Manny and a Wide Angle Lens

We have had two additions to our photographic repertoire; A 10-22mm Wide Angle lens and Manny the mannequin (I'm sure the name is not unique!).

Annette has been wanting a wide angle lens for a long, long time.  So, for her birthday, I got it for her.   (There was no surprise here.  I asked her to help me pick it out.)

Yesterday, we were in a hobby and crafts store, I saw Manny and I thought about the photographers out there who have an object that they place in their pictures as they travel.  I thought Manny would be a good object for me.  He is posable, so he might make some cute pictures.

Well, Annette has been busy with work.  She works from home so it is easy for her to return to her work after supper.  Anyway, she hasn't had the time to experiment with her new lens and I hated to use it before her.  But, today I had some time and waned to try it out.

So I combined the two.  I used the wide angle lens to take some pictures of Manny.

You can see the difference in the zoom with the first two pictures.

You can see that Manny's posing ability has limits in the last two pictures.

Manny stepping off of the platform

Manny pointing foot and hand

I know it's been hot, but you'll never be able to finish that!

That's one way to cool down!  Hug an iced tea!

Hiking Tumbling Run

Today my boys (my sons), Ashley and I hiked up the Trail at Tumbling Run.  It took us about an hour.  It was about 90 degrees and we sweated the whole way up!  Well, yuck!

While we were at the top, we all took some obligatory snapshots.  Winston took some with his phone.  Then Winston said something that resounded with me.  He said, "The pictures on my phone are like a record of my life."  Ain't that cool.

I knew exactly what he meant!  When I look back through all of my pictures. I feel that same way.  These are really a record of where I have been.

Well, sort of.  I don't have any pictures of the day job.  Imagine that!  So I guess it is really a record of all of the great places I have been, which is still a record of the great parts of my life.  The only thing that would have made it better is if Annette would have been able to join us.

So anyway, here are a couple snapshots that are records of where I was today.  They are not artful.  They are a record of one more of the great parts of my life.

This is one tough girl!  She walked up the rocky stream bed in her bare feet!

Our little hiking group.
I'm glad they slowed down enough for me to keep up.

Stupid looks all around!

Once inside the woods, we did not see much of the sky except for this hole in the canopy.

Portraits in the Park with the camera club

One of the camera clubs that Annette and I belong to had a "Portraits in the Park" night on Thursday in place of the regular club meeting.  We had a very good turnout.  I counted almost 20 photographers.

One of the club members brought a model that he has been shooting for almost a year.  However, this was her first time in front of a group.  She certainly put forth a great effort.  She worked hard and she tried to look at each of the photographers.

It was interesting how the passers-by gawked at what we were doing.  One couple asked me who the girl was and if she was famous.  They didn't recognize her so they were puzzled.  It finally made sense to them when I told them that this was a photography club and that we were doing a model shoot.

I asked the club member who brought the model if we could give her direction and he told me she takes direction well.  So a couple of times I gave her some direction and she followed.  Annette also tweaked the model's poses to get a image that she had visualized.  However, the rest of the club seemed to be content.

It actually went quite well with 20 shooters.  It seemed like everyone was conscious that they had to share with the other photographers, so there was an ebb and flow.  A few people would go close for a shot and then ease out to the back while others would move forward.

I also saw a lot of longer lenses there, which was a good idea.  I finally switched to my longer lens.  The longer lens helped to reach past the closer shooters, if you didn't want to step forward.

Here are a few pictures from the shoot.

Just so you know, this is not the model.

This is a found subject.

A Direct Gaze

A Pensive Moment

Flowers Past Their Prime

In the last post I mentioned that Annette and I went to Canoe Creek State Park and saw the ruins of the Limekilns.

While we were there we also saw many flowers.  Unfortunately, they were past their prime.  Annette and  I agreed that we should have been there a week or two earlier.  Oh, well.  Life sometimes gets in the way!

Anyway, we were there and we tried to make the best of it.  Here are some flower pictures.  They are not great, but it forms a baseline.  Let's see if I can improve!

Where's my other petal?

Does anyone know what this white flower and the next purple flower are?

 

Violets?

Jumbled Ferns

Look at the center swirl around!

A Weed, but I liked it.

Are these bugs mating?????

Limekiln Ruins at Canoe Creek State Park

I think a lot of photographers like to take pictures of abandoned pieces of yesterday.  That includes me.

While I am at the abandoned sites, whether shooting or not, I try to imagine life the way it was at those sites.

• Was this a site where genteel people lived or those less fortunate?
• Did a lot of people visit the site on a daily basis or was it just one family?
• What type of work was done in this space?
• How did the people relax in this space?
• Was there conflict or did the people get along well?
• Was it a site that made people happy, sad, anxious, relaxed, tired, etc.?

Anyway, on Saturday, Annette and I visited Canoe Creek State Park near Altoona.  It was only a five minute stroll through the woods to the Limekiln ruins.

Again they made me think about the past:

• Why did they build on this remote site?
• Why was the cement so rough?  Was it a scarcity of materials? Or was it a cost cutting measure  (Hurry up and get those forms up!  I'm not making any money until we're in production!  Every day "prettying" up those forms is a day I'm not making money!  Let's go!  Let's go!!!)? 
• Why was there a room on either side of the central space for each of the kilns?
• How many times a day did the workers walk the "hallway" between the back of the kilns and the side of the hill?
• How hot was it in the buildings?

Anyway, enough of that.  Let's look at some pictures.

Aren't the perspective lines leading out to the vanishing point interesting in their obviousness?

Don't the kilns look like some sort of ancient temple?

I wished the sky had been blue, but this is the way it was.

Limekiln Ruins at Canoe Creek State Park 

Limekiln Ruins

In the Unusual Flower Box image below, I like the juxtaposition of the fragile flowers with the mass of the structure.  I like the organic plant life against the man-made brickwork. 

Unusual Flower Box

June was a busy month

June was a busy month.  Between visits from both Annette's side of the family and mine, there was hardly any time for shooting

However, we did get to Harper's Ferry and shot a few pictures there.  Like this one of St Peter's Roman Catholic Cathedral.

St. Peter's Cathedral in Harper's Ferry

While we were in Harper's Ferry, it rained.  Hard!  I ran for a couple of hundred yards with my camera under my arm, trying to keep it dry.  We ended up in John Browns fort.

John Brown's Fort in Harper's Ferry

This was the view out from the fort during the rain.

Also, during June, we heard about a Lavender Festival.  My mom was visiting and it seemed like a good thing to do.  So off we went.  I think Mom and Annette had a good time.  I was just along for the ride.

Lavender Fields

Mom with the sprigs of Lavender that she "harvested".

What you don't see

You're out there shooting pictures and you are careful about so many things such as merging lines, composition, textures, borders, what to include, what to leave out, etc.

But, it's funny what you don't see until you open the image on the computer.

Take this image for example.  I was trying to capture the rhododendrons at the side of our house and didn't see a couple of things.

I didn't notice that the spots on the petals are only on one side of each flower.

I didn't see the spider web fiber running straight through the image at about the right one third line.

Hmmmm.  I better get better at seeing!

I noticed in the preview that the spider web thread does not show up.  Believe me, it is visible in Lightroom!