As a now-paying member of the camera club, I have the opportunity to participate in monthly competitions. Every member can submit a combination of up to 2 digital images and 2 prints (ink or analog) to submit for judging. There are 3 levels of participants (beginner, advanced, and master) and the top 3 placing photos from each month are then submitted for an end of the year competition. Part of me loves the idea of a competition. After all, I recognize that what has driven me in most successful circumstances in life has been my desire to become the “best in the room”, and when I become the best in one room, I try to find another room in which I can climb “through the ranks”. Photo competitions offer the same opportunity. Then again, part of me loathes the idea of competition. I picked up the camera with zeal 4-5 […]
The weather has sucked – there has been no reason or opportunity to go out with the camera, so I have been trying to do stuff in the house with the camera. Last weekend, I worked on an environmental multiple-exposure self portrait that fell flat. This week, I decided that I would try to take a portrait of Christine. Bear in mind, she is NOT comfortable in front of a camera: when she is photographed alone, she struggles to smile for the camera and she doesn’t know how to allow the camera to flatter her. So I wanted to make the picture easy on her. I quickly decided on an environmental portrait and the environment would be her exercise space. My initial thought was to use a flash with rear curtain sync while she rode the stationary cycle, but the lighting wasn’t right and the position to static when I […]
Last week, I was intending to participate in a meeting of the Syracuse Camera Club for the first time. They were expected to have a guest speaker who was presenting on an subject the I have now since-forgotten. Obviously, I did not attend; the kids were with Grandma and Grandpa, and it was the first night in 2 months that the house was quiet. My time was better-spent ordering take-out and watching the Princess Bride. It seems that the camera club meets three times per month (Wednesdays), so with February being a short month, there was a meeting on back-to-back days (back-to-back-to-back, inclusive of next week). It is one of the longest-running camera clubs in the country (dating back to the late-1800s). On Wednesday, a member of the club was given the floor to share his images of a trip that he had made to Scotland 6-7 years ago. I […]
The sunrise forecast looked promising and the clouds looked like they might be high enough to let some light in. Then again, they also looked quite heavy and were a little lower than would usually lend themselves to a nicer sunrise. But, I have seen the sky light up with them even lower. I had no intentions of going out today; I had hoped to sleep in, but that hasn’t been happening. Even so, I had to drag myself out of the house to try to find a quick composition in the zero-degree temps in the field behind the house. I knew there were some trees that I could shoot through … I photographed them a few years ago, when I first started exploring this photography-thing as a more-serious hobby. With snow on the ground and a nice sky, I thought I might revisit this scene. But there has been […]
The snowfall has not kindly aligned with the weekends this winter, so I have not had a chance to get out with my camera while the snow is falling. This weekend proved to be no different. Then again, it was sunny (which is a rarity) so I decided to take advantage and try something a little different: creating images of bald eagles at Onondaga Lake. Last year, I took the kids to the parking lot at Destiny mall so they could have a chance to see a few in the trees. We also walked along Onondaga Creek and had a chance to watch one eat a fish in a tree across the creek. It wasn’t terribly close, but the kids got to watch the eagle with their binoculars and had fun doing so. This year, I had read that the creekwalk was open (last year, the shore of the lake […]
Yesterday sucked. A day earlier, I had received the 2nd COVID vaccine dose and I was starting to feel the effects (initially chills, then fever, aching, and headache) before going to bed and they persisted until the early afternoon. This morning, I was back to my old-self and it started snowing before dark, so I grabbed my camera, put on the weather-proof lens, and pocketed 2 extra batteries before getting in the car and driving to Green Lakes. I asked Austin if he wanted to accompany me, but he said it was “too cold”, despite only being 30 degrees. He would still be in his flannel pajamas when I’d return 4 hours later. I was tempted to go to Oxbow Falls to see if I could photograph the tree I had noted a few weeks ago when hiking with Christine, but I wanted to have a chance to photograph more […]
Last night, before going to bed, Christine offered to do the grocery shopping the morning to afford me the chance to go out with the camera. I considered shopping anyway, but the only reason that I could arrive at for not allowing her to do it was martyrdom, so I graciously accepted her offer with gratitude and was in my car this morning at 0630 and on my way to Stoney Pond. I fully expected the snow to have fallen from the trees after the winds the night before, but at least I could expect there to be some snow on the ground … which is more than I can say about the parks more local to me 1200′ lower in elevation. On the way to the forest, I passed Johnny Appleseed Farm, where I have never successfully been able to make a composition of the apples trees there, despite […]
The grounds near the house are unappealing photographically: there is little/no snow and everything is a brown as one might expect under the circumstances. This morning, Christine said that she intended to go to Stoney Pond for snowshoeing and I was shocked. While it is a higher elevation, I couldn’t imagine that they had that much more snow than us, and I encouraged her to bring her trail shoes (which she did). While she did use her trail shoes, she also returned home saying that there were some trails where she was able to use her snowshoes and she showed me some pictures that had been captured by friends with lovely snow covered trees. With 2 hours of daylight to burn tonight, I decided to drive out and scout out some scenes for tomorrow morning and … I never made it there. As I was approaching Perryville, it was clear […]
The kids were at Grandma and Grandpa’s for the night, and Christine and I had a couple of hours of daylight to go for a walk somewhere before darkness fell. My problem was trying to think of a place to go. Christine is running all over the parks throughout the region. She is always at Green Lakes. In the last week she has been to Highland Forest and Clark Reservation. The canal is too boring. Beaver Lake is too far away. The Conservatory is too wet. I didn’t have many choices, but it occurred to me that she hadn’t been to Oxbow Falls park, so I invited her to accompany me on a small walk in the woods there and she accepted. The walk is only 1 mile and it is mostly old growth with a lot of vines on the trees, but at least it was something different for […]