Tag Archives: clouds

Winter storm watch

The clouds were moving consistently from south to north (left to right in the photos). I believe that the consistent shape break up is due to the Olympic Mountains, which arise pretty much straight out from the edge of the bulk head.

I set my camera up on a tripod as the first bank of clouds arrived, put on neutral density filters (CPL plus a six stop), set the aperture set at F/16, and ISO at 64. Then I took the above sequence of photos between 4:00pm and 6:25pm. The length of the exposures varied depending on the ambient light but generally went from about 5 seconds for the first shot, at about 4:00pm to 10 for the last one, which was during twilight.

For Wordless Wednesday and Hammad Rais’s Weekend Sky

Mid-week monochrome skies

Mid-week monochrome seems like a perfect description of today’s skies. I took a couple of pictures while we were getting on the ferry and was curious to see how much difference switching to black and white would make

Ferry leaving the north end of Vashon Island.
Color
Same photo as above with GIMP's desaturate HSV filter applied.
Simple desaturation

Then I played with a more elaborate black and treatment:

Dramatic treatment using Nik

Looking in another direction.

Looking north-northwest from the Fauntleroy ferry dock in Seattle
Color
Same photo desaturated using the GIMP's desaturate with the luma method.
Simple desaturation

A more dramatic treatment using the Nik Silver Effects pro

Dramatic black and white

Since we had thunderstorms and a lot of rain the more dramatic black and white seem to suit the feel of the day. But my eyes did not deceive me: there isn’t a whole lot of difference between the color image and one that is simply desaturated.

A little later we got a little more light (and the power came back on!).

Skies over Fern Cove on Vashon Island.
Color
Same photo desaturated using the GIMP's built-in desaturate value method.
Simple desaturation
Same photo using the Nik Collection's Silver Effects Pro.
Dramatic treatment using the Nik Silver Effects Pro program.

For Brashley Photography’s Mid-week Monochrome.

Unstitchable skies

The last photos on my card for March are a sequence of the interesting skies we had yesterday evening. A weather front was moving in.

I was hoping to stitch them into a panarama, but I didn’t have my monopod and the angles and scales are a little too wonky to pull it off.

For Bushboy’s Last on Card: March and Hammad Rais’s Weekend Sky.

Whatsoever is lovely…day 20

Purple velvet

I do not know what the actual name of this plant is (please let me know if you do). I call it purple velvet. The hummingbirds like it but they fly away when the pups approach. Today the light was just right.

Gan Xingfu (chasing happiness) 赶兴福

This November I am chasing happiness by photographing and sharing one lovely thing I see each day. I do edit the photos, often with an artistic effect like the one above, because playing with a lovely thing makes me happy.

Note: My son checked with his co-workers and, while they haven’t heard the phrase gan xingfu, they thought it was just fine to use.

For more explanation about this project check out this post: Whatsoever is lovely…day 1.

This is posted for Nanopoblano and Cee’s Flower of the Day.

Whatsoever is lovely…day 19

November sky-Method 1
November sky-Method 2

The clouds gathering this morning made a dramatic back drop for the newly bare trees. I tried out a couple of different treatments on the same photo. Does one appeal to you more than the other (the original is in the header?

Gan Xingfu (chasing happiness) 赶兴福

This November I am chasing happiness by photographing and sharing one lovely thing I see each day. I do edit the photos, often with an artistic effect like the one above, because playing with a lovely thing makes me happy.

Note: My son checked with his co-workers and, while they haven’t heard the phrase gan xingfu, they thought it was just fine to use.

For more explanation about this project check out this post: Whatsoever is lovely…day 1.

This is posted for Nanopoblano.