Another Visit to High Falls

Yesterday was my last official day of vacation. No, I don't work on Sunday, but because I need to go back to work tomorrow, it is very hard to completely relax. I told my wife that I would like to go take some pictures, and she readily agreed that it was a good thing to do. There are a few places that I go to on a regular basis and one of them is High Falls, GA. It is a beautiful and picturesque place that I can't seem to get enough of.

This is a panorama stitched together of four different exposures. If the lighting looks a little of, I committed the most common mistake when shooting for panoramas, I let the camera set the exposure. These are the main falls, but there are more!


This is a wide angle shot of the falls. I took this with my Tamron 11-18. Here is something interesting. To achieve the "cotton candy" look of the falls, I used three neutral density filters stacked using the Cokin P system. The Tamron is so wide, the P system holder created major league vignetting on this shot. So, I cropped it!



This is a shot of one of the "mini" falls, as I like to call it. During the spring, this shot would not be possible because of the amount of water coming down the falls. However, in the summer, there are plenty of these little gems to see and shoot. This shot also taught me something about my camera. The Canon 50D internal metering system doesn't like the stacked neutral density filters and most of my shots came out under exposed. Luckily, I shoot RAW and was able to recover most of them. Next time I will use my light meter and then compensate for the filters.

I really like this shot. It is heavily processed as there is a telephone pole that somehow ended up laying in the middle of the falls. So, I had to clone it out.

I will go back to High Falls again, and hopefully I will have as much fun as I did yesterday.

Cuban Food in Asheville, NC

GGGrrrrrrrr.

I love Cuban food. I have ever since I have the chance to live in South Florida for a couple of years. I have been living in Atlanta since 2002 and have not been able to find good Cuban food.

This week I took my family up to Asheville, NC to visit the Biltmore Estate. More on the Estate in a future post. The night we arrived, we were trying to decide where to eat. We came across an ad on a local map for Havana. Yeah, I know, an original name for a Cuban retaurant. So, I piled the family in the car and off we went.

Havana is located in downtown Asheville near the Grove Arcade. There are plenty of restaurants and shops in the area, but don't get the shopping bug after six at night, as they roll up the sidewalks and shut the doors to everything except the eateries.

When we walked in the restaurant, I was worried. The place was very unassuming with a low drop ceiling and flourescent lights with paint the plactic covers in a attempt to give the room a tropical flair. The restaurant also has Bonnie's Little Corner, a tobacco and cigar bar that looks like you could light one up right there in the room. Now, I love a good cigar, but I would have been PISSED if someone lit up a stogie while I was trying to enjoy my dinner. My concern grew deeper when I pulled out my chair to sit down and it had that "this chair hasn't been cleaned in months" stickiness to it. However, I was determined not to judge the place to harshly as I have eaten in much dirtier places.

The server (is waitress politically incorrect?) came up and asked us what we wanted to drink. My family ordered Coke and Diet Coke, to which we were informed they only had RC products. RC PRODUCTS????? Are they still in business or have you been hording your soft drinks since the 1950s? Yikes! I order a beer, and they bring me my Miller Light in the bottle. No glass, just the bottle. I look around. I am in a restaurant and not a biker bar, right? So needless to say, I am now dreading having to order and am seriously considering paying for the drinks and leaving.

I look over the menu and order cheese dip with chips and crab cakes. My family loves crab cakes, so I risk it as I am concerned because I have never seen crab cakes on a Cuban menu before. the chips and dip come out first. The chips look home made. I take a small chip and put it in the dip. I am pleasantly surprised. The chips are light, tasty and crispy. The cheese dip was real melted cheese, not some white gooey premade slop. My family and I finish off the entire plate.

The crab cakes arrived next. They were fantastic. They had a nice crust on them and they were very flavorful. Now mind you, these were not the best crab cakes I have ever had, but they were very good nonetheless.

We ordered our main course next. Andrew had the Seafood Pasta, my wife had Lechon (Roasted Pork), Jessica had the Pasta Aux Champions, and I had the Palomilla Steak. Again, I became concerned again when the server could not pronounce my daughter's order, trying to say the "X" at the end of aux, but the food was good so far, so what? right?

Everyone thoroughly enjoyed their meal. My daughter's was the highlight and clearly the best plate of food that evening. Afterwards, I had Cafe con Leche and my family shared some cheesecake. Overall, I would highly recommend this restaurant.

Which begs the question. Why can't I get good Cuban Food in Atlanta?

I Love The Zoo!!!

I love taking photographs at the zoo. Sure, zoo photos can get a bit cliche, but I find it a challenge to take a photo at the zoo and turn it into something more than a snapshot of a captive animal.



Above is a shot of a Cassowary in a fenced in cage. The challenge was to try and show the bird as if it was in its natvie habitat. By waiting until the bird was far away from the fence, I could focus on the bird and the fence literally disappeared.

I have to wait awhile until the zebra decided to get totally in the shade or totally in the sun. Once in the shade, the shot was easy. I had to play with the white balance and the exposure in Lightroom to get the shot the way I wanted it.

To me, the key to great animal shots is to get close. I used my Tamron 200-500 lens with the camera on a monopod exclusively on this trip. Sometimes I missed shots because the lens got me a bit too close, but overall, I thought this was a successful trip.

This shot of the elephant is cropped for 8X10 printing, but that is it. The Tamron performed admirably this trip!

I saved the best for last. I had the exposure compensation dialed down to -1 EV to try and eliminate blown out highlights. This left the lion's eyes very dark. This was an easy fix in Lightroom, as I used the adjustment brush and dialed it up to +1 EV. I really love this shot, I hope you do as well.

Thanks for looking!

Scott

I love Zenfolio

I have most of my shots posted on Zenfolio. I love this site because it is very professional, they seem to listen to their customers, and they are cheaper than SmugMug. The latest and greatest offering is an embedable (is that a word???) slideshow. I am going to try it here. Here is goes....



I hope it works on this site!!!

Film Renaissance

I don't know if it is a desire to be different, or if there is just something magical about film, but I have been shooting a lot of it lately. Maybe it is because you don't get to see your shot right after you take it. Or maybe it is because you actually have a negative to show for all your work. I don't know, but I haven't picked up my 50D in a while now. My father gave me a Kowa/Six. The Kowa is a medium format camera made back in the 60s that doesn't have film backs, but loads like a traditional film camera. It came equipped with an 85mm lens (50mm equivalent on a 35mm camera). Because it has been out of production for awhile, the lenses are hard to come by. I would love something a bit more wide angle and maybe something in a portrait range, but right now I only have the 85. I started with a roll of Ilford Delta 100. I had some folks tell me that it didn't have traditional Black and White textures and tones, but I had already bought it, so I shot away. This first shot is one I actually snapped while stuck in traffic in Atlanta. Yeah, I know it is difficult to believe, but Atlanta has some horrendous traffic.

This shot I took on the way to work. I live in an area that is a mix of rural and sub-divisions. This size of shot really doesn't do the sceen justice.

It turns out that I love the Ilford and will be buying more of it soon!!!!