For some reason tonight I started looking back through my image library for images from France.
I stumbled across this one from 2002 – shot with my first digital camera – a Kodak DC290 – at Versailles. I love the composition – totally accidental though it was at the time! I captured a very special red head in the photo!
I post-processed this using a bit of Topaz Simplify and Photoshop CC’s oil paint filter. I love the look and the subtle textures!
In August 2010, I took a workshop focus on Tomales Bay and Point Reyes. One of the other participants – Jack – was shooting with a set of classic cameras. It was a joy to watch him work.
Here’s a shot of Jack taken early on a late August morning along Tomales Bay. He’s shooting the famous Point Reyes fishing boat – aground at Inverness. The morning sun is on his back. I can smell the scene.
Shot with my Canon 5D Mark II and the Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS lens. Post-processed using Lightroom 5, VSCO Film and Photoshop CC with Topaz Simplify 4.
Here’s another image from my August 2009 workshop with Chris Honeysett in San Francisco’s North Beach. Shot outside The Stinking Rose with my Canon 5D Mark II.
Converted to black and white in the camera – and tweaked in Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CC.
This is an image that’s been shot many, many times in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood.
On this Saturday morning in August 2009 we had some special light and I captured this image with my Canon 5D Mark II.
Post-processed in Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CC with a touch of the Oil Paint filter to add a bit of texture.
In April 2012 Doug Kaye and I met at the San Francisco Powell Street BART station. Because of the weather, we thought we might spend our time that day on the trains and in the stations – but when we got to Powell Street we could see daylight so we met in the station and headed upstairs.
This image was captured with my tiny Canon PowerShot S100. I was always drawn to this image because of the street advertising on the left side – seemed pretty cool!
The image was post-processed in Lightroom 5 using VSCO Film 04 and then into Photoshop CC where a radial blur filter helped add a sense of motion to the cable car coming down the tracks.
Earlier this summer, I picked up a Fujifilm X100S – a street photographer’s delight. The rangefinder design, its gorgeous styling and superb image performance make it a camera you just want to take with you everywhere.
When Doug Kaye and I go out for a photo walk in San Francisco, we’re always on the lookout for “stages” – great backgrounds that are just waiting to be filled with interesting people.
This is a shot in the park adjacent to the Transamerica Building (“the Pyramid”) in San Francisco. We had rich summer morning light flooding in along with some wonderful shadows – which help add depth to an otherwise two dimensional image. We also had four actors already on stage – nicely spread out! And then this woman walked across the foreground – wow, I couldn’t have scripted it any better – as she made her point to her friend on the other end of that pink cellphone call!
For this version of the image, I used a touch of Topaz Simplify in Photoshop CC to reduce some of the high frequency elements (trees) in the image. VSCO Film Velvia 50 was used to boost the colors a bit. A final pass of high pass sharpening was used to bring back the facial expressions of all of the actors!
Good fun!
We’ve got a lot of Berkeley in our family! I went to Cal in the late 60’s during the protest movements featured in this sculpture by Scott Donahue on the east end of the Pedestrian-Bike bridge that spans Interstate 80 in Berkeley. Ah, memories…
Shot with my Nikon D600. Post-processed in Lightroom 5, Photoshop CC, and Nik Analog Camera.
I’ve got two photos of mine hanging in my home office. One is a wide image shot at Sparks Lake near Bend, Oregon this summer. The other is a monochrome version of this “Bookends” image. Both are Sizzlpix images – and they’re magnificent. No frames, they just stand out from the wall as if they’re floating there. Beautiful.
I’ve been wanting to go back to “Bookends” for a while – to try a color version. The monochrome is very powerful – but there are some beautiful colors in the original shot taken with my Canon PowerShop S90 (since sold!).
This version was re-edited in Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CC. A subtle use of Topaz Simplify 4 was applied before using the Camera Raw filter to make some final tweaks. A bit of sharpening and a vignette applied back in Lightroom finished it off.
Brings back such great memories of our visit to New York!…
Two years ago this week Doug Kaye and I went to Rodeo Beach and then up the hill to Battery Mendell overlooking Point Bonita Light and the entrance to the Golden Gate. It’s a magnificent view from up there.
Captured with my Canon 5D Mark II with the 70-200mm lens. Post-processed in Lightroom and Photoshop CC with a bit of platinum toning applied.
I felt like I needed a walk this afternoon. I grabbed my Fujifilm X100S and headed down to Menlo Park’s Santa Cruz Avenue about 30 minutes before sunset.
I walked the avenue – camera in hand – and captured a few holiday shots. But I think one is my favorite – a Christmas tree shot through a store window. I had to do a bit of post-processing cleanup in Photoshop CC to remove some reflections – and then decided to apply a bit of a painterly feel to the image using a combination of Topaz Simplify 4 and Photoshop CC’s oil paint filter. I used a layer mask to keep the ornament details sharp and added a bit of burning to add some depth to the tree itself.
This one my be our holiday card cover for next year!