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First effort with my new D750

JDDavis

JDDavis

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jan 16, 2009
1,242
109
So I've had my new D750 for about a month now. It's been mostly utilized as a family snapper with all the holidays. I'm mostly interested in landscape and adventure photography but subjects have been limited with all of our rain here and the fact that I live, for the moment, in middle Georgia. So I decided to make a serious effort photographing the local coal burning electricity plant located on a lake near my house. Plant Scherer is the 5th largest electrical producer in the U.S. and the largest single point source of carbon dioxide in the States (yeah us!). 2-5, 135 car coal trains from Wyoming unload every day there. The following were taken over two different days and processes in Aperture, NIK, and Capture NXD.

I'm just sharing for the sake of sharing but any critiques on what works and what doesn't is appreciated. I guess you'd say I'm practicing for something I'm interested in and that's nighttime landscapes of mountains.

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I rarely say it but I really enjoyed your offering as a feast for the eyes. Thanks for sharing!
 
Nice stuff JD, if you have PS try some exposure blending from bracketed 3 and 5 exposures from -3 to +3, the D750 should show how sick the images can be in color tone and DR........look forward to seeing more stuff from you and your D750 ;)
 
These are great! You could make a nice project out of this while you're waiting for mountains :)

I especially like #3 (the middle-gray one) for it's eeriness. I feel like the rocks in the foreground are being lit by the glow from the power plant, which gives it a kind of creepy feeling.

I also like the color ones for a similar reason -- it seems otherworldly (and somewhat like a movie poster with the orange/blue). Especially #5, since stars are visible.

Nice work!
 
Mr.Noisy said:
Nice stuff JD, if you have PS try some exposure blending from bracketed 3 and 5 exposures from -3 to +3, the D750 should show how sick the images can be in color tone and DR........look forward to seeing more stuff from you and your D750 ;)
Click to expand...

I don't have PS anymore on my machine but I can use it on my wife's work computer. I've been trying Pixlemator as a replacement, though I was never a big PS user. When you say exposure blending, would that be done by using the photomerge selection in PS? I'm not terrible interested in HDR type images but I will sometimes push an image to have what I feel are slight HDR qualities (like one of the closeups of the plant). I have wanted to try focus stacking which I'm guessing would be a like process (to exposure blending).

It's funny but the D750 has kind of exposed how little I know about what's possible with image editing. Not becuase it needs a lot of post but becuase of what's possible with the image it gives you.
 
JDDavis said:
It's funny but the D750 has kind of exposed how little I know about what's possible with image editing. Not becuase it needs a lot of post but becuase of what's possible with the image it gives you.
Click to expand...


Yeah its a PS thing merging 3 or 5 exposures to get the best color or tonal contrast you can, the RAW files from the D750 should be nice to play with and hold plenty of info, This image is a 5 exposure shot -2 -1 0 +1 +2, it was the only way to capture the colours on this night.
 

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JDDavis said:
So I've had my new D750 for about a month now. It's been mostly utilized as a family snapper with all the holidays. I'm mostly interested in landscape and adventure photography but subjects have been limited with all of our rain here and the fact that I live, for the moment, in middle Georgia. So I decided to make a serious effort photographing the local coal burning electricity plant located on a lake near my house. Plant Scherer is the 5th largest electrical producer in the U.S. and the largest single point source of carbon dioxide in the States (yeah us!). 2-5, 135 car coal trains from Wyoming unload every day there. The following were taken over two different days and processes in Aperture, NIK, and Capture NXD.

I'm just sharing for the sake of sharing but any critiques on what works and what doesn't is appreciated. I guess you'd say I'm practicing for something I'm interested in and that's nighttime landscapes of mountains.
Click to expand...

Wow! I really enjoyed these images. So clean, stunning detail. I afire the one of the trees with the steam behind it - but if a sucker for a rich blue sky.

Fantastic shots well done!
 
Thanks all for the kind words. kenoh, that blue only lasted for a short time. It was that time in the morning when it was no longer the dark of night but not yet the start of dawn. It only lasted about 10 minutes and I think I have 2 other shots that have that color in them and the last one is a lot lighter.
 
JDDavis said:
Thanks all for the kind words. kenoh, that blue only lasted for a short time. It was that time in the morning when it was no longer the dark of night but not yet the start of dawn. It only lasted about 10 minutes and I think I have 2 other shots that have that color in them and the last one is a lot lighter.
Click to expand...

Right time, right place, shutter magic. Really beautiful effect. My daughters bedroom is east facing and we sit slightly elevated over neighbour so my tripod is setup ready! I will catch one of these soon!
 
kenoh said:
Right time, right place, shutter magic. Really beautiful effect. My daughters bedroom is east facing and we sit slightly elevated over neighbour so my tripod is setup ready! I will catch one of these soon!
Click to expand...

Right time and right place is key. That's what I'm learning about landscapes. It's super easy to pull over at the scenic viewpoint and snap a nice shot but to really get something noteworthy in that same spot takes lots of effort, timing, luck, and patience. Things change from "hey look, one of them turned out great" to feeling like you really might have accomplished something deliberate.

Poor girl, dad sneaking in the room before dawn to catch a sunrise :). I say wake her up and drag her out to the middle of nowhere in the freezing cold to wait on that sunrise! :D
 
JDDavis said:
Right time and right place is key. That's what I'm learning about landscapes. It's super easy to pull over at the scenic viewpoint and snap a nice shot but to really get something noteworthy in that same spot takes lots of effort, timing, luck, and patience. Things change from "hey look, one of them turned out great" to feeling like you really might have accomplished something deliberate.

Poor girl, dad sneaking in the room before dawn to catch a sunrise :). I say wake her up and drag her out to the middle of nowhere in the freezing cold to wait on that sunrise! :D
Click to expand...

Lol... I dragged both girls out below into the dark park to get a nightsky shot the other night... They were not happy! And like their mum, in the interests of safely traversing the day, best to leave them to sleep :)

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MacRy said:
They're great. I love number 4.
Click to expand...

Nah deffo 8 for me... Like I say, I am drawn to a rich blue sky like a moth to a flame
 
kenoh said:
Lol... I dragged both girls out below into the dark park to get a nightsky shot the other night... They were not happy! And like their mum, in the interests of safely traversing the day, best to leave them to sleep :)

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Nah deffo 8 for me... Like I say, I am drawn to a rich blue sky like a moth to a flame
Click to expand...

8 or 3 for me. All good though. I can't wait to get my hands on a D750. Make good use of all my glass.
 
kenoh said:
Lol... I dragged both girls out below into the dark park to get a nightsky shot the other night... They were not happy! And like their mum, in the interests of safely traversing the day, best to leave them to sleep :)

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Nah deffo 8 for me... Like I say, I am drawn to a rich blue sky like a moth to a flame
Click to expand...

Found another one for you kenoh. This was shortly after the one with the trees. The next image a few minutes later and the blue is gone.

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