Month: October 2018

Tuesday (30-October-2018) — New Jersey

Autumn Night Sky Over New Jersey.

This was the night with a clear sky for a long time. I set up two cameras to record the nighttime sky  for composite Star Trail images. The first a Nikon D810a camera with 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens looking west. I like this camera for nighttime sky photography because it can be set to take images longer than 30 seconds (up to 900 seconds). The second a Nikon D850 camera with a 8-15 mm fisheye lens looking up from my patio. I forgot to reset the ISO for the Nikon D850 camera from 100 to 800. When I looked at the images, they were all black — but since the raw  for this camera have an amazing dynamic range, I was able to increase the brightness by 4 stops during post-processing and get decent images…

Star trails 20:05-03:20. Composite of images taken with a Nikon D810a camera and 19 mm PC-E lens (ISO 200, 19 mm, f/5.6, 120 sec) (David J Mathre)
Star (and jet) trails 20:05-03:20. Composite of images taken with a Nikon D810a camera and 19 mm PC-E lens (ISO 200, 19 mm, f/5.6, 120 sec) (David J Mathre)


Star Trails 19:56-01:59. Composite of images taken with a Nikon D850 camera and 8-15 mm fisheye (ISO 100, 15 mm, f/5.6, 30 sec) (David J Mathre)
Star Trails 19:56-01:59. Composite of images taken with a Nikon D850 camera and 8-15 mm fisheye (ISO 100, 15 mm, f/5.6, 30 sec) (David J Mathre)


Individual images from the slideshow can be viewed here.

Sunday (28-October-2018) — New Jersey

Backyard Autumn Nature in New Jersey.

It rained on Saturday, total accumulation just under an inch (23 mm). When I woke up Sunday, the clouds were beginning to clear, so I put the Garmin VIRB-360 camera out to see if I could catch some dawn cloud colors. I ended up leaving the camera out for 12 hours, connected to an external USB battery. I’m starting to play around with Adobe Premiere Pro for processing videos. The eight-bit range of colors and light recorded in the jpg images does limit the amount of processing going from the dark predawn to some sunlight. In the end, I compressed 12 hours to 1 minute time-lapsed video displayed both as a 360 degree panorama, and side by side little-planet and tunnel views. Bottom line, I can do better with the dawn cloud colors with raw images, but don’t have the time to individually process nearly 9000 images. A lot more to learn with Premiere Pro (and maybe After Effects).

 

Thursday (25-October-2018) — New Jersey

Backyard Autumn Nature in New Jersey.

I woke up at 05:30. It was cold out, right around freezing and the sky clear with no clouds. I set up the Garmin VIRB-360 camera to record dawn and sunrise as practice for a day that I may get some colorful clouds. I used the camera again as I picked the remaining hot peppers (still green). The plants are pretty much dead after several nights when the temperatures dipped below freezing. I haven’t decided if I will use the remaining peppers for a salsa or will just dry them. Later in the afternoon I watched the ever busy squirrels hiding their acorns. This year the deer are also competing for acorns.

Time-Lapse Video: Tunnel View — Dawn and Sunrise. Garmin VIRB-360 Camera.

Time-Lapse Video: Little Planet View — Picking Green Hot Peppers. Garmin VIRB-360 Camera.


Individual images in the slideshow can be viewed here.

Wednesday (24-October-2018) — New Jersey

Home Cooking. Hearty Whole Grain Rye Bread.

Back from Portugal, and there is no bread in the house. It’s time to make another loaf of hearty whole grain rye bread.

Hearty Whole Grain Rye Bread Recipe: Rye Flour (1 cup); Sprouted Wheat Flour (3/4 cup); Bread Flour (1/4 cup); Whole Wheat Flour (1 cup) Flax Seed (1/4 cup); Chia Seed (1 tbs); Dill Seed (1 tbs); Anise Seed (1 tbs); Caraway Seed (1 tbs); Fennel Seed (1 tbs); dry milk (1/4 cup); cocoa (1 tbs); instant coffee (1 tbs); salt (1 tsp); egg (1 large); flax oil (1 tbs); walnut oil (1 tbs) water (1 1/3 cup); Maple syrup (1/3 cup). Above ingredients added to Panasonic Bread Bakery. Yeast (2 tsp) added to yeast hopper and the unit set for Whole Wheat Bread (Rapid) and started. Three hours later, I removed the loaf of bread. It rose right to the top of the pan — and the house smelled of rye bread. I only let it cool a few minutes before slicing a piece.

I set up a Garmin VIRB-360 camera to record the bread making process for a time-lapse video. Two versions, a little planet and an inverse little planet/tunnel view were combined into one video.

Bread Making – Garmin VIRB-360 camera – Little Planet and Tunnel View (720p 24p)

Tuesday (23-October-2018) — New Jersey

Backyard Autumn Nature in New Jersey.

I woke up early after returning from a week of photography in Lisbon, Portugal. Last night there was an intense orange glow at sunset, and I was hoping for the same at sunrise. I set up a Nikon D850 camera and 8-15 mm fisheye lens to capture images for a dawn sky time-lapse video. Unfortunately, the light was not as extreme. After it warmed up a bit, I recorded mowing the lawn and harvesting the remaining vegetables from the patio garden with a Garmin VIRB-360 camera. Even though the temperatures went below freezing at least once last week while I was in Portugal, there were orange bell  peppers, red-hot peppers, green tomatoes, onions, carrots, and Swiss chard in the garden. All that remain are some hot peppers that are still green. I used much of what I harvested along with some Garbanzo beans, roasted tomatoes, and olives to make a hearty vegetable stew in an Instant Pot.

Dawn clouds over New Jersey. Time-lapse video.  Nikon D850 camera and 8-15 mm fisheye lens.

Mowing the lawn. Little planet time-lapse video taken with a Garmin VIRB-360 camera.

Patio garden autumn harvest. Tunnel view time-lapse video taken with a Garmin VIRB-360 camera.

Preparation of an autumn harvest vegetable stew.  360 Degree time-lapse video taken with a Garmin VIRB-360 camera.