HDR Photography
My trips to this hill last year were constrained by the limitations of gravity; bringing my drone with me this year opened up whole new vistas and geometries. The artificial nature of this water retention area is far more apparent when view from the air.
A lot happens around the Kentucky cottage when we’re home from a show, but I have to admit that a pair of vultures drying out after a sudden thunderstorm in the top of a tree with a rainbow behind them isn’t what I was expecting…
This look from Papaya through the trees was pretty profound but still not really what I was expecting…
Quiet grazing in a sunset-lit paddock is perhaps closer to expectations, but this idyllic, Miyazaki-esque view still surprised me with the sense of warm summer calm.
Today marks the start of the spring semester at many colleges and universities. A wistful look back at winter break and its associated festivities seemed appropriate.
I found myself returning to one of my earliest Decaseconds posts (almost exactly 11 years ago) as I updated my Top 32 album on Flickr—the digital portfolio where I display my best (or simply favorite) photographs. Finding “Waves and Rocks Dwarf Man” in that set, I saw both the excellent light and composition that my old Nikon had captured in 2011, as well as all of the places where my choices in processing the original image now left my unsatisfied. Rather than simply reprocessing that original image, I went back to the folder of camera raws from that day and selected an image I took just moments later to tackle. (Always keep save those raw files!) I not only like this composition better than the older one, but I also feel that I have brought something new out here, rather than simply reprocessing something old.
This grand desert setting has a tiny bonus: can you spot the tiny walker in the foreground?
My final photographic adventure of 2022 felt fittingly fell at dusk and felt like an achievement: flying my drone at the Salton Sea’s Bombay Beach, capturing the unique sculptures and setting.
Seeing that little wading bird approaching this tetrahedral sculpture seems a bit metaphorical for humans approaching our own futures: Coming up to something big and interesting and completely beyond our ability to properly predict/explain. Here’s to 2023!
I guess I’m still discovering new tricks up the DJI Mini 3 Pro’s sleeve. I’ve never managed to create a panorama (much less one looking up) from drone images before, but this massive shot of the sunset over the San Jacinto Mountains has changed all of that. The pink clouds arc above and the Empire Polo Club (home of the Coachella Music and Arts Festival) spreads across the foreground.
(You’ll definitely want to click through for full resolution on this one.)
I upload pictures to be future Decaseconds posts as I find images I think are worthy. (Only the best for my readers.) During most of the year, a three-photographs-per-week pace keeps up with my new acquisitions. This fall, however, was a time of plenty, powered by my DJI Mini 3 Pro’s incredible range and low-light image quality. To keep up with demand necessitates a triple-play today.
Three views of Canton, New York begin with this image over the Grasse River, with islands in the foreground and SUNY Canton in the distance.
Farther south, St. Lawrence University’s campus is lit up for the evening.
And the quad by Kirk Douglas Hall looks warm and inviting. (It’s currently beneath a layer snow.)
Can you spot the tiny figures at the top of the hill? I’m confident that tiny figures produce a sense of grand scale in images—particular desert shots, like this one, where the inhuman nature of the place can make understanding the sizes of objects difficult. Nonetheless, I find myself wondering how small the figures in an image can be before the viewer loses the ability to recognize them as human.
Canton is the seat of St. Lawrence County. The multistory stone buildings amongst the sea of single-family homes that out here because they (and the church steeples) are the only structures tall enough to catch the remaining red light of sunset.
Autumn went by quickly this year; the thermodynamic realities outside my door make clear that the adaptations of the North Country trees aren’t coming any too soon.
Some titles speak for themselves. I wonder how long it takes to repaint all of this fencing?
A sunset Christmas Eve drive through the less-inhabited parts of Coachella Valley has to end eventually. The palm trees mark the seconds of the drive back into town.
While other cows in this field were hanging out in a herd together, this loner was keeping the Sun company.
Brush and tire tracks in the North Palm Springs desert look extra-tiny beneath the enormous Christmas Eve clouds.
Decaseconds 