2012, Day 197 - Crotch shot!

I love Portland at night.  This shot was taken near the rail yard in North Portland where I-5 and I-405 meet. The cloud formations were great and you can almost feel the crispness of the air.  Despite the sounds of traffic it was almost relaxing...

Canon 1D Mark IV, Canon 17-40/f4L
17mm, f5.6, 10 sec @ 320 ISO

2012, Day 79 - Before and after

I thought tonight I would post a little before and after.  This is another photo from Saturday night taken where I-405 and I-5 intersect.  Last night I posted a photo of the highways taken from a distance and is the same place but taken from a different angle.  I am astonished that what looks so well-ordered from a distance appears to be a chaotic mess close up.

Below the processed (over-processed?) finished photo is the image straight out of the camera with the only adjustment being for white balance.  From there I toned to add texture, ran a high pass filter to create definition, and then an exposure overlay to balance out the lightness of the intersecting roads.  The result is a high contrast and slightly gritty/dirty looking urban scene!

Canon 1D Mark IV, Canon 17-40/f4L
17mm, f8, 8 sec @ 200 ISO

Leaving Davis in HDR

HDR stands for high dynamic range and it is a process by which multiple shots of the same scene are combined, each one exposed different, in order to get the most details in the highlight and shadow areas. On my way out of Davis I stopped a few times to take pictures and decided to play with HDR :)

A leafless tree in the UC Davis arboretum.

A frozen pond.

A cozy looking ranch just off of I-5.

The same ranch, in portrait.