The Old Diner in Black and White

Marty CohenB+W, Daily Photo8 Comments

The Old Diner in B+W

The Old Diner in B+W

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Here is a black and white version of the Old Diner photograph I posted yesterday (scroll down to see it or click here to see it). This has also been processed as an HDR photograph and then further processed as a black and white image in Nik Silver Efex Pro 2. (Be sure to click on the photo above to enlarge it.)

Let me know which version you like better by clicking on the comment number bubble above the image and leaving a comment. Feel free to let me know why you choose the one you did. Thanks.

The Old Diner

Marty CohenDaily Photo11 Comments

The Old Diner

The Old Diner

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This is Mullen’s Dining Car Restaurant, a streetcar diner built in 1945. It’s near Buellton, CA, north of Santa Barbara, just off of Highway 101. It was open for only 13 years and now is at risk of being destroyed. It used to sit on land zoned for commercial use, but the land has been rezoned for residential use. (Be sure to click on the photo above to enlarge it.)

If you’d like to read more about this great diner and see several old photos, I highly recommend this article. Be sure to go through pages 1 and 2 of their web page. You can also read about the diner’s possible fate in this additional article.

This image is an HDR composite of 5 different exposures processed with Photomatix Pro. They were taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40mm f/4L lens, on SanDisk Extreme IV Digital Film.

The Old Cypress

Marty CohenB+W, Daily Photo, Point LobosLeave a Comment

The Old Cypress on the Cypress Grove Trail

The Old Cypress

This old Cypress Tree is located along the Cypress Grove Trail in Point Lobos State Reserve. It’s a beautiful grove of tress and lends itself to black and white photography.

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Photo taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40 mm f/4L IS lens 1/160 sec at f/4.5 ISO 100 on SanDisk Extreme IV Digital Film.

Weston Beach Rock Formations

Marty CohenBeach + Ocean, Daily Photo, Point LobosLeave a Comment

Weston Beach Rock Formations

Weston Beach Rock Formations

These rocks are just up from the ocean at Weston Beach in Point Lobos. The colors are really wonderful and they accentuate the grooves created by years and years of erosion from the ocean. Click on the photo to enlarge. (Click on the comment number bubble to leave a comment.) 

Photo taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40mm f/4L lens, on SanDisk Extreme IV Digital Film.

Tips on Photographing Jellyfish

Marty CohenDaily Photo, Jellyfish, Photography3 Comments

Spotted Jelly

Spotted Jelly - Click to enlarge

After posting three jellyfish photographs, my good friend Lee asked me how I shot the jellyfish photos through the glass? So I thought I’d post my answer here and share it with you.

I use a wide angle lens and hold the front of the lens against the glass to avoid getting light reflections from the room lights behind me. I do not use a flash. I set the ISO of the camera high and the f-stop low (aperture wide open) so that I can at least get the shutter speed up to 1/60 of a second or faster. If I can get away with a lower ISO or higher f-stop and still shoot at least 1/60 of a second, that’s even better. Next, I manually focus, hold my breath, tuck my elbows into my chest, and press the shutter to take the picture. Afterwards, I do some post-processing in Photoshop.

There are several difficult issues here:
  • Photographing a moving object
  • A dimly lit aquarium
  • Using a slow shutter speed (likely to get some blurring from movement)
  • A wide open aperture (low f-stop = narrow depth of field)
  • High ISO (results in more digital noise in the photo)
  • The Aquarium does not permit the use of a tripod

You have very little depth of field and it’s very easy to get a photograph that is either blurry from camera and/or jellyfish movement, or out of focus because of the narrow depth of field and with more noise (digital grain). So I end up with a lot of images that are unusable. But it’s fun trying.

This is a photo of a Spotted Jelly at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The rich coloring is due to algae living in the jelly’s tissues. The jelly gets some extra nourishment from the algae to enrich its diet of tiny animal plankton. (Click on the comment number bubble to leave a comment.)