Ravens

Ravens, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

One of the things I find most entertaining about photography is coming along something and you just snap a photo or 2 and go on your way. After a day or a week or a month, maybe even a year. You decide whether to keep that set of photo's on your computer or send them to the trash.
I am sure we all have them and for all of us they are different in types and scenes. This is one of mine. I came across this house just walking down the street. It caught my eye so I had to cross the street and snap off a few before moving on my way.
I could say this could have been anywhere but the block wall on the right side of the house says city all the way. But a great looking house none the less.
Once again I found a lot of fun in the processing of this. HDR, Topaz Adjust, Nik Color Efex Pro, Curves, Adjustment filters all sorts of fun in the processing. Taking me where ever the photo leads.

I know what you are thinking, I am all over the place with my photography.  Well I guess I am.  I am in search of where my passions lie.  Until that time, I guess my photography will all sorts of different scenes and objects.

The Shot:
Standard 3 Shot HDR, +2, 0, -2 with an additional -4ev for the sky, F/7.1, ISO 400, 24-105L @ 24mm, Hand Held

Post Processing:
>3 shots brought into ACR
>Removed Black, Sharpening, Added Noise Reduction, Corrected White Balance
>Added -4EV to preserve Highlights
>Saved all as Tiffs

Photomatix:
>Detail Enhancer
>Adjustments to taste and saved as Tiff

CS-5:
>Laso Tool and Fill to remove Electrical Wires
>Topaz Adjust-For Color and Detail
>Topaz InFocus for Sharpening
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0
  >Pro Contrast
  >Glamor Glow
  >Duplex (20% Opacity)
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat Reduce Yellows in House
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat Reduce Greens in House
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat Yellows in Grass to Green
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat Desaturate greens in grass
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat Reds in Metal on walk way and stainglass window
>Adjustment Layer-Warming Filter-15% Opacity
>High Pass Sharpened
>Cropped, Framed and sized for posting

Drapes

Drapes, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

This was a photo that was a lot of fun to work on. Getting to where I thought the colors were right with the contrasts and textures was probably the toughest but still a lot of fun to work on.  It didn't take long in time but I did work on it over a few days.  The first processing was easy but I couldn't seem to nail down the contrasts of the wall to the seaweed.  I had to keep coming back to it until I got it correct in my minds eye.

This is a wall on the side of the pier in Seal Beach. I am sure the seaweed got stuck here when the tide rose. When the water receded the seaweed was draped over the wall. I thought it seemed interesting enough to take a few shots of. I also knew that I would need to do this as an HDR to get the colors, texture and depth that I wanted to make it look interesting enough.

The Shot:
Standard 3 shot HDR +2, 0, -2, Hand Held, F/5.6, ISO 400, 24-105L @ 28mm

Post Processing:
>Raw-Remove Blacks-Remove Sharpening, Add Noise Reduction (Luminance 40, Luminance Detail 20
>Save all 3 images as Tiffs
>Photomatix Detail Enhancer

CS-5:
>Topaz Adjust-Add Color and Detail
>Color Efex Pro 3.0
  >Pro Contast-Adjust Contrast and Color Correction
  >Tonal Contast-Add Detail
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat-Enhance Greens (yellow adjustment)
>Topaz Infocus-Sharpening of overall photo
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat-Enhance Yellow and Greens in wall for overall contrast between seaweed and wall for better dimension
>Topaz Simplify-Adjustments to remove detail in wall for painterly look (Adjust to taste)
>Texture added Opacity Lowered to taste
>Framed and Sized for Posting

Little Church on the Corner & the Blue Door

Little Church on the Corner & the Blue Door, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

After shooting in the morning I was driving back home and I luckly came across the church on a corner in Seal Beach. What jumped out at me was the blue door. I drove past it and turned around and just wanted to capture this small church and blue door that stands out o the corner. After the shot and looking at it in photo's I realized that the stone railing going up the stairs stands out as well.
Thanks and enjoy.

The Shot:
HDR Vertorama, 2 sets (3 Bottom and 3 Top) of 3 shots +2, 0, -2, F/8, 1/400 sec, ISO 400, 24-105L @24mm, Hand Held

Post Processing:
>6 Shots brought into Camera Raw
  >Black Removed, Sharpness removed, Noise reduction Added
  >Saved as tiffs
>Photomatix
  >Detail Enhancer
  >Bottom 3 Detail Enhanced and saved as tiff
  >Top 3 Detail Enhanced and saved as tiff

CS-5:
>Bottom Tiff and Top Tiff brought into CS-5
>Top Tiff-Combined with Bottom tiff-Ctrl A (Select All)- Ctrl C (Copy)- Select Bottom tiff-Ctrl V (Paste)
>Select Both-Rotate 90 degrees-Auto-Align Layers-When finished Auto Blend Layers-Rotate the opposite 90 Degrees and Flatten Image
>Topaz Adjust-Color, Contrast and Texture
>Nik Color Efex Pro
  >Pro Contrast
  >Tonal Contrast
  >Glamor Glow-Masked for side walk and sky
>Tonal Contrast-Masked for stone hand rails only
>Adjustment Layer Hue/Sat for Blue Door
>Adjustment Layer Hue/Sat for Brown Trim
>Adjustment Layer Hue/Sat for green in rocks
>Sharpened, Cropped, sized and framed for posting

A Rose is A Rose

A Rose is A Rose, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

Another shot from Saturday morning when it was gloomy out. Now this would be one of the great things about June Gloom, flower and portrait photo's have great lighting.

Seems I have taken many a photo of roses or flowers and there have been few and far in between that I have liked and actually posted. I guess you can see since I am posting this one, I like it.

This photo came about after I shot the previous photo instead of retracing my steps back down the beach from the car I decided to walk up on the street back to the car which was about a 1/2 mile away. I came across one yard that had these pretty roses and one seemed to have a perfect shape. Snapped off a few and kept walking. This came out so nice I didn't have to do much post processing.
Thanks for stopping by, leave a comment if you get a chance.

Here is my post processing, but as you can see compared to others this didn't need a lot done.

The Shot:
Single Exposure, F/5.6, ISO 400, 1/500 Sec, 24-105L @105mm with .25 extension Tube, Hand held, no flash

Post Processing:
>Adjustment Layer Levels-Adjustment for Color and contrast
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0
  >Glamor Glow
  >Vignette Blur
>High Pass Sharpening-center area of rose only
>Framed and sized for posting

June Gloom Seal Beach

June Gloom Seal Beach, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

It wasn't a great morning for colors with June Gloom running a muck here in Southern California. But when life gives you lemons you make lemonade. So needless to say it was a great morning for Black and white and some decent long exposures without getting up to early. Sun rises around 5:30 or so and that means you need to be up at 4:00 to catch the sunrise, but with June Gloom I got up at 6:00 and was still shooting at 8:30. That is a great morning.

This is the Seal Beach Pier. I have wanted to shot this with gray skies for awhile to get this kind of a shot with the softness and solitude. With a long shot the waves and surfers are not an issue!

Thanks for stopping by!

The Shot:
Single Exposure, F/22, 195 seconds, ISO 100, 24-105L @60mm, ND 400 and CP filters, Tripod mounted, Cable Release

Post Processing:
>Camera Raw
  >Increase Black and Exposure

CS-5:
>Adjustment Layer Curves-Increase Contrast
>Silver Efex Pro 2.0-Black and White Conversion
>Adjustment Layer Levels-Increase white in water
>Color Efex Pro 3.0
  >Gradient Filter X2 to increase darkness in sky
  >Glamor Glow-Soften water even more (Masked for water only)
>Gradient Tool-Darken foreground water
>Spot Healing brush-removal of lots and lots of spots
>Gaussian Blur- (5 pxls) Upper Sky only to remove rest of spots
>Topaz Infocus-Sharpening of Pier only
>Cropped, Watermarked, Framed and Sized for Posting

Men of God

Men of God, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

My dear friend was ordained as a Catholic Priest over the weekend. The service was beautiful and possibly a tad bit long but it was a great time for self reflection. I am very blessed to have him in my life as a brother of Christ. Right now he is home until the middle of September and then he goes back to Belgium to complete his studies.
He is a true man of God and has a great heart to serve. By the way he is 2nd from the left with the balding head.

I think I am starting to get down some post processing consistency in my technique.  I think that is, maybe I shouldn't think and just go with the flow of the photo.  Anyway here is the post processing.

I was trying to go for a more painterly look in the robes and surrounding area but not in the faces or skin of the subjects.  I also didn't want to over saturate the image and purposely tried to keep it with a more traditional look.

The Shot:
Hand Held, Standard 3 shot HDR +3, +1, -1, ISO 400, F/7.1, 24-105L @60mm

Post Processing:
>3 Raw files brought into Camera Raw
  >Removed Black
  >Removed Sharpening
  >Adjusted Color Balance
  >Added Noise Reduction
  >Saved all as tiff's

Photomatix:
>Detail Enhancer
  >Default
  >Adjusted to taste
  >Saved as 16 Bit tiff file

CS-5:
>Topaz Adjust-Bring back detail and some color
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0
  >Pro Contrast
  >Tonal Contrast
  >Bleach Bypass 12% Opacity
  >Glamor Glow Masked out subjects
>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat-removed red in faces
>Non-Destructive Dodge and Burn-Darken and Lighten parts of robes to give more depth and texture
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0-Glamor Glow entire image and lowered opacity to taste
>Vignette added
>High Pass Sharpening
>Framed and sized for posting

Reflections on SF Bay

Reflections on SF Bay, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

This is another shot taken from the family trip to San Francisco. This was taken on Treasure Island which is a small land mass between San Francisco and Oakland in San Francisco Bay.
I am going to try to list all the steps I took to finally come up with this image on my blog, not sure if I can just because after my normal work through I tried some different processing for this specific image. One of these days I should write it down in case I want to duplicate it on another image, but until then I am going have to do it from recall.

I am slowly but surely realizing that I have a standard processes I go through to start all my images but after that I use all sorts of different tools for processing different images. There is no one silver bullet for all images. I go where the photo takes me. Some you just start out in and you can see what you thought would be a good photograph just isn't going to turn out that way and no matter what you do it isn't going to be worth the trouble so it gets deleted. There are others that you have taken and the idea is realized.

The Shot:
Single Exposure, Hand Held, ISO 400, F/9, 1/400 Sec, 24-105L @105mm

Post Processing:
>From Raw taken directly into CS-5

CS-5:
>Topaz Adjust-Add Color, Contrast and detail
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0
   >Tonal Contrast
   >Pro Contrast
>Rectangular Marquee Tool-sectioned of city and sky
   >Edit-Transform-Flip Vertical
   >Move Tool-moved flip sky until showed as reflection
>Non Destructive Dodge and Burn to darken reflection
   >Option/Click New Layer-Fill 50% Gray-Blending Mode Overlay
   >Choose Black brush for Burning With 10% Opacity (White Brush would Dodge)
   >Darken reflection to preference
>Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0
   >Bi-Color Filter
   >Glamour Glow With 0% saturation
>Silver Efex Pro 2.0
   >35% Opacity
>Vignette Applied
   >New Fill Layer-Black
   >Delete Layer Mask
   >Elliptical Marquee Tool-Upper corner to bottom Corner
   >Add New Layer Mask
   >Command I to invert Mask
   >Gaussian Blur 250 Pixels
   >Redo Gaussian Blur at 250 Pixels
   >Lower Opacity to 15-40% depending on preference
>Framed and Sized for posting

Original Image

It's all about the ride

It's all about the ride, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

This is the last in the series of Memorial Day Surfer photo's from the Huntington Beach pier. This is one of the simplest but like the first in the series I think it is one of my favorites. I like the idea of the older surfer on the long board just out there riding with the young bucks whom are cutting up the waves. This is surfing in its simplest and purest form.

This has the same processing as the last 3.

The Shot:
>Single Exposure, F/5.6, 1/3200 sec, ISO 500, 70-200L non-IS @190mm with 2X extender. With Tripod.

Post Processing CS-5:

>Raw Increase Black, Exposure, Adjusted WB

>Topaz Adjust 4.0 for Color and Detail

>Adjustment Layer-Levels-For White and Black points

>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat-reduce red in face and hands

>Noise Ninja for overall noise reduction

>High Pass Sharpening

>Sized and Framed for Posting

Surf City 1

Surf City 1, a photo by Tony DeSantis Photography on Flickr.

The Shot:

>Single Exposure, F/6.7, 1/750 sec +1ev, ISO 500, 70-200L non-IS @310mm with 2X extender. With Tripod.

Post Processing CS-5:

>Raw Increase Black, Exposure, Adjusted WB

>Topaz Adjust 4.0 for Color and Detail

>Adjustment Layer-Levels-For White and Black points

>Adjustment Layer-Hue/Sat-reduce red in face and hands

>Noise Ninja for overall noise reduction

>High Pass Sharpening

>Sized and Framed for Posting