Venice

A pickup point for Gondolas in Venice 

In this post, I thought I would concentrate on some of the things that we first noticed while wandering around the floating city - not so much the things that one thinks of as quintessentially Venetian, such as gondolas and Carnevale masks, which I will look at in more detail in later posts.

The image above is of the main Gondola "pickup point" at St Marks square. A 5.30am start was required to photograph the area around St Marks square without tourists walking into the frame. This area is unbelievably busy during "normal" hours of the day. The church in the background is San Giorgio Maggiore on the island of San Giorgio.

Read on for more info and images.

A Vaporetto navigates the Grand Canal

Venice consists of two main islands, which are divided by the Grand Canal, and a number of smaller islands. The Grand Canal, as the name suggests, is the main waterway used to get around. It starts in the Venetian lagoon and ends in St Marks Basin. The areas along the two banks of the Grand Canal are very touristy and full of restaurants and souvenir shops.

A Gondola glides along the Grand Canal

There are 4 bridges which span the Grand Canal. Of these the Rialto is the best known and the oldest - in fact, until the middle of the 19th century, this was the only bridge to span the Grand Canal. The Rialto is named after the market on eastern bank of the canal. It was initially a pontoon bridge built in 1181 by Nicolo Barettieri. Due to increased traffic the bridge was replaced by wooden bridge in 1255.  The wooden bridge burnt once and collapsed on two separate occasions, the last of which was in 1524. The stone bridge which stands today was built in 1591. It is constantly packed with tourists, either taking pictures, looking out over the Grand Canal or browsing around the two rows of shops which span the length of the bridge.

The Rialto Bridge

The Ponte dell' Academia is a relatively new wooden bridge across the Grand Canal. It is also the closest crossing to St Marks square. The entrance to the Gallerie dell' Academia is at the foot of this bridge on the eastern bank. The bridge offers two of the best views of Venice.

The Grand Canal photographed form the Academia Bridge

The islands of Venice are home to around 80 churches. Walking into most of these is like walking into small museums, as a number of them contain paintings and sculptures of the great Venetian artists including Tintoretto, Veronese and Titian.

Santa Maria della Salute photographed from a Vaporetto

All these images were captured using a Canon 7D and a Canon 24-105mm Lens. I also had a circular polariser on the lens.

Holidays! (Blog won't be updated for a while)

Travel Essentials

After what seems like ages, we are finally heading off on holiday. We leave for Europe in a couple of days and needless to say we are really looking forward to it. Apart from a new circular polariser and an extra 8GB memory card, I've not bought any new equipment for the trip. I've got an extensive shot list and if I manage to get half the shots I'm after, I'll be happy.

Unfortunately while I'm away I will not be able to update the blog. I will get back to it as soon as I return. Last time I was away I got back with around 70GB of images. I have a feeling I'll exceed that this time and as a result have a whole heap more to share here.

Read on for lighting information for the shot above.

The lighting for the shot was actually pretty straight forward. I fired a Canon 430 EX, gelled with a full CTO, from just behind the camera at 1/8th. It was fired into a white foam core board placed just out of frame on the left hand side of the image. The entire shot was lit with light bounced off the foam core board.

If I was to take this shot again, I would use a reflector (probably a piece of white A4 paper!)  to light the area below the lens. I think that part of the image is a bit too dark. I'd have to place the piece of paper just out of the frame on the bottom right hand corner of the frame. The area would still be relatively dark but more detail will be visible.

Scrabble

Scrabble board lit with a single light from three angles

This is a technique which I've used on a number of occasions when I need to light something from multiple angles with a single strobe. I've covered it in an article for digital photography school sometime ago. The post is still available online at http://digital-photography-school.com/making-the-most-of-one-flash-case-study . More info after the jump.

The first step of the process is to capture the "base" image. As seen below, the base image is evenly lit (in this case by bouncing the flash off the ceiling). Whatever appears in shadow in  this image, will be in shadow in the final image as well.

Base exposure used to produce the final image above

The "key light" images have to be captured next. In these images, a strobe is used to emphasise certain areas of the image. Typically a snoot or gobo will be used to control the direction of the light. The first key light image was captured to emphasise the tiles. A snoot was used to control the spill light here.

Key light image used to emphasise the tiles

The second key light image was captured to light up the area under the bag. Again, a snooted strobe was used to control the spill.

Key light used to emphasise the area below the bag

Once the image have been captured, I used a star trail action to merge the images. The end result is the image at the top of the post.

A tripod has to be used to make sure the camera doesn't move between shots. This ensures you avoid problems with merging the images during post processing.

This technique can only be used to photograph stationary objects.

Rose Ringed Parakeet

A Rose ringed Parakeet photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

Of all the parakeets found in Sri Lanka, the Rose ringed Parakeet is by far the most common in the lowlands. A flock of about ten birds visit our garden twice a day to feed on the fruit trees and whatever is left out on the bird tray. More images and info after the jump.

A Rose ringed Parakeet photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

Interestingly, this bird is one of the few birds that are not protected. They are actually considered to be an agricultural pest (more info on this here). They have been able to establish feral populations in a number of European cities as well as South Africa and India. Most of these populations have been established by introduced birds as well as escaped pets. Unfortunately these birds are still popular as pets in Sri Lanka.

A Rose ringed Parakeet photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

All the images in this post were captured with a Canon 7D and the 100-400mm lens. I didn't have to zoom in to 400mm to capture these images as the birds let me get quite close to them.

A Rose ringed Parakeet photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

More info and images of this bird at

• http://devwijewardane.blogspot.com/2009/10/rose-ringed-parakeet.html

Somersby Falls - Part II

The Main Waterfall - Somersby Falls, Australia

The Somersby Falls picnic area in the Brisbane Waters national park, on the central coast of New South Wales, is the starting point of a short walk along Mooney Mooney Creek. A number of decent sized waterfalls are within a ten or twenty minute walk from the picnic area. The first, and most impressive, of these is the waterfall pictured above. More images and info after the jump.

A Closeup of the main waterfall - Somersby Falls, Australia

One of the most interesting compositional elements of the main waterfall, in my opinion, is the branch which extends across the water fall from the left of the frame (shown in the image above). I think it helps convey a sense of depth in the  images of the waterfall.

A section of the lower falls - Somersby Falls, Australia

The drop of the second fall is not as big as the main waterfall but the rocks, moss and leaves make for some interesting compositions. I didn't have any ND filters on this trip and had to rely on an aperture of f22 to get  a suitable shutter speed required to capture the silky feel of flowing water. We got there quite early in the morning and fortunately the sun wasn't too harsh at the time.

The main waterfall - Somersby Falls, Australia

The wet moss and ferns growing on the rocks along the creek add a lot of colour and interest to the images of the creek. The fact that the area is very rocky allows photographers to capture interesting compositions of small sections of the falls themselves.

A section of the main waterfall - Somersby Falls, Australia

Somersby Falls is only around an hours drive on the F3 from our place in Sydney. I've been up there on three occasions already and will definitely head up there again. It's probably best to visit in late July or early August as the winter rain would ensure a decent amount of water flowing through the creek.

A section of the main waterfall - Somersby Falls, Australia

All images on this post were captured using a Canon 7D and the 24-105mm lens. The aperture was set to f22 and the ISO of 100 for all the images on this post.

More images of Somersby Falls

• http://devwijewardane.blogspot.com/2010/08/somersby-falls-part-i.html
• http://devwijewardane.blogspot.com/2009/09/somersby-falls.html

Somersby Falls - Part I

Somersby Falls - Brisbane Waters National Park

I've visited Somersby falls on two previous occasions and spent a fair bit of time photographing the three waterfalls. I went up there again last Sunday with Dean Toh and spent a couple of hours wondering around, photographing the different sections of the falls. The panorama above was one of the highlights of the day.  More info on this shot after the jump.

*The panorama was created using ten images.

In order to create a panorama which is made up of multiple images, a tripod is essential. Ideally the images would be shot in "manual" mode so that each of them are captured with identical settings. When capturing the images it is also important to ensure that there is a substantial overlap between adjacent images. This makes it easier to identify control points between them. These control points are used during the stitching processes.

During post processing I double check all the settings paying particular attention to the colour balance, fill light and blacks. All settings have to be identical across all images to ensure the final panorama is smooth. Stitching the images together is straightforward process and can be completed in any image processing software.

This image has to be viewed large for the details to really stand out. The final image was jpeg file which was over 10MB in size.

The images were captured using a Canon 7D and a Canon 24-105mm lens.

Other Shots of Somersby Falls

• http://devwijewardane.blogspot.com/2009/09/somersby-falls.html
• http://devwijewardane.blogspot.com/2010/08/somersby-falls-part-ii.html

Cherries - A second take

Cherries!

We picked up some fresh Cherries during the weekly grocery run and I decided to get a few images of them before they disappeared. I've been playing around with off camera flash for sometime and took the opportunity to experiment a bit more. I photographed some cherries a while ago and really liked the rich   shades of red on the fruit. I was hoping to light them in a way which accentuates the colour and texture of the cherries and I'm pretty happy with the results. Read on for more info and the setup shot.

The lighting setup for the image above

I used a Canon 430EXII as the main light source for this shot and fired it into a reflective umbrella at 1/32. I used a reflective umbrella as I wanted to light a section of the image evenly and didn't want too much light to spill onto the glass. The umbrella was half closed to control the spill. If I fired the strobe directly onto the Cherries, the light would have been too harsh. In order to get warm light I used a Full CTO gel on the flash. In hindsight (which is always a bit of a bitch...) I should have used a 1/2 CTO gel instead.

A sheet of glass was placed under the Cherries to create a reflection. 

The pile of Cherries to the left were about 4 - 6 inches behind the main subject so that they would be out of focus but add a layer of interest to the image and give it some context. I used a few tea light holders (which were around a foot behind the subject) to create some "home made bokeh" and balance out the composition.

The shot was captured at a shutter speed of 1/30th of a second and an aperture of f/2.5. I used a slow shutter speed to allow the ambient to burn in a little and light the image a bit more evenly. If I wanted to use a faster shutter speed, I could have used a reflector on the right of the subject to achieve the same result.

This shot was captured with a Canon 7D and the Canon 50mm f/1.8 lens.

Kiwi Fruit

Back lit Kiwi Fruit

I was playing around with the flash over the weekend when I composed this image. I wanted to capture an image of backlit slices of Kiwi fruit on a black background to highlight the "furry" exterior of the fruit while capturing its green insides. Read on for lighting information.

I placed the slices of Kiwi fruit on a piece of glass which was suspended across two chairs. I lit it with a Canon 430EX shot at 1/64 from under the piece of glass (not directly under, it was just out of the bottom of the frame in the shot above). The differences in the shade of green on the slices was caused by the thickness of the slices themselves.

I could have shot the flash through a sheet of white A4 paper to make the light source appear larger and create a white background but I wanted to go for the black background and back light the fuzzy exterior of the fruit.

I'm not sure about this image to be honest. what do you guys think?

It was shot with a canon 24-105mm lens mounted on a Canon 7D. No Tripod was used.

Oriental Magpie Robin

An Oriental Magpie Robin photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

The Oriental Magpie Robin is a common garden bird found in Sri Lanka. It is also one of the most musical birds found on the island. The Oriental Magpie Robin is distributed throughout a number of areas in tropical South and Southeast Asia. The images in this post were all captured in our garden in Colombo, where this species is a regular visitor.  Read on for more images and info.

An Oriental Magpie Robin photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

Oriental Magpie Robins breed from March to July in India and January to June in Southeast Asia. They nest in tree hollows or niches in walls and buildings. Most of the nest building is done by the female and usually starts a week or so before the eggs are laid. 

An Oriental Magpie Robin photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

These birds mainly feed on insects and other invertebrates. Globally, this species is considered one of "little concern". However, in some areas, this bird is on the decline. These birds were common in Hong Kong and Singapore in the 1920's but numbers declined in the 1970's. It is presumed that this was caused because of the competition of the introduced Common Mynahs. 

These images were captured with a Canon 7D and the 100-400mm lens.

Fresh Tomatoes

Fresh Tomatoes

I was bored last afternoon and decided to experiment with some hi-key shots. I used the tomatoes as I felt the vibrant red would really stand out against a white background. In order to add another layer of interest to the photographed, I dripped water on tomatoes with the hope of getting a different reflection of the light. Read on to find out more on how I lit this image.

I used two foam core boards as part of my lighting setup for this image. One was used as the background and I placed the tomatoes on a piece of glass which was resting on the second. The glass was used to create shadows of the tomatoes (again, to add another layer of interest). The shadows are subtle as I zoomed in very close to the subject. They would have been more pronounced if I had zoomed out a bit more and more f the glass was included in the frame.

Lighting the images was pretty straight forward. I used one flash which I fired at a piece of white A4 paper on the right side of the camera, close to the lens. The flash was pointing towards the camera and set to fire at 1/64th. I used the piece of paper to soften the light and to bounce it onto the foam core board placed behind the subject.

The Coat Hanger

The Sydney Harbour Bridge (also known as the coat hanger), Australia

I went to the Opera House on Sunday evening hoping to capture a completely different image but came away with this one instead. No complaints. For those of you who are not familiar with Sydney, Sydney-siders often refer to the Harbour Bridge as the "coat hanger", for obvious reasons. It's not too easy to take photographs around the Opera House as it is always full of people and inevitably someone walks into your frame. The area around the Opera House doesn't quieten down till the early hours of the morning as there are a number of bars and restaurants in the area. The marquees in the foreground of this image are actually from the Opera Bar. Read on for more info on how the shot was taken.

The final image was actually created by stitching together 6 separate images. I used the tripod and the same aperture, shutter speed and ISO (I shot this on manual mode) for all the shots. When capturing these images I made sure that I had at least a 20% overlap.  This makes the stitching process a whole lot easier as there are more control points available.

I am not too happy with the top of the marquee which can be seen on the bottom right hand corner. There was a lamp just above it ,which lit up that section of the image a bit too much for my liking. However, I do like the light reflected in the water and the different shades of blue in the sky, created by the setting sun. These images were captured at around six in the evening just as the sun dipped below the horizon.

I used the Canon 7D and the 24 - 105mm lens.

Bathing Purple Rumped Sunbirds

A Bathing Purple rumped Sunbird photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

It was early evening and our garden, at home in Colombo, had just been watered. I walked out of the house and found this drenched female Purple rumped Sunbird sitting on a large leaf. I was curious as to how it had got soaked and was trying to figure it out when it started rubbing itself on the wet leaf. More images and info inside.

A Bathing Purple rumped Sunbird photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

While I watched, the bird proceeded to wash its self by using its wings to flick water off the leaf. The whole "shower" took around 5 minutes and  the bird was not at all bothered by my presence. It was soon joined by a second Purple rumped Sunbird which did the exact same thing.

A Bathing Purple rumped Sunbird photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

I have a number of shots of the birds flicking water around but they were not very sharp. The birds movements were very quick and there wasn't sufficient light to use a faster shutter speed. If I remember correctly, the shutter speed for these shots were around 1/320 to 1/400. which in itself was quite fast.

A Bathing Purple rumped Sunbird photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

These images were captured with the 7D and the 100-400mm lens. I think the focal length was 400mm and the aperture was set to f5.6.

A Bathing Purple rumped Sunbird photographed in Colombo, Sri Lanka

More images of the Purple rumped Sunbird can be found here.

Dancing Dropwing

A Dancing Dropwing photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

The Dancing Dropwing is an uncommon dragonfly found in Sri Lanka. I came across a number of them in Anuradhapura. They differ from their more common relatives as they are slightly bigger in size. Their black and yellow coloration, long spidery legs and bicoloured pterostigma can be used to identify this species. More info after the jump.

A Dancing Dropwing photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

The female of this species has tinted wings and yellow anal appendages. it's abdomen is also shorter and thicker than that of the male. The abdomen area is around 26 - 32mm in length and the wing span is also around 30-36mm in length. They can usually be found on the banks of tanks (man made lakes), ponds, paddy fields and slow flowing streams. Their range covers areas of both the dry and wet zones.

A Dancing Dropwing photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

I was photographing Asian Groundlings in an abandoned paddy field on the banks of Tissa wewa (sinhalese word for a man made lake) when I saw a couple of Dancing Dropwings among them. I miss took them for the more common Green Skimmer and only captured a few images of the species. I was surprised as I was able to get within about a meter of them to capture these images. As usual I was unable to get closer to them because of the minimum focusing distance of the 100-400mm lens. I think I see a new macro lens on the horizon.

These images were captured using a Canon 7D and a 100-400mm lens.

A Dancing Dropwing photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

Another post on the Green Skimmer can be found here.

* I initially made a mistake and identified this species as a Green Skimmer.Thanks to Amila Salgado for the the correction.

Lemon Pansy

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

The Lemon Pansy is a common butterfly found throughout southern Asia. It is the most common of the six pansies found in India. The Lemon Pansy is known to be territorial and aggressive. I came across a number of these butterflies in Anuradhapura and found them quite easy to photograph. Their flight is strong and consist of strong wingbeats with less fluttering.  However, they do spend a fair bit of time perched on shrubs and flowers. More info and images inside.

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

Like the Chocolate Soldier,  the Lemon Pansy rests on or close to the ground with it's wings spread. It settles in wet patches on the ground more frequently than other Pansies. When I was photographing these butterflies they were feeding or basking in the warm early morning sunlight. They are a small to medium sized butterfly with prominent "eyespots" on the upper sides of both wings.

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

Male Lemon Pansies are known to perch at strategic locations with the aim of intercepting females and inspecting potential mates. It is quite well camouflaged when it sits still with its wings held above its abdomen. The male is known to move into new locations if their current locations are unsuitable.

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

This butterfly loves to feed on Nectar and can frequently be seen settling on shrubs and other small plant's to feed.  During this time it displays the upper sides of its wings. In the evenings they move into thickets and settle on a tall grass stems with their wings folded above their abdomen, to spend the night. It is known to have a typical posture, which it takes when it spreads its wings. As a result a lot of the photographs taken of this species look similar. 

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

I photographed these butterflies in an overgrown plot of land in Anuradhapura. There were a number of large bushes with flowers in bloom and these butterflies were feeding on them. They didn't seem to be too bothered with my presence and I was able to get quite close to photograph them. I had the 100-400mm lens on the 7D and was able to get some frame filling images.

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

A Lemon Pansy photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

Sydney Opera House and CBD

The Sydney Opera House and CBD

I hadn't been out with the camera for a while and since I had some free time on Sunday, I headed down to Milsons Point, on the north shore of Sydney Harbour. I timed my trip to get down there at around sunset as I wanted to have a bit of time to set up before the colour of the sky changed to that special shade of blue. Unfortunately the weather in Sydney hasn't been good and the sky was cloudy. Not a real surprise considering it is the middle of winter!

More info after the jump.

I set up the tripod on the wharf and started capturing the photographs which I needed to create the panorama above. The wind was not too strong but I found that the Tripod was shaking and, as a result, the images were not too sharp. In order to get around this, I had to stand next to the camera and block the wind. Thankfully it was a quick fix and seemed to resolve the problem. I zoomed in on the back of the camera a number of times to make sure the images were tack sharp.

I captured seven images to use for the panorama above. Once I got home all I had to do was process them using the identical settings and stitch them up to produce the final image. The panorama has to be viewed large to see the detail in the buildings. The version I've uploaded here is quite a small version of the final image.

The most frustrating part of this process was trying to capture images which didn't include any boats.  This was almost impossible considering Circular Quay is just to the right of the Opera House. Circular Quay is the hub of Sydney's ferry system and as a result, has ferries coming in and out throughout the day.

Other images of the opera house

• Opera House and Harbour Bridge at Dusk
• Opera House at twilight

Cattle Egret

A Cattle Egret photographed in Battaramulla, Sri Lanka

The Cattle Egret, is widespreadspecies belonging to the Heron family.  It is found throughout most of the tropics, sub tropics and warmer temperate regions of the world. This is the smallest of the Egrets found in Sri Lanka and is common in the lowlands and the mid hills of Sri Lanka. I saw these birds throughout the dry zone when travelling to Anuradhapura and Trincomalee. These birds can also be seen in and around Colombo.

The Cattle Egret can be differentiated from other Egrets by its size, its stocky build and its rounded head. It also has black legs and feet. It also has a shorter and broader-based yellow beak when compared to other Egrets. During the breeding season its bill may become darker and its mantle turns a golden-buff. 

A Cattle Egret photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

The Cattle Egret breeds in colonies in trees which are often, but not always close to large lakes with reed beds or other large wetland areas. They are often seen around the tanks and paddy fields in Sri Lanka. The Cattle Egret is generally considered to be a successful species with an expanding range. Its range was originally limited to Asia, Africa and Europe but it has now colonised much much of the rest of the world. 

A Cattle Egret photographed in Battaramulla, Sri Lanka

It feeds in shallow water or drier habitats, mainly feeding on frogs, fish, crickets and, in some cases moths and spiders. It hunts by spearing its prey with its sharp long beak. It stays still and allows its prey to come within striking distance. It is often thought that these birds feed on parasites of buffaloes as they are often found in close proximity of each other. In actual fact the Great Egrets feed on grasshoppers and other insects which are disturbed when buffaloes move around. They are also known to follow farm machinery for the same reason but are forced to move more frequently.

A Cattle Egret photographed in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka

These images were captured in Anuradhapura and Battaramulla. I used a Canon 7D and a 100-400mm lens for all them. 

* I had made a mistake earlier and identified this bird as a Great Egret. Thanks to Amila Salgado for pointing it out.