Final images USA

Today some of the left over images from our stay in the US in September.
And of course some tips which you maybe can use for your own photography.

At the end of each day the sun goes down (duh), and of course we’re not always in an area where we can make stunning sunset shots, however you can “fake” it a little bit. In this case we were next to a restaurant where we just had diner, the sun went down and created a nice shadow play with the trees as you can see here, by underexposing the scene by about 2 stops I created this image that actually hides the area we were in thanks to the composition but also creates a much more intense look by the underexposure than it was in real life.

Good travel/street photography is not only about good photography (although it helps a lot) but also about finding the story and sometimes adding some humor, when I saw these two businesses next to each other… well I had to hit the break and drive back to take the shot. As you can see the order in which you photograph can have a huge impact on the story you are telling. So if you have the chance always shoot from different angles.

Adding the sun into the frame is something that is often regarded as dangerous for the sensor etc. I have to be honest that I do this a lot and still have to find a problem, but be warned… some people claim your camera can melt, explode or beamed up to the Enterprise (well ok you are of course running a chance of damaging something), but to be honest the results you get are in my opinion worth the risk. I took several shots to get the flag the way I wanted, so make sure when you do something like this you don’t just take one shot, experiment with the position of the sun and of course (in this case) the flag.

Reflections on the water can be awesome, in this case I upped the contrast a lot and used some clarity to make the image pop more and show some of the light beams in the sky. The time before the sunset with the low sun are some of my favorite moments to shoot, actually I like it more than the sundown it self in most cases.

Ok, ok I always say I hate borders and dust and scratches, but sometimes…. it’s just fun to do.