Paris is, of course, well known for its magnificent Notre Dame Cathedral, the sheer scale and majesty of which is biblically awe-inspiring. Photographing the Notre Dame, however, is a challenge. By break of day the building is surrounded by thousands of tourists streaming through its grand doors and climbing its towers, and the numbers do not waiver until nightfall. There is simply no opportunity to capture the building free from visitors. Because I wanted to do more than merely walk away with the usual tourist postcard photograph, I was left searching for alternatives.

In an effort to make a better photograph I decided I would get up before sunrise and try a long exposure from one of the bridges across the river Seine in the hope of capturing the Cathedral in a more peaceful and serene environment.  This viewpoint is one I had not seen before and one in which I could utilize the river to place the Cathedral in context. Although the Cathedral is partially obscured behind the trees I like the angle for the added mystery. I used a ten stop ND filter to obtain a 4 minute exposure to soften the sky and create a sense of movement in the clouds and water.As much as I enjoyed indulging myself in Parisian café culture it now feels good to be out in the countryside and away from the hustle and bustle of the city. This has been my first visit to France and it has been as picturesque and scenic as I was led to believe. With its manicured fields and gardens the French countryside is beautiful and its many small villages quaint and adorable.

Over the last few days I have spent some time in the Champagne region (where healthy portions of fine Champagne were sampled and keenly devoured), Reims and the small town of Ambois located in the Loire valley where I have visited a number of spectacularly opulent chateaus located nearby.

I was not aware that there is in fact a second Notre Dame cathedral located in Reims and was fortunate to stumble across it whilst driving though the town. The choice of how to photograph this gothic Cathedral struck me as I stood below its imposing form and leering gargoyles. I wanted to make this Cathedral appear to be both rooted to the earth and soaring toward the heavens in order to do justice to its gothic architecture and imposing stature. I accomplished this using Canon’s 17mm wide angle lens and pointing the camera up toward the towers to create an exaggerated perspective. This photograph was handheld since the use of tripods, even on the external grounds, is strongly discouraged. The key to making this work was a combination of the wide angle lens, camera angle and symmetry to create the desired effect. I was also fortunate to have some dramatic clouds and lighting which add to the atmosphere and enhance the Cathedral’s foreboding presence.This trip has been a wonderful opportunity to shoot with the new 1DX camera which is continuing to surpass my expectations. It has the best metering and autofocus of any camera I have used. Tomorrow I will be heading for Dijon where I look forward to more photography with this remarkable new camera and of course some more “boudoir the grape.”

Paris has been the first opportunity I have had to shoot with Canon’s new 1DX multi-media powerhouse camera. I had only limited opportunity to test the camera before I departed for Europe because the camera arrived only a couple of days before my flight departed. With all the delays since its announcement in September last year I was having serious doubts whether Canon were going to deliver. I managed some initial tests to ensure there was no immediate problem with the camera and these proved very promising, with excellent results.

After two days in Paris and around 500 frames I can now report that the Canon 1DX has exceeded my expectations for low light and autofocus performance in every respect. One of the real highlights in Paris for anyone interested in history and architecture is its incredibly impressive cathedrals and churches. The sheer scale, grandeur, and majesty of Notre Dame, and others, make them wonderfully impressive subjects for photography. They can be hard to capture in their entirety as there is a fine balance between placing the structure in context and the creation of a mere postcard. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the challenge and I could happily spend many days prowling the streets and cobblestone alleys for new and different angles.

As impressive as the Cathedrals are externally, they are equally awe-inspiring on the inside. Unfortunately, all of them are extremely dark inside and tripod photography is forbidden (as is the use of flash – although, this last ‘law’ seems very poorly enforced) necessitating the use of high ISO photography to ensure sufficient shutter speeds and depth of field. It is not uncommon to have to push the ISO as high as 10,000 or even 25,600 in some cases to obtain 1/40^th of a second at F4 in the darker areas.

This photograph was taken inside the Eglise Saint Eustache cathedral with the Canon 1DX and 17mm F4L TSE, handheld at ISO 6,400, 1/60^thof a second, F 4.5. I want to emphasize that it was extremely dark inside the cathedral and that the light streaming through the stain glass windows was extremely hot. The dynamic range far exceeds the capabilities of any camera to record; yet the 1DX has managed to produce an excellent exposure without intervention from me. This photograph simply would not have been possible with such low noise with any previous camera I have owned or tested. The image has had only minimal post processing and noise reduction in Adobe Lightroom 4.1. There is virtually no appreciable noise of consequence in the RAW file, at least nothing that is not easily corrected with a small amount of noise reduction (a modest setting of 25 in Lightroom was used in this example to reduce the luminance noise grain – no color noise reduction was required). The results are simply astonishing and I am very much looking forward to the new opportunities created by the amazing capabilities of the 1DX. Although in this example I utilized the 17mm F4L TSE which is a manual focus lens I also shot several frames with the 24mm f1.4L MKII and 35mm F1.4L lenses, and in all cases the 1DX was able to immediately nail focus in near total darkness, center of frame. The era of shooting in the dark has truly arrived.Although street and city photography is not my preferred landscape, I have very much enjoyed my time in the city of romance and rate it as one of the most beautiful and charming cities I have visited.  There is a wavelength and ambience in Paris that I can immediately harmonize with. Its cobblestone streets are steeped in history and charm and this, combined with my love of the café culture, make it a city I could easily call home. I am looking forward to wandering its streets over the next few days before I head for Venice.

Au revoir for now…