About the Image(s)

Taken with my Canon 1DX - Canon 100-400mm @140mm - ISO 500 - f8 - 1/1600th second Tv

I have two presentations listed on Camera Club Hub, “African Photo Safaris - Everything you need to know before you go” and “33 Hacks to Improve your scores in Photo Club Competitions” that I’ve presented on Zoom for a number of PSA member photo clubs. In my “Hacks” presentation I used Ansel Adams’ famous quote, “You don't take a photograph, you make it,” for hack #15 and decided to illustrate this for January. I shot this image from the deck of a beach house my wife and I rented on St George Island, Florida ??“ the second I saw the flag waving, the people on the beach, the sun and the clouds I KNEW there was a photograph in there somewhere. So, I purposely shot wide not being sure of just how I was going to compose in post, I exposed for the sky, focused on the flag, and shot at 1/1600 Tv to ensure a tack sharp waving flag and frozen people, and with a bit of work in Lightroom and Photoshop got what I think is a pretty good shot that I titled, “Good Morning America!”

If you open up the shadows in the pre-post image, you’ll see that the flag pole is actually attached to the roof of the building next to ours that I eliminated in post.