Photograph of the Month at 20% Off - September 2010

Photo Tip of the Month - August 2010

Landscape photography with impact requires an interesting foreground and compelling lighting. Ideally the foreground leads the viewer into and through the photograph.

In this seascape photograph I tried multiple compositions but in the end decided to place the driftwood in the foreground. The dark color of the wood enhanced the B&W photography. The low sun provided beautiful warm lighting with long shadows that I built into the composition. Multiple times I released the shutter and waited for the incoming waves to perfectly align in to the horizon. I used the sky formation to close the loop for the viewer's eye between the driftwood, waves, and the clouds.

At Frenchman's Bay Maine

Twelve Orchids

In Bar Harbor Maine

A couple of weeks ago I visited Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park. Great times and I highly recommend a visit if you are nearby. Besides being a prime landscape photography location you can expect biking on the park's car-free carriage roads, hiking the mountainous surrounding terrain, kayaking the lakes or ocean and enjoying the exquisite Maine cuisine. During one of the evenings, I witnessed a spectacular sunset unfolding while I was making my way along the shore path towards the harbor. At half way you could tell, it would be a stunning night with fantastic lighting conditions for seascape photography. On the way I snapped a few photos of the four-mastered schooner, The Margret Todd, which was painted by the golden evening light while sailing Frenchman's Bay. When I made it to the harbor piers a jar dropping sunset over the mountains and harbor was in full swing. I took in the full spectacle and enjoyed every second of it! The sky turned into a beautiful purple once the sun fully set and the direct light disappeared. The reflecting water provided soft lighting on the moored fishing and sail boats. While photographing the harbor scene I had to adjust the camera ISO setting from 50 to 100 to compensate for the fading light and the shutter speed being too low for a hand-held shot. I then zoomed out to 28mm, laid the horizon real low to build a stronger foreground and maximizing the magical sky in the photograph, kept the camera as steady as possible on a pier pile and snapped a couple of exposure bracketed series of photographs before the magic ended seconds later.

In Cambridge

Location: Mount Auburn Cemetery
F-stop: f/4.5
Exposure Time: 1/80 second
Exposure Compensation: 1/3 stop underexposed
Others: Tripod, polarizing filter

At the 2010 Boston Arts Festival

My landscape and flower photography was juried into the 2010 Boston Arts Festival (ahts) and will be displayed at the event. The arts festival will take place on Friday, Saturday & Sunday, September 10, 11, 12, 2010 in the beautiful and idyllic Christopher Columbus Park. The Christopher Columbus Park is conveniently located between the Boston Aquarium and the North End on Boston's waterfront. It's a perfect location for a fun day outing in Boston. Feel free to stop by my booth for a chat and enjoy the visual and performing arts of Boston presented at the festival.

At Bar Harbor

The photograph of The Margaret Todd, a four-masted schooner, was taken on a misty day in Bar Harbor, Maine. The Margaret Todd carries nine sails on her four masts and is quite a local attraction, offering sailing trips around Frenchman's Bay. This day the beautiful schooner was quietly moored at its Bar Harbor summer dock. The backdrop was pure fog slowly creeping into the harbor. When the fog reached the schooner, the sun broke through the clouds, providing beautiful back-light for the sail boat. Sun spots were reflected in the ocean water. I instantly decided not to let the moment pass and since I had left my tripod in the trunk of my car I scanned my surroundings for a sturdy tripod replacement structure. Luckily I did not need to look far and the pier pile worked fine. I zoomed out to approximately 28 or 35 mm and started composing the image, feeling that the pier added significantly to the appeal of the photograph. A chosen f-stop of 7.1 provided a fast shutter speed of 1/640 seconds that ultimately let me forget all my tripod worries. I took multiple images and applied exposure bracketing in 1/3 steps. I worked off the underexposed 1/3 step image and applied minor adjustments to contrast, color saturation and sharpened to the image during digital post processing.

At the Photographer's Forum Magazine

Orchids was selected as one of the finalists in the Photographer's Forum Magazine 30th Annual Spring Photography contest and will be published in the hardcover book Best of Photography 2010. Winners will be announced August 16, 2010.

Photograph of the Month at 20% Off - August 2010