On Deciding . . . Better 3.0

Spello by Night, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

This looks like a really nice image, but it’s actually technically pretty poor. When I looked at it on my 21 inch monitor during sorting, I passed over it because the detail in the more distant walls are blurred by camera shake. It’s at 1/20 sec which I can usually handhold, but only if I brace the camera well, control my movement and breathing and squeeze the release. Sometimes I actually close my eyes at the moment of capture because it helps me focus on not moving.

But I was dodging occasional cars as I timed the capture. You can see the next car approaching around the bend. The headlight works well, but capture was not optimal.

I realize that when you get home and review, the images have imperfections that can’t be fixed until next time. So it’s the best we have.

Into the Clouds, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

As I process images from Umbria I realize that I’ve found a simple, effective equipment combination in the Nikon D300 and Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8. The images are sharp and have sufficient dynamic range for processing. The combination of aperture and usable ISO gives me the ability to shoot well past sunset. I have simple off-camera IR control of flash.

It’s a DX setup, but I have no need for a full frame sensor since I have wide and sharp DX lenses.

What would cause me to upgrade? The D300 is well built but heavy. I’d love a body the size and weight of the D80 but with the image quality of the D300. In fact, smaller and lighter would be better as long as it was balanced with the Tamron. The Tamron is optically perfect for me, but it’s not of the same build quality as the Nikon equivalent. But I’ll take the Tamron based on its size and weight.

The Gentle Landscape, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

I continue to work through the large number of images I captured in Italy last month. After a break, I’m rating and scanning again. It’s interesting how much I like the quick takes on images that I did while there because I had fresh ideas of what I wanted to say about what I had just seen. Now it’s more of a dialogue with the image and construction of experience.

This was processed in Aperture with some NIK plugins.

Piazza Inferiore, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

Here’s one of the few images I captured using my widest lens in Italy. It’s impressive and a lesson to me about creating large scale abstracted images.

The Nikon 12-24mm f/4 is very sharp, here stopped down to f/9 under cloud cover. Even at the edges, the image at full resolution is impressively detailed.

Outside the Walls, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

I looked at this image from Umbria this morning and wondered why I was working on it. I’ve been photographing the suburban environment I live in with a developing visual vocabulary. In Umbria, the suburban environment is very different and the resulting images reflect it.

It’s process. Spend time in a new environment and gain new visual impressions. For me it’s the essence of travel- getting out of one’s usual routines and ways of seeing. Then on returning, the daily reality doesn’t look the same.

Umbria is truly a beautiful place with extraordinary visual sights nearly everywhere. I’m not a travel photographer or a chronicler of Italian landscape. But I’m happy to share what I saw and hope that it helps to inform my more usual work.

Spello Wall Abstracted, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

These were stains on a wall I walked by every morning in Spello. They were constantly changing based on the light. Spello, like Assisi, is built of pink colored stone. All of the stucco and mortar are also tinted to complement the colors. It makes for one of the warmest environments you can image.

Reflected Light, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

I had some anxiety about my image safety during my vacation. Just before I left, the hard drive on my Macbook Pro was scrambled and I rebuilt it from a Time Machine backup the evening before leaving. I then couldn’t find the external hard drive / card reader that I bought a few years ago.

I just downloaded images from cards onto the laptop during the trip, reviewing and then erasing the cards. A single copy of all of those images until yesterday when they were copied over to external drives, consolidated into the big Aperture library, and put into vaults.

Spello Wall, originally uploaded by jjvornov.

It’s been a great 10 days in Italy. No real internet access for the entire trip. Tonight we’re in a hotel at the airport, prepared for an early flight out and back to the US.

Umbria light was much better for photography than that of Liguria two years ago. About 1500 captures, with a few winners already. This was quickly processed just in Aperture using the Nik filters.