Thursday, August 23, 2012

A trip to the West Highlands

Scotland is an interesting place for the photographer: beautiful landscapes and amazing light are easy to find. Friendly people and good seafood are also on the list of the ingredients to make a good recipe for a very good photographic trip. I think, I will come back.






Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Yosemite

In summer, the park is crowded, the mosquitos are aggressive, the nights in the backcountry are very cold because of the elevation, but it's still really beautiful. The beginning of the summer is a better time to see the park compared to september, when I came there for the first time. I hope, I will be there once mid-May , to see the waterfalls at their maximum flow and some snow on the top of the mountains.

Mirror lake
The top of upper falls
More pictures will come soon

Mammoth lakes

This is a classic alpine landscape. But the twin lakes and the waterfall are really nice. It's worth to drive half an hour from Mono Lake.




Sunday, July 15, 2012

Mono lake

This is a very interesting place. The lake is famous for the tufa towers. A good spot for photography, especially at dawn and in the earliest hours of daytime. The birds are numerous too. But I was more focused on landscape.
A first overlook on the lake from the Sierra Nevada.

 Tufa towers
 Eastern Sierra Nevada in background

This bird was so still and my long lens was in my bag...
It's time to leave this place



Saturday, July 14, 2012

Teaser ...

Northern California is also a nice place for landscape and wildlife photography. Some new pictures will come soon ...


Street photography in San Francisco

People in San Francisco climb the hills, ride bikes, have pets, and have their breakfast or their lunch outside.





Remark for unlikely events: If you read this blog, recognize yourself on these pictures and you don't like that , just leave me a message and I will remove the picture. Otherwise, if you like it and want a printing, you can contact me too.

Sightseeing in San Francisco

I had the opportunity to spend two weeks in the sunny but chilly Northern California. Below I put some pictures of famous places in San Francisco. You will likely recognize them. The last picture shows maybe a less known feature of the city : the murals. This one is located on Balmy alley.













Thursday, May 17, 2012

Some pictures of La Défense





This is an interesting place for modern architecture photography. I wished, I had a wider angle lens. My 18-70 zoom was a little bit narrow.

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Having fun with a prime lens



Yesterday during a rainstorm, I read an interessant article in the last issue of  "Chasseur d'Images". The writer is a kind of expert of macrophotography and of insect flight photography. This time, he suggests to use a prime lens for close-up photography. The magnification is not large enough to call it macrophotography. So, because there are some sun beams today, I decided  to use my 50 mm / 1.8 in an unusual way. So, I quickly pointed a ladybug among some white flowers. And I had a lot of fun ! Of course, I used a tripod and manual focus. Most of my pictures were taken at f/2.8 to get the maximum sharpness and to have some depth of field. Not all the pictures were sharp ... but some seem rather good to me. I managed to get some pictures at f/1.8 and I have to admit, this is very difficult and the resolution of my lens is not homogenous at this aperture. The last picture is the best, I got at f/1.8 .

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

one last crop

I decided to put some emphasis on the isolation of the couple. Sorry, guys on the left, you have to disappear !

post-processing

According to a friend of mine, black and white requires post-processing. So, I played a little bit with my favorite software to enhance the textures and add some drama. Now, the couple on the right stands out against the light sky.

Some pictures in Paris: the national library