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Cellpic Sunday – Lady Liberty

Lady Liberty from our cruise ship.

New York City.

Our departure on our autumn cruise to Canada left from the cruise port on the west end of Manhattan. We’d never been to New York City before, so we really didn’t have any idea where many of the sites were located in the city. After our cruise, we spent a couple of days exploring and I’ll have some photos to share of that trip in a future post.

I knew the cruise port is located on the Hudson River, but I really didn’t know where the Statue of Liberty was located in relation to the port. As we departed, from our balcony, we watched as New Jersey went by, a little disappointed that we weren’t on the other side of the ship. That is, we were disappointed until I happened to look toward the front of the ship, and in the distance, I could see her, torch held high. It was then I knew that we would be passing by Lady Liberty.

I captured many images with both my cell phone and my Sony camera in hopes of finding the best ones to share. As it turned out, at the conclusion of our cruise, we did a harbor cruise and that boat brought us a lot closer to Liberty Island and Lady Liberty than the Carnival Magic did.

About the photo: Though I anticipate better images of Lady Liberty, I wanted to share one of the first images I captured of probably our most well-known symbol of freedom in this Cellpic Sunday post. Indeed, from our balcony, the use of my S20U zoom function shows off the flaws in digital zoom. I promise better images, but I share this one because it was the first time I’d seen Lady Liberty.

The lighting wasn’t the best due to our late afternoon departure, so the statue is mostly in shadow. Having just downloaded the latest version of Lightroom, I used subject masking and Lightroom did a great job of selecting the island as the main subject. I was able to raise the exposure of the island by about 3/4 of a stop. Any more than that, and the statue took on an eerie glow. Lifting the shadows brought out more detail at the base of the statue. I can see getting used to the powerful masking capabilities now added to Lightroom. After the masking and exposure tweaks, I sent the image off to Luminar Neo to take advantage of that program’s artificial intelligence to enhance the image further. Click on the image above to see it in 2K HD on my Flickr site.

I encourage fellow bloggers to create their own Cellpic Sunday posts. I never have a specific topic for this feature, and the only rules are that the photo must be captured with a cell phone, iPad, or another mobile device… If you have an image from a drone or even a dashcam, that’s acceptable as well. The second rule is to link your challenge response to this post or leave a comment here with a link to your post in the comment. Oh, and, you don’t have to post it on a Sunday.

John Steiner

54 comments

  2. […] If I want sharp details, I should use a DSLR. A phone is what I would use if I wanted a quick snapshot which I would look at only on a little screen which fits in my palm. Conversely, if you want to see the defects in the phone photo, look at these examples on a big screen, not a phone. […]

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  15. Hi John, that had to be exciting to see your first view of the Lady. Do I have to do anything to get the latest version other than update? Do you use Lightroom or Lightroom Classic? What’s the difference. 🙂

    Reply

    • As long as you are a monthly subscriber, you need only download and install the latest update. I am guilty of using the term Lightroom but what I am using is Lightroom Classic. What is now called Lightroom is a smaller app that works on mobile devices. I am not at all familiar with that version having learned on what is now Lightroom Classic.

      Reply

  22. Thanks for sharing your first view of Lady Liberty. It may not be perfect but still a thrill to see in person. I have not had that opportunity but am happy you got to see her in person.

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