I just had time for a quick series of pictures.

All pictures were taken with a Nikon D700 + Nikkor 16-35MM VR F/4.0 and edited in Oloneo PhotoEngine Beta version (standalone HDR application available on PC) with the following settings:

Lors de mon dernier séjour dans la ville de Québec pour un workshop Photoshop, nous avions planifié une session à l’heure bleue avec le club photo dimension et la soirée était parfaite.

J’en ai profité pour faire une petite séries de photos  entre la rue Saint-Louis et la Rue des Jardins.

Tous les photos ont été prises avec un Nikon D700 + Nikkor 16-35MM VR F/4.0 et éditées dans Oloneo PhotoEngine (application HDR disponible en version beta sur PC) avec les réglages suivants:

• Quebec City, Epicerie fine Richard et Edifice price, rue des Jardins

• Quebec City, Epicerie fine Richard et Edifice price, rue des Jardins

Quebec City, Restaurant Café de la Paix et Epicerie fine Richard et Edifice price, rue des Jardins

• Quebec City, Restaurant “aux Anciens Canadiens”, Rue Saint-Louis

• Quebec City, Restaurant “aux Anciens Canadiens”, Rue Saint-Louis

Curious about creating great pîctures at the blue hour? I would strongly suggest to check this post too!

While a lot of people are in their offices working or barely out in the metro or the subway, most people don’t see that special moment of the day where the sun goes down in December and that the sky becomes electric blue or purple if it snowing. The reflections of light on the snow gives it some pink to violet accents which are magical.

Properly covered and even wearing gloves, going out and capturing the life of a neighborhood is always fascinating and nice adventure close to home. Let’s start this week with Masson Street, located in Rosemont District in Montreal.

Masson Street is the heart of Old Rosemont and bears some of the most noticeables landmarks of this neighbourhood. It starts from Papineau Street and fisnishes up at Pie IX Boulevard and the Botanical Garden. It was the main commercial artery since 1905. Since a few years ago, the artery has become more vibrant and dynamic.

Here is some photos captured an evening of December. Enjoy the walk!

• nice neons of Tabagie Imperiale

• Facade of Bistro bar les Gemeaux

• some christmas decoration hanging on the street

• the colourful and cute facade of Fruiterie Premier Choix

• another angle of the colourful and cute facade of Fruiterie Premier Choix

• The Trinity United Church

• Man walking on the street

• People preparing for supper time at M sur Masson restaurant, one of the street most prized restaurant

• Woman reading at Brulerie Saint-Denis on a beautiful cold evening

• Entrance of Cafe Lezard, one of the most popular bars on Masson.

• Poivre et Sel grocery store

• People waiting to cross at the corner of Saint-Michel and Masson.

• Shell Station at dusk

• The local post office

• Cute Christmas decoration on a balcony of Masson Street

• Photos of a classic food joint of Masson Hotdogs

Thanks for viewing!

Equipment used for the shoot

Nikon D700

Nikon AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G

Default ISO settings : 800

Aperture: between F/1.4 and F/2.0

The 50mm is my favorite lens to capture streetscapes and scenes and its low light ability allows for great documentary styles images.

hardware used for the editing

Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bits

Core 2 Duo E6750 + 4GB memory

Samsung 275T 27″ monitor + Samsung 244T 24″ monitor

Wacom Intuos 3 tablet

The Wacom tablet is always a must have tool for editing. It allows for pressure sensitive adjustments and it will speed up your workflow once you get used to using it.

Software used for the editing

Photoshop Cs5

Thanks for viewing!

As you have read in my previous post, this type of location is perfect to shoot at the blue hour, because you have more than enough to shoot before the night falls.

Because it’s the tallest building and it looks a bit like a monolith, the “tour de la Bourse” skyscraper is definitively the most important landmark there:

At its feet and near the metro entrance, you will find a cute little flower shop:

If you venture a little to the north near the Hotel W, you will find beautiful water fountains and a Statue of the Queen Victoria (from 1872) and a classic Parisian Metro Entrance by Henri Guimard, offered by the city of Paris in the 1970s.

Then at the north end of the square, you will find a sculpture from Ju Ming called “Taichi Single Whip”. The two buildings at the background are the Bell and Banque Nationale towers and were built in the 1970s.

Thanks for viewing!

Now first,what is the BLUE HOUR??? Well according to wikipedia:

The blue hour comes from a French expression, l’heure bleue, which refers to the period of twilight each morning and evening where there is neither full daylight nor complete darkness. The time is considered special because of the quality of the light at this time of day. The blue hour is considered especially flattering for people with blond hair in photography and is often also when the smell of the flowers is at its strongest during the summertime.

Pretty simple, though if you want a more precise and technical definition, the blue hour happens usually starts 30 minutes after sunset and 30 minutes before sunrise. The duration of the blue hour is generally around 30 minutes. For a better experience, it’s best to go shooting just after it has stopped raining. Also, the quality of light at the blue hour is usually at its best during fall season. At this time of the year, it looks almost like the sky is glowing.

Blue Hour on Old Montreal Skyline - Fall 2007

• SCOUT: Because you don’t have much time to shoot at the blue hour, you MUST plan for it and the first step is finding locations where you’ll be able to shoot different angles in 30-45min! Scouting will also help you frame the photos in your head when the sun is up and get a good feeling of distances. Squares and waterfronts or look-outs are usually the best places to achieve this rather easily. Oh one more thing, the blue hour starts to the east and progresses to the west, plan accordingly.

• USE GOOGLE MAPS and FLICKR: Well, if you can’t scout because you’re only be going there on vacation, use Google Maps to view the orientation of the locations photographed and check flickr for the best shooting locations (not doing so would be idiotic, finding new locations of places you don’t know is pretty challenging and remember that the clock is ticking… 30 minutes of good shooting!)

Blue Hour on Portland Skyline, Oregon, USA - FALL 2009

• WEATHER: If you want to get the best results, pick a day without smog. Shoot a day after it has stopped raining, The sky will be clean of most particles and impurities.

• PREPARE YOUR GEAR:

• Take your tripod: Exposures at ISO 100 and F/8.0 usually go between 4-30 seconds
• Take your remote trigger release to avoid vibrations
• Clean your lenses and put the hood to avoid flare
• Mount the lens you will most likely use ( I use a Sigma 10-20mm for architecture shoots and 17-50mm for landscapes or cityscapes)
• Set the camera to Aperture priority mode or Manual mode, ISO 200 or below (you really don’t want noise in the blue sky because of high ISO).
• Use a circular polarizer if you shoot on the shore of a river or lake (remove it once it lengthen exposures besides 30s).
• Take a bubble level

Blue Hour on Notre Dame de Paris, France

• BE ON LOCATION EARLY: I always try to be on location early (30 minutes) for two simple reasons:
  1. If I couldn’t scout, it leaves me time to check for alternate locations
  2. I’m totally relaxed. I usually bring a book with me and read while the sun is going down.

• USE A LEVEL: I always have a bubble level on my flash hotshoe to make sure the camera is levelled.

Blue Hour on Monpazier, Dordogne, Perigord, France

• BRACKET: even if you don’t plan on blending exposures in Photoshop or doing HDRs, bracketing make sure you won’t miss any exposure. Take as many possible as possible.

• EXPOSE CORRECTLY: If you use matrix metering, in aperture priority, compensate between 0.7 and 1.5ev. Otherwise shoot in manual mode and check the result at the back at the camera so that you don’t have too many dark shadows. The histogram should have a clear dome at its left (which means you haven’t clipped the shadows too much and that the image is not too dark!

Blue Hour on Seattle Skyline, Washington, USA

• INCREASE YOUR AWARENESS: You want to make great photos, relax, breathe and feel the smell in the air, the wind on your skin, the flow of water and let your intuition guide you.

• RUN!!!: Damn it does not last long so if you can, train yourself at being able to run like a crazy monkey with a big tripod looking for your next shot! LOL

Blue hour at Union Square, San Francisco, USA

Now this is not over. Taking the photos is a good thing, but processing them is key to get the best results… stay tuned for part 2!!!

Book me for:

• a portrait session or a portfolio, or
  
• an assignment (architecture/urban landscape), or
  
• a Photoshop training lesson (english and french)

View my portfolio and contact me now!

Photos and videos are all rights reserved – David Giral 2010.

• Snowy backyard somewhere on the Plateau Mont-Royal

• Snowy alley of the Plateau Mont-Royal

I’ve always loved those lonely photo walks, listening to audio books, while trying to find secret places and different angles to what everybody has already photographed. I’ve had already come by that book store and taken a photo but never published it. On that night, it was really different, when I saw the bookstore again, with the yellow light coming from inside the store against the white snow and the blue sky, it really made an impression. It was the right moment to take a photo. After figuring out the perspective I wanted, I then set up my tripod in the middle of the road, took a look left and right to make sure no one would run me over and then took 3 different exposures (from 1.6 to 6s) with my Nikon D300 and a Sigma 10-20mm zoomed at 16mm and F/10.0.

I knew that this photo had something more than the others I took that night. When I get that feeling,  I usually like to wait a few days or months to process the photos, because I want it to reflect exactly the impressions I had that night. Like I say to my friends, it’s not about the technique, it’s about using the technique to reflect what your feelings were and just go with your intuition. Like demonstrated below, I don’t see HDR as a technique, my photomatix processing is really basic and the core of what I do is micro-contrast management using curves until I get the result that I want, without any second thoughts. This particular example mixed HDR and DRI and a bit of Photoshop. Enjoy!

• Final result:

• Baseline exposure:

• Making Of:

Book me for:

• a portrait session or a portfolio, or
  
• an assignment (architecture/urban landscape), or
  
• a Photoshop training lesson (english and french)

View my portfolio and contact me now!

Photos and videos are all rights reserved – David Giral 2010.

The following photowas actually the first one taken that night afternoon using a Nikon D300 and a Sigma 10-20mm all zoomed out at 10mm. My main concern when I took this photo was to make sure I had the all shed on the right of the image along with the perspective of the alley.

• Photo after retouching

• Photo before retouching

Processing involved accentuating the lack of colors through a partial black and white conversion except for the rusted scene and make the scene feel more real and textured through contrast enhancement.

• Unedited video of the whole processing (Music by Guitar Flute and String, Moby) – real time 15 min:

Book me for:

• a portrait session or a portfolio, or
  
• an assignment (architecture/urban landscape), or
  
• a Photoshop training lesson (english and french)

View my portfolio and contact me now!

Photos and videos are all rights reserved – David Giral 2010.

This specific photo was taken on Christmas Eve 2009 on a fairly overcast weather. I used a Nikon D300 and a Sigma 10-20mm all zoomed out at 10mm to make sure I captured the whole scene. I used a tripod to be able to stay at low ISO. The exposure lasted 2.5 seconds at F/10.0 and ISO 200.

Retouching involved mainly curves and levels adjustments in order to increase contrast on the whole image as well as locally.

• Photo after retouching

• Photo before retouching

• Video showing the adjustments done on each adjustment layer in Photoshop.

Enjoy!

Don’t forget to check my portfolio and my stock photos at http://www.davidgiralphoto.com

• Ranked 10 | The hilly Streets of San-Francisco II | HDR/RAW

• Ranked 9 |  Classic Seattle Skyline,  Washington, USA

• Ranked 8 | Spooky Evening in Bodie, California, USA | RAW

• Ranked 7 | San Francisco at Night from Russian Hill, California, USA

• Ranked 6 | Rush Hour on Rue Royale, Paris, France

• Ranked 5 | Blue Hour on Hawthorne Bridge and Portland, Oregon | DRI

• Ranked 4 | The Streetcar of Powell Station, San Francisco | DRI

• Ranked 3 | The old Plymouth on the road less travelled, California, USA

• Ranked 2 | Blue Hour on Vancouver, BC, Canada | DRI

• Ranked 1 | The Big Rocks of Klamath Beach, California, USA | HDR

Enjoy! You are welcome to use them as wallpapers.

All those photos are available as prints and some as stock photos at www.davidgiralphoto.com !