Today I wanted to share a couple of photos from Piazza Plebiscito in Naples, Italy.  Just a few minutes walk from the Salone Margherita, Piazza Plebiscito is a popular tourist destination and a wonderful place to spend some time when you are strolling through this unique city.  The Piazza is also used for many events, concerts, and celebrations.  I was lucky enough to see Elton John perform here a couple of years ago with thousands of other screaming, rowdy Italians. 

Initially, there was an Italian Army jeep sitting smack dab in the middle of this frame.  Some of the nicest people I have come across, they were happy to move their vehicle so I could set up and take a few shots.  The top photo is a generous panoramic crop of a regular sized image, but due to the D800′s immense 36.3 megapixel count, I was able to maintain a tremendous amount of quality and detail.  This small view area here does not do the photos justice, so I recommend you click on each to check out the detail yourself.  Don’t fret if it takes a minute or two to load, the files are around 10 and 20 mb files.    Enjoy!

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Have a great weekend!!

Today I wanted to try sharing the High Resolution JPEGs from last night’s photo shoot in Monte di Procida.  A friend and I met up to catch a wonderful sunset, the perfect opportunity to get more acquainted with my new Nikon D800.  I have shot at this location a few other times, but wanted to try it with the new camera. 

If you are interested in seeing what the 100% JPEG images look like, click the photo and it will open up large.  Scroll around the shot and see how much detail this camera can actually capture.  I think they measure around 7300 pixels on the long edge (big enough to see every blemish, spec of dust, and other debris - of which I actually just noticed in a couple of spots!!)…  These files can provide for some amazing large prints to decorate you house!  Anyways, enjoy, and feel free to share!

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As a side note, for the regular visitors who have blogs out there, I have been terrible about making the rounds and checking out your recent work, but I have been swamped lately.  I am looking forward to catching up this weekend!!  Thanks for all the visits and comments, I really appreciate them!

I wanted to share my first photo from the camera with you guys today.  Honestly, on the blog this looks just like some of my D7000 shots, but it really shines when you look at an 100% crop or view the full quality JPEG (for my blog, I usually scale everything down to 150dpi and 1500 pixels on the long edge).  I am still getting the hang of the D800′s sheer awesomeness (new “pro” functions, buttons in different places, capabilities, etc) and I will need to get a little more methodical with my technique (36.3mp does not leave much room for error), but I see tremendous promise from this little piece of machinery.  This is the sunset from an overlook in Monte di Procida, just minutes from my house in Bacoli, Italy.  Enjoy!    

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All of the pictures below were taken with my D7000 and 50mm f/1.4 lens. 

On a side note, shooting the D7000 at ISOs around 1600-2000 got me so excited about the D800 - If I can get these (relatively) clear, sharp, and low-noise shots with the D7000 at ISOs this high, I can only begin to imagine the possibilities once I have my shiny new D800 with me! Any day now…

All of the black and white photos were processed with Nik’s Silver Efex Pro.  Save 15% off your purchase when you order here!

**UPDATE** Shiny, new Nikon D800 is sitting on my desk right now.  I keep shooting it shy looks like it was one of my high school crushes.  Only a couple hours until I get to test it out in the field!!

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In celebration of this wonderful warm weather, I am having a 15% off sale for the month of May on all Prints (as good a reason as any, right?)!. Head on over to http://adamallegro.smugmug.com and pick something up for yourself or a loved one.  Mother’s Day is only a week away and a beautiful photo is the perfect gift!  Use the coupon code “SPRING” at checkout!  Thanks for the support!

Today we head back to Torino, Italy for a glimpse inside the Gran Madre di Dio (Great Mother of God) church.  The internal architecture of this place is just awesome, reminding me of the Pantheon in Rome.  Large dome structures, to me anyways, are very difficult to shoot unless you have an ultra-wide fisheye or can stitch together a crazy-big Pano.  The church is an iconic structure of Torino, sitting just across the River Po, and is one of the coolest places to visit in the city. 

When I arrived inside the church, Mass was in process, and I was a bit apprehensive about shooting images.  Seeing the Preacher with an almost divine light on him quickly dispelled my reservations.  I clicked the camera in to silent mode and went to work.  Of all the images I took, this was the neatest perspective.  Some minor clean up here and there, as well as taking down some of the saturation, and the photo was complete.  What do you think???

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Digging back in to the archives once again, I found a gem that just needed a little bit of dedicated polishing.  Originally, I processed this and the two other matching bracketed images as a HDR photo, but the result was less than appealing.  Quickly forgetting about the photos and moving on, they fell out of the “important shots” category and in to photo archive purgatory.  As I was searching for another photo to re-format and send to a client, I stumbled across this one.  The third and overexposed photo of the three brackets, this shot had the best wave movement, but the sky really needed some love.  With some graduated filters in Lightroom, saturation bump, and contrast increase, it was just about perfect. 

The location of this nice little seascape is the rocky Miseno Beach near my house.  I took this in the early dawn hours one day in January, where the temperature was low and my patience even lower.  These vivid colors are usually present about 20-30 minutes before sunrise and after sunset.  If you take the time to actually get out of bed early enough for sunrise or stick around late enough for sunset, it is worth it to invest an extra half hour to ensure you get the absolute the best colors and light. 

To get wave movement like this you would need a tripod (or very steady arm) and a relatively “long” exposure.  I put that in quotes because the long exposure could be half a second or more, just enough to get a little movement in the water but not to make it look like a sea of fog.  Make sense?  You can read a tutorial about how to take long exposure photos here!  Enjoy, and please leave your comments below!

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