Posts Tagged Canon 18-55
March 9, 2010 – Mt. Shuksan
Posted by Dave in Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on March 9, 2010
Mt. Shuksan
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=631
I don’t like this picture. I mean, I *really* don’t like this picture. The foreground is all muddled up with a shapeless mess of green stuff, and not only does it not nicely frame the mountain in the background, it actually partially blocks it. I really really don’t like this picture. But for some unknown reason, it seems that everyone else does. At the time I’m writing this, it’s got 53 votes, with an astronomical average of 8.96!! What?!? I mean, I can understand the odd high vote here and there, but normally by the time a mediocre picture gets 53 votes, sanity has prevailed and the average rating has fallen to a more reasonable level. But not with this one.
Am I wrong here?? What do you people see in this picture that I’m missing? There’s got to be something, right? Anyone??
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/200s, f/5.6, ISO 100. Focal length: 22mm.
Subscribe to the Picture of the Day via: Popularity: 11%
February 9, 2010 – Washington Park Japanese Garden
Posted by Dave in Fall Color, Picture of the Day, Washington State on February 9, 2010
Woodland Park Japanese Garden
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=697
Meh.
Popularity: 12%
February 5, 2010 – Fort San Cristobal
Posted by Dave in Picture of the Day on February 5, 2010
Fort San Cristobal, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Friday, February 5, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=463
Whoa, wait, what happened to Thursday? Dang. I had the perfect crappy picture too! Oh well. Maybe next week. Instead, today, I’ll share with you this one, which I really like, but the rest of you… not so much. (judging by all of the votes in Rate Dave’s Pictures anyway.)
This is Fort San Cristobal, in old town San Juan, Puerto Rico. It’s been around since like 300 BC or the 1500′s or something like that. It’s way older than just about anything I come across each day. (Not surprising considering I live in a city that’s a grand total of 100-some years old.) The thing I like so much about this shot is the color. All the swirly multicolored designs that have just slowly appeared in the several-hundred-year-old-concrete-or-whatever-it-is. That’s what really fascinated me when I was there. I don’t know what color all of the intimidating walls and such were to start out with, but now they’re… beautiful. When I was taking this picture, I was trying to contrast the super old stuff in the foreground, with the modern city of San Juan in the background, peeking out through that little archway. It turns out that the little archway is way too small to make out any detail really, but I ended up loving the picture anyway just because of that delicious texture on the walls. (And I like how the blue sky mixes in too, it’s just a steaming pile of color casserole.)
Vorrei dire “avere un grande fine settimana”, ma ho il vago sospetto che nessuno sia in realtà la lettura di questo. Invece, io dico: “Mi piace il formaggio giallo!”
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/200s, f/5.0, ISO 100. Focal length: 21mm
Popularity: 2%
January 19, 2010 – Green Bottle Fly
Posted by Dave in - Best of Dave's POTD -, Macro, Picture of the Day on January 19, 2010
Green Bottle Fly
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1040
Alrighty, I finished up with that whole travelling to Montana thing. Now, back to real life. My original plan was to use something from that trip here, but honestly, I haven’t had a chance to even BEGIN going through them yet, so instead today I’ll fulfill one of last week’s requests. (If you want to request anything, either leave it in the comments or contact me directly – dave (at) davefry (dot) net. I’ll see if I’ve got anything that works.)
This is a green bottle fly (or at least that’s what my (really) brief research on google suggested), seen through a reverse-mounted 18-55 mm kit lens. I talked about this already at length in this post, so if you’re at all interested in this kind of stuff, please do yourself a favor and read that entry too. But, long story short, you buy a little adapter for your lens, and then the magic happens. Wooo!
I’ll try to at least do something resembling a first pass on the Montana pics tonight, at least as far as finding one worthy of posting here. We’ll see how that goes.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, reverse-mounted 18-55mm kit lens. 1/320s, ISO 200.
Popularity: 7%
December 15, 2009 – St. Thomas Sunrise
Posted by Dave in Picture of the Day, Tropical/Beaches on December 15, 2009
St. Thomas Sunrise
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=459
Welcome back everyone. Today’s shot takes us back to my honeymoon a few years ago, in (among other places) St. Thomas. St. Thomas is in the Caribbean, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, for those of you who need a quick geography refresher. This was the view at sunrise from our hotel complex. It was really hazy while we were there, which may very well be the way it usually is, I really have no idea. But, it made for these somewhat unexpected colors during sunrise and sunset, kind of cool.
I went back and forth for a little while about which picture I should post today, this one or a similar image, taken horizontally, which didn’t have nearly as much sky in it. In a lot of ways, that one is a better image, because this has all the interesting stuff way at the bottom, and just a bunch of dead space up top. Except that it’s not quite dead space. It’s got that huge color gradient, from yellow to deep navy blue. The other one cut off right where the yellow turned into the mud brown. So in the end I went with this one, since it was the amazing color that made me want to take the picture in the first place.
Be sure to check back tomorrow, because I’m going to post another picture of… actually, I have no idea, but I’m sure it’ll be utterly fascinating. See you then!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/400s, f/5.6, ISO 100. Focal length: 30mm.
Popularity: 8%
December 9, 2009 – Fly
Posted by Dave in Animals, Macro, Picture of the Day on December 9, 2009
Fly
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
http://davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1111
I know, I know, a lot of you think pictures like this one are kind of disgusting. And let’s be honest, they kind of are. But they’re still really cool. And, you have to admit, it’s been quite awhile since I’ve posted one.
This was taken with the 18-55 mm kit lens that came with my Canon, reverse-mounted using one of these guys: http://bit.ly/hCi4n . It’s truly ridiculous how close-in you can get that way, and all you need is a cheesy little 13 dollar attachment. Unfortunately, since you’re attaching the lens to your camera backwards, you obviously don’t get the benefit of any of the electronic controls, which means the focus is totally manual (although focusing at that distance consists of simply rocking back and forth on the balls of your feet) and your aperture will be wide open. However, I don’t think shrinking the aperture would help you at all anyway, since there’s such a pitifully small amount of light reaching your sensor anyway.
As you can tell, the depth of field when taking pictures like this is quite literally microscopic. In normal landscape photography, you can take a photo with everything from 15 feet in front of you out to infinity all in focus. Here? The only thing in focus is a very narrow band between the fly’s back and the front of his head. We’re talking maybe a millimeter here. It’s weird. Another odd thing about doing this kind of stuff is how close you have to get to your subject. This fly was literally less than an inch from the front (well, the back) of my lens. As you can imagine, this introduces a whole host of new issues. Such as: flies tend to be a bit skittish. So it can be hard to get close enough to even get a picture. And, I don’t know about you, but I’m not good at standing perfectly still. I tend to rock back and forth a bit. When I’m taking a picture of a mountain, an inch or two in either direction doesn’t really make a difference. But when your depth of field is a millimeter, it’s a bit different. And, even on top of that, it’s worth pointing out that flies are FAST. They move a LOT. So while normally the biggest concern is using a fast enough shutter speed to avoid camera shake, with these shots you need to get much, much faster than that, so that you don’t get motion blur. (1/400th of a second is a great place to start.) So to say getting this picture was a bit frustrating a bit of an understatement. Let’s just say, it’s a good think I was shooting digital, because I had a couple hundred frames of complete garbage. (Not an exaggeration.)
One thing I like about these shots, and this one in particular, is that they’re very illustrative of what happens when you move away from the focal point. The eye is fantastic, because you can see what it looks like in focus, and you can very clearly see how it degrades from that into the general out of focus mushy stuff. Fun times, all around.
Before I let you go today, I’d like to point something out real quick. If you see that bit.ly link above ( http://bit.ly/hCi4n ), that’s a link to Amazon, to the actual reverse-mount attachment I use. If you use that link to go to Amazon, then buy ANYTHING on the site, it’s linked up to my referral account, so I get 4% of your purchase paid to me. So I would urge you, if you’re going to do any Amazon shopping this holiday season, to please go to Amazon via that link, help me out a bit. If you buy enough stuff, I’ll send you a free calendar!! What could be better than that?! Oh, a lot of stuff, you’re right. But it’s still pretty awesome!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, reverse-mounted 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/400s, ISO 800.
Popularity: 6%
December 7, 2009 – Gold Creek Pond and Chikamin Peak
Posted by Dave in Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on December 7, 2009
Gold Creek Pond and Chikamin Peak
Monday, December 7, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=615
Wow, that was close, I almost missed Monday. Got it in just after business hours closed on the west coast. That’s fine, that just means that this picture will be the “latest post” for a shorter time, which is probably good, because it’s not my favorite. They can’t all be winners, of course, but it still stings when one loses.
This is Chikamin Peak and Gold Creek Pond, seen from the Gold Creek Pond picnic area near Snoqualmie Pass. I’ve talked about it before so I’m not going to go into any more than that now. This is a good illustration of why sometimes you hear people say that the best light for pictures tends to be either early in the morning or late in the afternoon. The mid-day light tends to just flatten out the colors, which results in a more ho-hum picture. Still great for some purposes (like documenting a hike you go on, for instance), but you’re much more likely to get the really dramatic “keepers” closer to the fringes of the day. The light then tends to be a lot warmer, and the angle of the light leads to nice shadows and such, which do a great job of emphasizing details and adding depth. Also, there can be a lot of haze during the day. Nothing will kill color better than a little bit of haze. It doesn’t even have to be a LOT of haze. There’s haze here, but you wouldn’t even know it. It drains the color from stuff in the distance, and gives it a flat bluish hue. The haze goes away late in the afternoon (for whatever reason) so the details in the distance can look a lot more interesting.
That’s fine, whatever, it’s a pretty spot, worth visiting if you’re in the area, etc, etc, etc. Okay, go watch the football game now, I’m done with you! 
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/250s, f/6.3, ISO 100. Focal length: 31mm.
Popularity: 3%
November 30, 2009 – Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on November 30, 2009
Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake
Monday, November 30, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=641
Hey everyone, welcome back from Thanksgiving! I hope you were all able to give heartfelt thanks for all the good stuff in your life, and passive-aggressively attack those who are guilty for everything else. I was, and man, it was awesome.
So, first off, I do feel like it’s worth mentioning that no, I have not posted this picture before. I have, however, posted at least a couple that are really similar. That’s just the way it goes around here. When I go places, I take a lot of pictures, that are all just a little bit different. The differences are usually subtle enough that you won’t notice them unless you’re looking at two versions right next to each other. But what usually happens is that half of the subtle differences that I like better are in one version, and half in the other, so I can’t in good conscience pick one over the other. So I usually keep both hanging around. That’s exactly how it happens that all 10 if the top 10 most highly-rated pictures of Colorado in Rate Dave’s Photos are pictures of the Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake taken on the same day. This one’s not QUITE that similar, (it’s vertical, whereas the ones I’ve posted here before were horizontal), but the point still stands.
If you actually read the text here on potd.com closely (I’m not sure how many of you actually do), you probably noticed that I failed to post a picture last Tuesday as I had promised. It’s a long story as to why, but it involved running out of time and almost missing a flight. But, before things got quite so desperate, I had planned on posting this picture. Mostly because I figured it was a safe one to go ahead and post with a minimal write-up. So since I was already mentally committed to using it, I figured I’d go ahead and use it today.
This is of course a view of the Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake, just outside of Aspen, Colorado. I think I’ve actually posted three Maroon Bells pictures before, so if you’re interested in seeing those, search for “Maroon Bells” in the search box on the upper right. I would normally link to them here, but I’m feeling a bit lazy today.
But, since I actually do have time to do a write-up today, I’ll go ahead and say something about it. And here we go.
There are a lot of different kinds of photo opportunities. There are the subtle ones, where something catches your eye in the middle of an ordinary day. And there’s the ones where due to some unique circumstance, like a crazy storm rolling through or a nice sunset, something ordinary is turned into something extraordinary. There’s mood shots, where for whatever reason the scene in front of you does a perfect job of encapsulating the aura of a place and thus makes a good story. The list goes on and on. But somewhere in that list is the lookout point. A well-marked spot where the general consensus is that the view kicks ass. Doesn’t really matter the time of day, time of year, or weather. It’s just an awesome viewpoint that makes for a great picture. That’s what this place is. The natural elements are all there in such a way as to make it idiot-proof to get an awesome shot. I’m not really sure where I’m going with this, but I do want to make sure I somehow work it into this paragraph that you should take the time to try out a lot of different stuff in such a situation. Try taking it horizontally, try it vertically, try it with all sorts of different layouts of foreground. Try it with everything. Because you’re using digital (you’re using digital, right?), so who cares how many you take? And for god’s sake, don’t delete them on the camera before you’ve had a chance to see them on the big screen! The ONLY excuse for that is if your card is full and you need to take more pictures. But it’s WAY too easy to miss something on the little tiny camera screen that will turn an image that you think is only ho-hum into something fantastic. It very often happens that the real winners, my favorite shots of the day, are not the ones I expected to be so when I was taking them.
Okay, lunch time. I’ve rambled at you enough for one day. Thanks for coming back after almost a whole week of no posts! I promise I’ll do it again soon.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/320s, f/7.1, ISO 100. Focal length: 25mm.
Popularity: 7%
November 12, 2009 – Mt. St. Helens
Posted by Dave in Flowers, Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on November 12, 2009
Mt. St. Helens
Thursday, November 12, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=498
Hello everyone. You probably noticed that there was no post yesterday. I was sick, as it turns out. I promise not to let that happen again, EVER. (The getting sick thing. There will PLENTY of days with no posts, because I possess a mix of both laziness and a desire to make your life more difficult.) I’m somewhat recovered today, which means that you guys get a picture today! That may not be a positive thing, but it’s too late for that now.
This is, of course, Mt. St. Helens, in southwestern Washington state. Yes, this is the volcano that exploded back in 1980. And yes, I realize that a lot of you reading this blog weren’t even alive then. As I’ve said before, it’s a fascinating place to visit, just to see the devastation that was caused. Even now, almost 30 years later, the landscape has only begun to recover. This spot in particular is pretty illustrative: there used to be thick forest right here. And when I say “thick” I’m not kidding around. Some of you have seen the forests out here in Washington (Seattle has a reputation for being rainy for a reason), and some of you haven’t, but we don’t eff around with our forests. When we decide to put a forest somewhere, that forest is going to be serious. As in, unless you cut a pathway through it, you won’t be able to walk between the trees. And now? All gone. Demolished. As if there wasn’t anything here at all. In the blast zone, bushes and such have started growing back (like these flowers) but it’s a much different landscape than it was before the explosion. Also interesting in this picture: you can see the new lava dome being formed in the crater, and you can see the jet of gases being expelled. It’s still quite active, for sure.
To switch gears a bit, I’ve hinted several times at how anal and picky I can be about my pictures. Today’s picture is a great example. I’ve had this picture for quite awhile, but I’ve never felt right posting it, there was just this one glaring flaw that made me think it wasn’t worth it. Now, finally, today, I did something about it. Normally I don’t bother with using Photoshop to touch up pictures (beyond brightness/contrast/sharpening/etc), mostly because I don’t know how. But today, I decided it was worth it. (Well, I used the Retouch feature in Picasa, not Photoshop, but it’s the same idea.) What’s that? You want to know what the one little flaw was? The flaw that made me decide this picture was essentially worthless unless it was removed? Well, why don’t you take a look for yourself, and see if you can find it. Yeah, like I said, I’m a little bit picky.
Have a great weekend out there everyone! If you live in Washington, hopefully you can make it out on the hill for some turns! I can’t, but I’d love to live vicariously through you!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/250s, f/7.1, ISO 100. Focal length: 25mm.
Popularity: 5%
October 21, 2009 – Mt. Baker
Posted by Dave in Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on October 21, 2009
Mt. Baker from Heather Meadows
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=628
Hey everyone. You may have noticed that my Picture of the Day efforts this week were a big fat fail. I’ve been sick the last couple days, and absurdly busy. But, I didn’t want to let it slip three days in a row, so here’s a pic for today.
This is Mt. Baker, in northern Washington State. It’s a big volcanic peak, just like Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Adams, Mt. Hood, and several others that stretch along the Pacific crest from California to British Columbia. Not much else to say here, and I’ve got to get back to work. Enjoy!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/400s, f5.6, ISO 200. Focal length: 22 mm.
Popularity: 4%
October 16, 2009 – Heather Meadows
Posted by Dave in Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on October 16, 2009
Artist Ridge trail - Heather Meadows
Friday, October 16, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=623
This is the 100th Picture of the Day! Pretty incredible, right? I figured I would have lost interest a LONG time ago. But no, 100 pictures, in 100 days (more or less, not counting weekends…) So far, I’m still doing just fine on the picture supply too. (Sure, I’ve posted a couple duds this week, and will no doubt do so again quite a few times in the future, but hey, without the crappy ones, how would you recognize the good ones??)
I started this knowing that there would certainly come a day when I would just run out of usable pictures. Obviously reusing them is an option, one that I haven’t ruled out, but it feels kind of wrong. Of course, I can push that day back by continuing to take more pictures, but if I add fewer than 5 to the pile every week, that doesn’t solve the root problem. Overall this summer I did a decent job keeping the pile about the same size. But this winter may be tough. It’s a lot harder to get out in the winter, and even when I can, the weather tends to suck (out here anyway.) We’ll see how it goes I guess. As it is, I think I’ve got at least another hundred in me, give or take a couple.
Here’s how the stats are looking: I’ve got 361 fans on Facebook. The majority of those arrived via the Facebook ads that I was buying for awhile (I bought ads for about a week, but that was awhile ago…) I’m not actually sure how many of those folks actually ever see any of the pictures though, they’re certainly quiet on the comment/like threads. On http://picture-of-the-day.com, I’ve got 17 more people who check the RSS feed every day. That’s pretty cool. I know one of them is Will Cothen. Because Will Cothen is cool. Will Cothen also just had a baby. Congrats Will Cothen!
Anyway, here’s today’s picture. It’s from Heather Meadows, near Mt. Baker, just outside the boundary of North Cascades National Park, in Washington state. I’ve posted a couple pictures from there before. In the winter, this spot would be under about 20 feet of snow, solidly in the backcountry of the ski area at Mt. Baker. In fact, even as late as July it’s still usually buried several feet deep. But it’s got some nice colors come late September. Lots of blueberries too, good stuff. It’s a great day trip, heading up there. It takes about 3 or 3 and a half hours to drive up there, but there’s a number of little trails that you can knock off with just an afternoon (this photo is from one of the short ones – the Artist Ridge trail). There are of course longer trails too, some of which cross the boundary into the national park, some of which head toward Mt. Baker itself. Somehow I always seem to end up there at least once a year, which is nothing to complain about.
That’s it for today, have a great weekend, and enjoy the next 100 pictures!
Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/320s, f7.1, ISO 200, focal length: 31mm.
Popularity: 3%
October 2, 2009 – Upper Silver Lake
Posted by Dave in - Best of Dave's POTD -, Picture of the Day, Washington State on October 2, 2009
Upper Silver Lake - Buckhorn Wilderness
Friday, October 2, 2009
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=540
Hey everyone, welcome back. Today’s picture is another one of my all-time favorites. It’s proven to be really hard to decide to use one of my all-time favorites for a Picture of the Day post. I mean, on the one hand, they’re my favorite pictures, the ones I’m most proud of, so of course I want to show them off to everyone. But, once I use it, it’s done, it’s used. And I can never use it again. (Well, fine, it’s my own blog, I can reuse one if I darn well please. But that’s cheeseball.) So, I don’t want to use all of the great ones early on, then have nothing left but mediocre shots until eventually I run out completely. So there’s definitely a (small) pile of personal favorites that I’ve been holding back, waiting for.. who knows what. And everytime I think about using one, I manage to talk myself out of it.
So, today I decided to go ahead and toss one out. Lucky you! Feel free to send me cookies to say thanks, I wouldn’t complain.
This is Upper Silver Lake, in the Buckhorn Wilderness on the Olympic Peninsula, and yes, you’ve seen at least one other picture of this lake already. And yes, you’ve already seen SEVERAL other pictures that I took on the same hike. (As recently as… yesterday, in fact.) For whatever reason, that trip was probably the best trip I’ve ever taken, in terms of the sheer number of high-quality images that came out of it, particularly when you compare that to how long we were out. (Just two days.) Pretty wild. Here’s another one that I posted awhile ago, that was taken just a couple hours after this one, but is also in the “all-time-favorites” pile: http://picture-of-the-day.com/?p=139 . In fact, that picture was taken just over the saddle on the ridgeline that you can see in this picture. (Just past that little snow patch.) Needless to say, it’s a really beautiful area.
Any requests for next week? Mountains? Flowers? Bugs? Snow? Beaches? Anything?
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/250s, f/6.3, ISO 400. Focal length: 18mm.
Popularity: 6%