The Skillion Exposure Blend with Luminosity Masks

This was the beautiful sunrise that greeted us yesterday morning (27th March 2012) down at the popular shooting location on the Central Coast called the Skillion. I was teaching a local photographer Shane and we made the decision to do a sunrise course which if the light is right, they are the best as you can see why. Shane had my 17-40mm on his 7D and my Lee Filter system and remote, so I set up next to him with my 24-70mm and snapped a few images as exposure brackets to show how you can do it without the use of filters. (I used Shanes camera setting as my base as he had perfected his exposure with his histogram, just as I had shown him, nice one.) I used the camera on a 2 second timer so the 5D MkII took the images one after the other so I didn’t have to touch the camera which is important for blending later on.

So this image was a three shot exposure blend with a 2/3rd stop variance between them and then blended in Photoshop using luminosity masks that targeted various tonal ranges.

Full details on my range of group and private courses can be found here. Where I teach you to take images just like this, focusing on using your histogram to perfect exposure, the composition of your image in terms of light and shutter speed, various shooting methods and techniques, digital panoramic’s and more.

Sydney City Day Courses – Sydney Opera House

This is one of the images taken on my latest fully booked Sydney City workshop ran on the 4th of March. No matter how many times you venture into the city there are always new images to capture and create.

This image on my facebook page was taken when explaining the set up and capture process of digital panoramics. I have two more Sydney courses for this year. Details can be found here.

Sydney Morning Herald Feature Article – Traveller

Early last month (August) I had the privilege of having on my Blue Mountains course a freelance journalist who was writing an article on photography courses you can do in Sydney and around NSW. The article he wrote which uses my courses as the feature is published in todays edition of the Sydney Morning Herald in the Traveller section.

CLICK THIS LINK TO HAVE A READ

Merewether Baths Photos, Newcastle, NSW

Shot yesterday when out teaching. Watched the cloud slowly roll in and the client wanted to nail a shot down at Mereweather baths. To say they were happy when this unfolded infront of us is an understatement.

This one will make the Newcastle Gallery. Click here.

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Manly Beach Photos, Northern Beaches, Sydney, NSW

This was last nights sunset over Manly while I was out teaching my Northern Beaches Day Course. The sunset to the left was great, but there wasnt much of a composition shooting right into it. So this one is a panoramic stitch (8 images) going from South Steyne to Curl Curl Headland.

Sort of hoped the nice light would have filtered through more making the shot more of a keeper, but this one is off to the stock site.

5D MkII | 24-70mm f.2.8 lens @ 60mm | 1.3 sec @ F16 | 50 iso | lee three stop ND soft grad.

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Woy Woy, Central Coast, NSW

Overcast days are never a right off in terms of taking photo’s. Out teaching and exploring the Woy Woy area for shots and this boat is so photogenic. The small boat to the left was sunk for a while and has since been resurrected which is great. Nothing worse than seeing great spots like this die off, like the other great location down the road “Sheathers Wharf” that is now a shadow of its former self.

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Horseshoe Falls, Hazelbrook, Blue Mountains, NSW

This shot was taken yesterday while running my Blue Mountains Day Course… great weather but the rain got a bit heavy towards the end of the day. None the less perfect weather for shooting waterfalls.

This shot had quite a bit of work done on it in terms of trying to balance the dark tones and shadow detail in the image. Quite tricky to edit when some techniques adding contrast resulting in the greens really popping so you have to go back and kill the colour back a bit.

All the tonal work has been done using different types of luminosity masks, blurring them / sharpening them in selective areas that kind of thing. I didnt use the shadow / highlight tool in this shot (which I am a big fan of). Think the image could still do with some more work especially in the colour, but next time I might think about bracketing a shot or two for some more shadow detail in certain areas.

Single image capture | 5D MkII | 17-40mm lens @ 17mm | Polariser | F11 for 8 sec 50 iso

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Oakland Falls, Hazelbrook, Blue Mountains, NSW

Another shot from my trip to the Blue Mountains last week.

This one is of Oakland Falls which is just down further from Horseshoe Falls. There is another falls down from this called Burgess Falls but I was totally soaked from the days shooting and couldnt be bothered going any further and at Oakland is where I got hit by another two leaches.

This shot is a single image exposure, double processed for shadow detail and then a combination of targeted vibrance and saturation masks, a mid tone masks to drop the overall shine on the image and then luminosity masks to target various shadow areas. Might sound like a lot of work but it only ended up being about 6 layers.

Shot on the 5D MkII | 17-40mm lens @ 25mm | Polariser | F13 for 2 sec 100 iso

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Balls Head Lookout, Sydney City

Found something on my desktop to post. Just needed finishing off as it is a shot taken on the Fotoman 6×24.

Taken from Balls Head Lookout in the afternoon while teaching Mike who was out here from the US for business as he owns several McDonald restaurants. Amazing organisation and it was great talking to him.

This is a great lookout apart from the total destruction of the view of the harbour bridge from the apartment block, but boy imagine living there.

Collaroy Beach, Northern Beaches, NSW – Photos

Another cracker of a sunset last night, making it 5 in a row. Out teaching a private course on the Northern Beaches and decided Collaroy Baths would be a great advantage point to shoot the magic show that you could see was going to happen.

Panoramic stitch on the 5D MkII | Two stop Lee ND soft and One stop ND hard. Bugger all photoshop editing.

Out teaching again today, awesome sunrise, lets see how the sunset goes…. maybe 6 in a row… is that too much to ask

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