Alki Pier – Seattle

08. November 2012 · Comments Off on Alki Pier – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

Tonight I’m taking you back to sunrise at Alki.  The sky was really pretty and we had taken loads of pictures of the cityscape I was looking for something different.  Just further up the beach was this little pier hanging out over Elliott Bay.  There were actually a few people standing on the pier when I took this and they kind-a ruined the picture. So I hit Photoshop and now they’re gone.

This image was all about timing.  I really wanted the ferry in the right of the picture to have a counter point to look at (so it just wasn’t only about the pier) and I had to bide my time for the ferry to get in the right place.   I was lucky that the other people on the pier weren’t moving around too much so I got the shot.  There are so many things that make this picture nice, I love the sky, the reds are really pretty.  The boat and the pier are great (they were the things that attracted me to the shot in the first place) and I love the rocks under the pier and the waves lapping against the shore.

All in all I like this one and feel getting up at a stupid hour on a day off was actually worth the effort.

I think the guys were watching some Disney films today and insisted on both sucking the same spaghetti, it’s kind of Carter and the Tramp!

Pier – Seattle

19. August 2012 · Comments Off on Pier – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

A friend at home (Kathryn Skinner) asked me if I had any nice black and white images, so we looked though my image collection and both decided I didn’t.  As a result I thought I’d try to capture a picture that would make a good black and white.  So this evening Abi and I went out to see what we could get.

We found ourselves over on the west side of Lake Washington down by the I90 bridge and stopped by a small park with a pier.  The sun was starting to set so the pier was no longer directly lit and I thought the dark wood of the pier might look good against the sky.  Ideally I would have been there a little later so I could have taken the picture with a nice long exposure to smooth the water but I had Abi and couldn’t really hang around.

At the end of the pier were three fishermen and under the pier were loads of kids swimming.  Every now and then they would climb up onto the pier and jump off.  I spent some time in Photoshop removing all the people until the image looked as it does below.

I actually had a couple of lenses with me, one of them was my wide angle “landscape” lens, but unfortunately it started capturing images that were way over exposed.  So that’s going back to Nikon tomorrow.  As a result I took the image below with normal zoom, but I think it came out really well.  So I’ll show this to Kathryn and see what she thinks.

Nothing like a nice game of pool, but as there are three colors on the table I have NO IDEA what Carter and Master Chief are playing.

Carillon Point – Kirkland

06. April 2012 · Comments Off on Carillon Point – Kirkland · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

Today was a very odd day.  I actually took the day off work to spend it with the family and we planned on going to the Seattle Aquarium.  We finally got James out of bed at 11am and headed off to Seattle.  It was a lovely day and we arrived in the city without issue, then we tried to park.  It appears that everybody in the Pacific Northwest decided to also drive to town and we spent over an hour trying to park.

Eventually, after much frustration we decided to just give up.  There were road works everywhere and just getting from street to street was a real pain.  So while stationary at some stop lights we talked about somewhere else to go.  As we have never been to Gas Works Park before, we thought we’d go there.  So Lisa punched that into her sat-nav and off we went.  We got to the I5 and headed north and drove right past the exit we needed.  What made things worse was that the traffic on the other side of the freeway wasn’t moving and we had to drive a few miles before we got the chance to turn around!

By now James had decided he was hungry and wanted to go to Taco Bell.  So we pulled off the freeway and started looking for some food.  Eventually we found the restaurant and went in for some lunch where I took a picture of a taco which I very nearly posted tonight!  Of course by this stage we were hysterically laughing, this was turning into a terrible day off!

On the way home I was worried about what I was going to post so Lisa suggested Carillon Point in Kirkland.  It was on our way home so off we went.

It was still really sunny and there was a great blue sky and the clouds looked fantastic.  So when we got there I made sure I captured lots of sky in all my shots.  I actually took loads of pictures and decided to post this one tonight.

This image shows the pier that wraps around the harbor.  The water was really calm and the sky looked great.  In all a nice shot.

Today Carter unboxed his new Nokia Lumia 900, he said he loves it and it’s much better than the cups and string he was playing with the other day.

Alki Pier – Alki West Seattle

15. February 2012 · Comments Off on Alki Pier – Alki West Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

There’s kind of a golden rule in photography; when you get the camera out look EVERYWHERE.  Look up, down, both sides, in front and behind.  Don’t just see one opportunity and shoot that.  So that’s the goal, truth is though, like most people once I get an idea I kind of get caught up in that one thing.  I always think after “oh I should have looked around, or tried something different”.  Trouble is I kind of get this revelation on my way home!

Anyway I was in Alki and standing on the pier taking shots of downtown Seattle across Elliot Bay.  For once I thought, what if I shoot over here instead?  The picture below is the result, I have Elliot Bay behind me and not in the picture at all, instead I’m shooting into land.

There was actually a huge trash can on left under the pier light and I pulled that out of the way before taking the picture (I’m so pleased I thought of that too as it would have been a pain to remove in post).

When I got home I was really pleased with the image and like the look of the light on the pier and the way the pier draws your eye back to the shops and apartments on the water front.  The sky has a stormy look about it as well that adds to the picture.

So I get home tonight and to my surprise I find the Halo guys photocopying their butts on my scanner!  This is ridiculous, I mean it’s not a Christmas party or anything like that and both of them were sober!

Kirkland Waterfront – Kirkland

03. January 2012 · Comments Off on Kirkland Waterfront – Kirkland · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

So here we are day three and I’m having to work hard to find images 🙂 especially as I’m back at work. So this evening I decided to drive home via Kirkland’s waterfront and see what I could get. The sun was setting which created a beautiful sky but it was raining so I had to work fast.

A lot of people have asked if the images I capture are all HDR and I know everyone thinks that this image was heavily processed.  But surprisingly this is pretty much what came out of the camera.  The sky really was that blue and the orange from the lights was that strong.

Here is the image:

Being a big kindle user myself I thought if would be fun to see the Halo guys reading a Halo book, this was the result:

Kindle