DEK Photography: Last Week's Photos in a Single Post!

Here are all of last week's photos, which I posted for your viewing pleasure. I hope you enjoy them, as much as I did taking them!

DEK Photography: After The Rain

It had just stopped raining and the clouds were - for the lack of a better word - dramatic. The sun was trying to break through, creating that lovely light, visible in the very few minutes before sunset. A seagull was navigating the skyscape, wings barely moving. It was quiet and not even the sea waves dared interrupt this rare moment of natural tranquility.

You can click for a bigger image. Just.. do it quietly.

DEK Photography: Smiles in the Rain

It's raining outside, so I decided to dig through yesteryear's archive and find a lovely photo I took, under the autumn rain.

Found it! I remember walking along the main street and then, in the blink of an eye, it was pouring. I rushed for the closest building, trying to protect my precious Nikon. I took a look around, smiled and stepped back into the rain. I just couldn't miss all of it - the wall of water falling from the sky, the people with umbrellas, which were of no use to them, and the girl, which started laughing when she saw me get wet.

Click for a bigger version! Don't worry, you don't need an umbrella! Umbrella... 'mbrella... 'ella...

Was it worth risking several thousand in photo equipment and getting a cold? Yes. I love this photo, and I hope you will enjoy it too!

DEK Photography: The Tomcat

This guy... all the ladies stopped to massage his pointy lazy ears, take a photo of him, and wave him goodbye.

You can click for a bigger image!

For a time, this cat was the city's unofficial mascot. You know how cats like to position themselves right smack in the middle of everyone's attention - in front of the TV, on your keyboard, and sometimes, even on your head.

But this guy... he managed to beat all cat records. He would sit all day long on top of a beautiful brass compass, which had the exact GPS coordinates of the city's center inscribed on it. He owned the city, he sat on top of the city, and was getting all the petting attention that came with it!

And then some idiot decided it was a good idea to beat a defenseless kitty. I heard someone brought him to the vet, but we never saw him again. I hope he's being the same lazy asshole, living happily at someone's home, where his ears get massaged daily.

DEK Photography: RawTherapee Before Bed - Some Initial Thoughts

Most photographers are stuck with Adobe Lightroom. Here's an open source alternative, named RawTherapee - it's a RAW editing software for Linux.

I was quite sleepy already, but I just had to play with RawTherapee for an hour. I found an interesting shot, which I thought would go nicely in black and white and starting tweaking with (what seemed to be) thousands of modifiers to the image.

You can click for a bigger image! Don't worry, he won't run you over! Taken at 50mm, f/1.8, 1/80s, ISO 1600.

Initial observations:

The white balance and / or color profile from my Nikon NEF files wasn't recognized at all. The image was visibly red, when imported.
Too many possible tweaks, overwhelming first time users. Some modifiers appear to have similar effect.
Not every tweak is visible, unless zooming 1:1, which makes the program extremely frustrating to use. Added sharpness and noise removal is only visible in the final, rendered image (unless editing only in 1:1 zoom).
The crop tool is strange. Instead of cropping the image, it simply creates a selection and darkens the rest of the image. Again, the photographer must imagine what the final shot would would like.
Rendering an image takes a LOT of time. I thought Lightroom was slow. And I had to render the image several times, to hit the exact blend of sharpness and noise removal.
There are some interesting tweaks, which are not available in other RAW editing software - I found them extremely useful when editing black and white photos.

DEK Photography: The Dance of the Internet Folk

The Internet. A seamless network of electrons, carrying our data around the globe. These are the net gnomes.

You can click for a bigger image. It's OK, they won't bite!

I took a right turn at an intersection and saw the magical net gnomes, pulling out thick fiber optic cable from the ground, mumbling something in their binary language. "Quick," I thought, "before they spot me, or I'll miss the shot!" I raised the camera to my eye and they all smiled right back at me.

I guess I can't beat the reflexes of the electron keepers.

Thank you for taking the time to look through this week's photos! Be sure to follow #dek-photography for more of my work!

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