Denver Capital Building
Back in late October, I participated in the Colby Brown Photowalk in downtown Denver. Colby is a local travel and landscape photographer here in DEnver and I’ve followed him in various social media outlets for a few years now. So when he decided to host a photowalk, I eagerly signed up if not just for the networking opportunities.
We began the walk at City Park, behind the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and the Denver Zoo, walking westward towards the Capital building. This being October, the trees in City Park were spectacular.
Denver Photowalk 20111023 019-20-21 HDR
Denver Photowalk 20111023 082-3-4 HDR
Denver Photowalk 20111023 121-2-3 HDR
Downtown Denver was busy with people going wherever they need to be going on a Sunday afternoon. With the Occupy Denver protestors (patrol cars, looky-lou’s and hecklers) and the lower-downtown (LoDo) tourists, it was hard to get anything to stay still long enough for any camera exposure.
Denver Photowalk 20111023 255-6-7 HDR
Our walk ultimately ended up at the Capital building, amongst the Occupy Denver protestors hanging out in the quad behind us (in between the Capital building and the City and County building to the west.) And over the course of these couple miles, nothing really caught my eye — I wanted to really get to the Capital building and try out some HDR photography techniques with the waning sunset light on the building itself, so I was a little antsy to get to the end, I guess.
Denver Photowalk 20111023 243-4-5 HDR
Denver Photowalk 20111023 297-8-9 HDR
And finally, after the sun had set and the “glow” of the sun on the copper dome had faded, I had to try processing one final shot of the capital building in Black and White.
Denver Photowalk 20111023 327-8-9 HDR BW
What do you think of these images? Too “HDR-ie” or natural enough that it doesn’t bother you to learn they were shot and processed as HDR images?
Finally, the journey turned out to be a great walk and something Colby will conduct again this year. It was free to join and very fun to shoot and mingle with a lot of excellent photographers. I highly recommend this event this year. Check out the link above to Colby’s web site for announcements and dates of the next photowalk. I hear Roxborough Park might be on the agenda this time.
Posted in Landscapes, Nighttime, Photowalks and tagged architecture, buildings, capital building, Colby Brown, colorado, Denver Photowalk, Denver;, government, HDR, sunset, twilight by greggl with 1 comment.
Denver Christmas Lights
Met up with a few photography friends last night on a short-notice holiday light shoot in downtown Denver. This is the Denver City and County Building across the garden/grass mall from the Capitol building near downtown Denver. Every year they light up this building and I’ve always wanted to come down and capture it, but I’ve never taken the time until this year. In fact, something similar to the fourth image (portrait mode) won Grand Prize at our Louisville Art Association‘s 2009 National Juried Photography Show.
[nggallery id=3]
Posted in Nighttime and tagged architecture, christmas lights, City and County building, Denver;, nighttime by greggl with no comments yet.
Nighttime Photography – Montreal
On a recent vacation to Montreal to visit Katherine’s mother Sonia and her cousins, I took the opportunity to do a little nighttime photography with the excellent guide services of Sonia’s husband Georges, who has lived in Montreal since 1967. I think we must have put several hundred miles onto his car during that vacation– he was so gracious, always willing to take me around to show me his home city. It was beautiful!
First up is the view of downtown Montreal from West Mount.
Montreal - Downtown View from West Mount
Next, we have a couple images of Saint Joseph’s Oratory of Mount-Royal. This is a beautiful church of fairly modern architecture, nothing like the architecture of the Church of Notre Dame (see below) located in Old Town Montreal, but still beautiful and rich in history.
Montreal - Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal
Montreal - Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal
Finally, here are three images from the inside of the Basilique Notre-Dame de Montreal–stunningly beautiful!
Basilique Notre-Dame de Montreal
Basilique Notre-Dame de Montreal
Basilique Notre-Dame de Montreal
I really love my Nikon D90 and it’s ability to correctly expose tricky situations like these photographs. My previous camera would have been lost if given these shooting conditions. This camera is awesome!
I have more photos from a previous day’s adventures up north of Montreal in search of the last Maple leaves of the season too, but for another post.
And thanks again Georges! We had a wonderful visit and I really do appreciate your patience and your guide services. Can you send me the card where you wrote down the Père’s name and email address.
Posted in Nighttime and tagged architecture, Basilique Notre-Dame, church, city, indoors, lights, Montreal, nighttime, Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal by greggl with no comments yet.