A brilliant sunset with deep blue sunrays. Shot this through the windshield from my Grandma’s car. The colors were interesting, and the contrast and light patterns beautiful.

Editing involved noise reduction, heaps of added contrast and darkening, and lots of burning on the upper-right quadrant. Enjoy!

Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 1/2000, F3.5, 18mm, ISO100, 2008-07-11T17:25:14-04, 20080711-212514rxt

Download a perfected high-res JPEG or download the source image (Canon Rebel XTi RAW file).

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp, and link back to richardxthripp.thripp.com or rxthripp.com. Thanks!

More of the Sunrays series.

I spotted this doll’s head on the top of the grate of a storm drain. Didn’t even have to stage it. Great ideas just find me sometimes.

Canon PowerShot A620, 1/60, F2.8, 7.3mm, ISO50, 2006-10-06T17:31:41-04, 2006-10-06_17h31m41

No editing. Really, this photo needed nothing.

Free high-res stock image.

I’ve been wondering what the Florida lifestyle I’ve been hearing so much about is, but I’ve found it here. You may not know it, but the Florida lifestyle involves lots of bugs. There were plenty of flies flying around as flies sometimes do, but I shooed them away to snap this shot of an orange smoothie by the pool. I went with a blue border for this photo. Never done that before, but it fits the image so well.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/2500, F3.2, 50mm, ISO100, 2008-06-28T14:16:13-04, 20080628-181613rxt

Source image. I added contrast, removed specks of dirt from the glass, and touched up the color on the orange slice.

Free high-res stock image.

Ominesence: the state or quality of being ominous. The real word is ominousness, but I made up this alternate. This is a river and city with dark clouds overhead. The right side is bright light and good weather, though it too is broached by darkness. I took this in a moving car crossing a bridge; you can see the railing at the bottom. Used a 1/250 second shutter speed to freeze the scene, though I had to go up to ISO800 because it was so dark out.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/250, F1.8, 50mm, ISO800, 2008-06-26T17:44:30-04, 20080626-214430rxt

Source image. I added contrast, darkened the dark clouds and corners, and removed a lot of noise. There were lots of markers and pylons in the river which were bugging me. I cloned all of them out. Now it looks like it should.

Free high-res stock image.

The stars and stripes fly low on a windless day. There was a nice background of clouds, so I shot this of the flag from the ground. I placed the pole off-center a bit, as that’s more appealing to the eye.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/800, F7.1, 50mm, ISO100, 2008-06-12T11:14:07-04, 20080612-151407rxt

Source image. Added some contrast and color through curves.

Free high-res stock image.

Richard's picks:

These raindrops were on the back window of a friend’s car, after the rain (appropriately). This was as close as I could get with my 50mm lens; I put the focus right in the center, so it fades out toward the edges. I liking how the reflections of light and clouds in the background turned out. You can see an outline of each drop on the underside of the window below, which is also interesting.

This is the spiritual successor of The Sky’s Ceiling and possibly Crystal Rain; check them out to see how my ideas are evolving.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/400, F2.8, 50mm, ISO100, 2008-05-22T17:05:05-04, 20080522-210505rxt

Source image. The blue colors were largely fabricated. I darkened the photo and added contrast for effect.

Free high-res stock image.

These are magnets that are holding up 4*6 copies of my photos on the refrigerator. The sun shines through the window in the morning, lighting them up like this. I didn’t notice it before (not usually up in the mornings), but I had to snap this when I saw it.

Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 1/50, F5.6, 55mm, ISO400, 2008-05-30T07:39:13-04, 20080530-113913rxt

Source image. I toned down the blue channel while adding to the red channel, and darkened a bit.

Free high-res stock image.

An awesome blue sunset. I saw this while my Dad was driving, so I started snapping photos with a fast shutter speed out the window. By luck, I got the timing just right on this frame, including an interesting white fence and some nice palm trees.

Buy a 4*6 copy for $0.95 (USA only). Lustre finish. After adding, go to your shopping cart.

Canon PowerShot A620, 1/640, F2.8, 7.3mm, ISO100, 2007-04-14T19:28:00-04, 2007-04-14_23h28m00

Source image. I wanted the fence to stand out, as it matched the white rays well, so I dodged it in Photoshop. Then, I added color and contrast with the curves function, and brightened the sunrays. To color the text with the title and my name, I cropped a portion of the photo, stretched it to the size of the text, added a lot of contrast, and then set it as the fill pattern in PhotoFiltre Studio (I use it for text and borders, because it’s much more intuitive than Photoshop).

More of the Sunrays series.

Free high-res stock image.

These marbles go to infinity, but not beyond it, because they have proper boundaries… sort of. The two rows of three marbles are diverging, though your mind has to work to decide if they are parallel or otherwise. This represents infinity because it makes you think, or so I hope. I did a lot of trials positioning the marbles; this proved to hold my interest the best. The day’s light was good, helping me to get the dramatic mix of black and blue.

Buy a 4*6 copy for $0.95 (USA only). Lustre finish. After adding, go to your shopping cart.

Canon PowerShot A620, 1/15, F7.1, 7.3mm, ISO50, 2007-01-18T14:11:46-05, 2007-01-18_19h11m46

Source image. I enhanced the contrast, and used Photoshop’s spot healing brush on the mess of specks that are permanently affixed to my subjects.

More of the Blue Marbles series.

Free high-res stock image.

This, following the first, is the best in the series. I got really close here, so you can see the terrifying details of the marbles. This also gives very shallow depth of field, so the ones far back become quite blurry. Turning the camera to the side is another stab at creative composition, but I mainly did it to keep the edges of the yellow table out of the frame. The blue colors in this one turned out perfect; not too dark nor too bright.

Buy a 4*6 copy for $0.95 (USA only). Lustre finish. After adding, go to your shopping cart.

Canon PowerShot A620, 1/3, F2.8, 7.3mm, ISO50, 2006-12-22T16:49:43-05, 2006-12-22_16h49m43

Source image. How come I didn’t notice all the dust and hairs on the lead marble when I shot this? It was a pain in the neck to remove, but after that, all I had to do was add a splash of light and color.

More of the Blue Marbles series.

Free high-res stock image.