looking back at the Royal Argosy which had docked at port with the city skyline in front of it.  Pier 56 to the left in the picture has some restaurants on it that were all lit up providing cool reflections on the water.

It all looked really nice and made I think a lovely picture.

Tonight the guys decided to play “Littlest Petshop” on Abi’s Nintendo DS.

Harbor Water Lillies – Carillon Point

25. June 2012 · Comments Off on Harbor Water Lillies – Carillon Point · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

So I’ve been going through a photography crisis over the last couple of days.  There is this video podcast I watch called “The Grid”, and the show is presented by a couple of guys I really respect.  I’ve been a bit behind with the shows (mainly due to work) and had the chance this weekend to catch up.  Well on a few shows the two presenters (Scott Kelby and Matt Kozlowski) carried out some blind reviews, where people send in their images and basically Scott and Matt tell them what they really think.

Unfortunately sometimes what they think isn’t nice to hear.  That said if an image sucked (and a lot of them did) they give the message in a respectful way, clearly stating what’s wrong and what you need to do.  Well as I’ve been watching the shows I’ve been going through my own pictures and have seen a lot of the “mistakes” they raised on the show.  One of the things they said on The Grid was that people tend to tell you nice things on Facebook and Flickr, friends don’t say things like “I don’t like that image”, they just don’t “like” it.

As a result looking through my “images to post” directory I found I didn’t like any of the shots anymore as I keep seeing errors and mistakes.

Tonight’s image is another shot from Carillon Point, this time from right down on the waterfront just by the harbor.  Just in front of the boats is this small separated area for small row boats and kayaks.  The water is covered in water lillies and lit from small lights that edge the water.

When I took the shot I loved the lillies and the reflections on the water.  Looking at the image at home I noted that the water in the bottom left corner was a bit “scummy” – and that’s being nice.  This was an attention to detail issue that was raised on the podcast.  So I spent an hour cleaning the water in Photoshop.  (Now I’ve said that you will all be looking in the corner at the water).

The end result is a better picture, but after this weekend I still feel I have a lot to learn.

Tonight the Halo dudes decided to cut up some fresh berries.  Fortunately they didn’t make too much mess.

Elliott Bay Sunset – Seattle

24. June 2012 · Comments Off on Elliott Bay Sunset – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

Tonight I’m posting another image from last nights visit to Seattle.  Shortly after I got there I caught a ferry coming in as another was going out.  The sun was really over the Olympics mountain range but the sky was a great orange, red color.

It was getting dark at this time so I had to shoot either with a long exposure or with high ISO. As the ferry was moving, long exposures were out, it would just look like a blur going across the water, so I had to ramp the ISO up on the D4.

Now with my older camera, if I went above 800 ISO the picture had a load of “noise”, this looked like heavy grain in the image, almost like a really old picture from the early 1900s.  Sometimes this looks cool, but only sometimes, so high ISO was kind of useless on my old camera.  But this D4 is amazing.  I pumped up the ISO on this image to around 6400 and managed to get a stationary ferry with a nice exposure with very little noise.

I love the orange sky in this shot and the black clouds, catching both ferries cross paths also get some strong foreground interest.

Carter found a bracelet that he liked and started wearing it around the house.  Not to be outdone, Master Chief did the same.

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