A beautiful golden sunset near Walgreens. You can almost see the sign at the bottom in the shadows.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/145, F4.2, 12.6mm, ISO64, 2005-10-05T18:57:54-04, 2005-10-05_18h57m54

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

A rainbow high among the clouds.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/333, F4.7, 5.8mm, ISO64, 2005-10-02T07:47:59-04, 2005-10-02_07h47m59

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

A vivid pink sunset from September 2005, heavily edited. At the time I believed editing produced “fake” photos but now I know better.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/21, F2.8, 5.8mm, ISO100, 2005-09-09T19:50:41-04, 2005-09-09_19h50m41

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Rain falling far away.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/74, F4.7, 17.2mm, ISO64, 2005-08-29T18:35:23-04, 2005-08-29_18h35m23

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A swirl of clouds in a blue sky. This is from 2005. The only problems are the power lines and over-exposed clouds; otherwise I think it looks great.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/2000, F4.7, 5.8mm, ISO64, 2005-10-07T17:43:10-04, 2005-10-07_17h43m10

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I shot this sunset from the backseat while my friend was driving. This is on West International Speedway Boulevard right near Daytona State College in Daytona Beach, Florida, USA.

On the left is the rear-view mirror and at the bottom you see the windshield wipers. That’s why I’m titling this Driving Sunset.

I cloned out a big electronic sign at the bottom-right. It was the college’s sign, but it was bright blue and annoying. You can still see the clone marks if you brighten the photo considerably, but no one will notice normally.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/500, F3.2, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-15T18:53:32-04, 20091015-225332rxt

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A beautiful golden sunset right before sundown.

I shot this right down my street. There were power lines blocking the way, so I walked in someone’s yard to cut them out of the shot. Some woman yelled “get off my property” at me as I was shooting this, so I tripped the shutter quickly and then walked off.

I put contrast at +100% in Adobe Camera Raw 5.0 and then used the curves tool to push it even further. Even though I pushed the exposure bias down to -1.33, I think I was in the wrong metering mode so the clouds in the middle are over-exposed: they are at (255,255,255) (8-bit) and there is no detail there. Nothing I can do about that… It’s not a big problem in this photo because you expect the sun to be bright.

I pushed a lot of stuff to black with the curves tool, such as the trees and houses below. They aren’t important… no reason for you to see them.

There is a lot of black and empty space in this image. You can do that. The subject does not have to be big and in the center. In fact, it’s often …

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I shot this on an evening walk in my neighborhood. The sunset and white car paired well in my eyes.

I brightened the car and darkened the sunset in Photoshop for balance. The car was much darker than the sunset, but I was able to bring the colors out since I always shoot RAW. The files are 10MB each, which is a lot bigger than JPEGs, but it’s worth it for creative flexibility.

This was my first outing with the XTi kit lens in a long time. Because it’s EF-S and goes down to 18mm, it has a much wider field of view than my EF 28-135mm lens, which I enjoyed.

Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 1/60, F3.5, 18mm, ISO100, 2009-10-10T18:31:03-04, 20091010-223103rxt

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Puffy clouds over a road around noon-time. I just took this through the windshield while my Dad was driving, which reduces contrast. In Photoshop I punched up the contrast while making sure not to white out the clouds.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/640, F6.3, 38mm, ISO100, 2009-10-10T16:04:22-04, 20091010-200422rxt

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The swamps of Ormond Beach! Took this on my 18th birthday out the car window. There is water and a lot of dead grass.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/3200, F3.5, 28mm, ISO200, 2009-08-17T14:36:04-04, 20090817-183604rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.