My online journal where I share my interests in photography, nature, journaling, fountain pens, bicycling, coffee life, spirituality and the mystery of it all.
We all need it! And when it’s cold outside and the wind is blowing I decided to play around with Topaz Adjust and my off camera flash. I learned a few things about my flash and gained a bit more confidence. I also had fun! Can you tell? Look at that smile! 🙂
Art is not to be found by touring to Egypt, China, or Peru;
Ralph Waldo Emerson
if you cannot find it at your own door, you will never find it.
I’m not one who travels to Africa for wildlife images, the streets of Bangladesh, or the mountains of Nepal. However, if the opportunity presented it’s self I’d be there. Nor do I have a 1,000 square foot studio for portraits and commercial work. I’m one of those photographers who goes on walks and hikes with his camera finding my studio and exotic lands just around the corner or in my hotel room.
I’ve been playing more with the HDR software to see what I can do with it. This is one image of three exposures, metered and plus and minus one stop. It is only the layered image then back to Lightroom and a tweaking of contrast and tone. One aspect of this is finding the detail in the moon. Hope everyone had a good Christmas season and ate as much as I did. 🙂
Many of us live our lives within the city, therefore all around us are the buildings we use for protection from the environment, creating another world. Straight lines are common in designs. For me as a photographer the patterns and shadows from these straight lines present interesting subjects. I attempt to crop out as much interference as I can to keep the focus on these lines and shadows. I attempt to simplify, using the lines to hold the viewer. In nature we do the same thing with the curves a beach, a grove of trees, a flight pattern of geese, a field of dandelions.
There comes a time when we learn there is no Santa Claus or at least one that lives at the North Pole. I remember when I discovered there was not Santa Claus. I was in kindergarden when a classmate informed me and in the process laughed at me for not knowing. Since then I’ve discovered that Santa lives in people’s hearts, not at the North Pole. I wished that the toys we find on Christmas morning were made in Santa’s workshop rather than mass produced in China. As we get older we come to understand that Christmas is not about Santa Claus but about keeping the spirit of Christmas alive is within us.
A story not always told to our children or grandchildren is about a young man named Nicholas. After joining the church, Nicholas heard the sorrowful tale of a poor old man and his three young daughters. It seemed the man could no longer feed his daughters, and he feared he would have to send them away from him. Nicholas knew he could help this family.
That night, while the whole village slept, Nicholas crept up to the hut where the three sisters lived. He climbed up to the rooftop to find the chimney. There Nicholas dropped three bags of gold, one by one, down through the chimney stack.
Earlier that day, the three sisters had hung their newly washed stockings by the fireplace to dry. Each small bag of gold that Nicholas dropped fell into one of the stockings below.
The next morning, the girls were overjoyed to find gold coins in their stockings. “Father!” they called, running to wake him. “We have received a magical gift!”
As the story of these three sisters spread from village to village, other people began to hang their stockings by the fire, hoping to find a secret gift when they awoke the next morning. Though this was Bishop Nicholas’ most famous gift, it was not his first good deed. And it would certainly not be his last.
Bishop Nicholas enjoyed surprising people. He began to deliver his secret gifts of hope and joy only at night, while his friends were asleep.
People all over the world began to celebrate St. Nicholas Day. They hung their stockings by the fire the night before and awoke the next morning to find them filled with candy, fruit, nuts, or toys. St. Nicholas had left a magical gift at each home!
So the spirit of Christmas is about gifts, those we give and those we receive. I pray that everyone enjoys the Holiday Season. Merry Christmas!
… and hoping everyone has a wonderful Holiday Season!
Here is few lines from A Charlie Brown Christmas movie:
Charlie Brown: Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?
Linus Van Pelt: Sure, Charlie Brown, I can tell you what Christmas is all about. Lights, please. “And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, ‘Fear not: for behold, I bring unto you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the City of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”
I’ve been having trouble with the Main Command Dial on my D300. I find when I want to change shutter speeds or adjust my EV, it takes a couple of clicks to get it to change. My first indications was when it started to stiffen up. It makes sense to me as that is the most used dial I use on my camera. I’ve been looking for quite some time in having another D300 as a backup but did not want to put out the money and wondering if it would be more feasible to wait for the next generation to come out. I’ve been using my old D100 as a backup but I’m noticing some switch issues with it also. Financially a used D300(s) would be a better solution than paying a higher price for the next generation. I found a used D300 on Craigslist that’s a year newer than mine and with about 50k actuations. He told me bought it to play with Photomatix HDR and therefor the higher shutter count. The price fit my budget and he threw in the Nikon 18-70mm kit lens. We ran it through a few tests then made a deal with him. So, here is a shot of one of my tree ornaments using the camera with the lens. So, I guess I bought myself a Christmas present!
We had a 6″ dusting of snow during the night with more still falling. When you add a bit of wind we have some foot and a half snow drifts. Not sure but it may be a snow day for the school kids, so a few moms will be stressed out. It really is looking like Christmas.
I was up early and in fact had a restless night. Way too active of a mind to sleep well. After bundling up I ventured out to the lake where we have thousands of geese who overnight on the open waters. What a racket they can make. During the summer I was a bit envious of those apartments backing up to the lake but after listening to the geese this winter, I’m glad I’m in the central portion of the complex. It amazes me how many there are, definitely in the thousands. It’s also amazing to see them lift off as they head for the fields for a feeding frenzy or coming in for a landing. Their diet consists of grasses, clover, cultivated grains, such as corn, wheat, barley and soybean and includes seeds, berries, sedges, aquatic vegetation, legumes and succulents, as well. some reports suggest they can eat up to 1/2 pound a day. And they are sure wary. I tried to sneak up on them this morning but they spotted me started raising an even louder ruckus. It is also reported they are not migrating as far south in the winter as in the past which is attributed to farming hunting practices and even weather changes. I’ve lived here most of my life and it seems we sure do see more than in the past. Well that’s the end of class! You can now go out and play in the snow.
The winter solstice occurs exactly when the axial tilt of a planet’s polar hemisphere is farthest away from the star that it orbits. Earth’s maximum axial tilt to our star, the Sun, during a solstice is 23° 26′. More evidently from high latitudes, a hemisphere’s winter solstice occurs on the shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun’s daily maximum elevation in the sky is the lowest. Since the winter solstice lasts only a moment in time, other terms are often used for the day on which it occurs, such as midwinter, the longest night or the first day of winter. But, the best event to ever happen on this day was back in 1996 when my youngest granddaughter was born. Happy Birthday Maddie!!
I’ve had a couple of jobs where I needed to commute to work. Those varied from 20 minutes to an hour. For the past 8 years I’ve not had to deal with that. I’m not a fan of commuting and considered commuting a waste of “my” time. There are too many other things I would rather spend my time doing, like photography. I also work with flight crew who live in other cities (Austin, Seattle, etc.) but are based in Denver and commute to work. There are some commuters who will have two flights rather than one which means part of their days off will be spent getting to and from work. If flights are full or there are delays they may not make their flight(s) home. It’s tough on them.
However, this summer that will change as I move back into my condo in Fort Collins. It then will take me about an hour and a half to get to the airport, and that’s in good weather. However, I’m planning on working halftime, two trips a month, so I will only need to commute about twice a month. That works for a short time.
This morning, I bundled up good and headed out to again meet the morning sunrise, out in nature and away from the city. It was really a combined scouting trip. I drove in a direction I’d never been before and went farther than I expected. To my enjoyment I found some new areas worth shooting that included several groves of trees and rolling hills. As, I headed back to my apartment, I looked down at my odometer and realized I’d just driven about 60 miles round trip. I had to laugh because here I was commuting to enjoy the sunrise. So, I commute for my solitude and sanity.
I also apologize in advance for future postings of these new found groves of trees. 🙂