Day 34 – Indoors and Out

I got tired of fiddling with this:

So I went outside. How I love it that while the gardeners keep the lawn mowed and the leaves blown, they pretty much leave the wild vegetation in a natural state. Otherwise they would have weed-whacked this lovely away.

Day 31 – Color and Light

I’m sorry I’m so late posting this. I had class tonight and I’ve spent the evening working on my first assignment. And no, I’m still not satisfied, but my battery just about ran out of juice, so I had to stop. As is typical on a work and school day, I didn’t have a whole lot of time to shoot, so I returned to the same park where I shot the bridge on Day 18. While I did take a few pictures of the bridge, what really caught my eye was how the late afternoon sun was playing on the sparse vegetation. I even found a little color in our drab northern Nevada winter.

Now, off to bed.

Day 29 – Playing with HDR

I’ve been hearing a lot about HDR and wondering if I might start incorporating it into some of my photography. From what I can see, HDR is an effective tool when you are dealing with wildly different exposed areas in a photograph. In northern Nevada it is quite easy to blow out the sky when trying to shoot a landscape. Anyway, I experimented a bit today. First I did a quick bit of research on the intertubes, just to figure out the mechanics of it in Photoshop, and then I went out into the front yard and took photos. Using a tripod, I set my f-stop to 22, ISO to 100 and took multiple shots adjusting shutter speed each time to properly expose for the sky, the mountains, foreground, etc. I also did the same thing looking out through our front door. Here are the results.

A view of the mountains from our front yard. © Carissa Snedeker

Normally to get this kind of definition in the colorless landscape I would have to blow out the sky, so I kind of like how the sky looks here.

Looking toward the mountains through the leafless windbreak. © Carissa Snedeker

I really like the sky in this one.

Finally, I shot this in our living room looking out on our front yard through our storm door (I live in the desert…we only have lawn in the backyard). Shots like this are really where HDR appears to provide the greatest assist. In order to get any blue from the sky and still properly expose the interior of the house, HDR is a nice tool. I am not that happy with this particular photo, but I wanted to share it anyway.

Looking out the front door. © Carissa Snedeker

I have much to learn if I want to use this tool more effectively.

Day 27 – Tangled Tree and a Kitteh

I wanted to share this with you. I took this photo in the same field where I shot the wagon wheel. Behind the wagon wheel (lower left of this photo) there is a tree with a wheel that, as the tree has grown, has been absorbed into the tree itself. One of these days I’m going to sneak through the barbed wire to get a really good look at it.

Normally Maya is a bit aloof but every now and then she wants to hang out and tonight was one of those nights. She paused on the end table and I was able to snap quite a few of her lit only by the table lamp. She looks so sweet and soft.

Day 23 – Snow Flowers

We woke to some much-needed snow. Again, it didn’t last, but it was a much healthier dump (and much wetter) than the last storm that came through. I took these just as I was leaving for work this morning. We let our wild flowers just stay long after they’ve lost their petals. I see beauty in every phase of their brief lives.

Day 22 – Withered Vine

We have a grape-vine that crawls over the latticed roof of our deck. This portion of vine was hanging over the far corner of the deck and I took several shots, changing the exposure with each try. While the sky is completely blown out in this photograph, I actually like it best of all of because it shows light through the leaves and emphasizes the curves and shadows of the vine. It almost has a studio lighting quality to it.

Day 20 – Broken Bird

I slipped out to the duck pond by NV Energy again today. Amidst all the geese, ducks and coots, this little guy caught my eye. Hopping along on one leg, he didn’t appear to feel the least bit sorry for himself, but he just broke my heart. I converted the shot to black and white. It seemed fitting.

Day 19 – Fire

I went out at about 1:30 with my camera and saw some smoke in the sky. Given the nature of the topography in Reno and the Truckee Meadows, it is often difficult to tell where a fire is located. However, this fire appeared to be fairly close because the smoke was moving quickly and starting to move into south Reno.

I took this picture because I liked the size and beauty of the tree. But those aren’t clouds in the background. It is smoke.

When I got back to work at 2pm there was a voice mail from my boss letting me that he had to leave as there was a brush fire in his area. I checked in with him a little while ago and they have just evacuated. Snow and rain were forecast for this afternoon but it is just now that we are starting to get some precipitation. A tiny bit. We really have no idea how many homes have been lost.

It is Reno’s second major fire in less than two months.