Photographing Paris - Day 1
Our first (half) day in Paris is in the books! Our flight departed Washington, DC on time and we landed in Paris around 12 noon local time today. After we grabbed a cab, fought some traffic and got into the city, we got to our hotel and our room by 2pm. The room is nice but very small. Oh well… It’s not like we plan on spending a whole lot of time here anyway. It’s in a great location on Rue des Ecoles in the Latin Quarter, only a short walk from Notre Dame.
After we checked into our room, we decided to take an hour nap since neither of us slept very well on the airplane. We woke up around 4pm and decided that we just wanted to wander around the Latin Quarter to familiarize ourselves with the neighborhood before we went on too many grand adventures around the city.
It was incredible! The narrow streets with hundreds of shops, cafes, and bistros are fantastic! We made our way to the Seine where we eagerly crossed to see Notre Dame a little closer. The sky was somewhat cloudy today but it was perfect for taking photos.
After walking around the cathedral, we wandered back to the Latin Quarter for a bite to eat. We stopped at a little restaurant called Baladin (I believe) where I had lamb and my girlfriend had the rotisserie chicken. Afterwards, we wandered up to the Pantheon, which is only about 2 blocks from our hotel. After taking some photos, we found a nice little cafe from which we could see the top of the Eiffel Tower just as the sun was going down. Here, we enjoyed some coffee, hot chocolate, and shared a banana split. I could have sat there all day!
After our dessert and heavy dose of people-watching, we headed back to the hotel since both of us were still somewhat tired from the trip.
I can’t wait for what the next few days hold for us… The highlight of my day, thus far, has been speaking French throughout the city. I took French for about 8 years between high school and college but never had the opportunity to really use it. But, as I suspected, it’s all starting to come back to me. I’ve been speaking French almost exclusively in the restaurants and out on the street… I’m sure it isn’t perfect from a French perspective but I haven’t really had any misunderstandings yet.
Anyway, I wanted to share a few of the photos I took today… This is just a snapshot of the 500 shots I got. I did very little post-processing since I really don’t have the time or the horsepower on my laptop. That being said, enjoy some shots from our first day in Paris!!
The rest of the photos from Day 1 can be found here.
Enjoy Paris! Looks beautiful
Very nice. I really like the photos of Notre Dame with the clouds behind them. They really add drama to the photos.
These photographs looks very promising.
I’ll be eagerly waiting to see, what else you can find from Paris.
I’m going to have to stop following your blog and twitter this week, every time you post up something new I get all teary eyed and nostalgic. I miss Paris so very much! The sepia toned shot of the back of Notre Dame is my favorite from day 1…can’t wait to see more…even though they’re going to make me cry
Hey Shawn,
Great stuff here! Kim and I are going to Paris in a few weeks and it really gets me all the more excited to see some “real” shots of the city as opposed to snapshots.
Look forward to more!
Jason
Looks wonderful Shawn, have a great time!
Shawn
Nice photos. You said you would be doing very little PP, but what you did on the sepia shot was amazing! I loved the way the clouds turned out. Do you mind sharing what you did? I’ve not much expertise in PP work.
Thanks for all the comments!!
@Jeremy: I converted a few of them into High Dynamic Range photos… A quick Google search will turn up a ton of tutorials on creating HDR photos.
Thanks!
Shawn - these are just fantastic! Awesome processing on these!
Thanks Jen! Most of the week was somewhat cloudy so the HDR processing was a must!
Hey Shawn, Are you using a tripod and taking several exposures and then doing HDR? Or are you using a single exposure for the HDR?
Nice work!
Take care,
Crash
@Crash: About 90% of my HDRs are taken with three exposures and no tripod. I generally set the exposure bracketing to +/-2 and fire off three shots without moving the camera. Generally, the only HDRs for which I use a tripod are the HDRs at night.
Thanks!
It’s your day 1 and can’t wait to get hold of your day 2. love your hdr, mind if you can share a little bit. i always have a problem with the tone mapping part. by the way i use photomatix 3. thanks.
Thanks skonoz! I am also using Photomatix 3. I’d love to help you in any way I can. I’m not sure precisely what you need help with in the tonemapping, though. Lately, I’ve been turning down the Strength a bit to create more “realistic” HDR images. Then, after I get it as good as I can, I open it in Photoshop and do a few more adjustments. Is there something specific you had a question on?
thanks Shawn for the tip. I forgot the final tune in Photoshop. About tonemapping, seems that I can’t get to tune to get the image that I wanted it to look like. Not like you, you seem to know how to get the image that you want and you tune it right with Photomatix ans Photoshop.
Thanks skonoz! Ultimately, it’s all about trial and error. Also, keep in mind that some images simply don’t work as HDRs. I’ve taken countless HDRs that really turned out like crap. Live and learn, I guess. But, keep at it! I’m sure you’ll be successful!