A. Louis Photography: 2014

Saturday, December 13, 2014

"Waves of Wrath"

Waves driven by gale-force winds relentlessly pummel the lighthouses in Saint Joseph, Michigan in late October.

Click on image for purchasing information

Sunday, July 27, 2014

A. Louis Photography

This is a collection of this year's fireworks displays from South Haven and Bangor, MI.

I have 8"x 10" and 16"x 20" prints available for purchase at special pricing by clicking here.

Light Up The Lake 2014

South Haven, MI

Bangor Fireworks 2014

All these images are available for sale at special pricing by clicking here.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Practice Makes Perfect-- The Art of Post Processing

I call it the "art" of post processing, as it is definitely not a science.

I have read several books, watched countless hours

of tutorials of Youtube on how to process

my camera's RAW files to create the best images possible and just when I think I have it

all figured out, I learn something new that changes everything.

For me, trial and error seems to be the best teacher. I have learned many things in the last

couple of years and believe me,

it's because I have made countless mistakes taking and processing my digital images.

Case in point:

I was quite happy with the end result of this panoramic image taken this past weekend. Happy enough to post it on my Facebook page. I have been practicing and refining

the proper techniques with my camera and tripod to be able to capture the several properly

exposed and aligned images needed to create a robust, stitched panoramic image.

My first attempt processing the 6 image stitched shot (click to enlarge)

I admit that I was not 100% happy with this image but I could not figure out

what bothered me about it. It wasn't until I decided to walk through all the processing

steps that I stumbled upon the one little detail that I had overlooked.

One small adjustment that I had not made.

Finding this one overlooked detail was all the encouragement I needed to start processing the

RAW file all over again. (Just a tip. If you take your photography seriously, you need to

be shooting in the RAW format---it allows so many freedoms in post processing

to save an image)

Same 6 image stitch after making needed adjustments to the white balance
(click to enlarge)

This is the reprocessed image. The only difference is the white balance between

the six original images. In my haste to take the six images

before the light started to dissipate, I neglected to lock down the white balance setting in my

camera, it was set to auto. That little difference in the exposure of the images made a huge

impact on the final result. The colors are now clean and the details in the shadows now sharp.

Just another lesson learned :)

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Looking back at 2013, it was a very interesting year.

I was able to photograph some pretty amazing things this

year while meeting some great people and making friends

along the way. I ventured into the arena of portrait and advertising and was met with success. I even produced a couple calendars

As awesome as 2013 was for me, 2014 is looking to be even better.

I will travelling more in the coming year. With hopes of

sharing new and exciting images from around the this great state of Michigan. But before embarking on a journey into the new year, I thought I would take a minute at look back at a baker's

dozen of my most popular images from 2013