Mother nature decided to snow on Louisville KY, it’s also going to hang around for a few days as it’s going to stay cold. With this bit of fact the family decided we need a sled and we will go find one! We went to Costco, Target, Meijer and Dicks. We also were looking for real “snow boots/moon boots”.
We never found a sled. We never found real snow boots. We were too late and the stock of said items were totally depleted.
We did find a boat and used that for a sled……it’s totally awesome.
I know, I know… you have been asking yourself… I wonder what Steve’s drive to work and back home is like. You look at maps, analyze traffic patterns, try to follow me around while trying to take notes about stop lights and driving style.
In an effort to save your time, save the environment, save trees, save the otters etc I have a time-lapse video of me driving to work and driving back home. Your Welcome
Now I’m sure your asking your self. What’s the cost! How do I get tickets to watch the video, can I get a private viewing and is it up for “best video of the year”? The answer to these questions are in order: free,none needed,yes,no
See below for your entertainment. If you are entertained then you are easily amused and that’s good because these videos are bad.
Hit “Play” and then pause it. It will need to buffer some for best viewing experience.
Hit “Play” and then pause it. It will need to buffer some for best viewing experience.
This was my first attempt at Time Lapse, I set up my camera on a tall light stand and set the remote to take a picture every 30 seconds. I put in a 8GB CF card and was able to capture 450 pictures until my batter failed. The battery was only 45% full when I started and was impressed with the number of shots that it did manage to complete. I had the autofocus off and no image review, this may have added in the battery life as well.
After I downloaded the pictures to my PC, I converted them from RAW to JPGs, then into a WMV using windows movie maker and then finally converted the video to flash and posted it. Using this 30 second interval, it was disappointing as you could not see anyone “progress through the scene”, but merely a “pop” “pop” “pop” as people bounced around with out an actual “path” most of the time.
I think I’ll do this again in higher resolution and might even go down to every 10 seconds. I’ll also retouch all the images (in batch mode) as these look flat and weak.
The original reason for HDR is the contrast range of the digital sensor (or film) is not as great as our eyes. When you look at, say a landscape, you can see the highlights (Sky and clouds) and the shadow detail (Under trees, in the shadows) with out too much of a struggle. Your camera is not able to adjust the ISO based on available light under a tree as your eye is capable of. HDR can also solve the indoor photography problems with windows being blown out and shadows being too dark and/or you are not able to manage the issues with flashes and equalizing the indoor/window exposure situation. I have seen some HDR shots that look nice and normal and I have seen some that look alien and surreal. HDR is not for all situations, say an HDR of a sporting event may not turn out if you used multiple pictures.
HDR of windy trees looks weird and may mess up the project. HDR of your fish tank during feeding is not a great plan either. Stuck In Customs has some good examples of normal HDR and alien HDR, It looks like he may use single photo HDR technichs at times as well. Flickr has plenty HDR photos to review as well. Watch the video at the bottom.
The Problem
You place the camera up to your eye and take a shot, the captured image is not as it was in real life and the contrast range is too small. If this is a lad scape picture, one of two things happen to the photo in most situations. The camera either meters and exposes for the Sky or for the dirt/rocks/buildings and you end up with a blown out sky or deep dark areas with no detail.
The Fix
Using the bracketing +/- exposure function in your DLSR can allow your camera to aid in correcting this issue. It will take at least three (depends on your camera) pictures in a row (use a tripod or get good at being still). Some cameras can be programed to your style or bracketing needs for more bracketed pictures. Each picture will be exposed more or less from the measured exposure the camera should have taken if not in bracketing mode. It does this by changing the shutter speed faster and slower so more or less light is captured. You need to be in Aperture Priority mode on most cameras. If the “correct” (correct as far as the in camera meter thinks) exposure was f4 1/250, when in bracketing mode the camera will speed up and slow down the shutter to obtain the different levels of exposure.
You end up with three (or more depending on your camera) exposures. Ranging from Blown out sky and detailed dark areas to perfect skys with black dark areas. These can then be fed into some HDR software and “combined”. This will combine the pictures and try and give you the same feel on that sunny day high contrast view in digital form. Using Photomatix is simple enough for me. I cannot speak about other software packages as I have never used them. Nor do I have the experience necessary to tell you what’s best. Using Photomatix you can get normal photos to the surreal photos. I have included some flat before pictures as well so you can see the “before” HDR and clean up of a RAW photo
Below are some of my HDR pictures. Normal to surreal. I still have plenty to learn.
Joe Canning is a videographer and has been tweaking his skills on the camera and the post processing. Joe is a Oracle/MSSQL DBA by trade and also works at Insight. He is a good person to have on any team.
Anyway Joe asked John Stone and myself to play roles in a commercial contest he was shooting for www.forrent.com , I reminded Joe I have no experience, he must have been really desperate.
We had a great time and half the fun was my “Plank/stiff/” style of acting and the jokes about things that cannot be repeated. John Stone on the other hand is a natural and built for comedy. Below are some stills and the commercial as well.
I purchased my 1996 Ford Ranger, used in 1997. The truck had 20K miles already but was in great shape. I think a girl owned it before me as it smelled “pretty” inside, all the time, a lot. I used to be a smoker, that killed the “pretty” smell real quick.
Anyway, this truck has been great. Below you can see and share in it’s special moment.
(The picture will change every 10sec or so, or you can hover over the picture and some controls will appear)
(The picture will change every 10sec or so, or you can hover over the picture and some controls will appear)
Well, my oldest son finished reading the book “Holes”. He wanted to dig holes after reading it so I told him to dig up the bush in back yard. He finished that and asked if he could keep digging. It took him almost 2 days to complete this crater. I guess all I can say is I had an attack of the “redneck” and let loose.
