Jim shared images he took during the La Jolla Cove meet-up Feb 9th to photograph pelicans, osprey and cormorants. In February, these birds exhibit breeding behavior and colors. Quail and Black Cardinal photos were from a recent February Joshua Tree camping weekend. He also spent some time out in the cold, photographing the full blood moon lunar eclipse. It was partly cloudy but he was able to get intermittent photos during the cloud breaks.
Last meeting, Jim shared ~10 favorite images of 2024. This month he shared several Passion Projects images – he has many ongoing eclectic projects. Trees – he loves photographing trees and the Salton Sea/Bombay Beach are just two continuing subjects he photographs. Minimalism is another genre he wanted to try after watching a YouTube video on long exposure black& white seascape photography. So during a recent La Jolla Cove meetup to photograph cormorants and pelicans, he brought a tripod and did some long exposure oceanscapes.
Jim shared his favorites of 2024, some seen before but re-processed, and others that were overflow from previous meetings. Meaning, with the 10 image limit per meeting, these were ones that were cut for time.
Jim used a small on-camera flash and long exposure to both freeze and blend time, a technique he hadn’t used in a long time. The results are unpredictable but, fortunately unlike film, when using a digital camera, you can review the results. Then adjust the flash intensity to blend with ambient light and subject distance to reduce the flash “blitz”. His favorite shot almost didn’t happen – the Naruwan Taiko drummers were performing for December Nights so he photographed the finale of the show using a slow shutter speed and flash. Although he took several shots, one was a keeper.
Jim also shared a photo from a Lake Skinner Thanksgiving trip & hummingbird photo taken at the zoo before December Nights. Here’s the images he shared:
I (Jim) had a busy 4 weeks since the last meeting. Wanting to catch the Oct 17-18 Supermoon and Comet A3, I traveled inland for the weekend to find clearer skies. Unfortunately, the Santa Ana Winds were howling Friday, causing extremely hazy conditions the first day of shooting the Supermoon and comet. Day 2 was spent photographing Salton Sea’s Bombay Beach in the late afternoon & evening. This solo outing ended with photographing Comet A3 over Salton Sea after sunset. Day 3 started at the Palm Springs Air Museum – a great place for plane photos. Then I headed to Joshua Tree National Park for astrophotography, hoping to catch the Milky Way with Comet A3. It was a very enjoyable & successful 3-day photography trip.
The Dia de los Muertos Nov 2nd Old Town San Diego celebration was another fun photography outing. I enjoyed the meet-up although I wandered off in search of images (and missed the margarita break). One thing about joining other photographers on such an outing and separating, is you get to see their perspective of the same event. After viewing their images, I feel I need to zoom in and capture more closer detailed portraits. I tend to include all the costume detail and really liked their tighter perspective. I shared 12 images but include a few more here. Astrophotos were taken with a Nikon Z8 & Z7II with 105mm f2.8, 50mm f1.8, 20mm f1.8, and 16mm f1.8 lenses. Salton Sea/Bombay Beach & Palm Spring Air Museum were taken with a Fujifilm XPro2 with 10-18mm Sigma f2.8 lens (15-27mm effectively).
I participated in the full moon meetup on Sept 17th at Ski Beach Mission Bay. Photographing the moon during blue hour is always challenging especially when there are clouds. Fortunately, there was only a narrow band of low clouds above the moon horizon. With some post-processing and compositing of my moon over USD campus, here are my best images so far.
To follow the Above/Below theme, I went to Oceanside Harbor beach in search of shore birds. There were none so I made the best of it, opting to shoot surfers from the jetty. Fortunately, with a low tide and great conditions, I spent 90mins capturing thousands of images. Shooting from the jetty will hopefully qualify as “Above” eye-level. Surf photography is something I’ve wanted to do since seeing Barbara’s award winning photo she showed in August.
Since I setup the themes, I tried to represent and share at least one image that fits. The hardest was artificial light – I hoped to get out and photograph some neon nightscapes but it didn’t happen. I did photograph some shows at night and dusted off my Panasonic point-n-shoot. It’s the only type of camera that is allowed in concert or show venues other than cell phones. Cell phones do a great job but to have an equivalent 500m lens helps get some tighter-in shots. Unfortunately, the slower lens aperature is not great for capturing fast action like Olympic gymnasts. But overall, I am happy with the results especially after post-processing noise-reduction.
I also included some AppArt photos: Brushstroke and Waterlogue are the apps I play with. Photo purist would balk at their use but I consider myself more of a visual artist. I’ll use whatever tools and software are available to me. One exception – completely AI-created images – that’s where I draw the line.
Other artificial light images are photos taken in Tokyo’s TeamLabs immersive/interactive art installations. The lighting effects were phenomenal and the photos cannot do them justice. This is a must-visit if you are in Tokyo.
Jim used the iPhone app Brushstroke to apply a illustration-style effect for his photos.
I have been struggling to be motivated to take photos lately. The monthly meetings are actually motivation for me to make an effort to take my camera out. Without my usual travels lately, I’ve felt less interested in photographing locally. That’s a mistake. Fortunately a lack of theme-related images in my archives for this month’s “summer/beach” motivated me to bring my camera during a beach walk. People-watching at the beach can be fascinating with such a diverse crowd. Trying to catch moments with your camera is fun and challenging. Here are a few of my recent favorites:
Many of us rely on finding theme-related images in our photo archives is we are unable to take new ones. The recent warm weather makes taking your camera out less appealing. But motivation is one thing about being a member of the photography interest group. You often push yourself to get out an take new photos.
I did both this month, relying on some recent photos from my 2023 trip to Japan, and a local photo ‘walk-about’. I’ve been wanting to do some macro photography using the focus shift feature of my camera. So I setup on some flora I spied when walking the dog. Like astrophotography, macro photography takes some practice especially when using focus-shift on windy afternoons. So like astrophotography, macro photography will be something I’ll do more to get better. The local walk-about was to an area of Oceanside where I thought I might find some color – wall murals are common near the beach. I loved that a few of the photos I shared were a little bit better because of happy accidents. A bright orange car and bicyclist riding by the Cafe 101 mural; the train reflecting between the algae mats at Buccaneer Beach Bridge.
Jim enjoys using Lightroom and Photoshop along with other digital darkroom tools to bring out the best in an image. Practicing processing Milky Way images taken during his recent trip to Yosemite. He’s been learning how to use Starnet++ and StarXterminator with Siril to separate the Milky Way nebula from the stars. This allows the Milky Way to be processed independently from the stars, as separate layers.
For architectural photography, Jim watched a few tutorials on how to convert architectural images into ‘fine art black&white’. So many of the images he shared this month, were black&white high contrast, dark sky images.
