Picture info: ISO 100, 35mm, f/20, 3 seconds, -2.1 ND, -1 exposure stop

Week 24 (1/13/14 – 1/19/2014):  Hoboken, Maxwell Place Park

Picture taken on 1/18/2014 at 2:41 PM

Picture description:

If you’ve read my last couple of posts you may have noticed that I’ve been alluding to different goals and projects for 2014.  One of my 2014 goals is to create a collection of “Hoboken pictures” with the ultimate goal of selling them at the festivals held in town throughout the year.  I’ve been to the last couple of art and music festivals, and one thing I’ve look for each time was good (fair priced) Hoboken art and pictures.  Unfortunately I’m yet to find a booth that has both good and reasonably priced Hoboken pictures.  Knowing that current Hoboken residents, like myself, are looking for local pictures is one of the reasons I decided to take on this project.  I think this project will be a good way to take the next step in my photography adventure.  Another reason why I decided to take on this challenge is due to all of the positive feedback and encouragement that I’ve been getting from friends and family.  You all have motivated me to keep pushing myself forward by continuing to develop my photography skills and for that I thank you!

Although I won’t feature a Hoboken picture each week I’m planning on taking a lot more pictures in Hoboken.  As I talked about last week, finding new perspectives will be one of my focal points for taking pictures in 2014.  This idea particularly applies to this Hoboken picture project since no one will want to buy pictures they could have taken themselves.  The key to being successful in this venture will be getting unique pictures that people will want to feature in their homes.

This week’s photograph is an example of finding a unique picture in Hoboken.  I’d bet that few Hoboken residents have noticed there is a beachfront in town.  During the summer the city hosts kayak and canoe days where they launch the boats from this beachhead.  It’s a wonderful location and absolutely one of the secret amenities of living in Hoboken.

20 Second exposure

Photography concepts:

It’s been a couple of weeks since I last experimented with ND filters.  Week 17’s post “One Shot” was the first and last time that ND filters played a role in my featured picture.  Unlike in week 17, this week’s picture was shot in broad daylight.  Getting a long exposure during the day would never have been possible without using ND filters.  In this picture I stacked two filters, 0.9 and 1.2, to gain the -2.1 percent neutral density level.  In case you missed my week 17 post, ND filters reduce the amount of light that hits your camera’s sensor and thus enables slower shutter speeds.

In addition to using ND filters, shooting this picture at an extremely small aperture of f/20 is also how a 3 second exposure was possible.  Taking a long exposure of the ocean or some other body of water that has lots of movement (waves) has been on my bucket list for a while.  Since it’s the winter I’m yet to make it to the actual ocean, so until then this will have to do.  The crashing of the waves is what created the motion blur effect in the water as it crashed and receding from the shoreline.  I love that ghosting look and plan on getting a lot more pictures like this over the summer.

Mini-Tripod used to take photo (link below)

Over the past few weeks I’ve been using Instagram and Facebook to gauge the different editing techniques that people like.  Since I’m planning on selling my pictures in the near future it’s important I know what the average person likes.  I personally tend to like more dull, low contrast pictures, while I’ve found that more of the people I come into contact with like high contrast, vivid photographs.  In an effort to hit the look that people have been liking more, I’ve been editing my photos to have more pop.  It’s really hard to describe my editing process verbally, so in the coming weeks look for me to try my hand at creating Lightroom editing videos on YouTube.  Expect a follow up edit to this post with a video on how I edited this picture.

Tripod: http://bhpho.to/1jkddfR