O'Neal Urban

Kingdom Come

Byron O'Neal — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 22:14:26 +0000

Well, it’s kind of heavenly don’t you think? The shapes in the middle right bring to mind a figure doing something super saiyan or the like but naming an image after Dragon Ball Z seemed a bit childish. It’s still fun to travel through these and see what you see though.

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Dark Plume

Byron O'Neal — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 15:19:14 +0000

Clouds are so fun. It’s been great playing around with this. We all see different things and our subconscious tends to run wild. For me, a dark malevolent presence was rising from the cloud form complete with a horn no less. I’m not sure exactly what that might say about me, perhaps I read too much sci-fi/fantasy stuff before bed. Anyway, I leave you to your own imaginings. Thanks for looking.

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In The Clouds

Byron O'Neal — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 21:10:04 +0000

Whew, it’s been awhile since I was able to post anything. Today’s shot begins my delving into images of clouds taken on our five state traveling journey. This image was taken somewhere over Georgia. A little advice if you want to shoot from inside an airplane cabin, don’t try using a polarizer. This should have been obvious to me, but you live and learn sometimes by making mistakes.

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Shadowed Entrance

Byron O'Neal — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 19:09:36 +0000

No flashy skylights or rays of ghostly light today. I wanted to emphasize the sense of movement into the slot canyon. This is the wider entrance where the watercourse interacts with the sandstone. It has its own kind of unique beauty if it isn’t as flashy as images are from the inside. The little bush is a prop that the touring company leaves there. It makes a nice little transitionary focal point as you move through the image.

Equipment
Canon 5d Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Benro tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead, Heliopan polarizer

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Peephole

Byron O'Neal — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:15:03 +0000

I wish I could put my finger on why images of slot canyons are so well received. This shot is from Canyon X which resides on the upper tributary of what becomes the more famous Antelope Canyon. I don’t have much anecdotal or cool to say about it except that slot canyons are hot and sandy, dugh. They are also surprisingly variable. One would think that images from the same places all look the same but it depends greatly on the angle of the sun at that time of year. Those sought after ghostly rays don’t happen unless the sun is at the right angle which happens significantly more during May through August and at specific times during the day. This would seem obvious enough but most visitors to Antelope Canyon aren’t aware of it as most now are not professional photographers.

This image is a composite of four bracketed shots. I used the exposure fusion method to combine them and then did some selective tone mapping of different layers in Photoshop. Very little was added in terms of saturation. I think many of the shots you will see that look flat are just the camera trying to compensate for such an extreme contrast range. Yah for digital as you can’t do this with film.

Equipment
Canon 5d Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Benro tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead, Heliopan polarizer

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Johano-ai

Byron O'Neal — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 17:21:42 +0000

Tsohanoaii or Johano-ai is the sun god of the Dine(Navajo) people of the American Southwest who travels across the sky each day. As the story goes Estanatlehi (his female counterpart) and Johano-ai had two sons, the Twin Spears or Little War Gods who’s purpose was to eliminate the chaos of the then new world which took the form of various monsters.

This is the first piece in a chronological series that depicts the creation myths of the Dine people using abstract digital compositions adapted from images of slot canyons I shot for source material. All the original material was gathered on Navajo Nation land.

From a Navajo story:

The Sun-God, Johano-ai, starts each morning from his home in the east and rides across the skies to his home in the west. He carries with him his shining gold disk, the sun. He has five horses–a horse of turquoise, one of white shell, one of pearly shell, one of red shell, and one of coal.

The skies are blue and the weather is fair, the Sun-God rides his horse of turquoise, or the one of white shell, or the one of pearly shell. But when the heavens are dark with storm, he mounts the red horse or the horse of coal.

Beneath the hoofs of the horses are spread precious hides of all kinds and also beautiful blankets, carefully woven and richly decorated. In the days gone by, the Dine (Navajo) wove rich blankets, said to have been found first in the home of the Sun-God. He lets his horses graze on flower blossoms, and drink from mingled waters. These are holy waters of all kinds–spring water, snow water, hail water, water from the four corners of the world. The Dine (Navajo) use such waters in their ceremonies.

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Stud Horse Point

Byron O'Neal — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 15:20:21 +0000

If you are looking for directions to Stud Horse Point, good luck. We were following cryptic directions from some German cat’s blog roughly translated into English. I can tell you that it resides behind the single massive rock formation that sits on the plain across from Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, and you can see Wahweap Bay from the top of the point. We ended up paralleling the telephone lines before we found it. GPS can give you the location but there are tons of little roads leading off every direction that are unmarked and really confusing. We found it after about an hour and a half of looking. Don’t even try it in a vehicle with low clearance and having a four wheel drive definitely helps. We didn’t but then again we were used to driving in the mountains of Colorado. You will end up skirting the top of the ridge passing by on the southern side before traveling between the telephone poles and the ridge line. Stop when you see the tops of the larger hoodoos as the road turns sharply to the left. It’s an amazing location but be prepared to get dirty and really mind your footing. The sandstone can be relatively loose and it’s too easy to slide. If you are feeling adventurous, try getting down below the hoodoos and shooting up. I love the results which I’ll put into another post on this location. Bring a snack and lots of water, a hat isn’t a bad idea either.

I wanted to highlight the greater landscape below the hoodoos with this shot to add a larger sense of scale to the image. It feels isolated without that grounding element which is fine but not where I wanted to go with it. Perhaps a better sky might have made me change my mind.

Equipment
Canon 5d Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Benro tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead, Heliopan polarizer

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Lens Flare at the Rimrock Hoodoos

Byron O'Neal — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 20:20:34 +0000

This shot was a little bit tricky. After you get to the Rimrock Hoodoos famous Spire, you will be looking for other stuff to shoot. This is right behind it. I bracketed and took three shots exposing for different areas and combined them into one using exposure fusion.

Equipment
Canon 5d Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Benro tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead, Heliopan polarizer

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Little Long Pond

Byron O'Neal — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 17:50:30 +0000

Little Long Pond on Mount Desert Island sits along the popular Route 3 drive opposite Bracy Cove on the south side of the island. It’s a great magical place in the fall. The water is full of reeds making for interesting abstracts or the larger landscape shots are full of a diversity of colors. The walk along the east side of the pond is easy and the Rockefeller boathouse adds an extra architectural element to compositions. Deciduous trees lay closer to the water with conifers covering the landscape behind them providing another layer of complexity for wider shots. The water is also often calm helping with reflections.

Equipment
Canon 5d Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Benro tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead, Heliopan polarizer

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Peace Hill Ruins

Byron O'Neal — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:10:51 +0000

The Peace Hill Ruins jut out between Hawksnest Bay and Denis Bay within the boundaries of the Virgin Islands National Park in St. John. Formerly a windmill site, the short hike up the hill is very rewarding with panoramic views of azure water up and down the coastline. I think it is one of the nicest, overlooked sites in the Virgin Islands National Park as people tend to pass by moving from lounging at Hawksnest Bay and hurrying to take the familiar mandatory snapshot at the Trunk Bay overlook.

I set up within the ruins and composed the shot trying to feature some of the native flora and the expansive views while using the curve of the arcs to frame them. This image is a composite of three shots exposed for the different areas. I can’t see how you could do this without HDR.

Peace Hill is a tranquil place and unlike many of the other ruin sites on the island stays relatively cool as it sits at the end of a peninsula. There are opportunities for everything from panoramics to macros so bring your backpack. Anyone in reasonable physical condition can hike the short trail. Bring decent shoes. The trails of St. John can be rough if you are footing it in sandals.

Seestjohn.com is a good resource for hiking information on St. John.

My Equipment Bag for this shot
Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, Heliopan Polarizer, Benro Tripod, Cable Release, ScanDisk Extreme IV 8GB CF, Really Right Stuff ballhead

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