Photo: Gridiron Sky

Gridiron Sky

The science building, #410 at Daytona State College. The side of the building is all clear glass in a white grid formation, but from this angle all it does is reflect the sky. It was a bright and sunny day out, and with the fluffy white clouds behind, the effect was quite charming.

I forgot my polarizing filter when shooting this, but I added the polarization effect through burning in Photoshop, so I’m including it under the polarizer tag.

Editing brought out the colors quite a bit. I added lots of contrast, burned in the sky, the corners, and the clouds especially. You can see the dark halo around the clouds from my use of the burn tool, but I like it so it stays. I also brightened the building, as it was a bit dim in relation to the clouds. The turquoise reflection is my favorite part.

Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 1/1250, F4.5, 18mm, ISO100, 2008-08-25T11:54:20-04, 20080825-155420rxt

Location: Daytona State College, Building 410, Schildecker Science Hall (outside), 1200 W. International Speedway Blvd., Daytona Beach, FL  32114

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Please credit me as “Photo by Richard Thripp” or something similar.

Photo: Bubblegum Garden

Bubblegum Garden — shiny pink flowers against a rich blue and white sky

I went to Lowe’s flower shop and started snapping photos as I sometimes do. I used my polarizing filter to get the rich blue sky, and waited for the sun to come out (the clouds were moving) to get this shot of these pink perennials. The clouds in the background make the shot; when I got down lower and only included blue sky, the background was too dull.

Bubblegum is pink, and this photo is like bubblegum pop for me, but in a good way.

Just some color and contrast enhancements, plus a light glow effect (by duplicating the image on a new layer in Photoshop, adding a gaussian blur, then choosing soft light blending between the two).
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Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/320, F6.3, 50mm, ISO100, 2008-04-23T13:19:11-04, 20080423-171911rxt

MarioGamer99 from deviantART fiddled with the source file; here’s his creation: Luminessence.

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Please credit me as “Photo by Richard Thripp” or something similar.

Photo: Night Meets Day

Night Meets Day — sunlit leaves against a moonlit sky

Leaves from the American sycamore tree in my yard. This photo is with my new polarizing filter; I made the sky look as dark as possible with it, and put the moon in the frame to make the scene a cross between night and day. So the moon didn’t become a blurry white blob, I closed down to F18, so I increased the ISO speed to 800, but the grain works well here. So you have the sunshine of late afternoon, but the dark blue sky of a moonlit night.

Though the polarizer took care of making the sky dark, I added some contrast, toned down the colors of the leaves, and added heavy vignetting (darkening at the corners), to keep your eyes from wandering off the edge. I also brightened the moon a bit.
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Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/50, F18, 50mm, ISO800, 2008-04-11T18:15:36-04, 20080411-221536rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Please credit me as “Photo by Richard Thripp” or something similar.