My Sony RX100 just returned from being repaired after a damaging fall onto a New York sidewalk.  I wasted no time putting it back to use.  Not having it for a few weeks really let me know how much I relied on it for those spur of the moment occasions when you just happen upon something.  Here are a couple of photos I grabbed since it's been back.

This is the emergency stairwell in my building.  I had to climb the 12 flights of stairs during the hurricane blackout.  Now I do it regularly as part of my exercise routine.

The Empire State Building was lit in red last night.  I gave the scene more of a Christmas look by changing the sky color to green.

Christmas wreaths were hung up for sale at the farmers market.  I photographed this one back lit with a mid-day sun.

I shot this image of the setting moon and a seagull in New York this morning at dawn with a 1600mm focal length lens on a Nikon D800.  ISO was set to 400 with a shutter speed of 1/80 second.

To light this scene I used two tungsten lights, a 650w behind and off to the right, and a 375w to add fill light from the front.  Both lights shine directly onto the subject to provide a harsh, candid light. Additionally, the back light is allowed to flare out into the camera lens.  I also allowed the lights to retain their warm color by balancing the color for daylight. Photographed with a Nikon D800 and 105mm macro lens with wide open aperture.

For information on how this photo was taken, visit my new blog:  ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

Thanksgiving day!

Here are the photos of the meal we prepared at our New York home.  I always drive my wife a little crazy by wanting to photograph everything before it is served.

I prepared a set beforehand by a window so all I had to do was put the turkey and side dishes into it and take a quick picture before we sat down to dinner elsewhere.  Taken with a Nikon D800 and 24-70mm zoom lens.

Taken with available tungsten light in the kitchen at an ISO of 1000.

My daughter, Jamie, always makes a pumpkin pie for the occasion.  Photographed with a 50mm f/1.4 lens on a Nikon D800.

These images were taken with a 12mm extension tube attached to a 50mm f/1.4 Nikkor lens and Nikon D600.  For a further, in depth, explanation see my new blog at: ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

Shooting with a back lit sun is one of my favorite lighting techniques.  It works particularly well on autumn scenes to bring out the vibrant colors in leaves.  All photos were taken with a Nikon D600 -- the two wide scenes with a 24-120mm zoom and the close-up of yellow maple leaves with the Sigma 50mm macro lens wide open for a shallow depth of field.

The very hard afternoon light was softened considerably in post-processing to give a much lighter, hazy look to the image.  Taken with the Nikon D600 and 24-120mm zoom.

These photos were taken at sunset in the woods near where I am staying.  I used the Nikon D600 and 24-120mm lens wide open to achieve the out-of-focus background with soft bokeh effect.

I particularly liked the way the suns rays flared out behind this leaf.

Grabbed this shot in an empty movie theater using my cell phone camera.

Historic Leica Calendar

Every year I do a calendar for myself using my images.  This is a selection of photos I took recently for my personal calendar for 2013.  All the photos are of antique Leica cameras in period still life situations.

I put two versions of the calendar on LULU.COM.  If anyone loves Leica cameras as much as I do and wants a copy  or just wants to check it out, you can access it here:  ANTIQUE LEICA 2013 CALENDAR.

I still shoot film with some of these cameras today.

Leica IIIf - c1954, with complete Leica case of lenses and accessories

Leica IIIb - c1938 with 8.5cm f/1.5 Summarex lens

Leica IIIf - c1952 with a 20cm Telyt lens and Visoflex I viewer, shown here with a Weston Master III light meter of the same period.

Leica I (c1930) with Ur-Leica photo by Oscar Barnak using the first Leica prototype in 1913.

Lecia M4 (c1968) - My favorite film Leica, and the one I use today when I want to do some serious black and white film photography.

Leica III - c1937 with the special 9cm Thambar lens and soft focus filter.

Leica IIIc - c1944

Leica III - c1938, one of my favorites.  It currently sits on my desk loaded with film and ready to shoot.

Leica Standard - c1932

Leica M2 with dual-range Summicron c1959.  This was the first Leica camera I used professionally.

Leica IIIg - c1957

There is an interesting story about how these two stock shots were taken.  Read all about it on my new blog at: ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

On my early morning bike ride the sun was low in the sky and softly filtered by a light fog.  The glass buildings along the Hudson River had a bright, pastel look to them that was muted by the back-lit haze.  I used a Nikon D600 and 24-120mm lens to photograph these two important examples of modern architecture.

This is the AIC building by Frank Gehry.

Here the low morning sun shines right through one of the apartment towers designed by Richard Meier.

Whenever I photograph I include a gray card that enables me to adjust the color balance later in post-processing.  It is not that I always balance the color to a normal setting.  Sometimes I prefer the color cast to be more cool or warm.  But at least I know what "normal" is and can deviate from there.

The card I carry with me is the QPcard 101.  It is small enough to conveniently fit in a vest pocket or camera bag.  The images below show a rather dramatic example of how effective these cards can be.

For more information and images on this topic see my newer blog at: ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

I took this photo with available window light very late in the day under exceptionally cloudy conditions.  Under such circumstances, colors will normally tend to a heavy blue range.   After correction in post processing the colors were restored to normal.

Here is a before and after using the QPcard 101.  The upper photo shows the results using an auto white balance camera setting.  It tends heavily towards a blue cast.  In post-processing I clicked on the white or gray area to correct the color to normal.  The gray block usually results in a slightly warmer rendering.

Every year I do some still life images of late autumn leaves, leaves that are past their color prime and have more of a sculptural quality in their decaying state.  This project was inspired after I had read an essay by Thoreau, entitled "Autumnal Tints".  My ultimate goal it to make a book of the finished project.

I am including a few of the images I took this year as part of my late autumn project.  This year I used a technique of extreme depth of field to bring out a high resolution, sculptural quality to the individual leaves.  To do this I took approximately 25 photos of each leaf and combined them later to achieve one image of super depth of field.

To learn more about how this was done and access higher resolution links to these images, visit my new blog at: ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

1938 Photo-journalists camera kit

Here is another photo in my series on what the well-dressed photographer would wear at certain periods in history.

The camera is a 1938 Leica III in black paint.  It is equipped with a 2.8cm f/6.3 Hektor lens, which was the extreme wide angle of its day and had just been introduced in 1935.  The background telephoto lens is a 13.5cm f/4.5 Hektor.  In the foreground is a 5cm Summar with a fast f/2 aperture. Next to the camera on the left is a variable focal length viewfinder.  The Art Deco styled Remington 5 typewriter in the background is also of the same period.

This photography kit was state of the art in its day -- completely manual, built in range finder, and shutter speeds from 1sec to 1/500 sec. It is also one of the most beautiful cameras ever made and copied in retro-style designs even today.

I happened upon this scene with the descriptive "Crime Scene" tape while riding my bike.  I had the Nikon D600 and 24-120mm zoom with me.  More photos from this scene and an expanded description on how they were taken can be found on my new blog by clicking here:  ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY

 

The past week without power in lower Manhattan we lived with candle light, and I picked up a number of photos of partially burnt candles.  All photos were taken handheld with the Nikon D600 and Sigma 50mm macro lens at a wide open aperture of f/2.8 and ISO 400.

This is only one of many photos I took of New York in the darkness caused by the power outage.  To see some of the others please visit my new blog by clicking here: ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY.

Looking south towards the Flatiron building the city was totally dark except for the blurred running lights of passing vehicles.  The brightness from the full moon helped to silhouette the building against the sky.  An 8 second exposure with a Nikon D600 and 24mm focal length lens blurred the traffic.  I placed the camera at a low angle to emphasize the color and texture of the street.

There was a full moon this past week which caused excessive high tide conditions that resulted in extraordinary water surges of up to 14' in the city.  This mass of water caused much of the damage to the New York area.

The blacked out part of the city had an eerie look to it lit only by the moon and passing traffic.  This is a 20 second exposure taken with a Nikon D600 at ISO 400.