Dance of the Sufi

I was sitting on a bench looking at this little flower,  I’ve forgotten what it is called, and it seemed alive in a most joyous way.  I had the impression that it was dancing on a bright, sunny, beautiful day.  The weather right now is the payoff for the sweltering heat of July and August.

Nikon D90 with Tamron 90.  1/125s at f/4, ISO200, Landscape Mode.  In Lightroom, adjusted White balance and light levels.  Decreased clarity and increased light tones to create a soft feel.  I used split toning to introduced blue-red to the light areas and sepia to the dark tones.

Mixed emotions

When I look at some of the grain-added photos on the big monitor, I am disappointed.  I have always worked so hard to remove noise and it seems I am simply adding it back.  With this photo, I decided to add the grain in an effort to give it a dreamier feel in the petals.

 

Inside White Cyclamen

Nikon D90 with Tamron 90.  2s at f/16, ISO160.  In Lightroom, desaturated, boosted light levels, removed clarity and increased contrast.  Added grain but made it finer.  Used split toning to introduce some sepia into the darker regions.

 

Texture

I wanted to see about imparting texture to a relatively flatly lit scene.  I did so with split toning.

Nikon D90 with Tamron 90mm.  1/15s at f/16, ISO100, Landscape mode.  In Lightroom: desaturated, added clarity, contrast and adjusted light levels.  Used split toning to add sepia to the highlights and blues to the dark shades.

I have been getting outside the box lately.  Some of my photos may seem a little strange but its all part of the growth process and I am not ready to stop growing as a photographer.

Sorry about the crummy background color the template choose…I am just about ready to change.  I may take this down fairly quickly if it bothers me as much as I think it will.

Reversed Pyramdion

Split-toned grayscale.  I worked for a long time on this image.  At first, I wanted a sort of 50’s film look to it but the more I worked, the more it took on sort of an abstract, gothic look.  Pennzoil is a dark bronze structure that often looks black.  The architect’s view for the tower was bronze, though, and until I worked with this photo, I didn’t really understand the difference between bronze and black.  Overall, I am happy with this image.  In the final product, I will lighten it a little more for the internet but it prints beautifully like this.

Nikon D90 with Tokina 12-24 at 12mm.  1/160s at f/11, ISO200, Landscape Mode converted to Grayscale.  In Lightroom, recovered highlights, increased clarity and contrast.  Decreased brightness and light tones. Then, increased dark tones.  Adjusted aqua, blue, purple and red levels.  In split toning, highlights were blue/purple while shadows were sepia.  Adjusted balance between high and low lights until I had a falsely colored sky and the shadows had a bronze feel.