Te Uku Wind Farm
This is the view looking back towards Mt Karioi in Waikato, New Zealand on a bike track that goes up to the Te Uku Wind farm....
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This is the view looking back towards Mt Karioi in Waikato, New Zealand on a bike track that goes up to the Te Uku Wind farm.
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May, 2016Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This High Dynamic Range (HDR) photo was taken on the Pipiwharauroa Walking and Biking Trail that goes over private farmland to the Te Uku Windfarm between Hamilton and Raglan, New Zealand. The mountain in the photo is Mount Karioi.Time
I tried to time my ride so that I would be at the top by the trail by the wind turbines during sunset (Golden Hour). This didn’t work out as the clouds came in over the ridge meaning that I could not see the landscape when I was at the top. Luckily I had taken this photo on my way up to the top of the walking and biking trail on May 9th 2016 around 4:30pm.Lighting
I am looking into the sun which gives nice shadows to the front of the hills of the farmland. To get the most from the light and to get the image looking natural I had to take 3 bracketed photos and then create a HDR image in post processing.Equipment
I used my Canon 600D with a Tamron 18-270mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC Lens on a Vanguard tripod to take the 3 bracketed photos for the final image.Inspiration
I was inspired to go for a bike ride to get a series of photos which included this image as It had been a while since I had been for a bike ride and I had been contacted by Hamilton & Waikato Tourism regarding photos I had taken around Waikato, New Zealand. I was practicing taking selfies of me cycling within the landscape that could be used in promotional material. This is a general landscape image taken because I saw the clouds over Mount Karioi during my bike ride.Editing
I bracketed 3 raw photos so that I could use the HDR tool in Canons Digital Professional Photo 4 to create a HDR image. In the HDR settings I adjusted the image by increasing contrast and detail enhancements by 10% to get the hills looking better. Then I used Adobe Photoshop Express to increase the clarity and bring up the shadows to get a bit more detail in hills. Finally, I cropped the sun out of the image as it was too bright and distracted from the hills for the final image.In my camera bag
What equipment do you normally have in your bag? I have a backpack with a small padded camera bag inside to protect my Canon 600D, Tamron 18-270mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC Lens, a Canon 50mm f/1.8 prime lens, Canon Speed Lite 430EXII, a circular polarizing filter is left in a pocket in the back for when I take photos of waterfalls. My tripod gets strapped to the outside of the backpack with 2 feet in the mesh drink bottle holder with the top buckled to the backpack so it stands upright. Spare charged batteries and memory cards because occasionally I leave the memory card in the laptop and decide to create a time-lapse video requiring a fully charged battery.Feedback
Even if you will not create a HDR or exposure blended image it can be helpful to bracket your images +2, Ev & -2 to help get the correct exposure of the scene. The easiest way to do this is by using a tripod and the 2 second self-timer in the camera. I have found that if I use the self-timer most of the time the camera (Canon) will take the 3 photos one after the other allowing you to touch the camera once avoiding bumping it. If you don’t have a tripod you can handhold the camera and use the burst mode to take your 3 bracketed photos. As you take the photos try to stay as still as possible so that it is easy for the software to align the images in post processing. This photo was not what I had planned when I went on my bike ride to capture photos but I took it any way. I didn’t get to take my planned photos as the clouds came in on the ridge and didn’t include myself biking in the landscape. The unplanned photos can be your best photos from a trip or photo adventure like my unplanned photo.
