Seattle Space Needle Ferry Window Reflection

Those that follow my Instagram feed know that I take the ferry a lot. For my other business which is stand up paddling instruction, I travel to Olympic Peninsula in Washington State regularly to teach SUP surfing and coastal paddling.  

Living in Seattle means I'll be taking the Kingston, Bainbridge or Bremerton ferries from Seattle to access the Olympic Peninsula. For me, the ferries are super photogenic as each are different. Some are older with a retro feel while others are more modern. And every time the weather is different, or I'm in a different head space thus it's never the same. Being that my drive to the coast with the ferry is 3hrs (more in summer with traffic), I always get out and walk around to stretch my legs. 

Some of the ferries have square exterior windows, others have the classic round port holes. In the pic below, I was on a more modern boat on either the Seattle to Bainbridge or Bremerton run. The window leads to the crew quarters room, so it's always a little funny shooting in the window, sometimes folks surprise me and peek out. 

Shooting reflections on the ferry is challenging as the background is always moving and the light and shadows changing as the boat moves along. And there's also camera shake and high winds. A gyro is required for videos, but good sound is out of the question.  

This image meant pre-planning the shot knowing the skyline could reflect in the window when the boat turned west. In between walking ferry goers, I was able to get a few shots off.  The light was blue-ish, so I made the blue more rich as going amber/warm didn't look good in post.  

I had to zoom in on my phone quite a bit to get the right framing thus cropping out unwanted background items. Then crop further in post to remove the reflected deck railing.  The final here is an Instagram image (see also at @robcaseyphoto).

On the return trip, I got an older ferry with a round porthole. I tried to line up the sunset and ferry's boat wake but I couldn't get the deck railing out of the window which took up nearly half the frame. And the light was so direct, I couldn't get myself out of the reflection as well.  Sometimes a selfie like that works but not in that case. 

Final shot / crop

Orignal shot

Photo Tips - Always Look Behind You

A photo tip I learned from a Jay Maisel workshop years ago is to not overly focus on what's in front of you, but also take time to look at what's behind you as well.

In the case of these two images, I was originally drawn to shooting the dark entry-way to this WW2 era harbor defense battery in Washington State.  I've shot the structure many times and often challenge myself to find new perspectives. On this day, after shooting the entryway, I walked inside the dark room using my iPhone flashlight, then turned around to look back out and shot a frame of the 'looking out' view which was equally interesting. 

For the future, I could light the interior with a flash, flashlight or try for a super long exposure to see what details could appear (thus blowing out the doorway in either direction). 

Looking in

Looking out

Window Reflection of Trees at Hurricane Ridge, Olympic NP

Here's an image I shot at at the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center at Olympic National Park yesterday. The center has windows on all sides that each reflect the park in different ways. I usually walk around and in the center to look for reflections to shoot.  

This one was a reflection from the front door (lot side).  I used a Canon 80-200mm lens to isolate the scene thus removing unwanted reflections, a door and window frame, etc.  

Then in Lightroom mobile while having a beer at the Next Door Gastropub in Port Angeles, removed most of the dirty window smudges. Then I exported the image to my phone, then uploaded to Instagram.  In IG, I bump up the brightness, contrast, structure, saturation, warmth, sharpness and do a touch of a vignette.  I also cropped it a touch to further clean it up a bit and help fill the IG frame better.  Then posted to IT, later adding geo tag and keywords to help folks find the image. 

Final Image

 Before

Interior Reflection Photos on the Fly - Take Advantage of any Location

Whenever I go to the doctor's office or have a downtown meeting in a skyscraper or other large building with great views, I keep my eyes open for potential photos (and camera in-hand).  Certainly more fun than looking out outdated magazines while you wait.  

I also keep in mind for photos the interior itself that I'm sitting in. For stock images, I'll look for non-cluttered medical devices on the wall or an uncluttered check-up bed/table thingy. For those, I'll remove logos prior to posting to my stock agencies.  Usually the agencies will determine if there needs to be an additional property release from the hospital or product.  

In the case of these two images, both are shot from my cardiologist's office in the PolyClinic in downtown Seattle while waiting for the doc. Luckily this waiting room is a corner window with a West and SW view over Seattle. Over the course of two years, I saw a large building go up and several contrasting weather days, from cloudy and rainy to bright sun.  

A challenge for shooting from any public (ish) space are window reflections from behind me. So I either press the camera (phone) lens up to the window to eliminate room reflections, or look for sections of the window with no interior reflection.  Recently I did see a device that can go around your lens to reduce distracting window reflections. But sometimes, interior lights or other reflections can add to the photo especially if I'm going for a fine arty perspective.  

In the bottom image, that's of the hospital lobby. I shot the clock on the wall for over a year in different light combinations and varying reflections.  This year, the clock disappeared. Then I shot the wall without the clock one day which led to a guy following me out of the building. He asked what I was doing. I showed him the photo and said it's for 'art'.  He left.  Not sure if he was on their legal team or?  I do give them a lot of business.  

Everything here shot in an iPhone 6s, processed in Lightroom. See more versions on my Instagram page @robcaseyphoto

SW View

SW View

SW View

View directly west

Lobby view

Easy Mobile Phone Camera Zoom - Add Binoculars to Extend your Distance

Can't pull in that far away object without getting weird pixelation on your mobile phone?  Here's an easy hack that can help out.

Bring along a pair or binoculars (or monocular) and align one lens to your mobile phone lens.  It can be tricky, but once you get the right alignment, you now have a 2-4x zoom without the extra pixelation.

You get a vignette around the image unless you crop that out in post.  A Lens Baby effect that also be achieved. 

I've found it best to not zoom the camera phone - keep it at normal, then align with the binocular.  If the binocular is on a tripod of a stable surface, it's easier than trying to hold both.

Here's some samples..

Behind the scenes of a Miniature Shoot

Some ask how I shoot my Miniature images.  Here's a quick peek into some of the props.  With this shot, there's a large dental mirror on the left reflecting light into the faces of the figures.

The house is a train hobby prop.  Behind is a blue piece of construction paper. 

Lights are three Pepper 100 watt hot lights on c-stands.  I use black foil and 1 to 2 stop scrims to shape the light as needed.

The figures are attached with putty to stay in place. I remove the blue putty in Photoshop. 

Camera for the final shot is a Canon 5d Mark 2, 100mm macro lens.

Final image