06-01-12 Flowers For Katie I

Once again a photo found me. I was engaged in the mundane task of putting our garbage receptacle away, when I noticed that the late evening sun was offering perfect, direct light on Deb's beautiful Siberian iris patch, which had just gone into bloom. Knowing that I only had a few minutes of this particular light, I literally ran into the house to get my camera.I took 92 photos of these flowers - I just couldn't help it! Compositionally, this one made the "first cut," in part because I am a slave to the rule of thirds and this photo exemplifies it. I shot this with my Canon 70-200 2.8L lens so I could get very good selective focus. And, I used a tripod.Canon 5DII 1/640s f/2.8 ISO320 200mm

05-30-12 Look What the Cat Dragged In!

I was walking down our hallway to the kitchen on Sunday when I noticed Mac chasing some dark thing towards me. I though it was a toy at first but then I noticed that it was furry and running like hell. I think I might have screamed as Mac and the harry thing ran past me.I thought it was a mole at first but when I found the animal cowering behind a hard drive in my den, I saw that it was a baby rabbit. Deb came to the rabbit's rescue and he was released to the wild. In our back yard.Will Mac find him again? Maybe. Will the rabbit find our deck door wide open, as he did on Sunday? No way!

05-29-12 Lisbon Trolly #12

Lisbon is famous for its vintage trolleys and If you go, you have to ride them. They are especially useful for making your way up the fairly steep hills that guard the relatively narrow central part of Lisbon. The other good thing about riding local mass transit like this, is that you get to mix with locals, who don't view the trolly as a novelty but as a practical way to get around.

05-28-12 Window Shopping

So I've gone back to Lisbon this week - at least I've gone back to the photo collection from Lisbon, Portugal. This photo was taken on the run under less than ideal circumstances. What drew me to the window was the beautiful purple tones of this fabric. But I also love the presentation, with all of the lines and curves. It has a bit of a seashell appearance to me. The window captured my attention and I captured it with my Canon 5DII. :-)

05-27-12 A View From Above

Inspired by an article on Lisbon, Portugal,in the Travel section of today's NYT, I went back and looked at things I had from our trip there a couple years ago. This photo was taken from the top of a monument to the Portuguese explorers, who boldly went where no European white men had gone before.I am captivated by aerial shots that show shadows and of course there are strong shadows in this photo, though I'm not all that impressed with what I got. Compositionally, I would like something different, though I can't tell what that would be. If I had spent 30 minutes more, in this location, I probably could have gotten the perfect placement of my unsuspecting subjects below.

05-25-12 Resident Scholar

My wife and I have made frequent trips to southern California over the last few years. My morning routine involves a visit to the nearby Peet's Coffee and the McDonalds on Beach and Warner.While our trips to California are sporadic, there is one thing that has been completely predictable: when I walk into the McDonalds, the gentleman in this photo is sitting at this same table in the same position with what appears to be the same three books. And he is always reading and taking notes with great concentration.Yesterday, I watched him work as I ate my breakfast and overcame a compulsion to introduce myself. But I didn't because I felt like I would be walking into my picture. And as I write this, I wonder if he's real. Maybe he is a very clever McDonalds joke. Or a work of art by Duane Hanson?I am going back this morning. I am guessing that, like the sun coming up over the eastern mountains, he will be there.

05-24-12 Branding

Yes, I'm back in California. Now I know whom to call if I end up in jail.

05-23-12 Crop Circles

05-22-12 Geometry

05-19-12 About To Bloom

I'm practicing my macro technique again, this time on an Iris that is probably one day away from full bloom. Somehow an iris bud reminds me of the super compact foam toys that blow up to huge proportion when you add water. I guess with an iris you just add water, too.

05-18-12 E Pluribus

I am getting ready to teach a short seminar in macro photography and so I thought I should try to photograph a few objects with my macro lens. This photo is a detail from the obverse side of a coin my aunt Betty owned. It is about the size of a silver dollar, though I don't think that this coin was minted by the US government.I'm not into numbers but in a moment of boredom (or curiosity) I started to count things on the US dollar bill several years ago and found that the number 13 seems to prevail. That's true of this coin, too, which uses many of the same symbols that are on the dollar. There are thirteen stars above the eagle. There are thirteen stripes on the shield in front of him/her. There are thirteen feathers above the e pluribus unum banner. And there are thirteen letters in e pluribus unum.Why 13? Well my pot smoking friends from the 70s would say that "m" is the 13th letter in the alphabet and that "m" really stands for marijuana. Thus, this silver coin (and the dollar bill) are subversive and subtle promotions of the use of pot. But you'd have to be high to think that. More likely, 13 is the number of original US colonies.All of this from a macro photo of a silver coin. . . .Canon 5DII 1/125s f/5.6 ISO250 100mm 2.8L

05-16-12 Jill

Several years ago I was asked to do a few portfolio photos for a woman named Jill, who had modeled in her teens and early twenties and who was interested in trying to get back into the market as an "older" model. I said, "Yes" but told her that I had never done anything like that. She had worked with many photographers and told me that she would help me get the poses she needed. Needless to say, I had fun.The interesting thing about the job was that she told me that she wanted very little "photoshopping" done to her photos because a model portfolio should show potential customers what the "real" person looks like. Thus, I gave her what she wanted, though I did use a slight soft focus on this photo.Canon 1dII (?) 1/400s f/8.0 ISO200 95mm