Photo Story

Tokyo Japan Skyscrapers - Roppongi Hills Tokyo Midtown Tokyo Tower

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Tokyo Tower (center) Tokyo Midtown skyscraper (right) - Nikon D300 with Tamron 17-50mm @ f/11 ISO 200 1/50th single exposure (not HDR)

Yesterday I was going through my photography archives searching for a shot (daytime beach) that might be usable for a potential client when I came across these shots of the Tokyo skyline.  They were made from the balcony of a Russian photographer friend who had an amazing condo in central Tokyo.  All these shots are the views he gets to enjoy everyday!  If I recall, his condo was on about the 22nd floor.  The time was around 4:30pm in February of 2009, when the sun sets not so long after 5pm, which is why it already looks like dusk on this overcast day.  None of these shots are HDR, which was just starting to get popular again around 2009.  It is possible to get vivid detail and color without HDR if shooting during the best light of day.

Tokyo Tower (left) Tokyo Midtown skyscraper (2nd from left) Roppongi Hills skyscraper (center-right) - Nikon D300 f/11 ISO 400 1/250th single exposure (not HDR)Just as my photography career was starting to take off in Japan, I was set to move back to Florida.  This was the last time I visited with my Russian photographer friend.  

Tokyo Midtown is the middle skyscraper in the above shot and at the time was the newest mega-office-entertainment-shopping building.  The shops on the lower floors were great, if you had at least $500 for the cheapest item seemingly.  Roppongi Hills is the right-most skyscraper, and was the previous title holder of newest mega-office-entertainment-shopping building.  Roppongi Hills remained the far more interesting architecturally, and is home to the best movie theater I have ever been to.  

Roppongi Hills in detail from up high - Nikon D300 with Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens @ f/11 ISO 400 1/160th single exposure (not HDR)I am glad to have these photographs to remind me of my last visit with a friend I am probably never going to see again.  I still follow his work on flickr (Vladimir Zakharov) as he never ceases to find new roof top views to photograph.

Banyan Trees of downtown St. Petersburg appreciation

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Banyan Tress in downtown St. Petersburg - 7-bracket HDR @ f/11Recently I have had to answer the question of why I live in St. Petersburg to a couple of different people.  It would be better to say why I live in the specific part of St. Petersburg I do:  Snell Isle & the Old Northeast.  That I can answer easily:  because of the trees.  The neighborhoods here are covered in large trees of many different varieties.  

The banyan trees in the above photo are in a non-descript part of downtown on a not so often traveled sidestreet.  There are much larger banyan trees on Beach Drive that get lots of attention.  As I was walking back to my car from a small photo job I came across these banyans and thought I should make the effort to photograph them and show some of the hidden beauty of the city I live in.

Banyan Tree roots in downtown St. Petersburg - 7-bracket HDR @ f/11Luckily the photo job I had to do required a tripod so I was able to make HDR shots of the banyan trees.  I used the tripod on the shortest leg settings, requiring me to sit on the ground for both shots, which is fine with me as I like the slowness using a tripod requires for making shots.

What trees are there in your neighborhood and why do you live in the city you do?

Photographing common objects in public for historical purposes

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Will street signs still exist in 100 years? Photographs help remind what the past was like.Photographers often go to great lengths to shoot the most impressive subjects as possible:  a stunning Florida sunset, a beautiful model, nature, etc.  Such subjects make it easy to create a memorable photograph.  However, oridinary scenes and objects should not be overlooked by the modern photographer, for in one hundred years from now, what is modern will appear quaint.  I recall seeing old photographs of a street construction crew.  At the time the photograph would have appeared very ordinary.  To modern eyes, the photos were very interesting to see how construction workers dressed back then, what they brought with them for lunch, what machinery were they using.  

I made the above non-descript street sign shot while teaching a DSLR Photography lesson to just demonstrate how easy it is to create bokeh using a 50mm lens.  Back at home I was halfway to deleting it when I paused and recalled the old construction crew shots.  Maybe in 2111 there will be someone wondering what it was like to cross a street that had actual cars on it.  

In my own personal shooting over the fall I will shoot a series of "ordinary scenes & objects" with the aim of documenting daily life in 2011 in case anyone in the future has the same fondness I have for looking at old photos of such things. 

Smacks Bayou home after a storm - black & white long exposure

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A home on Smacks Bayou - Nikon D300 with Nikkor AF-S 105mm VR micro f/2.8G lens @ f/11 ISO 200 50.4 second exposure on Induro CT214 tripod with cable releaseOnce again an interruptive rain storm allowed me a photography opportunity I would otherwise not of had.  A windy rainstorm swept it right when my evening DSLR Photography Lesson was to start, forcing its rescheduling.  After the rain past I went out onto my back patio with the same gear setup I was to use to teach the lesson with: 

That lens choice would not have been my first thought to use for the Smacks Bayou long exposure landscape shot I previsioned, but I wanted to setup a challenge to see if I could make it work.  Instead of feeling restricted, I felt liberated to be using a 105mm prime lens.  I sat down in a chair, let the tripod hold the camera, and even rested the cable release on my lap as once I setup the shot, I let the gear do all the work!  This is an extremely relaxing way to do photography.  

New Salvador Dali Museum St. Petersburg Florida

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The new Salvador Dali Museum of St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 with Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 @ f/11 ISO 200 7-bracket HDR with partial blend of a single image on Induro CT214 tripod with cable releaseThe appearance of any new piece of architecture within a photographer's city is an opportunity to create a defining shot of it.  I am far from the first local photographer to make photos of the new Salvador Dali Museum here in St. Petersburg, Florida, and even farther from producing the defining shot.  Moris Moreno has already made those shots (view here).  When I did a search to see what photos of the museum already existed, finding and viewing Moreno's shots were humbling.  

I finally photographed the new Dali Museum mostly because a commercial client wanted a shot of it to use for cross promotional purposes.  They required only a single shot which is the above.  I then went back on another occasion to use the museum grounds as the site of a DSLR Photography Lesson and made a few more shots during that time.

The above shot represents the culmination of all my HDR shooting skills, plus my increasing use of masking.  I will describe this editing technique in detail in an upcoming post.  It also helps now that I am using a professional level tripod, an Induro CT214 with Induro BDH2 ballhead.  Again, a review of those sticks will be coming soon.

The glass waterfall of the new St. Petersburg Salvador Dali Museum - Nikon D300 with Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens @ f/11 ISO 200 7-bracket HDR with partial blend of a singe image on Induro CT214 tripod with cable releaseThe main architectural flair of the museum exterior is a so-called waterfall of glass flowing narrowly from the east facing roof of the building to a wider flow along ground level wrapping around the north side.  Using an HDR technique to photograph the triangular glass panels up close allows for being able to see inside the glass while keeping the sky correctly exposed.

The Mahaffey Theater (right) has a new neighbor in the Salvador Dali Museum - Nikon D300 with Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 @ f/11 ISO 200 1/250th 3-shot panorama on Induro CT214 tripod with cable releaseI always liked the Mahaffey Theater's glass architecture feature, and now it is complemented with the glass waterfall of the Dali Museum.  The buildings are not exactly in a popular area of downtown St. Petersburg, more on the outskirts of it.  The only times I passed this area in the past were on exploratory cycling trips.  The roads are wide, smooth and empty in this area, great for cycling.

Melting Time bench at new Salvador Dali Museum St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 with Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D lens @ f/11 ISO 200 1/400th single frame handheldThe grounds of the museum before the glass waterfall contain a well landscaped garden inlcuding a melting time bench reminding one that they are still in the world of Dali.  It is details like that, an extra expense no doubt, that add a lot to the visiting experience.  I did not sit on the bench myself, for time already moves in strange ways for me.  I did not want to risk any further altered perceptions.

Handwritten note adorning a tree at the new Dali Museum in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 with Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D lens @ f/2.8 ISO 200 1/8000th single frame handheldAnother great feature of the Dali garden was a tree adorned with long green streamers to which people afixed handwritten notes with clothespins.  Some just tied their entrance wristbands to the streamers.  Whoever thought of this came up with a really great idea to give a visitor a sense of what other people experienced and felt on their visits.  No matter how good digital communication gets, the power of the handwritten note/letter/document just cannot be denied.  Penmanship is just as much a representation of a person's character as anything else.  When I formally go to the museum as a visitor, I will take the time to add my own handwritten remembrence.

Street Photography - what comes from the dark

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Nikon D300 Nikkor AF 50mm f/1.8D @ f/2 ISO 200 1/80th - B&W processing in Silver Efex ProLast month I began watching the original Twilight Zone series from the first episode.  It is a black & white world where the ordinary always leads to the extraordinary.  It is unfortunate that I am not able to continue my street photography career here in St. Petersburg as I was able to do with ease while living in Tokyo.  One has to really look for shots here as there are very few people walking the streets of downtown.  

What drew me to this scene first was the lighting and then my curiosity to what the woman in the booth thinks about.  How often is her mind on something outside the booth?  Does she still try to stare into the darkness before her searching for anything?  Did she ever?

For someone passing by it appears as a small booth, but I am sure she has her own world in there.  Like the ending to many Twilight Zone episodes, what really lies in her mind, or in the dark beyond, will remain a mystery.  

Cessna Sailboat Helicopter St. Petersburg Tampa Bay

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Cessna taking off from Albert Whitted Airport St. Petersburg Florida - f/8 ISO 200 1/800th using shutter priorityEven though it is not entirely correct or perhaps in anyway connected, the inspiration for this post was, "One if by sea, two if by land."  The only real connection between all four of these photographs is that they were taken from The Pier while I was otherwise engaged teaching a DSLR photography lesson.  The photo of the Cessna plane above was taken with a student in practice for photographing eagles in Alaska.  Tracking a small moving object can be tricky and is definitely a skill that needs to be repeatedly practiced and refined.  This plane had just taken off from Albert Whitted Airport in downtown St. Petersburg.

Setting sail for Tampa Bay - f/7.1 ISO 200 1/800th using shutter priorityThis sailboat represents the whales the above student will photograph in Alaska.  It is kind of funny how The Pier with a little imagination can be a single practice point for photographing the wide ranging wildlife of Alaska!  For me, my goal with the sailboat shot was to get everything framed tightly and neatly regarding the boat's position in the frame, the location of the horizon and the predominantly cloud background.

Helicopter frozen in midair over Tampa Bay - f/4 ISO 200 1/4000th using aperture priorityA few months earlier, again with the same photo student, we were also on the roof of The Pier photographing anything that flew by.  What does it take to freeze a helicopter's blades in motion?  It would seem 1/4000th of a second does the job nicely.  Helicopters always make me think of Magnum P.I.  

Police ride jet skis in Florida - f/4 ISO 200 1/2500th using aperture priorityA few minutes later we were back to looking for waterborne subjects to photograph again and I saw for the first time a police jet ski!  Personally, I am against jet skis and other similar watercraft they just seem to be "too much."  They are incredibly noisy and it just seems so uncivilized for one person to be able to disrupt the Sea so much.  To me it just looks disrespectful.  

If not "one if by sea, two if by land" that what other connecting theme may you suggest for these four photos?