Harold Davis's Blog, page 131

Succulent from our Garden

Succulent from our Garden © Harold Davis

Fortunately, this succulent was in a planter so I could bring it indoors and out of the wind to photograph. 85mm macro, nine exposures at shutter speeds from 1/4 of a second to 2 minutes, each exposure at f/64 and ISO 100; tripod mounted; processed and converted to black and white in Adobe Camera RAW, Photoshop, Nik HDR Efex Pro, and Nik Silver Efex Pro.

Peonies

Peonies on Black © Harold Davis

Peonies on a Scanned Paper Background © Harold Davis

Peonies on White © Harold Davis

Peonies on White (bottom) is a photo composite created from 18 individual 36MP captures on a light box photographed for transparency. Peonies on Black (top) is an LAB L-channel adjustment (an inversion) of the image on white. Peonies on a Scanned Paper Background (middle) shows the white version added to a background that was created by scanning a somewhat aged sheet of paper..

Old Train Bridge near Calvignac, France

I clambered up the steep embankment, and followed the faint path that ducked under the barbed-wire fence. Once on the train tracks, I headed onto the old bridge across the Lot River rural France.

Old Train Bridge near Calvignac, France © Harold Davis

Clearly, these tracks weren’t in use. Still, there’s something about being planted squarely in the middle of train tracks on an old, rusty bridge high above a rushing river that gets the blood flowing (almost as fast as the water below)!

Old Train Bridge (Black & White) © Harold Davis

Zeiss 35mm lens at f/16 and ISO 100, ten exposures at shutter speeds from 0.4 of a second to 1/500 of a second, tripod mounted. Processed in Adobe Camera RAW, Bik HDR Efex Pro, and Photoshop. Black and white conversion using Photoshop, Nik Silver Efex Pro, and Perfect B&W.

Related image: Old Train Bridge, Maine.

Flowers at Monet’s Giverny and at Home

Willow Reflections, Giverny © Harold Davis

Scarab of Flowers © Harold Davis

Nocturnes Exhibition and Competition at the Southeast Center for Photography

I am the juror for Nocturnes a competition and exhibition based around night photography at the Southeast Center for Photography.

Here’s the description:  A nocturne is a musical composition that is inspired by, or evocative of, the night. Enter your best photos that express the poetry of the night referentially in visual symbolism. Show us you night images, your light painting talents. Imagery should be evocative of the night and our human relationship to nocturnal darkness. Structures are okay, as is the urban landscape. It’s fine to include celestial features such as star trails or the Milky Way, but images should include terrestrial markings as well; this will be an exhibition about the human relationship, and feelings about the night.

Submissions close on June 5, 2016. Click here for the prospectus for the competition and exhibition.

Edge of Night © Harold Davis

Nanzenji Aqueduct

Nanzenji is one of the Five Great Zen Temples of Kyoto, Japan. Wandering through the grounds at Nanzenji, I came across a huge red brick aqueduct, built in the 19th century, and designed to carry water to Kyoto from Lake Biwa (it is still in use today). The mammoth nature of this structure seemed incredibly interesting to me, so I moved underneath the aqueduct with my camera and tripod to capture its supports, which seemed oddly out of place, almost like an ancient Roman engineering project in the heart of Japanese Zen.

This image is brought to mind because it is one of the illustrations in my new book The Photographer’s Black & White Handbook, which will be published by Monacelli Press.

Under the Aqueduct at Nanzenji © Harold Davis

28mm, 4/5 of a second at f/22 and ISO 100, tripod mounted; processed in Photoshop, and converted to black and white in Photoshop and Nik Silver Efex Pro.

Click here for more blog stories about Japan.

Related image: Under the Yaquina Bay Bridge.

Monet’s Garden

Two more from Giverny via my iPhone and the Waterlogue app:

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Giverny on my iPhone © Harold Davis

Monet’s Garden © Harold Davis

Morning Mist

Morning Mist © Harold Davis

In the early morning in the Lot River Valley fog follows the course of the river, shown here behind a stand of trees and in front of the cliffs on the far side of the valley.

Country Rainbow

To paraphrase Ansel Adams, if you don’t go out in the rain, you will never get to photograph the clearing storm. As I explored the ancient town of Cordes sur Ciel, it began to rain. I pulled out my rain gear and continued up to the highest battlement. From the top of the fortifications, a rainbow spread out over the countryside of southwest France below me.

Country Rainbow © Harold Davis

Gourds

I realize that I never blogged this iPhone image of gourds, which I rather like. It was photographed locally at the wonderful Berkeley Bowl produce market. I processed in on my phone in the Snapseed app.

                                               Gourds © Harold Davis