Here's something from the archives to cool us down. There was a beautiful snow storm in Baltimore in mid February - it started snowing in the evening, and kept snowing all night. In the morning everything was covered in fresh snow, and I spent hours photographing the unusually quiet areas within walking distance of my home. I love what the storm does to the city - there is no traffic, no noise, no rush. Instead the streets and sidewalks are swarming with people shoveling and socializing, and the occasional cross-country skiers;-)

I felt like posting another;-)

I'm still here, sorry for the lack of posts lately - I've been super busy and traveling (mostly work related unfortunately). Now I should be getting back to a regular (albeit extremely stressful and busy) schedule, and hopefully I can manage to work in regular posts. Afterall, I can't work on a dissertation every minute of the day, right?

This picture, by the way, is of my adorable nephew.

Here'a a shot of the waterfall at the same location and time as the two shots earlier this month, only facing in the opposite direction. Isn't it amazing what a difference light makes? The earlier shots used the golden setting sun to color the water, and this waterfall, though shot at the same time and location, was completely in shadow.

I don't know much about shooting long exposures of waterfalls. I'd appreciate any feedback on this picture: how's the exposure - is it too dark/light/flat/blue/long? What about the framing? I chose this tight framing because the rocks surrounding the waterfall are not that interesting, and I couldn't get in a good position to have a dramatic wide-angle-water-gushing-at-you shot.

I did learn something shooting this shot though - I didn't realize that a polarizer could so dramatically change the appearance of wet rocks. In this image the polarizer was used to decrease the amount of reflected light off the rocks, making the rocks very dark. In reality the rocks were much brighter/shinier and more distracting (I think).

So I guess my taste in black and white florals isn't popular - oh well. Here's something different - the lines remind me of a music staff somehow.

Some tulips from Sherwood Gardens, Baltimore. I converted to black and white using primarily the green channel to bring out the purple striations of color along the tips of the petals.

Thanks everyone for your in-depth critical responses - I really appreciate them. Based on the comments I got on the previous image, I chose a different image from the same series and processed it differently. I wonder whether you think this one is more or less successful?

Now that I look at them side-by-side, I realize why I chose the first one in the first place, and why I processed it the way I did. I still think it looks "flat" (and the second one less so), but I like the lightness and brightness of it, and I like how simple and uncluttered it is. Well, but I'm curious what you think.

Update: I decided the light rocks at the top were very distracting and I cropped them out of the original

I was so excited when I discovered the setting sunlight reflected in this mountain stream in the Appalachians a few weeks ago. I probably spent an hour taking various long exposures, crouching on slippery rocks almost falling into the river. And they looked great on my viewfinder, yet somehow I am completely unsatisfied with how this turned out. I cannot figure out how to process it so that I like it, and I can't figure out what it is that bothers me - but it's something about the colors/tones, I think. Can anyone tell me please - what is wrong with this picture? Please don't be afraid to be honest. I was using a polarizer to control the reflected light - should I have let more of the blue reflected light in rather than trying to get as much gold as possible? Something just seems very flat about this image - and I'm not talking composition-wise. Help!

I couldn't resist posting a spring image even though I have a 3 month backlog of photos that I haven't done anything with yet. I haven't decided how to deal with them yet. Is anyone in the mood to see snowy winter wonderland pictures anymore?