Monday, May 4, 2009

Pinon Valley Park

Here's a view of a section of Pinon Valley Park in NW Colorado Springs, CO as seen from the top of a ridge that runs through Ute Valley Park. Even though Ute Valley Park is surrounded by suburbia, there are many places in the center of the park where you'd think you were in the wilderness. I spend a lot of time hiking around the park (and photographing in it).

Click on the link to see my other posts about Ute Valley Park.

This photo was taken with an old Canon G2. It's fairly small and light, yet gives full manual control and shoots in RAW. I use it when backpacking and other occasions when I want to travel light. It has been a while since I last used it. Since backpacking season is coming up, I pulled it to refresh myself on its operation. In comparison to my 40D, its very slow and cumbersome, but it can still take some descent pictures.

The other, possibly, interesting aspect of this photo is the style. I wanted this shot to look like a model. To accomplish that, I replicated the narrow DOF by selectively blurring areas, and jacked up the saturation and contrast. Since we've been trained to associate the narrow DOF with macro photography, this effect makes it seem as if we're looking at a photo of a small model. The other way to accomplish this is to use an expensive tilt/shift lens.

Hike over to That's My World Tuesday to sightsee elsewhere around the planet.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I like this blurry effect.

chrome3d said...

That was spooky. As hard as I tried I still couldn´t see it as a real place. It was just a scale model. weird.

Gennasus said...

I thought it was a model too. Thanks for explaining.

Deanna Lack said...

You definitely accomplished your goal! I thought it was Mr. Rogers' neighborhood ;)

VALKYRIEN said...

Wow - that IS spooky! I was sure it was a model - and I still do! No - I don't, but I cannot see it in another way! God job! Made me smile!

Bryan said...

Interesting use of blur. I definitely focused immediately on the playground, which obviously was the intention as it is the most unique element in the photo.

The perspective/angle here added a great deal to the whole "model" feel as well. I feel like a giant intruding on a world of people 1/100th of my size, which gets me thinking about the "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids" movies from back a few years.

Russ said...

Thanks! I've always been entranced by this effect. I'm waiting to win the lotto, so I can get the tilt/shift lens and take this sort of shot right out of the camera :)

ms toast burner said...

That's very cool, Russ. I am going to give that a whirl!

Like others, I really thought that this was a photo of a model!

Ebie said...

Just beautiful, very impressive. I thought it was a model too.