Home»scenery and travels»portland at dawn

Pictures taken around dawn in downtown Portland Oregon, overlooking the Willamette River, on a rare dry and somewhat sunny morning in August. The occasion was a get-together with other Nikon shooters who met on an online forum at dpreview.com, organised by Amy Sakurai and Roman Johnston.

This is my first dawn shoot of a city landscape. I started with shots that could be considered cliche, and then I started playing with the lighting and colour balance to provoke more distinct images. Some attempts were more successful than others...

I started out with a Sigma 10-20mm wide angle lens, but quickly switched to a Nikon 18-200 "consumer" lens. This move was a bit boorish of me, but the convenience of having a broad focal length range at the ready was too tempting. This may not be professional class, but it helped me to experiment and learn.

Starting with image titled DSC-9233, the images are from a second trip to the same spot, again at dawn. The first trip left me with an appetite for more, there are SO many thought-provoking vantage points in this area, it's too much to resist. On the second trip, I put aside the 18-200 lens and went for the sharpest lenses I have. Where the images are blurry or soft, it isn't the equipment that's at fault... it's the photographer.

Hope you enjoy these. I'm learning...