Perseid Meteor Showers

I took a nap from 9:00 - 11:30 pm and awoke to take some night sky of the Perseid Meteor Showers. I wasn't fortunate enough to capture interesting meteors. I started shooting around midnight at Sand Beach, moved to Ocean Drive at 1:00 am and the final destination of Cadillac Mountain around 2:15 am. I found some nice folks star/meteor gazing and thought they would make a nice photo under the stars. They are Tricia, Amanda, Matt, and Kasey from Buffalo, NY and they were craving chicken-wings at 2:40 am.

Under the stars, Cadillac Mountain - Acadia Photo Safari

I'll take you through the post-proccess of this shot.  This is straight out of the camera. I use tungsten for my white balance setting.

 

 

Under the stars, Cadillac Mountain - Acadia Photo Safari

I started Lightroom with toning down the foreground and leveling the horizon. Then I brought the image into Nik - Define to smooth out some graininess, my ISO was at 2500. 

 Under the stars, Cadillac Mountain - Acadia Photo Safari

Now it's time to bring out the details with Nik - Color Efects Pro:
   -  Tonal Contrast gives the image a little punch
   -  Detail Extractor brings out the detail in the stars and foreground

 

To finish this image, I did a tad more in Lightroom: took down some highlights in the blanket, cloned out some odd lights or sensor noise, added skin-tone color to the faces. Here's the finally image.

Under the stars, Cadillac Mountain - Acadia Photo Safari

EXIF data: Nikon D800, Nikon 24-70mm @ 24mm, f/2.8, 25 sec, ISO 2500, 08/13/13, 2:41 AM

 

Bar Harbor Fog Bank

Bar Harbor Fog Bank, original image

I was fortunate to attend the George B. Dorr Society event held by Friends of Acadia yesterday.   This year they decided to take us on a cruise to "The Hop", only accessible at low tide from Long Porcupine Island. It was a great intimate event with David MacDonald and Sheridan Steele among the participants. I had a great time and got to eat as many lobster rolls as I wanted! Back to the photography - on the way back to Bar Harbor we were headed into a fog bank with the prominent island mountains protruding from the fog. Here's my shot and the post-processing that followed.

Bar Harbor Fog Bank, with Nik Viveza

Using Nik Viveza: 

  • Added structure and saturation to clouds and sky
  • Added structure to the water
  • Add 4% warmth to overall picture

In Lightroom (I usually edit in Lightroom first, but I wanted to see if the image had potential - so I jumped right into Viveza):

  • Straighten the horizon
  • In Photoshop cloned out (with content aware) two lobster buoys

Bar Harbor Fog Bank, with Lightroom and Photoshop

The final image after editing with Nik Color Effects Pro using the 'Howie trio' of: Tonal Contrast, Skylight Filter, and Detail Extractor (DE - only on the sky, the water was fine just the way it was). Also a touch of post-crop vignetting in Lightroom.

Bar Harbor Fog Bank - Final Image, after Nik Color Effects Pro

EXIF data: Nikon D800, Nikon 24-70mm @ 27mm, f/13, 1/160 sec, ISO 320, 07/29/13, 1:06 PM

Jordan Pond Path

Crouching Doug, Jordan Pond, Acadia National Park

Years ago my friend Doug had taken a picture around the Jordan Pond area of the path and split tree boardwalks.  Yesterday, I asked him to show me where that was. There were many times during the walk Doug said, " I think it's just ahead."  We found plenty of other areas to keep us busy during the hike to this special spot. When we arrived, I didn't even realize it, until Doug pointed out the spot. I mean I would have walked right past it!  

I was shooting handheld (no tripod). In all took 16 pictures of this scene, it's rare that I only take one picture at a given scene. Below is the first picture and the one I liked best (the one I decided to post-process). 

The first and best of the series: 

 

first shot at Jordan Pond Path

best shot of Jordan Pond Path, Acadia National Park

Here is the best shot, after some editing in Lightroom with these adjustments: 

best shot after lightroom, Jordan Pond Path, Acadia National Park

  • Cropped most of the first break in the boardwalk
  • Cropped so left tree was silhouetted
  • Straighten image, so left tree was straight  
  • Increased exposure .25
  • Decreased exposure with brush on the boardwalk hot spots
  • Increase white balance temp - for warmth

The final post-processed image after running the Lightroom image through Nik Color Effect Pro with these adjustments: Tonal Contrast, Skylight Filter, and Detail Extractor.

final image post-process, Jordan Pond Path, Acadia National Park

EXIF data: Nikon D800, Nikon 24-70mm @ 34mm, f/4.5, 1/80 sec, ISO 400, 07/27/13, 8:48 AM 

Testing The Connection

Chasm Brook Falls, Acadia National Park

I would like to post a blog and have it uploaded to FaceBook.  Also I would like to add and an image to represent my work.  Tom and I setup to take this picture while scouting Chasm Brook Bridge for the  Painting Bridges project.  Later I will update this post and see the effects on FaceBook.

When we did the bridge shot there was only a trickle of water from the falls.  Tom and I hit it right after a hard rainfall.