Photowalking^2

Yesterday was a day full of photowalking with both the Charleston and North Charleston instances of the Worldwide Photowalk. One ambitious walker also did the Worldwide photowalk in Summerville, making 3 in one day. Stamina.

It was a hot day for photowalking too. The buildings downtown provided shade and respite from the sun, which made things mostly tolerable. By the time I got to Waterfront Park though, I was very tempted to join the throngs of kids playing in the fountain.

Refreshing

Despite the heat, there was a pretty decent turnout for both photowalks.

Assembled photowalkers

The Charleston photowalk started off in front of the Powder Magazine downtown on Cumberland and wandered a route that took us down to Tradd and then back up to Market St through Waterfront Park. Yeah, that fountain was very tempting.

The North Charleston photowalk that I was leading started off at the Riverfront Park in North Charleston and wandered through part of the old Navy base. At one point, one of those big heavily armoured military vehicles drove past a bunch of us. How could anybody resist photographing that? Not long after that some security dude drove by and said we weren’t allowed to take photographs of them.

Fortunately the rest of the photowalk went off without any other incidents. Much fun. Pork Trifecta at EVO afterwards was very yummy after all that photowalking.

More photos from some of the other photowalkers in the Worldwide Photowalk North Charleston Flickr group and the Worldwide Photowalk Charleston Flickr group

Polarizer play

Took advantage of a sunny-but-not-roasting-hot afternoon to go outside and play with the polarizing filter I bought a little while ago. I haven’t used it too much because I just keep forgetting to pack it along with me. So I wandered up the block to the ponds, set up the camera on the tripod and started to play.

First, without any filter. Pointed the camera down the street at a lone cloud in the sky, with the sun mostly to my left.

f4.0, 1/1000 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

No polarizing filter f4.0, 1/1000 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

Then put the polarizer on and turned it to get the minimum amount of polarization. The image is a little darker because the filter does have a little bit of tint to it.

f4.0, 1/1000 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

Polarizing filter minimum polarizing f4.0, 1/1000 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

Turned the polarizer 90° to get the maximum amount of polarization. The effect is quite dramatic. The sky gets much darker and really makes the cloud pop out. The greens really come through too and the colours look more saturated.

f4.0, 1/400 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

Polarizing filter maximum polarizing f4.0, 1/400 s, ISO 100, aperture priority

Next I zoomed in on the clouds down by the horizon. First with no filter

f8, 1/500 s, ISO 100, auto

No polarizing filter f8, 1/500 s, ISO 100, auto

Then with the filter on and turned to minimum polarizing. The clouds look pretty flat and boring, and don’t really stand out at all.

f5.6, 1/400 s, ISO 100, auto

Polarizing filter minimum polarization f5.6, 1/400 s, ISO 100, auto

Turning the filter 90 degrees really makes things pop out.

f5.6, 1/250 s, ISO 100, auto

Polarizing filter max polarization f5.6, 1/250 s, ISO 100, auto

Will definitely have to remember to keep the polarizer with me.

Back door guardian

Close-up of the spider guarding the back door

BackDoorSpider.JPG