I was there too
A girl clambers over the statue of two sea lions on Pier 39, San Francisco. This pier is where people embark on the journey to Alcatraz Island and it was packed with tourists. Luckily Toni booked our tickets a few days previously and we were able to walk straight onto the boat!
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 200mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/320s |
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 |
Two fishermen enjoy the sun while a huge container ship, the Maersk Derince, passes by in the background. You can see they’re very busy. Even the gull that has landed close by is watching intently.
It’s another hectic day in San Francisco.
Technique: I wasn’t sure what to make of this photo. I love the composition, especially the background to this sedentary activity. Unfortunately it was very misty and colours looked washed out. By converting to b/w and playing around with the exposure I think I produced an interesting looking photo. Finally, adding a vignette around the edges focuses the eye on the fishermen in the foreground.
I like this: Plane landing via Podz
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 200mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/2000s |
Looking down on a street in San Francisco. You wouldn’t want to be afraid of heights walking around on top of a building!
We all want to see what the neighbours are up to and living in a high building is the perfect opportunity of peeping-toms everywhere. You can see all sorts of things – a parasol with lounger across the street, garden furniture, a tree; all invisible from street level.
The postman has been and delivered 100 minicards from moo.com! I ordered 100 duplicates in the order as well so I hope they’re on the way too. I got in touch with their customer service people just in case and am waiting on a reply from them now. Later – I got my reply. The duplicate cards are a separate order and were shipped separately. Should be here in a day or two!
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/125s |
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 |
People wait expectantly in San Francisco International Airport for the first sight of someone they know to appear in the crowd off a plane.
Toni, Andy and I were there to meet Podz off his plane. I had flown in earlier in the day and was almost asleep on my feet but I managed to make this hand held long exposure shot!
I like this: Daft Punk at Marley Park because I wanted to go, heard that they were brill in Scotland, but Donal didn’t think much of their gig in Dublin. Nice shots of their light show though!
| Aperture | ƒ/4 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 800 |
| Shutter speed | 1/8s |
How are the White Sox doing this year? I went to see several baseball games in Chicago and they were always a blast, more a social occasion than anything else. I of course had my camera, here are some shots from a White Sox game, and here’s the famous game where Sammy Sosa used a corked bat! That was my first baseball game, watched from a corporate box owned by Fox!
This picture was taken last year. It’s on the location of Donald Trump’s new building, Trump International Hotel and Tower (Chicago) on the site of the old (and ugly) Chicago Sun-Times building.
| Aperture | ƒ/7.1 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 54mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/125s |
Aboard one of the trains of the Chicago L, the elevated and underground train network in Chicago. I think this was taken near the south end of the Loop, possibly around the corner from the library.
The last time I was in Chicago I took the L for nostalgic reasons and because it’s not a half-bad way for a tourist to see the town. The stations of the Loop are all elevated above street level and some afford a good view down the main streets of downtown Chicago! Maps and schedules are posted in each station, on the trains and online too making it very easy to find your way around.
Here’s a tour of the Loop with pictures if you’d like to know more.
I like this: Real Esteli played its best match ever – couple of great football shots!
| Aperture | ƒ/5.6 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/100s |
This is the sky bridge between the two sections of the Wrigley Building in Chicago. We were walking through when I looked up and immediately noticed the leading lines of the buildings and the walkway.
Way back in 2003 I photographed the Wrigley Building a few times and I’m pretty sure it featured in the film Batman Begins too.
Wrigley.com has a page dedicated to the history of the building and it makes for interesting reading.
While searching ocaoimh.ie for those pictures, I came across this little nugget about Bill Gates from 2002. 🙂
Something else from the archives for you street shooters – A face in the crowd, tips from the Street Photography List on capturing the elusive face in the maddening crowd.
I like this: Cow & Gate, never mind the baby food.
| Aperture | ƒ/9 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
