Vikings Message Board.Com

Kansas Viking wrote:
I very much enjoyed the photos you have Jay. Especially the ones of Cape Town. Those were just fantastic. I also see you carry a variety of cameras just as I do. They all did a great job for you.

Be safe on your trip and have a good time. I will be looking forward to those Mongolia photos.

Thanks, Mike. I like the Cape Town photos, too. The city is just gorgeous.

As for the cameras, I tend to carry my nikon with me when I go on big trips, but I bring my small digital on all of my trips because it is much easier to tote around. That little camera can take some very sharp pictures! It lacks the zoom of a larger camera, but for the price, I love it!

Unfortunately, since I discovered a love of photography, I now have 3 hobbies that I cannot afford -- watches and stereo equipment being the others. Oh to have money.....

Thankfully football is still reasonably cheap for those of us who are not in an area where season tickets are available.

Cheers,

Jay

http://picasaweb.google.com/contact.jay.allen

Canadian Viking wrote:Anyhoo, I am back from Mongolia and as promised, have posted sone photos. I haven't done much processing on them, so they are pretty raw (and some fairly dark), but feel free to have a look. I think that some of the pictures from the lake area will remind you of home... It sure reminded me of parts of Canada.

http://picasaweb.google.com/contact.jay.allen

Cheers,

Jay

Great pictures Jay. I assume you had a circular polarizer for some of those landscape shots. I just love what it does for the colors and the sky. Looks like you had a great time.

Canadian Viking wrote:Anyhoo, I am back from Mongolia and as promised, have posted sone photos. I haven't done much processing on them, so they are pretty raw (and some fairly dark), but feel free to have a look. I think that some of the pictures from the lake area will remind you of home... It sure reminded me of parts of Canada.

http://picasaweb.google.com/contact.jay.allen

Cheers,

Jay

SWWEET pics. Damn, I'm jealous (except for the elephant eating outside the tent).

I really like the picture of Vienna you took.

Kansas Viking wrote: Great pictures Jay. I assume you had a circular polarizer for some of those landscape shots. I just love what it does for the colors and the sky. Looks like you had a great time.

Thanks, Mike. The only filter that i had was a Hoya UV filter. The sky was just that blue. In Mongolia, the people speak of the blue skies and whispy clouds as part of themselves. Because it is so dry and so wide open, the sky really is amazing there. I just wish that I actually knew what to do to capture it properly!

I think that the nikon has a tendency to brighten blues, though, so that might have helped to pump up the colour. I actually found it very difficult to get any shots that weren't basically just blue because there wasn't much in the way of green in the southern part where I took most of my photos.

Thanks also to Jackal and PurpleMustReign for the complements.

BTW, the elephant outside my tent was probably the scariest thing that I'd ever experienced... All that I could think was please don't get tangled in the ropes.... They won't step on a tent, but if they get tangled in it, they will drag it and thrash it around, apparently.... I lost much sleep that night.

Canadian Viking wrote:Thanks, Mike. The only filter that i had was a Hoya UV filter. The sky was just that blue. In Mongolia, the people speak of the blue skies and whispy clouds as part of themselves. Because it is so dry and so wide open, the sky really is amazing there. I just wish that I actually knew what to do to capture it properly!

Looks like you did a pretty good job of capturing it IMO. I would love to see the skies there. You have got to shoot with a Polarizer her in Kansas to get that kind of blue out of the sky. Must have really been something to see over there.

It was gorgeous. The sense of space and isolation was overpowering. One really feels alone out there, even at a tourist camp. Driving is VERY slow and there are so few towns, so it can be days between sightings of people unless one actively seeks them out. At one point, we drove for 5 days (about 5 hrs per day was all that we could manage in the van because of the beating that we were taking) from the capital city to the lake -- the return flight was 45 minutes long!

I find the blue overpowering in some of the shots, but on the bright days, even with sunglasses on, there was a blue haze on the mountains and anything in the distance. I don't know if it was the altitude or the clear sky, but it was pretty impressive.

Jay