Category Archives: OUTSIDE FLORIDA

iPhone vs. "big" cameras?

Cameras and Photography, Technique, Utah, VARIOUS, ,

When I’m traveling, I try to take an iPhone photo when I get to a new place.  Sometimes I forget but when I can remember, the iPhone’s GPS capability records the location for me.  Then when I’m back home, it makes it easier to map out exactly where I’ve been.

This is one of the first photo’s I made on our trip out to Utah a few weeks ago:

Cedar Breaks National Monument amphitheaterCedar Breaks National Monument amphitheater iPhone panorama

 When I posted it on Flickr, I commented “Straight out of the iPhone’s panorama mode. I’m not sure why I have all these other cameras.”  And I do like the photo.  Phone cameras do pretty well, especially in good light.  So I wondered …

When I got home and processed the rest of my photos, I took a look at some of the other iPhone images compared with similar images from my “big” cameras (interchangeable lens cameras with larger sensors).  Here’s another example:

Sunrise at Point Supreme, iPhone PanoramaSunrise at Point Supreme, iPhone version – Panorama mode

Although the light was very pretty that morning, it was also very challenging for the iPhone sensor and lens.    I’ve tried to adjust the photo to be as similar as possible to the one below.  But I can still see major differences.  I made the next photo a minute or so later and very near the same spot with an Olympus E-M5 II micro four-thirds camera and the 12 – 40 mm f/2.8 Pro zoom lens.

Sunrise at Point Supreme
Sunrise at Point Supreme – Olympus version – multi image panorama

After looking at several cases where I had similar photos, I think this example shows why we need to keep our big cameras.

  • The exposure latitude and dynamic range capability of sensors that are larger than the one in the iPhone means that the dark areas have more detail and less noise, and the bright areas are less likely to blow out.  For high contrast light (sunrise / sunset) this helps a lot.
  • The lens in the iPhone didn’t handle the flare / glare very well.
  • The resolution capabilities of phone cameras are growing.  But with careful capture, I can create much larger images with the big cameras.  For instance the last photo above is 58 megapixel. The amount of detail in a file that large is enormous compared to a phone photo.
  • Control:  For me, the big cameras beat phone cameras in flexibility / control and ergonomics.  I can easily control everything from lens choice to aperture, ISO, shutter speed, etc.  You can get apps for your phone that add better controls, but I find them inconvenient and don’t often use the ones I have.
  • Color / white balance:  The default color and white balance on the phone are very good.  But when I use the big cameras, I can shoot in RAW format, which makes adjusting white balance and color much easier in post processing.  RAW format also allows more adjustment latitude, since I’m working with a 14 bit file in RAW, instead of an 8 bit jpg file.  RAW is coming to the iPhone soon, which should help.

So there are some reasons why I think big cameras are worth the extra weight / trouble of bringing them along.  I use my phone camera to supplement them.  How about you?

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos!

©2016, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Utah road trip – Chapter 2

OUTSIDE FLORIDA, Utah, , , , ,

As promised, this is the second installment of images from our trip to Utah.  You can revisit chapter one at this link to see photos from Cedar Breaks and Brian Head Peak.  This time, I’ve included images from Bryce Canyon, Zion, Red Canyon, and the road to Capitol Reef.  At the end of the post are two photos MK made.  I don’t often include “behind the scenes” photos, but maybe you’ll like them as much as I do.

Agua Canyon HoodooAgua Canyon Hoodoo, Bryce Canyon National Park

The first four photos in this post are all stitched panoramas.  I found it very hard to fit Utah landscapes into a single frame!  I made the one above with a 200mm equivalent telephoto lens.  I wanted to show a lot of detail in the foreground hoodoo and bring the hazy background closer to make the hoodoo stand out.  I like the result.

Hoodoos watch the sun riseHoodoos watch the sun rise.  Black and white infrared panorama from our drive through Red Canyon on Route 12.

I brought my infrared converted camera on the trip and used it often.  It’s good to have when the visible light gets harsh, since the scene will often look different in IR.  In the composition above, the two almost human looking hoodoos on the top of the cliff drew my eye.  They seemed to be enjoying the sunrise too.  I also liked the way the IR light was hitting the trees and the cliff on the far left.

A switchback near Nepworth WashA switch back near Nepworth Wash, Zion National Park.  

The locals kept warning us about congestion in the parks and there were a lot of people at Zion.  But compared to Orlando we thought the traffic and crowds were pretty light – especially for a holiday weekend.  I composed the frame above to leave two buses and their people mostly out of view on the right.

Desert stormsDesert storms. This is a false color infrared panorama made along Route 12 between Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument and Capitol Reef National Park.  

The clouds and rain storms were awesome on the day we drove over to Escalante and Capitol Reef.  IR does well with clouds.  I like the way the ones above look almost three-dimensional.

And here are the two “behind the scenes” images:

Brian Head Peak
Ed and his Nikon (not too close to the edge!) at 11,307 feet on Brian Head Peak.  Photo by MK Rosack, used with permission
MK and Ed at Rainbow Point, Bryce Canyon
MK and Ed at Rainbow Point, Bryce Canyon – we weren’t very tired at this point in the morning – that came later.  Photo by MK Rosack, used with permission.

If you’re interested, you can see more photos from this trip in my Utah album on Flickr.  And you can click on the ones in the post to see larger versions.  I really enjoyed the tour and definitely want to go back and spend more time in this extremely scenic area.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now, go make some photos!

©2016, Ed Rosack and MK Rosack. All rights reserved.

Epic Utah road trip – Chapter 1

OUTSIDE FLORIDA, Utah, , , , , , , ,

I have many “out of Florida” photos to share with you today from Utah.  MK wanted to take a short sightseeing trip out there over the 4th of July weekend and asked me to be her travel buddy.  Of course, I couldn’t turn that down!  Last year on my trip out west , I passed up seeing Zion and Bryce Canyon because I wanted more time in Death Valley National Park.  I’m glad I got to go back.

Flowers at daybreakFlowers at daybreak – Cedar Breaks National Monument.  We visited this beautiful place twice.  The second time before dawn, when we were the only ones there.

Because this was my first time there and our visit was so short, I’m going to write more of a “travel log” instead of a “what and where they are and how to photograph them”.  I wouldn’t try to write that until I was way more familiar with the area.  I will say that it is spectacularly scenic and if you get a chance, just go.  You’ll find all sorts of things to point your camera at.

The first place we visited was Cedar Breaks National Monument.  It was a surprise to me – I hadn’t really heard of it before.  It’s very scenic and has a lot of wildlife too.  We saw many deer on the trip.  Unfortunately, there were several on the side of the road – we watched carefully to make sure we didn’t hit any.

Morning deerMorning deer

We actually went by Cedar Breaks twice.  The second day, we left early to find a sunrise spot and ended up there.  By ourselves – magnificent!

Sunrise at Point SupremeSunrise at Point Supreme – Cedar Breaks

We were walking through the visitors area and I was looking around in the trees trying to find the bird making a very strange call I didn’t recognize. A nice German gentleman came up to me and pointed out the Marmot that was making the racket. A bit embarrassing – but I did get a photo.

Yellow Bellied MarmotYellow Bellied Marmot

Our bird watching was casual, but I did record one new life bird.

Mountain BluebirdMountain Bluebird – These were quite common at Cedar Breaks National Monument

One other place we wandered to was Brian Head Peak – a very scenic ski town.  You can tell from the first photo and this one that there were lots of wildflowers blooming – a beautiful bonus!

Flowers by the road to the topFlowers by the road to the top – On the way up to 11,000 feet at Brian Head Peak, Utah

Here’s a summary of our trip:

  • 53 hours duration (Saturday morning – Monday evening)
  • 1,091 miles driven
  • 3 National Parks (Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef)
  • 3 National Monuments (Cedar Breaks, Grand Staircase-Escalante, Timpanagos)
  • 1 All-American Scenic Byway (Route 12)
  • 1 life bird (Mountain Bluebird)
  • 1 Yellow-Bellied Singing Marmot
  • 1 Elk
  • Lots of deer
  • 14 stamps for MK’s National Park Service passport
  • 700+ photos
  • 1 epic father-daughter Utah road trip! We were so very tired when we got home!

What a terrific trip – thank you MK! I’m still going through the photos and adding favorites to my Utah album on Flickr.  You can take a look there if you want to see more.  And click on any of the photos in this post  to see a larger version on Flickr.

I’ll work on a post with photos from the other spots next week.  Until then, thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now, go make some photos!

©2016, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Boundary Warp

Maine, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, Technique, , , , , , ,

There’s a new feature in the latest Creative Cloud versions of Lightroom and Camera Raw, and if you stitch together multi-frame panoramas like I tend to, then you should take a close look at it.

It shows up as a new slider called “Boundary Warp” in the “Merge to Panorama” dialog and it’s designed to help fix the empty areas along the edges of some stitched panoramas.  You can see an example in the first image below.

The Tarn - This is a three frame panorama from Acadia National Park that I'd never processed. I used it to test the new "Boundary Warp" feature
The Tarn – This is a three frame panorama from Acadia National Park that I’d never processed. I used it to test the new “Boundary Warp” feature

An easy way to fix this is to crop out the empty portions of the frame, like this:

The Tarn - This version has been cropped to eliminate the missing portions.
The Tarn – I cropped the missing portions out of this version.

But that throws away pixels that you may want to keep.  You can also try to fill in the empty areas with content aware fill or the clone stamp, but that often leaves some anomalies that take time to clean up.

Using the new function is easy.  It keeps all the pixels in the image and warps the edges to fill in empty areas.

The Tarn - I used Boundary Warp on this version to fill in the missing areas.
The Tarn – I used Boundary Warp on this version to fill in the missing areas.

I like the way it works. It’s better than cropping or trying to fill in missing portions with the clone stamp.  Try it – I think you’ll like it too.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos and warp some boundaries!

©2016, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Panama Canal

Cruise Ships, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, , , , , , , , ,

Our visit to the Panama Canal and passage through the Gatun Locks was the main feature of our recent cruise.   As an engineer, I’ve long been intrigued by the canal and it lived up to my expectations.  It’s amazing that something built over 100 years ago in such difficult conditions is still operating and remains an import part of global commerce.

The ship’s Captain planned well.  We arrived near the entrance just in time to view the day’s sunrise.

Panamanian SunrisePanamanian Sunrise – a pilot-boat paces us as we head toward the canal entrance

The crew opened up normally closed areas at the bow for viewing and many folks crowded there to watch the activity.

Entering the Panama CanalEntering the Panama Canal

At the evening meal the night before we arrived, Nino (the maître d’) promised us the “best seat in the house” if we came to breakfast at 7:30 that morning.  We thought we had a nice view up on the bow, but decided to follow his recommendation and go down to breakfast.  It was surprising how few people were in the dining room.  He fulfilled his promise and we sat at a table at the very stern of the ship right next to the large windows on deck 2 – and it did have the best view!!  Watching the locks filling and the canal walls go by from that vantage point was captivating.  It took longer than normal for us to finish our meal!

In the Panama Canal Gatun LocksIn the Panama Canal Gatun Locks – view from the Main dining room on deck 2

The MS Zuiderdam is 106 feet wide and the canal is only 110 feet, so there’s very little clearance.

MS Zuiderdam in the Panama Canal - showing the 2 foot clearance
View from our balcony on the 6th deck – 2 foot clearance!

The operation, control, and precision while in the canal is very skilful.  The photo above shows the 2 foot clearance between the ship and the canal.  One of the “mules”  (center left) is helping to position us and move us safely through.

Once past the locks, we anchored in Gatun Lake so people taking excursions could disembark.  Then we sailed back out through the canal and tied up for a port visit in Colon Harbor, where the excursions re-joined us that night.

Colon Harbor at nightColon Harbor at night

Colon wasn’t our favorite stop, although I was able to buy a genuine Panama Hat there.  Interesting fact:  Panama Hats are made in Ecuador!

I’ve posted a short video that we made in the canal here on YouTube.  It shows our entrance followed by a time-lapse as we descend into the Gatun Locks on our return.  Take a look if you get a chance.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos!

©2016, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Death Valley Addendum

California, Death Valley National Park, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, , , , ,

Good morning, wonderful readers!  I hope you don’t mind a short post today with a few more photos from Death Valley.  The place made a big impression on me.  I hope to return  sometime in the future.

Desert rain waterDesert rain water – A different view of the post storm water in Death Valley. Some locations had 5 inches of rain on October 18th. The water here collected in small puddles.

Overbury Building ruinsOverbury Building ruins in the Rhyolite Ghost Town near Beatty, Nevada.  Black and White Infrared panorama.

Death Valley SundownDeath Valley Sundown – I like the sun rays and reflections from the wet mud below.

Mosaic Canyon MonochromeMosaic Canyon Monochrome – Rushing water carved these canyon walls, resulting in a variety of textures to explore.

Monochromatic testuresMonochromatic textures – Zabriskie Point in Death Valley is a wonderful place to photograph. The hills vary in color and with the changing light and clouds, it seems there are always new textures, shadows, and compositions to focus on (pun intended). I wanted to emphasize the textures, so I used Lightroom to convert this one to monochrome. For some reason, this was one of the first photos I made there and one of the last that I finished processing.

We’ve added even more photos from our Death Valley expedition in the albums at these links:

Thanks once again for stopping by and reading my blog.  Now – go make some photos!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Death Valley National Park, California

California, Death Valley National Park, Must do list, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, , , , , , , , , , ,

As you may have gathered from last week’s post, I got home on October 24th from a trip to Death Valley National Park.  Four of us from the Photography Interest Group (me, Tom M., Kevin M., and Kevin K.) were out there together, exploring this waterless wonderland on our longest, farthest group photo expedition yet.

When you think of the desert in the western US, you might imagine extreme heat and monochromatic scenes of empty barren land.  If so you probably haven’t been to Death Valley.  There is some empty barren land:

Badlands sunriseBadlands sunrise – This was my first visit to Death Valley and what I thought it would look like. 

And there are sand dunes and wind-blown textures:

Photographing Mesquite Flat DunesPhotographing Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes – A distant photographer lines up his shot.

But there are so many more things to experience there.

It’s the largest national park in the contiguous US at over 3.4 million acres.  The habitats are varied and the elevation ranges from 282 feet below sea level in Badwater Basin (the lowest point in North America) to more than 11,000 feet at the top of Telescope Peak.

Badwater panorama from Dantes ViewPanorama of Badwater from Dantes View, looking west toward Telescope Peak

Wait – did I say “waterless wonderland”?  When we arrived on October 18th, there was an epic rain storm in progress that caused flash flooding, road closures, downed power lines and other damage inside the park.  If you’re interested, I’ve posted a short video on YouTube that we made on our drive into Death Valley, showing the rain storms and some of the flooding we ran into.  And you can read this article on the National Parks Traveler webpage about the floods and damage.

Many of the places we wanted to see weren’t accessible while we were there.  The good news is that there were more than enough locations we could still get to, and the water created some rare views of the area.

Death Valley FloodsDeath Valley Reflections – Some locations had 5 inches of rain.  The following morning, we saw large pools of water west of route 190 and north of Furnace Creek.  It was a long walk (~1.5 miles from the road) to get close, and at times I wondered whether it was a mirage.  I’m guessing it’s rare to see the mountains and clouds reflected in standing water at this spot.

And are there any waterfalls in the desert?  You wouldn’t think so, right?  We decided to find out one day and after a long drive, hike, and rock scramble through a gorgeous canyon, we arrived at Darwin Falls, which seems like a miracle in the middle of such arid country.

Darwin FallsDarwin Falls – This desert waterfall in Death Valley had about a 40 foot drop. It’s spring fed and  flows year round, although the rains may have added some water while we were there.

There’s a lot of history in Death Valley too.  The Native American Timbisha tribe have lived in the valley for at least 1000 years.  Gold and silver mining started in the 1850s and Borax was discovered in the 1880s.  There are also several ghost towns to explore in the park and the surrounding areas.

20 Mule Team Wagon Train20 Mule Team Wagon Train – Used in 1885 to haul Borax From Death Valley to Mojave.
Borax Museum, Furnace Creek, California

Landscapes and scenery aren’t the only things to see.  There’s very little light pollution in the area.  The milky way is easily seen and we viewed an active Orionid Meteor shower on the morning of 21 October.

There’s also a surprising amount of wildlife.  While hiking back from the Mesquite Flat Dunes we spotted some motion ahead that turned out to be my first sighting ever of a fox in the wild.

Fox at Mesquite DunesKit Fox at Mesquite Dunes – We saw it from a distance. At first I thought it was a coyote, but Eric Vanbergen on Flickr suggested it might be a Kit Fox. Judging by the info on Wikipedia, he’s right.  I made the photo handheld (with my tripod still attached!) using a 24-120mm lens that I was using for landscapes. This is a small crop from the frame. It was nice of the Fox to stop, stand in the light, and look at the camera for me – but it should have come closer!

We also saw several of these, curiously along or as they crossed the road.  They’re large enough (~3 inches across) to spot as you drive by.

Classic Death ValleyClassic Death Valley (Photo by Kevin McKinney – used with permission) – We saw several Tarantulas while we were there.

And birds:  The National Park Service official bird list has hundreds of species that frequent Death Valley.  On this page they have some info on where to look and migration patterns.  Kevin M. also had a good time birding in places around and on the way to the park.

Here’s one last photo.  We’d been searching for a Road Runner all week but hadn’t seen any.  On the last afternoon we finally sighted this one as we drove by the visitor’s center. Of course, none of us had our camera gear – thank goodness for iPhones!

Greater Roadrunner, running“Beep Beep” – A Roadrunner outside the Visitor Center at Furnace Creek. I think this is the one the rangers have nick-named “Robbie”. It’s very tolerant of humans and went about catching and eating bugs while we watched.  

You can view many more photos from our trip at these links:

This is really more of trip report than a review or guide.  With so little time on site, I’m not qualified to give you much specific advice on photographing Death Valley.  But here is some info I found very useful:

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. We are really blessed in the US with all our national parks.  Now – visit one and make some photos!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Night Sky in Death Valley

California, Death Valley National Park, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, VARIOUS, , , , ,

I’ve been away for the last week and caught a bad cold on the trip.  I got home last night and I’m feeling better today although I  don’t have the energy for a long blog post. Sorry.

I’ll be back next week and I promise to provide more photos and info.  Here’s one image to whet your appetite.   This is a 20 second exposure at f/2.2 and ISO 1600, under the darkest skies I’ve ever seen.  The Milky Way was easily visible even though the brightest part was below the horizon.

Two galaxiesTwo galaxies – Andromeda Galaxy and part of the Milky Way, from Zabriskie Point in Death Valley National Park

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Vacation, part 2: Shenandoah National Park

Must do list, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, Virginia, , , , , , , ,

On July 4th, 1936, in the Virginia Blue Ridge mountains along Skyline Drive at Big Meadows, President Roosevelt dedicated Shenandoah National Park.  Since that time, people have greatly enjoyed wonderful vistas, beautiful waterfalls, quiet wooded hollows, hiking, wildlife and the night sky.

Shenandoah sunrise at Spitler KnollSunrise at Spitler Knoll

I’ve been to Shenandoah many times.  It’s the first national park I ever visited – too long  ago to admit.  I hiked there with our Boy Scout troop from Bowie, Maryland when I was a very young man .  Hiking’s a major activity at the park – the Appalachian Trail runs along and crosses Skyline Drive in many places.

Appalachian trail viewAppalachian trail view

Lynn and I also took Mike and Mary there when they were younger and we have fond (and scary!) memories of hikes with those two scrambling over rocks and along ridges to be first to see a view.  On one of our visits, we also picnicked with our good friends the Sullivans, and hiked with the kids down to Dark Hollow Falls.

Dark Hollow FallsDark Hollow Falls – A gorgeous waterfall, although crowded at times since it’s one of the closest ones to Skyline Drive.  (Photo from 1996).

To get the most out of your visit, you need an up to date guide-book.  We had one from our previous visits (printed in 1988!), but unfortunately we didn’t realize how out of date it was.  Fires and other events have changed places in the park, sometimes quite dramatically.  Fortunately, we found updated books at the park.  One example of the changes:

Dead eastern hemlock treesDead eastern hemlock trees – Hemlock Springs, Shenandoah National Park. We really enjoyed hiking through large stands of hemlock trees the last time we were there, 20+ years ago.  Now, 95% of the Hemlock trees in Shenandoah have been killed by the hemlock woolly adeligid, an invasive species introduced by humans. 

Weather can vary in the park.  All of our visit was beautiful, but we spent one day completely socked in with heavy rain and visibility of 50 to 100 feet.  I had fun walking around in the fog looking for photos, while Lynn wove a White Oak basket from scratch.

Rain drops in the mistRain drops in the mist

We saw lots of wildlife while we were there.  The deer are all over and not very skittish, since animals are protected in the park.  We also saw 2 black bears – exciting!  I didn’t look too hard for birds, but managed to spot at least one life bird (Dark-eyed Junco).

If you search the web you’ll see things to do in the surrounding area too.   We’ve been to Luray Caverns in the past, although we didn’t have time to explore outside the park this time.

In summary, Shenandoah National Park deserves to be on your bucket list.  If you haven’t been there yet, just go.  If you have been there, you know what I mean.

You can see larger versions of the photos above by clicking on them and some other photos from our trip in this album on Flickr.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

 

Vacation!

New Jersey, OUTSIDE FLORIDA, VARIOUS, , ,

Lynn and I returned yesterday from our longest vacation in a while, to New Jersey and Virginia. We enjoyed riding the Amtrak Autotrain from Sanford, Florida to Lorton, Virginia and back –  something we last did about 25 years ago.  We highly recommend it for travel up and down the south-east coast.

Sanford Auto TrainSanford Auto Train

In Newton, NJ, we attended the International Congress of Iron Collectors, and the Pressing Iron and Trivet Collectors convention.  After that we drove to  Shenandoah National Park in VA and stayed for 5 wonderful days.

I was the “semi-official” photographer, so I spent a lot of time there photographing all the activities, displays and people.  And Lynn photographed too, especially when I wasn’t around.

Something that you might not know:  Lynn is the author of two books on trivet collecting:  The A-Z Guide to Collecting Trivets, Identification and Value Guide and The Expanded A to Z Guide to Collecting Trivets – Identification and Values (read more about them on her blog), and I made the photographs for her books.  Which, by the way, is an excellent justification for camera and lens purchases.  😉

Pressing Iron and Trivet Collectors business meeting
Pressing Iron and Trivet Collectors business meeting

Lynn and I have a lot of work left to finish going through the photos from the conventions and distributing them to people. I also have a lot of work to finish going through photos from Shenandoah, so I’ll try to write about that next time.

I didn’t do a lot of photography outside of the conventions in New Jersey, but there was a nice red barn next to the fair grounds where the meetings took place and I made this photo one day when I had a few minutes off.

Barn WindowNew Jersey Barn Window

I like the peeling paint texture and the reflections in the surviving window panes.

More to follow…

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.