Seattle (lots o pics)

silversx80

My wife and I recently returned from our honeymoon to WA. We spent the first 5 nights at San Juan Island, and the last three in Seattle. It was a very neat trip, and we can't wait to go back.

Of course, what kind of dgrinner would I be without bringing my camera (much to the dismay of my eye-rolling wife)?

Here are a few from the Seattle part of the trip. The gallery can be found here: http://silversx80.smugmug.com/Places-Ive-Been-3/Washington-State/Seattle/11857101_QYhds#838431926_jCdnK

As we were walking to the Pike Place Market, we saw this guy taking a nap in the sun. I thought it made for an interesting shot.



(original shot here http://silversx80.smugmug.com/Places-Ive-Been-3/Washington-State/Seattle/4082945/838084192_FHH4e-L.jpg)

Pike street... not a pic to write home about, but I was happy we weren't lost... still. The original directions sent us 30 minutes in the wrong directing (walking).




The pig, of course



All the spices in Pike Place Market was quite mind boggling to me.



The fish, of course.



Watch out!



The colors all stood out to me as well



Obligatory :wink



Once again, the colors!




All the bikes, too.




Wonderful Food!







Where, oh where would we be without them?




Looks like a scene from Miami






Time to move underground

This is one bad Crapper:




Nothing special, again, but I like Seattle's architecture




Underground again






Who want's espresso?




This is one, nice Crapper






One more obligatory



Thanks for looking, C&C is always welcome.

frigidlight

Loved the shots, especially the first one with the dog. Did you do anything with the color there? It looks almost infrared. Great set! Reminds me how short my visit to Seattle was and how much I want to go back.

ABCL

I loved the B&W market shot, it grabbed me. The first one looked like a Holga photograph (and I LOVE those!)

silversx80

Thanks for the compliments!

That first shot is a result of me wanting to get somewhat of a lomo/holga look. After the standard sharpening, mild contrast and color corrections in the RAW development (about 20 seconds, just to get it to look like what I saw) I took it over to GIMP. It's a little complicated at first, but it's a fun process. Should work in photoshop (elements if it has curves) and maybe lightroom.

1. Duplicate background layer, set to overlay, reduce opacity to around 80%.
2. New layer from visible.
3. Open Curves
4. Create an "S" with both R and G curves by dragging a lower-left (not the lowest left point) portion of the line to the right and an upper-right portion to the left. Play with them some for desired effect.
5. On B curve, slide left-most point vertically up and right most vertically down... to desired effect.
(note, I think that's what I did with the curves in that photo)
6. New layer from visible.
7. Add gaussian blur filter (because there will be a little noise from the curves) to desired effect.
8. New layer from visible.
9. Unsharp mask to desired effect.
10. New transparent layer.
11. Select whole image (with new transparent layer selected)
12. Reduce selection by 100-150 pixles (play with this some for desired result)
13. Feather selection by 300 pixles or so.
14. Invert selection.
15. Add a radial gradiant from white to black, starting from center of image (it should only be applied to edges selected from steps 11-14).
16. Set layer to overlay. If edges aren't dark enough duplicate the layer, set duplicate to overlay and play with opacity.
17. Go back and play with the settings to see if there is more or less of an effect you like better.
18. Save as jpeg.


Here is another result of a similar process (I only discovered it last week). It's from the Seattle underground as well. In this one, I took the luminance curve and slid the right point slightly to the left (still along the top of the graph). This made it so the blown-out portion bleeds more to white, insted of clipping.

Gringriff

I really enjoyed these. Never been to Seattle but it is always nice to see a little bit of the rest of the world. Thanks for sharing your photos.

Andy

frigidlight

Thanks for the explanation on that...quite the process. I've been trying to branch out more into curves and that kind of thing so maybe I'll give this a shot. Love the expression on the dog's face, too.

Sachis2112

I'm glad you got to take the underground tour. I always try to get my visitors to go on the tour. The history lesson is worth the $$ alone!

It's nice to see someone else turn the brass pig to B&W. I just sort of see him that way.

Also, sad to say, the Lusty Lady will be closing some time soon. It has been tradition to take a picture of their sign on every trip.

Paintguy

Wow.. nice shots. I have lived here all my life and never taken the underground tour. Peeked in through the sidewalk though.

Too bad you did not get a nice sunset in the San Juans.

silversx80

Thanks again!

I couldn't see the brass pig in anything other than B&W . Too bad about the Lusty Lady. It doesn't seem like my kind of establishment, but the sign entertained me.

Paintguy: as Sachi mentioned, the history lesson alone is worth the money. It was a lot of fun.

I don't think I have any sunsets at all from San Juan. It's a rare occation for me to photograph one anyway. Not that it mattered, because the sun didn't really want to peek out from the overcast around setting time .