Day 243 (31 Aug 2012) Soccer

I took a short drive during my lunch break to the Colchester Recreation Complex because I thought it would have some interesting stuff to shoot, even when all the kids are in school. The soccer goals caught my eye, with all the lines and the way the net hung.

18 mm, 1/500 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (In the Net)

18 mm, 1/400 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Into The Goal)

Which do you like better? Why?

They were both shot w/ the same f/stop, but the focus point is different.  Both were shot w/in a few inches of each other (first I stuck the lens through the net, second I moved so I could get to my lens’ min focus distance).

This is it till next week; I’m heading out in a couple hours for a weekend of mountain adventure!!

Day 242 (30 Aug 2012) Walking Around

Today I had a little time between work and class, so I took a stroll around the edge of the campus, away from all the buildings and students.  It was kinda relaxing to have nowhere to be for a while and have my camera 🙂

Though when I was shooting the second photo, I could hear what sounded like mini-zaps, “zzzzzzzppptt”.  It was a little unnerving!

 

53 mm, 1/100 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Hydrant in a Field)

29 mm, 1/200 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (High Voltage)

55 mm, 1/500 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Power Transmission)

Tomorrow right after work I head up to the ADKs for 4 days of camping and hiking w/ some good friends.  I may post tomorrow, but possible not again until Tuesday or Wednesday.  I’m planning on setting up some of my prints Tuesday evening, after work, with a friend at a local coffee shop as a gallery!!  I’ll deff post a photo of the prints 🙂

Day 241 (29 Aug 2012) Playing with Traffic

Not in traffic, but with traffic.  And my camera 🙂

Class started today so it was dark by the time I got around to shooting, and since I was in Manchester, CT, I thought I could try shooting a busy intersection and shooting the light trails from tail/head lights.  After a couple frames I changed things up.  I’ve been a big fan of bokah since I first learned about it, so I flipped my lens to manual focus, and put the camera deliberately out of focus to get these shots:

43 mm, 2.5 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100 (Unfocused Drivers)

55 mm, 2.0 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100 (Focus on the lights)

18 mm, 30 sec, f/11, ISO 100 (Phantom Car)

Day 240 (28 Aug 2012) Day Pond State Park

Do you ever have one of those days where you just don’t feel very creative?  Today was one of those days.  I wasn’t in a funk nor did I have a bad day or anything like that.  I was eager to go shoot (not my most eager ever, but eager enough to venture outside my home), but when I got to the Day Pond State Park in my town of Colchester, CT, I just didn’t “feel” it.  Not like other times, at least.  But I still put my camera on my Blackrapid strap, put my macro lens in my pocket, and just started wandering aimlessly.

My shooting felt a little forced, a little uninspired, and it probably shows.  I’m not sure how to kick myself into a more creative mood, or if this is just part of a natural cycle that tends to show itself when you are shooting (or otherwise engaged in a creative pursuit) every day.  What about you?  Have you experienced this?  Is it normal and I just have to sleep it off or is there something you do to reboot your creative side?

On a completely separate note, this weekend 3 good friends and I will be heading up to the Adirondacks for 4 days of camping including 2 extended hikes 🙂  That is exciting!  Since I’ll be on the trail for 2 days, and camping 3 nights, what kind of photos would you like to see?  I’m going to have to look at some outdoor photography to see what techniques work; I’ve not been satisfied by my trail photos as of yet.

60 mm, 1/40 sec, f/2.8, ISO 200 (Frog)

18 mm, 1/30 sec, f/11, ISO 100 (Moon Over Day Pond)

Day 239 (27 Aug 2012) Mansfield Hollow Lake

Sitting down to leftovers at my computer, I had already decided I wanted to shoot the sunset.  There were lots of clouds in the sky so I had hopes that they would provide beautiful colors (much like when I shot the Airline Trail sunset).  I decided that the colors would probably look amazing reflecting off the surface of water, so I started looking for lakes on yahoo maps that had the sun setting across from an access location.  Mansfield Hollow Lake fit the bill perfectly, and it was only 30 min away!

However, the cloud cover beyond the horizon must have been heavier than I anticipated, as there was not a lot of color.  But I still made the best of it, I think, with some long exposer shots of the water/sky.  And as I was packing up and walking back to my car, I noticed that the moon had risen high directly to the East, and was reflecting on part of the lake when the clouds parted a moment.  I set up my tripod next to the road and capture a few frames 🙂  And to reward myself for getting off my tush and finding/making my daily images, I splurged on a frappe for the ride home 🙂

18 mm, 30 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Mansfield Hollow Lake)

18 mm, 15 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Moon over Mansfield Hollow)

53 mm, 6 sec, f/22, ISO 100 (Waterlogged)

18 mm, 4 sec, f/11, ISO 100 (Colors Reflected)

18 mm, 2.5 sec, f/22, ISO 100 (Sunset Over Mansfield Hollow Lake)

Day 238 (26 Aug 2012) That Was Easy!

We’ve all seen that commercial and wished there was an actual ‘easy’ button, but we all know that it’s not reality.

Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.
– Marie Curie

Have you noticed that it’s the hard and difficult times in your life that really shape who you are?  That the people we really admire, the ones with character that and wisdom have all had very difficult experiences and have persevered and strived and pushed and not given up until they were through?  I have.  I’ve have my hard times, and I can look back at them and see how they’ve shaped me into who I am today.  I would not trade who I am, and the path I’m currently on, for not having the pain and difficult times I’ve experienced in my own life.

Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men.
– John F. Kennedy

Thanks for letting me share a little with you 🙂

60 mm, 0.6 sec, f/10, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Staples)

60 mm, 2 sec, f/14, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (One Staple)

60 mm, 1/5 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (A Few Staples)

60 mm, 0.4 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Scorpion)

Day 237 (25 Aug 2012) Power

I remember when I was learning how to drive, while growing up in Northern California, that at night it was easier to tell if there was an oncoming car around a bend or on the other side of a hill, because I could see the headlights reflecting off the power lines.  They would light up in advance of the car.  I used this cue to dim my brights and if necessary, signal them to dim theirs.  To this day I still use that clue, esp. here on the hilly, windy roads of CT.

For a long time I’ve thought about shooting the glowing power lines, but tonight was the night!  I pulled over on a semi-busy road after leaving a friend’s house, set up my tripod in front of my car, and took several exposure while cars zoomed by at 55+mph.  This image I cropped once I noticed the power pole’s silhouette, as it grabbed my attention, almost as much as the lit up power lines.

55 mm, 20 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Power Lines)

Day 236 (24 Aug 2012) Morning Fog

I took this image this morning before the fog burned off.  I kinda like it, though not sure it conveys the fogginess.   Maybe if I get up earlier and get it while still a bit dark and use a long exposure? (getting up early is the hard part, lol) 🙂  Anyway, my camera is not put away for the night, so maybe I’ll see something interesting to shoot again 🙂

55 mm, 1/15 sec, f/29, ISO 100 (Sun and Fog)

Day 235 (23 Aug 2012) Sockets

Well, I spent most of the night (from 7 till 11:30) in my garage, most of that trying to replace an alternator on a friend’s car.  After dealing with the typical rust bolts found on New England cars (due to salting of the roads in the winter), I discovered that the last person to install the alternator (body shop after an accident, maybe?), but in one of the bolts backwards.  Unfortunately this was a long bolt and there is no room to remove it w/o removing the axle.  That was more than I could do so late in the evening, so I had to reassemble everything and send them home un-fixed.  I have to admit that I’m really frustrated at whoever did the work last time.  I don’t mind giving up an evening to help a friend, but when it’s wasted because someone didn’t follow the tech manual, well, lets just say I’m not a happy camper.

I did manage, just barely, to get a few shots of some sockets that were laying on my workbench.  But the only reason I took them is so I would not miss a day on my 365 project.

60 mm, 1/30 sec f/2.8, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (Sockets)
60 mm, 1/30 sec f/2.8, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (14mm)

60 mm, 1/20 sec f/3.5, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (After)

Day 234 (22 Aug 22) Morning Flowers

This morning I grabbed my camera and marco lens to shoot some flowers (aka weeks) growing in my yard as soon as the sun peaked up over the hills.  I was really tempted to spend an hour shooting dew on grass (cause I love the images and it’s fun), but had to work, so I limited it to a couple subjects 🙂  Plus, I’ve shot dew a couple times already 😉  Let me know what you think of these images:

60 mm, 1/160 sec, f/8.0, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (Dandelion)

60 mm, 1/100 sec, f/8.0, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (Flower and Fly)

60 mm, 1/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Clover Flower)

Day 233 (21 Aug 2012) Black Eyed Susan

How to grow Black Eyed Susans: don’t mow your lawn!  Well, thats how these have grown.  I haven’t gotten to the mower in a couple weeks (and almost got to it today, good thing I didn’t!) so these survived long enough to be memorialized forever in my blog 🙂

The last shot is of one flower I’ve shot before.  It sadly is past it’s prime 😦  But it had a good life, brining cheer to me many days as I left my home, and to you when you saw it the first time.

60 mm, 1/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 200, 60mm macro lens (Sisters)

60 mm, 1/20 sec, f/8.0, ISO 800, 60mm macro lens (Little Sister)

60 mm, 1/60 sec, f/3.2, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (I Lived A Full Life)

60 mm, 1/30 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400, 60mm macro lens (Waiting For Tomorrow)

Day 232 (20 Aug 2012) Spiral Bound

Remember “back in the day” when we went to school and computers were either nonexistent or only in special classrooms?  Remember back when we took notes on paper instead of typing into our laptop or iPad?  I remember those days, even in college my computer was a desktop and I had a spiral bound notebook for each class or subject.  I especially remember being very excited when they came with perforated pages, esp. since my teachers hated the little ‘tassels’ from tearing out the pages I did my assignment on 🙂

Well, today I was standing in my office debating weather I wanted to try and shoot the night sky/`milky-way from my yard, or venture off to get some more dramatic foreground for a night shot and not really feeling up to leaving my house.  So while the internal debate raged, I was also thinking I needed to start reading my textbooks to be ready for my first day of class this semester.  Thats when I saw the corner of an old, beat up notebook in a stack of binders and other school supplies and thought that it looked rather interesting with the metal spirals and the edges of the pages all dinged up.  What do you think?  Interesting, boring, or just a reminder of days you would rather have not remembered? 🙂

60 mm, 0.6 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Spiral Bound Notebook)

60 mm, 0.6 sec, f/4.5, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Spirals)

60 mm, 0.6 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Corner)

60 mm, 0.5 sec, f/11, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Spiral Bound)

Day 231 (19 Aug 2012) Drama in the Sky

Another long day, but it ended with a nice bit of color in the sky.  I didn’t capture it well, but the clouds were great.  I ended up dong a B&W conversion since I couldn’t get the color to suite me.  I’m ok with this, though.

18 mm, 1/25 sec. f/8.0, ISO 100 (Drama in the Sky)

Day 230 (18 Aug 2012) End of a Long Day

Yesterday I didn’t post the a photo from yesterday.  I took several, but they were mostly of the boys while camping, so I won’t post them here.  But I did try to snap a few images of this lonely cloud I saw pulling out of the grocery store parking lot.  I had to stand on one of those tall bases for the lot lights to see over the fence enough to get a ‘clean’ shot.  But since it was pretty dark already, I had to boost the ISO up pretty high, and use some heavy post processing to get this image.  Definitely not work I’m proud of, but it’s what I’ve got for yesterday 🙂

30 mm, 1/13 sec, f/4.5, ISO 400 (Lonely Cloud)

Day 229 (17 Aug 2012) Children at Play

Yup, I’m a day late, again!  It happens, and I’m sure you survived 😉

Friday night and today I was camping with the Royal Rangers boys at my church (my church has over 30 acres of woods, so it’s easier for the adults, and ‘realistic’ for the boys).  Friday the weather was great and the boys were playing on the lawn after cleaning up from dinner (camp-made stew).  I had to shoot this one at a high ISO (they move too fast for a long exposure, as you can imagine), so I did a B&W conversion and dropped the noise.

I’m still downloading today’s photos, so they will go up tomorrow, with Sunday’s photos 🙂

23 mm, 1/20 sec, f/3.5, ISO 3200 (Nighttime Playtime)

Day 228 (16 Aug 2012) Riding the Rails

Ever since I was a kid I had a fascination with trains and rail roads, maybe because my dad had model (HO) trains as his hobby, or just because I’m a boy, and it’s part of the X chromosome 🙂  So tonight after visiting my friend in Norwich, I took a slight detour to some rails I’ve shot before.  I went to a different location this time and found multiple sets, most of which were abandoned.  I shot for a little while (would have gone a lot longer, but it was getting late) and headed home.

Now that I’m home, I got to play with my newest “toy”; Lightroom 4.  I just installed it this afternoon and after my first use, I love the new features!  If you use LR3 and you get the opportunity to upgrade, do it!  I wouldn’t have done it except I was able to find the student version on sale (take a low price and reduce it more, and I’m ok w/ it!).  If I made my living with my camera, it would be a no-brainer.  But if you are just a hobbyist, like myself, LR3 is still a very powerful and awesome photo editor!  But anyway, here are some of my images from tonight:

 

44 mm, 15 sec, f/10, ISO 200 (Night Rails)

50 mm, 15 sec, f/10, ISO 200 (Rail Switch)

29 mm, 20 sec, f/10, ISO 200 (Rails and Warehouse)

Day 227 (15 Aug 2012) Dragon Tree

For some reason I keep trying to type May or April for the date of my blog; it’s been happening over the past few days.  Am I stuck in a time warp, or is there a wormhole passing over my desk chair?  Anyway. . . .

This morning we had a few thundershowers pass through, with sun in-between.  I noticed my baby Dragon Tree looked pretty cool with the few drops that remained glistening in the sun, so I busted out my macro lens and spent a few moments between meetings shooting.

In case you are wondering why I say “baby” Dragon Tree, well, its because the momma died (I’m not the best with house plants), before I had a chance to dump the pot, two babies sprung up!  Talk about Grace 🙂

60 mm, 1/250 sec, f/2.8, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Dragon Tree)

60 mm, 1/150 sec, f/5.0, ISO 100, 60mm macro lens (Dragon Tree)

Day 227 (14 Aug 2012) A Walk Around The Block

I was in New London, CT this evening to attend a graduation ceremony for an employment class I taught a lesson in.  I arrived early and decided to just go for a walk with my trusty camera.  I ended up just circling the block.  My initial intent was to shoot the sun behind the steeple of the church where the ceremony was held, but as I walked, I noticed an old guard rail for a basement access of one of the old buildings that populate the are.  I then took several more photos as I went on this short walk.  I was glad that it was empty so I could shoot w/o distraction 🙂

37 mm, 1/50 sec, f/4.5, ISO 100 (City Fence)

33 mm, 1/50 sec, f/4.5, ISO 100 (City Guard Rail)

55 mm, 1/80 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100 (Blue Doors) 

21 mm, 1/60 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Power of God)

35 mm, 1/50 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Blue Bricks)

Day 226 (13 Aug 2012) Sunset on the Farm

I’ve passed this farm many times, driving to hiking and riding trails.  I was on my way to ride this evening and just HAD to stop!  I would like to plan a shoot here, but for tonight, the clouds made it a great site! (though this, and other delays, gave me the experience of riding in the dark, lol).

I tried several presets in LR3 and used my own settings on the first one.  I really enjoy making an image my own, even if it’s not exactly what I saw with my eye.  I do at least a little tweaking to every image I publish.  Sometimes it’s just adjusting white-ballance or a B&W conversion, or taking a bad exposure and creating a great image from.  Or sometimes it’s just fun to go hog-wild!  What are your thoughts on image editing?

18 mm, 1/320 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (Sunset on the Farm)

18 mm, 1/160 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (End of the day)

18 mm, 1/60 sec, f/8.0, ISO 100 (End of a Long Day)

Day 225 (12 Aug 2012) Perseid Meteor Shower

Seems I’m running a day late!  Well, I did send the last hour of yesterday with my shutter open (and the first hour of today waiting for the image), so I hope you like the result!

Since the sky was clear and the Perseid meteor shower in progress, I set up my tripod in my drive way, triggered the shutter, took a nap, and hoped for the best.  Well, actually I did spend about 10-15 min on my deck and saw two meteors.  However, in an hour, my camera only caught one (maybe North isn’t the best direction?).  My lens fogged up at some point, so you can see the it in the way the star trails change over time, but It’s still a good image.  Can you spot the one meteor streak?

18 mm, 61 min, f/4.5, ISO 100 (Perseid Meteor Shower)

It crosses the bottom left corner 🙂