Park Fun

The park is slowly turning into one of my favorite places to take photos.

Got the water which is always fun with different shutter speeds:

The moon in the middle of the day with some trees:

And walls and walls of advertisements:

Lonely Nails

Not sure why the theme of hands and paws has been so well-represented lately but gots to keep rolling with it.

More Cankles And Hands

Although of the four legged kind.  So not really sure that it is a hand but maybe more of a paw.

Cankles And Hands

Firing the blog up again.  I have about 1800 photos to get through so it is going to be slow but I will try for at least one a day.

Less Lazy

Finally took some time to walk around and get some shots.  The first and coolest was of Yachi’s display for Call Bridal in the mall at Papyrus.  They had a wedding deal and asked to show one of her dresses as their window display:

Saw a more than live sized picture of Abe Lincoln that I found an angle I was happy with:

I also kept feeding my barb wire passion while managing to catch a little of that elusive blue sky.  In the future I think I will try to keep the lines a little more gradual across the shot.  The corner to corner line is a little harsh or something like that:

A shrubbery:

Still Lazy

What is interesting is I think there is a good picture to be taken of this particular stretch of the city but try as I might I cannot find it.  This on I feel like puts too much focus on the pink flyer and not as much on the collage effect:

Haven’t Seen This In A While

And hope it sticks around for a while.  This also is the first shot were I think I learned what the dust brush in Lightroom is for.  Have I mentioned how much I like that program?:

Textures

Like blinds with a small depth of field:

And a table and flower:

And one more of the blinds cause I like it so much:

Just Hanging Out

Trying to fulfill some instinct to kill something.  Too bad it is just a fake fuzzy mouse:

Favorite Records

Not really just the ones that were easy to reach:

And a slightly more abstract shot of a sprinkler head:

Boring Day

Replete with bad pictures.  Not sure why I was not able to take anything better than this.  In the spirit of learning from our mistakes.  It is boring to me because there is no obvious focus point and it is way underexposed.  Also the sky looks grey and not very interesting.  Overall a lazy shot without much thought going into the composition:

Flowers Or Weeds?

Either way pretty and apparently one of Yachi’s favorite flowers so took some shots for her (and kind of ruined a pair of pants by forgetting how quickly dandelions give away their color to your clothes):

I liked the multiple light sources in this.  Makes me think more and more about getting a real flash and cord so I can do some rudimentary off camera light shots:

Not On This Street

No parking for you or anyone else for that matter:

Such A Nice Day

A good chance to wander around Capitol Hill and take lots of photos.  Unfortunately I was not choosing very good things to take shots of :( so I just ended up with these.

I like the framing of the sky in this and the fact it was so blue and nice does not hurt:

And a slightly out of focus shot of pope as we were drinking on the patio:

Too Cropped?

The ears are a little cut off but I do like the shadows on the eyes.

Outside Shutter Fun

Wandering around in the great weather and managed to take one of my favorite photos so far:

If you have been following this blog you know why I like this shot (hint:  Its the light):

Streams of water with different shutter speeds.  Finally made the concept concrete in my brain:

Slow speed:

Fast shutter speed (Water looks better with the slow in my opinion):

Let’s change it up and go fast:

And slow:

Boiling Rats

Or perhaps just come boiling water, like a good boil just past rolling:

And then the rat.  In between being attacked by the cats:

Capturing The Laptop

And demonstrating his dominance over it.  He loves the heat:

Packaging Up My Own Work

Seems a little presumptuous but it was pretty cool to see it put into a frame.  Still not signing it as that is too much for me right now but I do like the process.

These also are the first images I used Lightroom to process.  I am kind of in love with it even though its many knobs are pretty imposing.  I have been looking for a slightly better tool to manage my photos and this looks to be it.  Instead of 4 separate things now I just need one and it works better than anything else I have.  Also I am terribly impressed with how well developed and easy to use it is.  Now I just need to start saving my five dollar bills until I can buy it for the crazy ridiculous Adobe price.

My moms birthday present:

All wrapped up:

Reflections

On the cobblestones )If that is a correct term for something that big):

Just a delicious latte:

Vampire Kitty

About to strike:

And finally satiated:

Relaxing

After a particularly awful day at work it was really nice to come home and wander around during a great evening taking photos.

Lots of blue sky as that was what I was enjoying most.  I liked the fact that there were a pair of high heels instead of the regular running shoes over the wire:

But they did have the running shoe neighbors:

And some construction equipment color that I had to climb a little to get shots of:

Some final blue sky:

Half?

Full or empty?  A close runner up for a title was tiny bubbles:

Jesus Saying No…

To the overprocessed first attempt at an HDR photo.  I am not a huge fan of HDR in general but the point was made that the sunset over the city would be a good candidate for an HDR shot.  I agreed but upon doing the processing realized I had no idea what I was doing and mostly accepted the defaults.  When I have more time to learn something like this I imagine it will turn out better:

And here is Jesus looking up at the sky and remarking about how overprocessed it looks:

What Is Going On In There?

Why the need for the knife?

More Manual Shooting

As mentioned in the previous post I am trying to shoot manual and man it is a little more challenging than I expected.  It is also a lot of fun though.  My skillz are improving but the subject matter of what I was shooting fell some.  I was concentrating more on getting the focus right than on the composition.

So you just get some random day in the life around Greenlake which was swarmed with people enjoying the 70 degree weather.

Going To The Championship

That’s right MSU is going to the final game and facing their 3rd #1 seed of the tournament.  They played well against UConn let’s just hope they can do the same against UNC.

This day also represented my move to manual focus.  I have been complaining about my lens not being able to focus quickly enough for me to take good photos of people on the street and it finally sunk in today that this is just whinging and that I need to learn how to focus myself to make this happen.

Most of the photographers I really appreciate now either only used manual focus cameras or predominantly use it now.  The drawback is that it is hard :).  My normal keep rate of photos is between 5-10%.  On this day I kept 1% but I like that 1%.

Evil eyes Eric:

Laughing eyes Jack:

Far away eyes Tim: