Barri Gotic

The Story
May, 2009. Once again, we followed my sister and this time we ended up in Barcelona. She was studying there for some months and we couldn't waste the opportunity to know this beautiful city (with free accommodations). Before we went there, we've made a list of places to see and the Barri Gotic (Gothic quarter) was one of the main spots. I've had seen some pictures of it and I was hopping to find this exact spot, but I didn't knew exactly where it was. So it was a nice to have if we would end up in this alley.
In the first day of our visit, we started with Casa Batló from Gaudi in the morning and then we met up with my sister in the Gothic quarter to have some lunch. After lunch we were strolling around the Gothic and we ended up in this exact spot.
I took some photos of it and then we moved on.

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/30 second
Aperture: F/3.5
Focal Length: 18 mm
ISO Speed: 800

Original Photo


Post Processing
February 2010. Facing my new reality (parenthood), I decided to check my hard drive for some old photos to process. I'd been to Barcelona almost one year before and I always had the feeling that none of the photos that I published had any special value. For some reason I can't explain, this photo wasn't in my candidate list from the Barcelona shots. This time I decided to give it a chance.
I imported the NEF into Lightroom, slightly aligned it and when straight to the "Awesome BW" preset from synaestheta (you can find it here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/presets/discuss/72157612664073371/). The photo was almost perfect but it still needed some adjustments so I've: increased the Sharpening, added some Post-Crop Vignetting to hide that wooden bars in the top and reduced the Saturation to the minimum. Finally, I've changed the Split Toning to match the one that I used in some others photos like Bridge To Neverland or The Hero.
And that was it. Basically it's the synaestheta preset with a different tone.

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Barri-Gotic-154393278

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Misty River I

The Story
It was a Sunday afternoon in the end of 2008's summer. I had finished lunch and was in my kitchen in Corroios (near Almada, Portugal) doing the dishes (check the Bridge To Neverland photo story for more details)...
I arrived at the monument and sometimes I couldn't even see the bridge because of the fog. I took some photos from ground level and head straight to the top. From there the view was breathtaking. I took plenty of shots from the top and then returned back to the ground. In ground level I took a few more and this one was my favorite. I loved the amount of detail in it, the BUS crossing the bridge was great.

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/320 second
Aperture: F/8.0
Focal Length: 48 mm
ISO Speed: 100

Original Photo


Post Processing
This photo was my first choice from the ones I took that afternoon. There was very little to do, basically it needed more contrast (typical in photos taken in fog situations) .
I imported the NEF file into Lightroom and done some Highlight Recovery and increased the Sharpening and the Blacks.
Looking to it now, the difference isn't that much. The issue was that, in the moment I processed it, I was still importing the NEF files directly into Lightroom and, as I mentioned before, Adobe software can't reproduce correctly the NEF files. This original version you see here (as all the original versions in my posts) is the result of a conversion to TIFF in ViewNX and it has the correct info from the original file.

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Misty-River-I-98580228

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Misty River II

The Story
It was a Sunday afternoon in the end of 2008's summer. I had finished lunch and was in my kitchen in Corroios (near Almada, Portugal) doing the dishes (check the Bridge To Neverland photo story for more details)...
I arrived at the monument and sometimes I couldn't even see the bridge because of the fog. I took some photos from ground level and head straight to the top. From there the view was breathtaking. I mainly used the Sigma 10-20 to capture the scene but as I was in higher ground I also tried some shots with the 18-70. This photo was one of them. I tried to align the bridge towers to the thirds of the image to guide the eyes from the closer tower to the remainder of the bridge, ending in the fog. What I liked more about this shot was the amount of detail that was possible to capture, even in the fog.

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/320 second
Aperture: F/8.0
Focal Length: 35 mm
ISO Speed: 100

Original Photo


Post Processing
This photo was my second choice from the ones I took that afternoon. There was very little to do, basically it needed more contrast (typical in photos taken in fog situations) .
I imported the NEF file into Lightroom and slightly straightened it. Then I've done some Highlight Recovery and increased the Sharpening and the Blacks.
That was it! Some times, all it takes is a minor adjustment.

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Misty-River-II-98584720

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Ascensor da Bica

The Story
May, 2009. We've been in Barcelona a couple of weeks before and I was fascinated with the old Barcelona neighborhood. There I decided that I had to go for a visit in old Lisboa as soon as possible. I had several options but I decided to go to Bairro Alto mainly because of this funicular.
Before this day I, as usual, explored the location in Flickr and Wiki to check for good spots. I already knew that there were two "Elevadores" (lifts) in Lisboa: Santa Justa and Glória. But until that day I never had checked to see if there were more. When I found out that there were two others I felt ashamed. How come I, born in Lisboa, forever in love with this city, could not know this?
In google maps/earth I located this one and found out that it connected the low area of Santos to the high area of Bairro Alto. So the course was set: I would park in Santos, take the funicular to Bairro Alto and would explore from there.
This funicular is very different from the other two I knew. In the bottom side, you pick it inside a building and then it starts to climb the hill in some characteristic Lisboa's street. We bought the ticket and got inside. It took a little bit before it started the trip, but then it was worthy. It's a very small trip and you're off to one of the more typical Lisboa neighborhoods: Bairro Alto. This place is also one of the favorite places for the teens to go out at night (I lost the count of how many times I've been there) .
In the end of the ride, we got off the funicular and my wife went to the shops while I started exploring the site. I took some shots of the funicular, from the rails, from the people around and them moved on to Bairro Alto itself.

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/250 second
Aperture: F/9.0
Focal Length: 70 mm
ISO Speed: 400

Original Photo


Post Processing
This photo was the only one that I published from that day. I took plenty of photos in Bairro Alto but none satisfied me as this one. It had to be black and white but I tried something different: I left the characteristic yellow of the funicular as yellow and converted only the remainder of the image to black and white.
In Lightroom I've straightened and cropped it a bit and then applied the Mike Lao's "300 V1" preset (you can find it here: http://inside-lightroom.com/?page_id=11). The preset needed some adjustments after, so I reduced the Vignetting, increased the Contrast, the Blacks and the Clarity. Then I reduced the Saturation to the minimum on all colors except for the Yellows and Brushed all around the funicular where there were still traces of colors. This Brush was a -100% Saturation brush.
In CS4 I've selected all except the funicular itself and created a new layer with that selection. Then, I converted it to Black and White ("Darker" preset) and applied the "Warm (26)" action to warm it a little (you can find this and other actions to simulate the effect of Gradient filters here: http://www.thelightsrightstudio.com). Finally I've done: Auto Tone and Auto Contrast.
I usually publish my photos with 1024px in the largest size and use a great Photoshop action by Manyk to do the re-size.You can find it here: http://manyk.deviantart.com/art/Web-Sharpening-with-Photoshop-29038461

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Ascensor-da-Bica-122720360

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Meteora III

The Story
January, 2009. My sister was at the time working in Athens and invited us to go there for a week (check the Meteora II photo story for more details)...
It's a fantastic place. You can see big rocks with monasteries build on top. It was almost all the time very foggy, but every time it cleared a bit, the view was fantastic. I just leave you the photo. I think it speaks for itself.
If you ever go to Greece, do go to Meteora, you won't regret!

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/50 second
Aperture: F/8.0
Focal Length: 40 mm
ISO Speed: 100

Original Photo


Post Processing
This photo rested in my hard drive almost one year until I decided to give it a shot.
It was December, Christmas has passed and the weather was very rainy. On top of that, my wife was pregnant and my photo trips had been reduced to the minimum for us to be together more time. I already had published two photos of Meteora and in both I almost didn't touched them in post processing. This time I decided to give it a different atmosphere. Has I had noticed in other photos (like Bridge To Neverland) when they are shot under foggy conditions, the Contrast is very low. This was one of the first things to address. The second thing were the colors: they were very dull, so I decided to bring them up.
In Lightroom I've increased the Blacks, the Vibrance and the Sharpening, then I increased the Saturation on the Greens, Yellows, Oranges, Reds and Blues. Next I increased the Luminance on the Greens, Yellows, Oranges and Reds, and reduced it on the Blues and Aquas (to darken the sky). Next, another boost to the Contrast, Vignetting was added, increased the Clarity and the Saturation. Then I started playing around with Split Toning, with the objective of warming the colors a little: in the Highlights I increased the Hue to 40 and the Saturation to 20. Finally, I increased 0,75 stops on the Exposure and added a Gradient Filter to darken the sky.
In CS4, I've started by applying the Virtual Photographer plug-in (you can find it here: http://www.optikvervelabs.com) with the setting "Fall Colors" and then applied the "Tobacco Grad (125)" action to the sky (you can find this and other actions to simulate the effect of Gradient filters here: http://www.thelightsrightstudio.com). Then I adjusted the Levels and the Color Balance, increased the Brightness and Contrast and re-touched the Levels again ("Increase Contrast 1" preset).
I usually publish my photos with 1024px in the largest size and use a great Photoshop action by Manyk to do the re-size.
You can find it here: http://manyk.deviantart.com/art/Web-Sharpening-with-Photoshop-29038461

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Meteora-III-148221264

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Flatiron, NYC

The Story
April, 2008. After more than a year after the original planned date for visiting New York, we finally managed to go there (check the NYC - Times Square photo story for more details)...
In our second day in New York we still had a lot of places to visit. The Flatiron Building was one of them. This peculiar building is one of the first skyscrapers ever built and it is more than 100 years old. It was finished in 1902 and it is a landmark in New York City. From this perspective, we can see that it is very thin in the front, clothing iron shaped (hence it's name).
I took some photos of it and moved on to the next spot.

Equipment / Technical Info
Nikon D80
AF-S NIKKOR 18-70mm 1:3.5-4.5G ED

Shutter Speed: 1/250 second
Aperture: F/3.5
Focal Length: 18 mm
ISO Speed: 100

Original Photo


Post Processing
This photo rested over 20 months in my hard drive, waiting for it's turn. Well, Christmas day, 2009 was the day.
I had imported this photo into my Lightroom catalog a few days after our arrival from NY, back in 2008. I had tried almost all of my presets in this one, but never got quite satisfied with the result. In this day, I decided to let the presets aside and do it manually from scratch.
First I straighten it and applied the proper crop. Then I increased the Sharpening and reduced 1 stop to the Exposure to darken the sky a bit. This left the photo too dark and brought me to the next step: increase the Fill Light. Then I increased the Blacks, the Clarity and the Contrast; reduced the Exposure another stop and increased the Brightness to compensate. To darken the sky even more, I reduced the Luminance of the Blues to the minimum. Now it was ready for the Black & White conversion. I prefer to do this step in CS4, so I imported the photo there.
In CS4, I've done Auto Levels, Auto Contrast and Auto Colors, and converted to Black & White (Infrared preset). I then added some Vignetting, increased the Contrast and the Brightness and had some noise reduction (the clouds part was a bit noisy). And that was it.
I usually publish my photos with 1024px in the largest size and use a great Photoshop action by Manyk to do the re-size.
You can find it here: http://manyk.deviantart.com/art/Web-Sharpening-with-Photoshop-29038461

Final Photo


Link to image
http://jpgmn.deviantart.com/art/Flatiron-NYC-147974783

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