Day 19: The Difference is Practically Night and Night

(Nikon D60, 35mm DX, f/1.8, 1/20, ISO 800)

Despite ending class quite early today the inevitable happened.  I left the house in the dark, and came back to it in a similar form of lighting.  Alas, it was not all bad, since I had completed the two chapters I had set out to read in a realitively timely manner.  Not to mention I was not incredibly groggy since I had tried this highly experimental procedure commonly known as going to bed early.  Yes, for the first time in as long as I can remember I willingly went to bed before 12:00, thus allowing me to be fully re-energized after a quick powernap in my favourite study spot.

(Nikon D60, 35mm DX, f/1.8, 1/30, ISO 800)

Of course, on my way home I wasn't really thinking about what was for dinner or what I was going to do for the rest of the night.   I was in semi-panic mode because as usual the day was running down and I had not taken any pictures.  Crap.

Lucky for me, it allegedly snowed a bit while I was indoors all day; I could not confirm this because there was no window in the room where I was studying for the seven hours prior to my emerging from the subway (Finch) station.  While there wasn't much from when I got on the bus, it seemed to have accumulated by the time I got back to Markham.  Whoopie! 

(Nikon D60, 35mm DX, f/1.8, 1/15, ISO 800)

Much to my delight, it was wet variety.  Apparently there was a bit of a wind factor, because on my way home I started noticing one side of the trunk covered with snow.  As I continued down the street I was eagerly looking for the tree that had the right amount of snow without an annoying street light behind it.  Thankfully I found a few when I had gotten back to my street.  Like a pack of university students descending on any sort of free giveaway, I whipped out the camera.

(Nikon D60, 35mm DX, f/1.8, 1/30, ISO 800)

I'm pretty sure there were a few people either in their cars or houses wondering "who or what the hell is this kid taking a picture of?"  Alas, I made a few quick snaps, just slapped on Manual, fired a few bursts with the confidence that at least one of the three or four would be sharp.  Ironically, it was usually the first one, when there wasn't as much downward force from my finger depressing the shutter release.  There's probably going to be some quality lost because of the high ISO - so sue me; it ain't a fancy "see-in-the-dark" D3s.

 (Nikon D60, 35mm DX, f/1.8, 1/30, ISO 800)

Post-processing saved my ass.  In a bit of a setting-your-camera rush I (as per my normal behaviour) omitted setting white balance and left it on AWB (my friend Elijah never stops chewing me out on this; Zach Arias says I should slap myself for having a 'fix it later' mentality).  Still, I don't really like the presets; I'd rather have a direct custom Kelvin setting.  The original ones had some pretty nasty purply-reddish poop-smear all over them, so after applying my usual presets (all one of them, plus a little noise reduction) in Lightroom I dropped the colour temperature all the way to the bottom (to 2000 K).  Damn was I blown away.  There was a really nice coolness to it that just screamed 'awesome' to me.  So I stuck with it.  :)

All the photos were about five minutes apart, and the processing took about the same amount.  Not bad for ten minutes work and leaving/walking home in the dark on the same day.  Just goes to show that you really need to keep your eyes open.

Lastly, almost through the grind for the week.  One more 9 AM start tomorrow with a craptacular six hours in the same room.

Good thing I packed lunch.