Sunsets/Sunrises are not all the same
Yesterday seemed like a great day for taking a photograph of the sunset. If only I had looked closer at the weather. While it was a great day yesterday, today is looking to possibly be a brute with a storm barreling in from the west.
Finding that ideal sunset or sunrise is always a big deal for me. I would also go so far as to say that Sunsets are a big deal for anyone that considers themselves a photographer of any caliber. The majestic beauty of the sun fighting its way through the haze and dust of the continent as it rises from the east or sets from the west cannot be understated. Yet, not all sunsets and sunrises are the same and seldom do they look the same day after day. Before a massive rainstorm, the skies of the west are generally cleaner. This causes the light from the sun to refract less and give us clearer blues and sharper clouds. When the storm has cleared, the winds calm down, and the dust rises to cause the light to refract and splinter into the brilliant oranges we love to see. Yesterday was a particularly standard pre-storm day that delivered precisely what it should have, a bland and lackluster sunset.
Yesterday seemed like a beautiful day for taking a photograph of the sunset. If only I had looked closer at the weather. While it was a great day yesterday, today is looking to possibly be a brute with a storm barreling in from the west. Already I have received notifications about possible Tornadoes from the weather apps on my phone. If I would have looked ahead, I wouldn’t have been so stoked for the sunset and would have taken the time to relax a little more and enjoy it. The photographs of the sunset are decent, but since the air was from the wind, they weren’t spectacular, by any means.
The fascinating thing about this outing is that I got a couple of photographs that aren’t of the sunset but seem to be either more exciting or more potent than these. My favorite is the cold Oregonian looking beach scene while my wife, Kelli, seems to prefer the exotic tones and depth of the rocky shores with the hibernating bush/tree.
Kelli found this to be the more interesting of the bunch.
This Oregonian like shoreline is one of my most favorite photos from the excursion.
What do you think about the photographs from this excursion? Which ones are your favorite?
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Bomb Cyclone brings end to photo shoot
I went to the University of Arkansas to find a great spot to get the stadium and all that traffic. The video I got was all made in camera and isn’t the quality that I will get when I do it for real. This is just a scout to see what it might look like. Honestly, I am not going to use that spot again, it’s just not that interesting. But that’s why you scout!
From “The Weather Channel” website.
If you didn’t know, the mid-west is being bombarded with what the newsies are calling a “Bomb Cyclone. It is a blistering cold weather event that is over 800 miles wide. They even canceled school in the Denver area, that’s bad. Denver Schools never close.
When I lived in Denver there was a blizzard that put almost four feet of snow on the ground in three hours and it didn’t melt for a week. The Denver Schools were open the entire time. That means this must be something big.
I was out trying to discover the choicest places to shoot some time lapse videos. The camera does them nativity at a slightly lower resolution, meaning I was going for just a test shot, just to see. Soon, I will be receiving a new piece of equipment that calculates the perfect camera settings to get the ideal chance for a time-lapse.
Most time-lapse videos you see are actually hundreds of photographs compiled together. This takes forever to get right, and if wrong, they look terrible. I have produced every kind of video you can think of, except a time lapse. It takes a lot of patience and planning to get it right, and I just haven't made time for it. Now it's on my bucket list, and it's going to get done. If you haven't seen a time-lapse, here is one I found from Chris Pritchard on Vimeo. I love watching these things.
These are great for City-scapes as well. Here is one of NYC by Michael Shainblum.
As you can see, these videos can be mesmerizing, to say the least. But they have to be planned out. IN the NY time-lapse you actually get to see the camera move while the city literally runs at hyper-speed. Technically the second video is more of a Hyper-lapse, but a static shot for my work will have to do for now. Those take a motorized slider hooked to a computer to accomplish, and I just don’t have the 2K at the moment to afford the gear. Maybe I could rent it… hmm, that’s a thought.
That’s what I was doing tonight, scouting for a place to shoot my time lapse. I went to the University of Arkansas to find a great spot to get the stadium and all that traffic. The video I got was all made in camera and isn’t the quality that I will get when I do it for real. This is just a scout to see what it might look like. Honestly, I am not going to use that spot again, it’s just not that interesting. But that’s why you scout!
Typically, shooting video in the wind isn’t that problematic, and since these were really just for reference, it really didn’t matter.
Living in Arkansas, I didn’t think the “Bomb Cyclone” would effect us down here, but it sure as hell did. Tonight the wind gusts are so strong that it almost blew over my tripod while I was shooting. My “sticks” aren’t the super expensive Manfrotto ones, but they aren’t junk either. They are light though, carbon fiber is the majority of the materials used to make the legs. That wind just toppled them right over. Good thing I was holding onto them at the time. I really don’t want to file an insurance claim for a new camera and lens.
I did get to practice my long exposure photography though. Being that I have a new camera and I haven’t ever gotten to practice with it due to crappy weather, I thought I would share. But these also suffered from the wind. When leaving the shutter open for Thirty seconds, every little shake makes an impression. While this is the sharpest one of the bunch, it is most definitely not that great. Its composition needs a lot of work, but I proved to myself that I do understand the technicals of the camera well enough to really set up a beautiful shot in the future.
Let’s all hope that all we get is some more wind and a few days of sixty-degree weather rather than the pounding of snow and ice the north is getting.
Screen tests and the a7III vs. the a77 in studio
It was going to be the first time I got to use my Sony a7III in a real studio environment. And It didn’t let me down. My a77, the camera that I have been using for the past eight years did though. I honestly didn’t have any idea just how behind the times it was.
As a filmmaker, I always enjoy talking to folks who might be, interested or are very interested, in making films. I like finding new talent. Yesterday I got to do both. I was invited to an acting class by a local lady who finds raw talent and sees what they can do. Not really knowing what to expect, I conscripted my screenwriter and gathered my gear. It was going to be the first time to use my Sony a7III in a real studio environment. And it didn’t let me down. My a77, the camera that I have been using for the past eight years, did. I honestly didn’t have any idea just how behind the times it was.
Acting Class lecture
The class went as expected. I gave my story which seems to be getting longer and longer as time passes. I guess I am going to have to decide what high points are the ones that I want to talk about; there are just too many good things. The class was full of novices, amateurs, and a few professional amateurs, so they mostly didn’t mind hearing my harrowing tale about how I went from a rusty photographer to an actual award-winning filmmaker/screenwriter. Those stories always go over great when the folks in the room have nothing to compare them to, lol.
Kendra went well with the background
I brought all of my gear this time around. Most of the time I just bring a camera, and that’s it, but I am tired of not being able to hear the folks or having poor lighting washing out the contrast. I set up a basic two-point lighting system, my boom mic, and recorder with the help of my screenwriter. The cool part is that the class was being held at the local photographer community room, so I was able to get a backdrop that wasn’t a bare egg-shell colored wall. Always a plus.
I set up both cameras, the a7III, and the a77, as an A and B camera. A is always the best camera with the lesser picking up slack where needed. The first thing I noticed was that the a77 had way too much contrast in it. The settings for that camera have the contrast set to -3; it was still way too much. The a7III was set to the same settings but with demonstrably less contrast and way better skin tone overall. This made it very difficult to edit the color in post. I guess I am going to have to boost the contrast on the a7III if I am ever going to get them to match without breaking the footage in post.
The contrast on the a77 is as low as it can go, the a7III is reduced by two (there are three in total)
The sharpness of the images.
Since there was only one camera operator (me) and only one director (also me) not all the a77 shots came out super sharp as I wasn’t overly concerned with it being in focus for every frame like I was with the a7III, my primary camera. It is a bit of an unfair comparison between the two cameras. The a77 is the best technology of 2011 competing with the best of 2018: the a7III. You probably already guessed part of it. I had the a7III set to record 4k while the a77 can only do a decent 1080p. Just as a matter of fact, the a7III is going to be a much sharper and more color neutral image.
Putting some Lightroom Color Correction on the stills killed the detail in the a77
As far as noise is concerned, there is no comparison. The full frame a7III will always outperform the crop sensor of the a77. I was expecting more out of my old war-horse though. I set the ISO to 400, and it was beyond terrible. The a7III had to have it’s ISO on 100 as it is an over-achiever when it comes to light sensitivity. The lenses, well, there is another rub. This is why I am not going to pixel peep in this review. I left on the Sony kit lens of 18-50mm on the a77 that isn’t that great while using a brand new Sony 50mm on the a7III. There just isn’t any way to critique the image with that going on. I chalk most of the sharpness up to prime vs. zoom and 4k.
Zooming in on the noise lets us know just how much there is.
Interestingly, there is quite a bit of speculation that the a7III footage in 4k at 8-bit color is actually akin to 10 bit color in a 16x9 format. You know what, I believe it. You see, it wasn’t the inability to adjust the color on the a7III that got in my way, it was the a77. To make them match at all, I had to color the 4k footage to match the 1080p stuff. Just another lesson learned. Thank God it happened on a day that I was goofing off and not at a paid shoot.
Of course, both cameras have built-in microphones. The exciting thing here is that the a77 has better audio than the a7III. I have also noticed this on professional shoots using the a7III with a microphone plugged into the audio-in jack. The a77 just does a much better job at handling the input and controlling the auto gain than the a7III. Yes, I know, only crazy people use the audio input jack to capture the main audio. All I can say is that when you’re a one-man band, you gotta sacrifice something or it will take all day.
Sony did update the color space the camera records, thank God. For those of us with the right eye, ALL Sony cameras had a slight green tint to them that you had to color-correct every time you would go on a shoot. With this camera, I have never had to do that. The color is better in every way in the a7III.
Everything being considered, I am glad I have the Sony a7III. I am delighted that I have the Sony a77 as well. After all, it’s better to have two cameras rolling instead of one.
Sony A7III and Lots and Lots of birds.
One other thing that really makes me happy about the a7III is the amount of detail the stills retain when under exposed. Sony always does a good job at keeping detail in the blacks. Just like a RED camera, the Sony holds up when underexposed but really can’t deal effectively with over-exposure when compared to their counterparts. But really, I shoot dark all the time, it’s my style, so this camera makes my life so much easier in post.
This weekend was busy! My wife wanted to go to the Harry Potter convention here in town, so we had to go to bed early and get up like any other weekday without sleeping in. I know, such a rough life. It was pretty cool, the convention. I like the movies, but I’m not as big into HP as a lot of the folks there. One thing I found really interesting was the Raptors.
Wait, what? It’s a Harry Potter convention…
No! Not those kind of Raptors!
The Raptor Rescue from Conway brought them up because, you know, Hedwig.
Owls are part of the Raptor family of birds, and they are cool. They started off by sitting outside the Town Center, and everyone got a close look at them. My favorite? The Owls, of course.
As a photographer, I am happy with these pictures, but I am even more impressed with the quality of the camera I have. I have a new Sony a7III, and it really makes me not miss my “crop” sensor a77 that I’ve been shooting on for years. I shot all these photos with my Sony 50mm off the shelf Prime lens. Nothing special to it, just a run of the mill lens. But the quality is so good, way better than what I am used to. The Sony a7III is a full frame camera with about 20 stops of exposure built in.
Almost all of these shots on this page are cropped. Not just cropped in, but SUPER cropped. Here is the full photo of the Horned Owl.
Now, Here is just cropping in on the eyes.
It’s not precisely Pixel Peeping, but I am really stoked about the resolution of this camera.
One other thing that really makes me happy about the a7III is the amount of detail the stills retain when underexposed. Sony always does an excellent job of keeping detail in the blacks. Just like a RED camera, the Sony holds up when underexposed but really can’t deal effectively with over-exposure when compared to their counterparts. But really, I shoot dark all the time, it’s my style, so this camera makes my life so much easier in post.
These shots were mostly outside with the bright sky behind the subject. The photos were able to expose well and with very little noise. I was just running and gunning with these shots so let's not judge the shooter, ok?
As shot with no adjustments.
Fully exposed and adjusted. I even brought up the exposure more than I usually would.
In Lightroom, you can get even closer with the RAW photo, and I looked really hard and could not find any noise what-so-ever. Ok, maybe a keener eye might find defects, but they would be hard pressed.
Then we were off to see my father. It was his birthday on Saturday, and they had a little wine.
I noticed a cool looking thing in front of me on the counter. Since I had my camera with me, I couldn’t help myself.
I think this might be a shot I set up later for a product type shot. Better lighting, cleaner glasses, and probably not a wine stain, leaking down the label. But you know, it kinda works.
So, we all went out to eat for his birthday to an ok restaurant in Springdale that is kinda famous. It has been host to three Presidents and the latest season of “True Detective” on HBO, the AQ Chicken House.
Al and Vivian (Mom and Dad)
Kelli in all her Harry Potter stuff
CRAZY Chicken statue in the lobby of AQ Chicken House.
Still using the 50mm for all these shots, I was able to pull the detail out of them without sacrificing image quality even under some of the worst photographic conditions you can think of. Not too shabby.
The next day, it was finally sunny, but it was Sunday and Screenwriting day. Donald and I spent almost ten hours talking over just the opening image of our latest screenplay. UG!
He was running behind so that morning I went out and shot with my Tamron 70-300 zoom I bought for my a77. Fortunately, I thought far enough ahead to purchase the full frame version of the lens, so It works perfectly. The only problem I do have with it is that the lens information doesn’t pass through to the camera. Oh well. I can see the aperture but nothing else.
Since I couldn’t really go for a photo walk or leave the driveway (remember, I was waiting for Donald to show up), I decided to get some photos of the Cardinals and Robins that live in my yard, and of course, they weren’t around, so I had to wait on them too. With my patience rewarded I did get a few shots.
It was such a busy weekend that I had to include everything that went on in one post, I guess. Maybe I am just being a little lazy and not separating it all out into a daily thing, but as you can tell, I am really more interested in the photography of the weekend than I am Harry Potter stuff, but whatever.
Quick journey through the fresh snow.
It snowed in North West Arkansas today so I went out into the cold with my camera and found some pretty interesting colors amidst all the white.
It is brutally cold here in the south. I know, I know… folks in Minnesota are used to being cryogenically-frozen until spring, but this is the south, my dear. We have brutally hot summers where the humidity is so high we sometimes have to wear scuba gear to breath, but our winters only get into the teens and twenties for a few days, and you know, we just ain't used to it. LOL. The good news for us, here in North West Arkansas, is that it snowed a little. Not a vast snow, just a good dusting that made everyone think it snowed.
Since there was a layer of white stuff on top of everything today, I figured I better get out and take a photograph or two. I enlisted my father (who is in his seventies) because my Mustang GT might just get stuck and his giant Dodge Ram probably won't. He and I bundled up and headed out.
The first place I stopped was Lake Fayetteville. It is easy to get to and just deserted enough to test the roads for ice. The calmness of the lake seemed the best place to start.
The cold touch of winter
While this photo is good, it isn't what I expected I would get, and I wanted to do better. When taking a photograph, its all about contrast. Not the contrast slider in your phone's photo editing app that can be taken too far and usually is, but about the contrast of the subjects. Being that winter in Arkansas is typically cold and grey with brown dominating all the scenes where green is overabundant in the summer. Things need to stand out when you take a photograph and not dominate.
I kept looking for something better, something that may spark my interest. I wasn't hitting on all cylinders by my eye caught the wavy vanishing point just to my right.
Wavy lines of man
But really, that wasn't what I was looking for, and it really isn't up to the standards I have set for myself.
Telling this to my father, he started the truck and headed south to the Boston Mountains. I was worried about this trek into the pretend mountains (they are really just very rugged and steep hills) as it is challenging to find the right viewpoint without traveling across private property. He assured me that there has to be something worth taking a photo of. So, off we went, but first, we visited Mount Sequoya in Fayetteville.
Usually, you can get a great photograph of the entire downtown of Fayetteville Arkansas from way up on top of the hill, but just not today. It seems that the upkeep of this particular spot has fallen short this winter, add to that the other sightseers and a persistent haze, it really didn't look all that great. NEXT TIME!
Old main was obscured by overgrown trees and a persistent haze.
I did get this cute photo of the guest house, though. It makes me want to go watch "Its a Wonderful Life" for some reason.
But then we decided to go south. Visit the river and follow it as far as we could stand. It was worth it. While not all my efforts were print worthy, for this blog, I think most of them will do.
Even better was that the cold of the day caused the water in the river to turn emerald green and turquoise. FUN!
But the best one, as it always is, was Devil’s Den State Park waterfall. It never lets you down.
Always running, this waterfall is great, any time of year.
After that, though, I was just too cold. We headed home and had some stew and got warmed up.