Landscape Pictures
Continuing with the New Zealand pictures… We were heading from Oamaru towards the famous Moeraki Boulders when we came across a sign marked “Coastal Otago Scenic Route“. Taking a diversion from our intended route, we headed down this drive along Beach Road towards Kakanui. We were rewarded by stunning views of the Pacific Ocean.
If you have been following my dad’s photoblog, you would have come across his latest post on Russell lupins on our trip to New Zealand. These flowers were also in full bloom at scenic Lake Tekapo, which certainly lived up to its reputation as a photographer’s dream come true. I am surprised though that these beautiful flowers are notorious for its ravaging behaviour as a weed, with damaging effects on New Zealand’s natural environment.
Canon 40D technical report: One interesting feature that the 40D has over my old 20D is Live View mode, which allowed viewing of the viewfinder image over the LCD ‘live’ prior to clicking the shot, digi-camera style. This certainly came in handy for the above shot which was taken on a very low-mounted tripod, making it difficult to peer into the viewfinder unless I sat down on the ground (which Dad did!). The super-imposed grid on the Live View display also enabled me to easily align the horizon properly in many of the landscape pictures I took, something which may not be easy through the viewfinder itself.
The road from Queentown to Glenorchy in New Zealand has been described as “one of the most scenic drives you’ll ever experience”. The road runs along the edge of Lake Wakatipu, the third largest lake in New Zealand. The drive itself takes about 45 minutes although I must say that we took longer than that with all the stops for photography we made! 😛 The spectacular and surreal scenery we caught was certainly well worth the time spent!
Canon 40D technical report: One of the interesting features on the 40D that I like is the Highlight Tone Priority setting, which is supposed to expand the dynamic range for highlights, ideal especially for the scene above where exposure is critical to ensure that details are preserved in the bright clouds. I find that I get less blown highlights with this mode turned on although I have read that this is at the expense of more noise in the shadow areas. Definitely a good feature to have for landscape pictures!