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Blogging Chester County Downingtown HDR Nature Photo Journal Photography Streams

Norwood Road Creek with Logan

It started just like any other morning around the house.

The scramble of breakfast, then off to the bus stop and on to Day Care.

But today, there was going to be a twist.

When Logan and I got to Day Care, we were told that there were electrical issues, and the second floor was without power.

The refrigerators were down and the indoor temperature was already in the 80s, and if I left him, I might be getting a ‘pick-up’ call shortly.

110531 Norwood Road Creek hdr 01
110531 Norwood Road Creek - Follow-Up

So what to do…

After a phone call or two, it was going to be a “Boy’s Day”!

After grabbing donuts at Wawa, we headed home, and spent some time catching up on some cartoons.

As lunch time rolled around, we began to prepare for our walk, and eventually head out.

Finding parking along the road was a breeze, and from there we gathered our gear and head down to the creek, which called for some bush whacking.

Once we where down in the creek, Logan began to explore, and I was able to set up for my first shoot.

Almost…

I left my Neutral Density filters in my bag…

Thankfully, we were still close enough to the car that I could dart back and grab them!

Back at my tripod, I attached my 1.2ND, and started to frame my follow-up shot to my January picture.

In January, this was my last scene of the day, because I had started further downstream.

What made this shoot easier, was the temperature, which was totally opposite. Today, it is in the low 90s with high humidity!

After doing a series of HDR exposures, I called Logan and we started upstream. This was new territory for the both of us.

As we walked up the stream, one could look by the sides and see debris that had washed down through the months. It wasn’t that bad, but it was still sunny to see three beach balls sitting on the side of the stream.

110531 Norwood Road Creek 034 tm 01
Norwood Road Creek - Water Fall 034

I stopped a few times and set up for some small waterfall shots, which served two purposes.

The most obvious being to capture the scene, the second was to stand in the nice cool water!

We also noticed in the many pools of water filled with small little schools of fish swimming away from us as we continued walking upstream.

Logan made many attempts to crack catch them to little avail.

The creek split several times, and we continued to the left all the way up to the exposed manhole, which stood out from the creek bed a good 6 feet.

As we got closer, Logan very excitedly and insistently asked me to put him on top.

The grin on his face when he finally felt secure enough to stand, was ear to ear.

Looking at my watch, we had about a half hour before Madison got home.

I had Logan jumped from the top of the manhole cover into my arms, giggling on his flight down.

Heading downstream, we veered to the right and ventured into more new territory.

As we walked, I asked Logan if he thought Madison would also enjoy this little creek, and he nodded his head in approval.

We splash your way down the stream and finally found where we had started and headed up the little hill back to our car.

Once we were at home, we unpacked our things minutes before Madison walked in the door.

She was bombarded by Logan with “Sissy! Sissy! Guess where we went!”

 

Additional Images

As I was processing my images, the waterfall detail, struck me as a potential candidate for some additional post processing work of dropping out the color and turning it into pure black-and-white image:

110531 Norwood Road Creek 034 tm 01 bw 01a
Norwood Road Creek 034 bw 01a

Here is an additional overview shot of the same scene:

110531 Norwood Road Creek 028 tm 01
Norwood Road Creek 028 - Waterfall Overview

Thanks again for stopping by, and I hope you enjoyed what you have seen!

– Andrew
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Categories
Chester County Downingtown Nature Photo Journal

Changes in the weather…

Storm Clouds - UHES 266 tm
Storm Clouds - UHES 266 tm

It was another Saturday in the later winter, and there were reports that some rain was on it’s way, but by mid afternoon, the kids were too filled with energy to spent any more time inside.

So we packed up the car with Madison’s scooter and Logan’s bike, and we head up to Uwchlan Hill Elementary School to get some fresh air and exercise.

When we got there, we noticed two other families also had the same idea, and were enjoying the usually warm day.

As we walked around the school, playing on the various pieces of equipment, I was continuously pointing my camera to the sky, to capture all the dark storm clouds that were crossing our area.

At first, I let the camera’s sensors take care of the exposure, but in reviewing the images on the little LCD screen, I decided to switch into manual mode, with some setting as high as 1/4000 at F16 ISO 100, which was definitely underexposing the my captures bu 2-3 stops, but at the same time, giving more depth to the clouds as the flew by.

During the outing, I took around 350 images, and when it came time to edit them, I had to look very carefully, 1) because the images were very dark; 2) there were only subtle differences between some of the frames.

I was really surprised to find so few images with lens flair, especially considering that in many cases, I was shooting directly into the sun. What I found very intriguing, was some of the color halos that I was getting around the sun. It was easy to see that I was pushing the limits of the CCD on my camera!

After making my initial selections, I used basic Lightroom corrections to try and enhance the images, which worked in many cases, but I wanted to get a little more.

I then imported some of the images into Photomatix, where I applied mostly default settings in the enhanced tone-map section, plus added a little color temperature warmth to some of the captures.

Looking forward, I plan to use this underexposure technique again when faced with similar scenes, I only hope, that I will be able to hold the foreground detail…

If you are interested, more images can be found in my Flickr Photostream, under “Uwchlan Hills Elementary School (110305)

Andrew (SDC) - View my 'Uwchlan Hills Elementary School (110305)' set on Flickriver

Thanks for stopping by

– Andrew
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Categories
Chester County Creeks Downingtown Flickr HDR Nature Photo Journal Photography Photostream

1,100 Views of my little creek

1,100 Views, 761 Comments, 42 Favs, 2 Galleries
1,100 Views, 761 Comments, 42 Favs, 2 Galleries

As I sit here, trying to heal from another cold, I have been Flickr-ing about, and in doing so, I have noticed that my simple little picture of the small little creek near my house, has reached 1,100 views!

I think back to that day, it was the day after the first snow of the new year, and at the time, I had know idea how this capture would be received.

It just seemed such a simple capture, and simple HDR processing.

• • • • •

Since I posted this pictures, it has received several Flickr group awards that I am very proud to have gotten, including the following:

Andromeda "50"
Andromeda "50"
Elite Club of Photography for Recreation
Elite Club of Photography for Recreation
Above and Beyond - 500+ Comments
Above and Beyond - 500+ Comments

 

Build Your Rainbow Group Member
Build Your Rainbow Group Member

This capture has also allowed me to connect with many more photographers on Flickr, and share our unique visions from around the world.

Dragon Dagger Awards
Dragon Dagger Awards
The Light Painters Society
The Light Painters Society
Chariots of Artists
Chariots of Artists

 

Needless to say, I want to thank again all those that took the time to click on my thumbnail, and paste an award!

– Andrew
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Categories
Announcements Chester County Downingtown Flickr Online Life Pennsylvania Photography

2010 – Downingtown Photo Contest – WINNERS Announced!

I would like to thank all those that participated in the First and hopefully Annual Downingtown, PA Flickr group Photo Contest!

When I originally posted the idea for the contest back in December, I was afraid that it was going to go no where quickly!

But we got 23 entries from 11 different members!

So without further adieu… I present the Winners!

Winner of the 2010 – Downingtown Photo Contest


Autumn Walkway

Nina Cazille with 15 points!

Second Place


Flying

LanieB1966 with 12 points!

Third Place


The Persistence of Memory: Life is So Complicated

Entropic Remnants with 10 points!

Honorable Mentions

Heron
LanieB1966 (9 points)
The Persistence of Memory: The Wheels are Still
Entropic Remnants (8 points)
DSC_0134
shaknpolaroids (7 points)

Thanks again for participating, and another Congratulations for some wonderful images!

Thanks for Sharing!

– Andrew
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Chester County Downingtown Nature Photography

The Rite of Passage (Uwchlan Trail)

Walking into the unknown...
Walking into the unknown…

I had just dropped off my daughter at a birthday party for one of her classmates.

Now I had two hours free!

Before I had left the house, I said to Logan, that when I got back, he needed to be dressed to go for a walk in the woods.

When I got home, he was ready, so I grabbed my camera bag and tripod, hopped back in the car, and drove over to the Jones Pond area of the Uwchlan Township Park on Dowlin Forge Road.

We parked in the little lot next to the pond, and as soon as he was out of the car, he was off toward the trail. Nothing was going to stop him. I only had time to get my camera out before he was beginning to cross the small bridge.

At 4 1/2, Logan loves to go for walks, and it is always fun to go with him.

While I followed him, I began to take hand-held shots of the general area, which still had a lot of snow still stuck on the trees.

As you can see in the above picture, there was  still soft unpacked snow on the trail, and had already been split into two lanes. One for the walkers and the other for cross-county skiers.

I explained to Logan the reason for the two trails, and asked him if he wanted to learn, to which he said yes.  (If you are a skier, the conditions were great.)

The last of the leaves...
The last of the leaves…

When we got to the top of the hill, I stopped to put my camera on my tripod, and start doing some HDR captures.

Looking back down the trail, I was setting up a shoot, when I heard a small little voice from behind me saying – “Daddy, I have to go to the bathroom!”

Thinking the worst, I asked him to be more specific, and was happy to learn, it was going to be an easy remedy.

I proceed to carry him a few feet off the main trail, helped him get prepared, and began his first lesson in snow scripting.

Giggles and laughter were all I heard for the few seconds of the lesson.

When he finished, I got him in order and he was back up the trail.

I continued shooting, concentrating on the long shadows and contrasting sun colored leaves still to hanging to the trees.

Several minutes later, I hear – “Daddy, I have to go to the bathroom!”

“Do you need help??

“No!”

and then endless giggling…

Some late afternoon colors
Some late afternoon colors

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