Central Park in New York City

I used a R79 filter on my camera to get the wintery effect while on a recent trip to New York. The R79 filter is a very deep red piece of glass and you will need to use a tripod and longer shutter speeds to get correct exposure. Your image will be red and white if your in color mode on camera so you either change the camera mode to black and white or convert to black and white in post processing later. These images benefit greatly with a boost in contrast.

Panorama of NYC

Panorama view of New York City from the 86th floor of the Empire State Building.

Waterfalls and Photography

Waterfalls and photography go together like peanut butter and jelly. The falls come in all shapes and sizes and each one presents a different challenge. Large waterfalls like Niagara photograph better with shutter speeds around 1/4 sec or faster while smaller waterfalls have less volume of water photograph better at speeds of 1/4 sec or longer.

Aurora HDR Pro First Impressions

I have been using Aurora HDR Pro since it became available. You can purchase it at https://store.stuckincustoms.com/aurora-hdr-pro-holiday-bundle . Trey Ratcliff and the McPhun team have a winner here. This software is easy to use, has some awesome presets and with Trey's tutorials you can do your own style with ease. I like HDR but I am not a fan of the extreme HDR where photogs do the sky to dark and there are halos along the tree lines and way too much noise in their images. I am more of a perfectionist, I hate noise and I hate when images look too fake. This is all subjective and really just a matter of taste in what you prefer, so this is just my prefererences. This program converts RAW images seamlessly to the point I really don't need to convert with Adobe Camera Raw first. The bottom line is I may never use my old trusty standby, Photomatix to make an HDR image again. This new software is that good, buy it now and never look back. The only draw back is it's only for Mac users. One really cool feature is you can add a glow to highlights in your images without making the whole image ghostly looking. Here's a sample below of the glow look.

More of Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree

Here are a few more pictures I took of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center in New York, New York. As we maneuvered around the tree through the crowds of people I looked for flat areas to set my gorilla pod on or clap it to. There was no way anyone would want to try to get a tripod through this mob of people. Settings were ISO 80 f 5.6 at 1/8 sec. And just for fun I added snow to an animated GIF. on the last image.

The Most Famous Christmas Tree in the World

New York City, Rockefeller Center, Giant Christmas Tree...its doesn't get any better than this. I fought my way through thousands of people to get this shot. Anyone wanting to shoot this famous tree will need to travel light and quick. I used my trusty Canon powershot SX50 hs because it's a great travel camera. I mounted the camera on a gorilla pod and shot this at ISO 80, f-5.6 at 1/8 sec using the self timer to get a sharp picture. The image was then finished in Aurora HDR pro and Photoshop CC.

Holiday Season

It's been awhile since I posted here. I have been dealing with some issues, but I think I am over the hump now and I can begin to blog on a regular bases. Thanks to all for your patience and support during this brief period. To kick off the holiday season I thought I'd post a picture of our Christmas tree. I used a Canon powershot SX50hs on a tripod for this shot. With the tree lights on, I took 3 shots and highlighted the top, bottom and background with a Nikon 910 speedlight. I merged the 3 images with Aurora HDR pro. I then added falling snow with Photoshop CC and made the image in to an animated GIF.

Strobe It

Canon powershot sx50 hs with two sb600's & sunlight back lighting.

Portraits with Speedlights

Many people don't realize this but I threw away all my studio lights about seven years ago. I started using speedlights when Nikon introduced CLS and never looked back. I can easily set up portrait type lighting anytime, anywhere. The pictures above were shot in a basement with low ceilings against a white wall. I used four speedlights to make this portrait. One as a main 1/4 power with shoot thru umbrella, one in a strip box at 1/16 power from underneath in front of the camera, one from above pointed straight up into the rafters at 1/2 power, and one in a strip box off to the right pointed back at my subjects at 1/8 power. This system is easy to use and set up quickly and allows you great mobility.

Last Light

Beautiful lighting on the battlefields of Gettysburg.

Lighting Dog Portraits on the Fly

One of my many gripes about photographers, pro or amateur, is they go to great lengths and expense buying and using all kinds of fancy lighting and light modifiers for in studio work, then when they are not in a controlled studio environment they go back to shooting badly lit candids. My opinion is if you want to run with the big dogs then you run with the big dogs 100% percent of the time not when it's convenient. The picture above was taken in my daughter's living room with dark blue walls and a white ceiling. I placed her dog on the brown leather sofa and I sat on the floor about 6 feet away. I used two Nikon sb 600 speedlights placed facing straight up. One to the left on the TV table at 1/4 power and one to the right of my subject on a regular end table at 1/2 power. Flashes were triggered on camera with cowboy remote flash triggers. This whole portrait session took me 3 min. to set up. Just because you are out of your studio doesn't mean you shouldn't always strive to take the best picture possible.

My Lucky Break in Gettysburg

Gettysburg is a popular tourist destination, especially during Christmas vacations. The historic battlefields are great places to photograph. I always try to find unique or different angles when photographing landmarks, principally because they all photographed to death and I don't want my photos to be like ho-hum same ole photos. I was slowly cruising through the battlefield looking for an opportunity when I came upon a local re enactor dressed in full rebel uniform. None of the tourists seemed to notice him as he walked along. I walked up to him and quickly struck up a conversation. During our talk I asked if he would be so kind to pose for a few pictures for me. He agreed and I quickly looked for a good spot with a clear background. I wanted to show the realism of what it could have looked like back in the day. The sun was setting so the light was great for portraits. I found a lone canon and decided the best angle would be shooting in to the sun. This would normally be ideal if I had some sort of reflector or some fill flash to bounce some light back at him, to make sure I didn't lose too much detail in the shadows. I decided to HDR, ( high dynamic range ) a burst of five images spaced one stop apart would be my best approach. I used my Nikon D3 with 24-85mm lens at f8 aperture priority, iso 400. I also used a graduated neutral density filter to drop the exposure of the bright sky. I moved around my subject and shot various angles to get a variety of images. In my hast to work fast I stepped into a puddle of very cold water in the field...lol. I thanked him very much for posing for my camera and he went on his way. I felt very fortunate to have run in to him, and I knew I had some really great images to bring home. The images above were then uploaded to Adobe Camera Raw, processed in Photomatix and finished in Photoshop CC. I used various techniques ( sepia tone ) to replicate an old photo look.

Grand Opening

This blog, formerly Niagara Falls Wedding Photography blog, run by The Portrait Gallery Niagara has been changed to our new blog simply called Gary Muth PHOTOGRAPHY. It will not be a wedding based photography blog but I plan on covering my personal photography with pictures and tutorials and just general things of interest. I thank you for following my photography.

WWII tribute 2014

A few images from the WWII tribute held at the Dillsburg Tavern in Pennsylvania.

Gorge Walk by Gary Muth

We had a great opportunity to stop in Dansville and visit Stony Brook. A wonderful state park with nature trails and a gorge walk with plenty of photo opportunities. The waterfalls had a nice amount of water flowing which for August is probably rare. The park was packed with people and getting pictures of the waterfalls without people frolicking in the water was a little tricky but with a little planning and patience I got a few images.

Misty Morning

A fine misty morning with a bit of fog burning off the Lockport creek. Nikon D3, 24-70mm lens set at 24mm. Variable ND filter set at 8. Five bracketed exposures composited in Photoshop HDR merge at 32 bit. Finished in Lightzone 2.

1st Communion Photo Sessions by The Portrait Gallery Niagara

A special session for Leah. Images from her 1st communion photo session.