I was there too
A small hut on the island of Alcatraz looks out on San Francisco. It looks well preserved and anyone in the hut would have a god view of the city and probably the surrounding coastline up to the Golden Gate Bridge.
| Aperture | ƒ/10 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 200mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/400s |
An old oil drum stands on the quay at Ballycotton rusting away as the exposed metal is beaten down by the elements.
Technique: I increased the saturation of the reds to bring out the rust of the drum. I desaturated other colours so the drum would stand out.
I then duplicated the layer and darkened the top one to bring out the clouds and sky before using a layer mask to expose the ground on the bottom layer. After that a simple gradient at the top of the image provided a nice dark effect and finally, I dodge and burned the rust until I was happy. Was that useful?
I used CocoViewX to view my work directory from my Linux box on my Macbook. I was surprised that Finder didn’t display thumbnails and I didn’t want the iPhoto heavyweight when all I wanted was to know which image was which.
| Aperture | ƒ/9 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/160s |
The Bay Bridge in San Francisco all lit up at night. The lighting on the bridge casts a golden glow over the water that is beautiful to watch and photograph. More on Wikipedia.
Niall Kennedy walked with myself and Bryan Veloso around the Ferry Building on the night before WordCamp and we got some great shots.
You can see the pier to the right of this image here in more detail with a super reflection.
| Aperture | ƒ/5.6 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 20s |
Public seating near the Bay Bridge in San Francisco.
I shot this on the first evening after getting to the city. Matt, Andy and I went for a walk down the street and I got my first sight of downtown San Francisco.
Technique: I cropped the photo to a 1×1 ratio, converted to black and white, duplicated the background layer. Set the mode of the top layer to Overlay and added noise via Filters->Noise->Scatter RGB. I adjusted the noise effect by changing the opacity of that layer.
One thing to note – when you resize an image you’ll have to add noise again because the pixels are softened up by the resize procedure.
| Aperture | ƒ/10 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/200s |
As you can imagine, I was quite tired by the time I got to San Francisco!
Picture above was taken just down from my Bird flying by photo. I know there are lots of awkward lines in this shot but the line of the Golden Gate Bridge is just about horizontal.
Automattic had it’s first meeting of the week a few yards from here in the glorious sunshine. Some of us suffered sunburn but it sure beat sitting around some dusty old conference table!
| Aperture | ƒ/13 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/320s |
A gull flies off after an inconsiderate photographer runs after it to shoot it. Beats having the kids do the running eh? They might fall!
This was taken in San Francisco, and that’s The Golden Gate Bridge in the background. I went through my shots from my August trip a few days ago and selected around one hundred images for processing. I’ll mix in a few shots over the next few week’s posts. There’s everything from bridges, street people and furniture, Memphis Minis and Alcatraz so plenty for all tastes.
Note to self – when traveling to a new timezone, change the time on your camera!
| Aperture | ƒ/13 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/400s |
Clouds gather over Fountainstown in Co. Cork. The setting sun provided a nice backlight for the clouds on the horizon.
| Aperture | ƒ/11 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
The sun sets over a small inlet in Fountainstown. The tide is out and boats are stranded in the mud.
One thing that bothers me about this photo is the large black bit on the left. I think I overdid the lomo a little although I’m quite happy with the burned in clouds. What do you think?
I’ve ordered another 200 moo mini cards. 100 images duplicated. Should do me for several months I think!
| Aperture | ƒ/14 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/400s |
Have you ever gone beyond the beach at Fountainstown in Co. Cork? I’ve been visiting that beach all my life but I had never walked up the road until a week ago. I’m glad I did because it’s very nice up there, and coupled with a setting sun I went a little mad with the camera! Expect a few more shots from here over the week.
I like these: New terminal at Cork Airport and great child portraits.
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
Bank of Scotland(Ireland) are changing their unwieldy name to the much shorter “Halifax”. The bank is a major player in the UK market, but the name change could yet backfire because Halifax isn’t very well known in Ireland. I presume a slick marketing campaign will take care of that.
The building across the river is the Cork branch of the bank on the Grand Parade. I love how the sun picked out the bright white of it’s walls and the bike in the foreground was in shadow beneath a tree.
| Aperture | ƒ/16 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/500s |
A sign points the way to the public toilets, or restroom, at Inch Strand, Co. Kerry.
This sign can be a much sought after sight on a long journey!
“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”
“Mom! I need to go!”
“I can’t hold it any more!”
Everyone rushes to the public convenience when they hit the beach.
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 48mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/125s |
An abandoned fish box on Inch Strand, Co. Kerry. Clouds and a storm loom over the mountains across the bay but it was a bright blue sky that greeted us with only fluffy white clouds. I expect this box either fell overboard off a trawler or may have been used by a fisherman on the beach but left behind.
Technique: Split into two layers, darkened the top one to bring out the sky and cloud, used a gradient to make a smooth transition. Merge layers, burned the whole image, then created a new layer, set the mode to overlay and used another gradient to darken the sky further.
I like this: Oh oh, I’m caught!!
| Aperture | ƒ/10 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
