The Grape Poachers

 

My ripest grapes are being stripped from the vine just as the crop seems to be maturing beautifully. Well the poachers have become very brazen. Time to get some netting! I’ve also had to bring in the ripest bunches already, so I can enjoy at least some.

Sounds of Summer Panoramas

Under the Australian Sun

Summer can be hot here in Australia, and today it is supposed to reach 41°C and trying to get a decent photo during much the day just results in a totally bleached out sky. There are basically three solutions-

1. Only Photograph during the golden hours in summer.
2. Take separate photo just of the sky and using blending, masking and compositing insert a sky during post processing.
3. Use a Polarizing Filter

The first option is a bit restrictive, and the second can be a lot of work. I have an old circular polarizing filter it is designed to rotated when screwed onto the front of your lens. I find it pretty much indispensable for any daytime outdoor photos in summer. The polaroid sunglasses use the same principal of filtering sunlight and other strong light source which have reflected off a surface (including the earth atmosphere) and only the light with a particular direction of vibration is reflected so the light is polarized. A suitable filter can reduce this light when place at right angles to this preferred direction (its fairly technical physics) but is easily exploited. Those sunglasses have the polarised direction set to cancel out reflected light off water or surface. The circular polarizer is more flexible on a typical DSLR as you can rotate it to any angle and see the result in the viewfinder. The results are most noticeable at right angles to the sun. There is a good tutorial on using a polarizing filter by Cambridge in Colour.

   

Because the polarizer is removing light (in specific directions) it acts a lot like a neutral density filter making the exposure longer, diffusing the harsh contrast a little and frequently enhancing the colours a little.

A circular polarizing filter is almost a necessity in an Australian summer

PhotoFriday :: The Essence of Summer

It is actually technically winter here in Australian, but no one has told Far North Queensland

 

For PhotoFriday‘s topic Summer

A touch of summer

The weather is clearing, and an unexpected autoawesome HDR* from google+

Changes to sharing via flickr

Speaking of flickr, there have changes going on to the user interface for a while now some are appreciated whilst others are not so welcome. In general I think the changes are fine but one thing I can't find any more is a direct link to share back into here (blogger). There used to be a reasonable process that both format your image and annotated it with a caption and a link back to the original in flickr by just click on a blog this icon, Now the best I can find is via the share icon (a little curved arrow under the right of your image in the single photo). the popup share dialogue is shown on the right. You can still share to a number of "popular site", but google+ and blogger are conspicuously absent. You can however still create some useful HTML code to paste (or Embed) into your post, assuming you know how to do this.

Why I'm discussing this now is I'm back seeking ways to streamline my web participation & sharing, looking for that elusive POSSE Place [Publish (on your) Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere] Known is probably the best solution I've found so far, it certainly is the neatest

PhotoFriday :: Signs Of Summer

Cicada’s are definitely a sign that the heat of summer to come here. The seasonal theme’s in PhotoFriday are a bit of challenge for those of us in the southern hemisphere because down here winter is setting in. Luckily my grandson collected the cases of cicada nymphs as they emerged last November. So here are some memories of summer past.

For PhotoFriday‘s topic Signs of Summer

Probably my last photo for 2013

End Of Summer

End Of Summer, originally uploaded by imageo.

Summer ends in February here in Australian and that month despite being short can be very hot, with everyone waiting for a cool change.

For PhotoFriday‘s topic End of Summer

Late Summer :: Welcome Swallows

 

"Must be about time we headed north?"

Blue with an Australian Summer Intensity

Summer is arriving at last, the hot weather part, and the sky has cleared to its intense blueness. This blue is not that easy to capture with a camera, especially a cameraphone. The problem being, for most of the day in Australia the clear sky will bleach out to white (being the highest intensity light (according to your light meter, when it compares the light to the foreground objects). There are some well established ways to get around this.

1. Use a polarizing filter, works well but these filters can be expensive
2. Expose for the sky, Point the camera high in the sky and half press the shutter release (this performs the exposure and auto-focus on most new digital cameras, set to green or Auto mode). Then pan down to your preferred picture view and press the shutter button all the way down. This keeps the exposure setting of the sky but on your new phone. Most probably you will have a nice sky but the foreground will be blocked out very dark, with little detail. Such dark silhouette can be dramatic but you probably wont be able to tell Arthur from Martha.
3. Use the HDR process to extend the dynamic range of your photo. If you look back through my post you will find this requires taking several exposure of the same image and then post processing these (using special software)

This photo series was taken at 3pm (2pm without daylight saving and about 7 hours before sunset) using the updated HDRCamera app on my android phone. The beauty of this application is that it automatically undertakes the post processing in your smart phone. Ok it does take a while, but the results are usually great, this image for example does captured that warmth and  intense of our summer sky nicely without making a silhouette of the gun tree.

A Pleasant Evening

 
Happy Trees, the early summer weather has been ghreat for trees, some rain, not too many hot winds and reasonable humidity

Boxing Day in the Bush

 

Summer Sunset Silhouette

 

Late summer delights

The last of the day light saving light, a cool breeze, the smell of onions and sausages cooking, high summer is to be savoured. Also the opportunity for nice backlighting

The first full moon of summer

for Photofriday :: stillness