Photo of the Day

We stayed on a beautiful lake near Fussen, Germany in early Fall of 2012. After we arrived at the hotel I ran down to the lake and shot a few bracketed photos (3 photos with different exposures). It was mid-day so I didn't really think these would turn out. But I ended up being fairly happy with it.

This was my first real attempt at shooting with HDR in mind. There's more ghosting than I'd like, but live and learn.

The next morning I regrouped and snapped a series of photos in the early morning hours as the sun was coming up. I'll share those a bit later. 

View fullsize

Füssen, Germany

Photo of the Day

I'm slowly going through my Germany photos and I'm putting them out at a trickle. I snapped this picture in downtown Heidelberg just as the rain had stopped.  A group of soldiers were walking by in weird historical looking costum. I ran to set up this shot just as they were entering the frame. Their costumes were a nice blue color but I thought this photo was better served with a historical look to it. What do you think?

View fullsize

eidelberg, Germany

Photo of the Day

'm finally starting to edit some of my Germany photos. The first batch that I'm going through I shot with HDR in mind.

I took this inside a moderately small church in Heidelberg. I was fond of the peach hue as the afternoon light came in. I used a Sony NEX-7 for most of the trip. I'm a little upset at some of the ghosting I missed in the painting in the ceiling but live and learn.

Once I was done I used a new piece of software called Snapheal, more on that in another post. But it was great, it managed to remove two women who were meandering through my shot. It took roughly two clicks to do it. Again, more on that later.

hat do you think of the church?

View fullsize

A church in Heidelberg, German

Mirrorless Cameras Upending DSLR's

I'd been using the hulking Canon D Mark II for last the year or so until I met my new love the Sony NEX-7. Yes the lenses aren't as plentiful but the versatility is more bountiful. Today The Verge put forth the hypothesis I've been seeing for the past few months that mirrorles cameras are the future of digital photography.

Olympus, Sony, and Panasonic have proved that the best way to take on the mirrorless market is to start from scratch. Olympus joined forces with Panasonic to create Micro Four Thirds, which carries some DNA from the old Four Thirds system but is basically an entirely new standard with newer, smaller lenses to match. The result has been innovative and diminutive cameras like the OM-D E-M5 and Lumix GH2. Sony went a similar route by creating a new system with the same sensor size as its Alpha SLRs, and while its NEX series doesn't quite have the lens support yet, the cameras have an unbeatable combination of image quality and design. In fact, Sony's camera division is arguably the only part of the company that's operating at anywhere near the level of its former glories, which certainly isn't a prediction anyone would have made five years ago.