Category Archives: By Subject

Pentax K200D, Sigma 10-20mm f4.0-5.6, Urban

Yonge St, Toronto

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Yonge St, Toronto, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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Seeing Toronto

This is from when I first arrived in Toronto. My wife and I got ourselves a CityPass which allows you entry into the most popular attractions in the city at a reduced cost. I can highly recommend the CityPass, as you save an awful lot over paying the individual entry fees. One of the places a Toronto CityPass will get you into is CN Tower. The viewing area there gives an amazing outlook over the city, Lake Ontario and the islands.

The View

This is a shot looking North from the tower over the Toronto Entertainment District, with the Financial District on the right, and the line of building’s stretching towards the horizon is Yonge St. I had originally posted this shot to flickr in colour, but about 3 weeks later I was reviewing all the photos I had taken since we arrived, and decided to give black and white a try. I made a virtual copy in Lightroom, converted to black and white then adjusted the levels somewhat to come up with this image. I think it works much better than the colour version.

In Colour

Yonge St from above

Brenizer Panorama, Pentax K200D, Tair-11a, Urban

Newspaper? Recropped?

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Newspaper – recrop, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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I received a suggestion that perhaps a cropping of my previously posted photograph “Newspaper?” would improve the result. If you would like to know how I produced this photograph, please read the original article.

What Do They Know?

Initially I thought “No way, are you kidding? It’s perfect!” as someone often does when considering their own work. After a short amount of consideration, I opened Lightroom and made this crop. Though I remained unconvinced I thought I would publish the recrop anyway.

Maybe They Were Right

Now that it comes down to a comparison, I do believe I prefer this crop to the original. I think it highlights the point of focus and the out of focus effect of the image more than the original. I think this crop also shows more clearly what the subject of the photograph is.

What About You?

So which do you prefer? This one? Or the original? And why?

HDR, Landscapes, Pentax DA 18-55 AL II, Pentax K200D

Sunrise at Lake Moogerah

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Sunrise at Lake Moogerah, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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Here is a very old shot. I took this on my Lake Moogerah camping trip, early morning, mist rising off the lake, a few clouds about…

What more could you ask for?

This is quite harsh HDR processing, it has brought out a bit of noise, and makes the clouds seem a bit dark and threatening. Normally I don’t go for this more extreme processing, but it just seemed to work best for this image.

The shot was blended from 3 exposures taken at +/- 2.0 EV using my Pentax K200D and the old kit lens Pentax DA 18-55mm AL II (I sold this lens a while back now). The blending was done using Photomatix, tone mapping was done using the Details Enhancer method and final editing was done in Lightroom.

Architecture, Pentax K200D, Sigma 10-20mm f4.0-5.6

Osgoode Hall

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Osgoode Hall B&W, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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Doors Open

This photo shows Osgoode Hall and was taken during Doors Open Toronto. Osgoode Hall is found on the corner of University Av and Queen St West in downtown Toronto. This previous post is from inside the Great Library of this building.

Colour or Black & White?

I originally posted this shot to Flickr in colour, but looking at later I realized it would probably work even better in black & white. I think it does, what do you think? Black & White or Colour?

Photo Details

The photo is a single exposure, taken with my Pentax K200D and Sigma 10-20mm f4.0-5.6 lens at full wide 10mm. The only editing was levels and cropping in Lightroom.

Brenizer Panorama, Pentax K200D, Tair-11a, Urban

All You Can Eat

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All You Can Eat, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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Saturday Morning Photography

So here is another Tair-11a brenizer method shot from my Saturday morning pre-rain wander down University Av. I spotted this little sign and phone off a side street and decided it was interesting. I wanted to get this in 1 shot, but some objects in the foreground meant I had to get closer, which turned it into yet another Brenizer method photograph.

Failure

It actually took me 3 goes to get this shot right. It really has been a while since I have been out shooting. This image is made up of 12 photographs, all taken at f2.8 with my Tair-11a 135mm lens on my Pentax K200D body. I made sure the body was in manual mode, this is to ensure an even exposure across the panorama image. I set the manual aperture on the lens to f2.8, for minimum depth of field, then set the exposure to suit the part of the scene which I was most interested in (the phone in this case). Finally I started shooting the panorama images required. For some strange reason on my first attempt I forgot to focus the image properly, it must have looked ok through the viewfinder, but as I was walking away I did a quick check on the camera screen, and promptly returned for a 2nd attempt.

Fail Again

The 2nd attempt failed because I was rushing, and the shutter speed was too slow, meaning I had a bit of blur from my shaky hands messing up the images. Again I noticed this as I went to walk away whilst checking the image on the camera.

Success

Finally on the 3rd attempt, I adjusted the ISO up from 100 to 200, giving me a faster shutter speed. I slowly and carefully shot the panorama, keeping my hands steady and relaxed. This time I checked the shots before I started walking away, and was finally happy with the results.

Processing

For processing I used Lightroom to export the original RAW files to TIFF format, which I then stitched using Autopano Giga, and then made a few minor levels adjusts and cropped the image after re-importing into the Lightroom library. Enjoy!

Landscapes, Pentax K200D, Tamron 17-50mm f2.8

Niagara Falls

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Niagara Falls, originally uploaded by jezza323.

A close up shot of the Horseshoe (Canadian) Falls at Niagara Falls. You can really see the power of the water here!

I went for an early morning walk on our last day (Victoria Day) while there were not too many people about. It was a beautiful clear sunny morning, but the spray was quite intense, and the harsh light made for difficult shooting conditions. I walked up to the falls, then took this shot on the way back.

This was a single exposure, taken with my Pentax K200D and Tamron 17-50mm len with a Kenko Pro-Digital CPL filter fitted. All editing (levels and tiny straighten) were done in Lightoom 3.

Architecture, Pentax K200D, Tamron 17-50mm f2.8

Skylon Tower

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Skylon Tower, originally uploaded by jezza323.

This was taken from our hotel room when we spent the Victoria Day weekend down at Niagara Falls.

Skylon Tower is an observation tower built overlooking both the falls at Niagara. It is quite a sight all lit up at night.

I took this one handheld (I have no tripod anymore – see here for why) but it came out very sharp anyway. I pushed the ISO to 1600 (the highest my old K200D goes) and kept the lens as wide as I dared. The camera’s inbuilt Shake Reduction function also helped a lot for this shot. The exposure was 0.1s @ f4.0. Unfortunately I forgot to remove my Kenko Protection filter, so there are a few slight reflections doubling up in the shot. This happens with night shots as light reflects off the front lens element, then off the inside of the filter and back into the camera.

I edited this single exposure in Lightroom 3. I made use of the Noise Reduction, which is much improved from Lightroom 2. I also played with the levels and gave the shot a slight crop.

HDR, Landscapes, Pentax K200D, Tamron 17-50mm f2.8

American Falls

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American Falls, originally uploaded by jezza323.

This is the American Falls at Niagara Falls, viewed from the Canadian side of the border. I took this one quite late in the evening, on an after dinner walk. I was so stuffed full of food I had to walk some of it off.

This is a 3 shot HDR, taken at +/- 2.0 EV with the Pentax K200D and Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 lens.

I blended the shots with Photomatix and made some final adjusts in Lightroom.

Brenizer Panorama, Pentax K200D, Tair-11a, Urban

Newspaper?

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Newspaper?, originally uploaded by jezza323.

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I managed to beat the rain out and about in Toronto this morning. Its been a while since I been out just to take photos. Its good to be back on the horse!

This is a Brenizer panorama I took of some newspaper and magazine stands near St Patrick Subway Station in downtown Toronto. This one was 93 separate shots, all taken with my Pentax K200D and Tair-11a 135mm f2.8 lens. I set the camera to Manual, dialed in the correct exposure and then started shooting.

I imported the RAW files into Lightroom from the SD card. Next I exported the images as TIFF files to a separate folder (to make the stitching process quicker, I exported the TIFFs to only 1280×1280 max size), which I then ran Autopano over to generate the final panorama. Finally I imported the panorama back into Lightroom, made a final crop, distortion and level adjustment. The image is still slightly distorted, but this comes from the projection of the panorama, and I wasnt quite able to get it spot on.

If you like this shot, check out my Tair-11a lens review and my post about the Brenizer Method / Bokeh Panorama technique.

Landscapes, Pentax K200D, Tamron 17-50mm f2.8

Time for a Merlot

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Time for a Merlot, originally uploaded by jezza323.

I took this one in the rain, on a nice Sunday spent on a Niagara Wine Tour. The tour was great, it was a small group. We visited 4 wineries, and got an accidental (free) 3 wine tasting at lunch as well!

This shot was taken at the 2nd winery we visited, Reif Estate Winery in Niagara. They had there rows neatly labelled, which compelled me to take a photo. This is a single shot, taken with my Pentax K200D and Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 lens at 50mm and f3.5

As you can see it was early spring and the vines were just starting to shoot for the new season. I am looking forward to going back to the Niagara On The Lake area, maybe on a bicycle and having more of a look around.