Canon 5D Mark II, 13mm F/2.0, 6 exposures blended (read below for explanation)
Ever have one of those dreams where you wake up, and it's like you are still in the scene of the dream? That's what happened to me this morning. The dream was typical, a dose of reality and a larger dose of "that can't really happen."
Today's post is kind of long, so click on the "continue" link if you'd like to read the story behind this image.
In my dream, I was sitting in a window seat of an airliner. All of a sudden we abruptly slowed. Appearing VERY close out my window was a rocky crag, including a few conifer trees. Then we dove. Interestingly, my view now was from above the plane, I could see it diving toward the ground.
Next thing I know we are landing, on a fairly small strip in a beautiful wooded area. The pilot announced "this is my favorite little town in Colorado, why don't you get off and have a look around, and then we'll continue our trip?"
I walked along a small street, crossed the railroad tracks, enjoying one of my favorite smells, a redwood forest. It was warm and peaceful. I found myself in a building, like an old company office. I peered into rooms as I walked down the narrow hallway. It seemed everything was covered with warm woods, and now I smelled that familiar "old office" musty odor. I had the feeling I had gone back in time.
Through the glass of a door, I spied a desk and credenza with several old objects. I pushed open the door and entered the small room. To my left was the credenza, with some type of office equipment, I didn't really recognize it.
But I did realize I wanted to photograph this scene, and my camera was on the plane. [I can hear those of you that know me laughing: "Ah, now we get to the unreal part, Bob doesn't have his camera!"]
I hurried back up the road, but didn't see the plane or the landing strip. I stepped into the workshop of an old gas station and asked the man there "excuse me, didn't a plane land near here recently?" "Yes," he said, "but it took off again about two minutes ago, from right over there across those tracks." I ran to that spot, remembering my path now, and sure enough my airplane had left me.
That desperate feeling hit me... No clothes, no toothbrush, and no camera! As I began to absorb that I had a bigger problem than not being able to take some pictures, namely that I was in "who knows where Colorado," I began waking up. And for a minute or two I kept processing my situation, how would I get out of here? Who would take care of my camera sitting on the airplane seat? Gradually I realized it had been a dream, and today was just another Tuesday. Well, Topaz Tuesday.
Back to real life, at my computer, I decided to see if I could find an image that matched my dream, the moment I decided I wanted to photograph the scene. After a couple of false starts I began viewing my images from the Fonthill trip to Pennsylvania in September. Although it wasn't a typewriter I saw in my dream, it was something old and dark like this, illuminated by window light. This would be my image.
Or images. I shot this scene with mutliple exposures, planning on processing it with HDR (High Dynamic Range) software. With the strong window light, there is such a wide range of light that no camera can record the entire scene the way we people see it.
Besides these two images, there are four more "in-between" exposures. The goal is to take pictures which properly the brightest area, as well as the darkest area, and then several "in the middle." From Lightroom, I load the images into Nik Software's HDR Efex Pro, and it merges them together, to create this image:
Now with the full range of light in one image, I went into Topaz Adjust 4.0 to do some more magic. Just some straightforward use of the sliders and we have today's image. The look I created seems appropriate for travelling back in time.
I guess I would say that thanks to the image software available today, I'm able to create images that recently I could only dream of...
Great discounts are available on both these programs. Use the codes found on web pages of my friends John Barclay or Brenda Tharp.
Let me know what you think of this one, comments are free today on blog.
