A day in Seattle

[StephenK]

I, my wife and our dog were in Seattle for the better part of a day here recently... my wife had things to do, so my dog and I
went on a day-long walking tour... I wanting to share some of the images of this adventure...

The primary lens that I used was a Tokina 10mm-17mm.... What an incredible lens to have along for wide angle shots!

The pictures I'll be posting took quite a bit of beating to get down to get them down to this size but the damage itself isn't terminal! :^)

There's the one of the Space Needle (a must-shot for Seattle :^) but the next one is a shot I'd never seen before.
It's the "shadow" of the Space Needle in an area that compliments the Space Needle's shape! There's a picture of the
waterfront.. and a photo that was taken down at the Pikes Place Market... and finally a snap-shot of the work-a-day life of
two window cleaners.... Not at all my idea of fun!! :^)

[StephenK]

Here are two more, taken down by the waterfront... These are each two-picture panos.

This one is of the skyline, looking eastward from out on a very-empty dock.... the dock itself is something of a bizarre anomaly, so empty
around so much activity!


http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll202/StephenKr/skylinepanoreduced2.jpg


And then turn around and this is the view when you look westard.... The Olympic mountain range accents a most gorgeous bay backdrop....
The nickname "Emerald City" is a well earned term of beauty! :D


http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll202/StephenKr/Olympic-Mountain-.jpg

[StephenK]

One of the embedded charms of Seattle is the often cozy mixture of the old with the new...
Large and looming, among the quaint and traditional. The pictures below are a reflection of this trend.

----

While this one was a little bit different. This is a 9-picture Pano taken with my 28mm lens. I took it on a lark
to see how well it would turn out. Tossed them at photoshop and they came through like a dream! :^)




http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll202/StephenKr/seattle-roundbuildingsreduced.jpg

[Kaye]

Stephen, these are all so wonderful. What a great place.

I can't believe you did a 9 pic pano. Amazing. I also love the two large shots just above. You get great clouds there!

[trashytrucker]

Stephen,
Great job man. Thanks for sharing with us. They are so colorful and I myself enjoy the wide angle perspective. Thanks again.

Matt

[StephenK]

Thank You Kaye and Matt!! :^)

And to think they were calling for a 90% chance for rain all day! I originally thought that I would be filming the more
traditional "wet" side of Seattle... as it turned-out the type of clouds that dotted the sky that day was warmly welcomed!

The pano thing is such a cool process to work with Kaye! I've done enough now that I'm somewhat casual in how I film them.
I have an almost unconscious sweep that I do, without a tripod... just overlap each image enough to let photoshop make the connections and you're good.

I've heard CS2 has a poor pano stitching engine, that was dramatically improved with CS3 (which was where I started working with it)... and am finding
that it totally-rocks in CS4! :^)

And the Wide Angle lens was such a surprise to me Matt... when I first got it I was disappointed because it seemed like a
lot of money to spend on a "trick" lens. But now that I'm learning to work with it, I'm very impressed with it's effective diversity, and quite taken by
how almost indispensable it is when it comes to cityscape's!

Here are a couple more from the other day... I loved the differing contrasts one stumbles across in the oddest places
in a city such as Seattle.

I call these first two a "Tale of Two Alleyways"...

... and then another version of the Space Needle. I liked the space-centric theme to this composition. As though
everything was pointing toward the heavens.. (I also got lucky and caught a float plane flying by in the background :^)

[Kaye]

Again, beautiful shots Stephen. I just love the affects of your wide angle lens.
In CS2, I doubt if I could do a pano putting photos next to and on top of others. I must give this a try one day.

[StephenK]

Thank you again Kaye! :^)

I'm still processing photos from the shoot and this morning was playing with this contrast, that I'd setup at the time, to see what the
difference would be in a pano with differing focal lengths.

The first one was shot with my other lens (28mm-70mm) set at 32mm. I didn't bother cleaning it up much here, but photoshop did do
a wonderful job with the stitching....

With the second image, I had switched-out lens and used the wide angle one set to 10mm. This second pano was done in 2 shots,
while the first pano took 6 to complete.

Also... with the 10mm version I had to manually stitch them together in photoshop. Photoshop balked right-away when entering the stitching cycle!
It seems photoshop does have it's limits! :^)

Pretty cool stuff.... I really like the wide angle version for what it's giving me in both upper and lower content! And there's not a whole lot
of difference in the distortion between the two.

And also a quick tip.... when photographing a pano try finding the middle-ground for lighting within the pano area, and then hold
down the shutter button until you hear that little beep. That locks-in the settings for the shot. Now take all your pictures without lifting your
finger all the way... this will apply all the same settings to each picture within the pano. Photoshop can handle quite a spread when it's gone
into "blend" mode, while stitching images together... but if you have to join them manually this is an incredible time saver!! :^)

[DoctorJazz]

Stephen,

Your Seattle series is thoroughly amazing....all of them! I have been watching them unfold in awe. Thanks for all the details you are sharing.

[rbosman]

These are awesome! I'm about 2 hours from Seattle and always enjoy spending time there. Thanks for sharing....

[jonrayner]

What an amazing city to be in. Love the shots in particular the panoramic with the mountains in the backdrop. That shot needs to be blown up really big and put on the wall.
Jon

[StephenK]

Thank you so much Sandy, Randy and Jon!! I'm very pleased that some of my experience that day is coming through in a way that
you can share some of the essence along with me!

Seattle is a profound place to photograph! :^)

In this next-to-last posting for that day, I have a couple of street view scenes, with the first and second ones showing-off
a bit of the range of the wide angle lens. In the first one, tilted upward, it takes-in not only the street view but picks up the building
behind me... with the last image almost normalized shot as 17mm... all this still fascinates me! :^)

[StephenK]

And then lastly, to round-out the thread, I'll close with a series of Seattle's most famous landmark... These are at ground level (next time I return I want to elevator-up to the revolving restaurant and do a full-revolution panorama :^)

I was exploring the differing ways that the space needle could be represented in a photo. Both from the idealized angle and within context to it's surroundings.

I've already posted some of those already...these are a couple of others further exploring the theme. :^)

[Kaye]

And then lastly, to round-out the thread, I'll close with a series of Seattle's most famous landmark... These are at ground level (next time I return I want to elevator-up to the revolving restaurant and do a full-revolution panorama :^)

I was exploring the differing ways that the space needle could be represented in a photo. Both from the idealized angle and within context to it's surroundings.

I've already posted some of those already...these are a couple of others further exploring the theme. :^)

Stephen - great stuff!!
I remain stunned with your shots, and do not know how I will ever learn this much.

Concerning your full revolution panorama, do you mean something like this? :

http://www.proudphotography.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5212

[StephenK]

Those are great Kaye! I'll be giving that method a try with the images from the upper portion of the space needle. I have played
around with such types of interactive panos before. I went ahead and dusted off the software and put a quick one together here, in keeping with the Seattle theme!

It's working on my computer when I test it.. I haven't done one of these in awhile!

Just hold down the mouse button inside the image and scroll.... :^) (and sorry for the ad at the top of the page that loads... I'm using a free web server at the moment for such things... :)

http://mntwest.bravehost.com/pans/seattlePanorama1.html

[Kaye]

This is really great Stephen. So well done.
Let's see some more!!

[mrdoug]

Wow - love your creative thinking in simply changing camera angle. It lends an
incredible new perspective. Outstanding!

[StephenK]

Thank You Kaye and Doug! :^)

Kaye, I put together another 360 pano that I did last winter but this is one of Spokane, Wa. Your asking me about this
has reawakened an interest from months ago that I haven't revisited until now. Thank you for that!

http://mntwest.bravehost.com/pans/spokane-blufreduced.html

I have all the equipment for working with panos... including the pano tripod head through a really great company to work with:
http://gregwired.com/pano/Pano.htm The pano head helps to correct for lens distortion when rotating a wide angle lens on a tripod.

And thanks again Doug! I truly think that I have the editing-time spent with several photo forms to thank for what happened that day. I've been
so immersed in working with other photographers images that it seemed to have sharpened my own eye to what's available when now wandering-about open
to images to take of my own.

I've done these types of wandering-shoots before, but this one was soooo different than the others... and the only thing that's changed since these others was
experience on forums like this one!

This is nice to know!! Thank you Proud Photography Forum! And to all those who visit and make this possible!! :^)


.

[Kaye]

Stephen, this one is even more magnificent with great scenery. It does the full 360 continuously, whereas the last one stopped at the far ends of the shot(s).

I am glad I awakened you, as you have a real talent with this. I don't know whether I will ever see the day that I can do this, but I am still learning bit by bit which pleases me.
I saved your Pano equip info from your second link for future reference in hope!