HDR Photography
Sometimes, ghosting is a gross byproduct of taking HDR brackets in an imperfect world. Other times, it can be used to create a ghostly Schrödinger’s Cat elevator door, neither closed nor open, forever in flux. Different moments in time and space, overlapped, with brain-twisting results.
November snow can’t hold the title “unseasonable” in Canton, New York, but it adds a gentle blanket to the campus, just the same. The soft dusk ceiling of pastel clouds and the quiet campus converge at the end of the day.
Where earth meets sky at the edge of the horizon, the foothills of the Adirondacks oscillate under the autumn colors and I use increasingly baroque adjectives to describe the North Country.
St. Lawrence University’s Avenue of the Elms is notable for being:
(1) Very lovely.
(2) Very long.
(3) Very colorful (at least when autumn arrives.)
The sense of space and hue and Alice-in-Wonderland surreality pervade the space. On the Avenue of the Elms, the “regular rules” don’t apply and crisp fall Saturdays are forever.
With dusk arriving earlier and earlier each day, I feel that the time is right to extoll the glory of clouds stretching off to an infinite (or at least periodic) horizon and the first hints of yellows and oranges in the sky matching the hues of the trees.
Snow comes early to the North Country. Nothing quite justifies a cold morning more than waking up to a lovely dusting of snow and flakes in the air. The oak trees are still stubbornly holding onto their leaves, and thus there was a cozy snow-free zone (and a welcoming bench) from which to watch the snow this morning. Johnson Hall of Science looks friendly in all seasons.
When I have to be up early to shoot a horse show, I make certain to take advantage of the occasion. In looking across the autumn North Country fields, I was amused by the “chronological asymmetry” between the looming living tree and the stump of “tree-past.”
On the dawn of SLU’s homecoming weekend, the sky was filled with appropriately dramatic clouds and the campus was dotted with all sorts of exotic temporary structures. (Or really only one sort: tents.) The attraction of a liberal arts campus on a crisp autumn weekend jumps from the screen.
I’ll sneak in one more unscheduled weekend post with this photograph from St. Lawrence University’s Avenue of the Elms. Some fall afternoons are so perfect that they must be shared.
Rising before dawn (and posting shots of buildings taken from slightly below and to the right) seems to be a recent trend for me. When I struggled out of bed to shoot a Saturday morning horse show on St. Lawrence University’s campus, I had the opportunity to capture the predawn North Country roads. No HDR, no fancy post-processing here (beyond some simple noise reduction). I present a quiet Saturday morning moment that captures the whole “stuck in time” 1980’s vibe of northern New York. You can almost hear Bruce Springsteen tracks playing in the background.
The benefit of teaching early morning classes: I’m finally (routinely) up for the sunrise. Even when the morning is cold and my fingers don’t want to be operating a camera, the fall and the clouds and the trees conspire to make Johnson Hall of Science (a frequent subject) look like paradise.
St. Lawrence University celebrated Parents’ Weekend on Saturday with a gorgeous fireworks display on the south side of campus. Conveniently, this is the sky above Johnson Hall of Science. The combination of architectural textures, floral fireworks patterns, and fall foliage make for an image that would be more at home in a video game than reality.
I suppose part of the reason that I appreciate landscape photography is its ability to capture a perfect, transient moment of incredible beauty. Of course, on some evenings (such as this one), the weather and environment just won’t cooperate. (I nearly titled this photograph “Boring Sunset.”) As photographer, I can put myself in the right place at the right time, but I still need reality to do its part.
Red fruit makes me nervous. (Perhaps one too many lectures about not eating red berries as a child?) In any case, the combination of overwhelming red fruit, dark clouds, and a dilapidated garage make me just a wee bit uneasy.
Fire gains an unearthly, extra-sinister quality when HDR reveals the true extent of its tempestuous geometry. (The convenient “Office Burn Demonstration” cropping only added to the effect.) Knowing intellectually what a fire at work can do is very different from seeing the full effect, and I have to admit that I found the example presented by Canton’s fire department to be chillingly effective. (Pardon the temperature puns.)
Decaseconds 