Dogwood in Mist

This was the photograph of the four chosen. I cropped out the property marker, took out the piece of white debris, applied the ortonish affect which blurs and boosts the scene. This was right down from the house along Price Creek Road. I was heading down to take photographs of the lilies in the ditch. The dogwood barked so loudly I just had to stop.

Pleasant Hill

There is a certain quirk about Facebook that would tend to drive one mad, if one wasn't already mad. How is it that one can comment, "it should be an award winner" and yet it gets only two likes? Then, one posts a lame snap shot and it goes viral? There is no rhyme or reason to what drives interest.
This photograph was taken in October of 2012 on our trip to West Virginia and Kentucky. We spent an afternoon at the Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill outside of Wilmore, Kentucky. A wonderful place to spend several days. One day was just not long enough for all the possibilities I saw. I lamented being on 'vacation' and having to vacate so soon. I always tell myself, someday, I shall return alone, but I never will. Time and places and funds are just too short and too long at the same time.
These draft horses were grazing and as we left to return to Wilmore, Lexington and on home to Florida, I stopped in the car and shot from the window from the highway. I took this one and three others. This one was the best, the first snap, with all the horses heads up. And so we moved on. Sometimes it is best to shoot once, get it right and move on. When I tend to fuss over a shot and take many, I always return and use the first one of the series. Go with first principal, so said Hannibal Lecter to Clarise in Silence of the Lambs.

Pre-Determine

The fog was just right. The Sunday morning sun was just right. I grabbed the mountain bike and took off down Price Creek to photograph the lilies in the ditch. I used the Canon S95 and the Nikon D3100 with the 18-200 lens. I wasn't too pleased. I rode down 245A toward Rossi Road. I knew there would be the possibility of deer crossing the road. I stopped to make sure the settings were correct on the camera.
And sure enough, ahead was a lone deer watching me. All I had to do was point, frame and click,click, click. Three was all I got. But, three more than I would have gotten had I not pre-determined the possibility.
Manual mode set at a speed of 400 to stop action. ISO 800 to allow the higher shutter speed. Aperture 5.6.
Which shot do you prefer? I chose the third in full stride. I would have liked to have gotten one with her standing on the side of Rossi Road looking at me, but hey, I am not that fast. Time she saw me she started across. The scripture applies to all aspects of life. Always be ready to give an account.

Honeymoon Nest

It stood for years in Cedar Key. Subject of countless paintings and photographs. Many still adorning the walls of the galleries in Cedar Key. I was no exception. I took this photograph back in the '80's. Too bad in the day I was very judicious with my slide film and would often only take one shot of a scene. Unlike today where one has a difficult time editing for all the many choices, the last post of mine, March Madness, being an example.
Even though I do take way too many frames of a scene today, I still have that conservative approach from the film era. And, at the same time, as I had in the film era, the same photojournalist shoot it quickly before it goes away mentality, even though no honeymoon nest at the time was in danger of going anywhere.
I was thrilled when I purchased the MD-12 motor drive for the Nikon FE and FM's. But then, I found I still went click, click, not whiiiirrrrr with it. I eventually sold it and continued to click, click.
Today we have MD-12 built in with the continuous mode.

March Madness

Today being Saturday, naturally beside the running outside and shooting the azaleas, the bees on the blueberry, the clouds in experimentation, I mostly sat in doors and watched NCAA men's basketball. Florida, then Louisville, the several in between capping after 11 tonight with Wisconsin and the four white men starting. Tomorrow it continues with Kentucky.
First thing this morning at 9:30 I made my way down to the Gateway Gallery where two Gainesville artists, Karen and Cindy, came over to give the few of us that showed up, ideas on decorating the 6x6 squares for the May fundraiser for the new gallery location downtown.
I would like to paint one but also have the option of attaching a photograph, or doing a woodcut type of work.

The last photograph above of the trees, the one signed, was one of  twenty five I played with on the Canon S100 in the backyard. This option somehow made the sky monochrome, leaving the trees alone. It was the one I found most interesting.I also liked the one where I made the trees blue as well.
It goes to show you can create an infinite amount of affects and looks from one scene. The trick is getting to know all these options well enough and being able to quickly apply the look to a scene, knowing mentally what look would best serve the scene.
I still wish there was the in camera make it look painted option, like I can achieve somewhat in the post processing.

Switch Out

the new

Thursday I switched out all nine of the prints shown here. Of these, I only sold the top left in a different version for $65, even though I was asking $95. The frame made it. The customer will probably toss my print and use the frame for something else. Another customer wanted the top right one in a 5x7 but he has yet to come by and pick it up. And so it goes. And, I forgot, I sold the third one down on the right, Intrusion of Illusion to Kim. In the new prints, I sold the zero out moon and airplane as well. I placed Catscape in the gallery,third place winner in the recent Art League Spring show.

Focus

Yesterday at the Gateway Gallery I had a good conversation with fellow Art League Photographer Herb Ellis. Herb recently won first place in the Photography category for the Art League Spring Art Show at Gateway College. Herb, a retired attorney, shoots,develops and prints his own film.
We were discussing the teaching of photography and the difficulty. He said that he tried to convey to the group the three basics, shutter, aperture and focus. Upon later reflecting on what Herb said, I had to somewhat disagree on the third aspect, focus. I would add ISO(International Organizational for Standardization) or the old term ASA. ISO has more of a bearing upon the exposure of a photograph than focus. Focus is subjective. Shutter, f/stop and ISO are objective ratios. ISO is one of the few things one can set on modern day point and shoot cameras. You cannot always adjust shutter,aperture or even focus.
Herb I found places emphasis upon focus. I do not. Last year we were both asked to judge a Woman's club art show along with Art teacher Danny Owens. All three of us went through each category individually and determined our first,second and third selections. We then compared notes. In most of the categories, Danny and I were relatively close. Herb diverged greatly from our choices. One choice in particular he did not care for was an out of focus scene. He said it was a bad photograph because it was out of focus. His choice was an in focus arrangement of flowers, because he said, he likes to grow those particular flowers and knows how difficult it is. In politicking for my choice, I said, I do not care that the photograph is out of focus, it spoke to me via the composition and the emotion it conveyed, despite not being technically correct. Neither Danny nor I cared for the floral arrangement interestingly.  We all finally came to a compromise and I trust the Woman's Club ladies were pleased and Herb not too offended we did not vote the flowers first place.
So, if you are considering learning the basics of photography with a camera that does not do it all for you, concentrate on the shutter, how fast the or how slow the light enters onto the sensor or film, the aperture, or the iris, and how much light is let in or kept out, depending upon the size of the hole, or the ISO, the sensitivity of the film to the light, whether your setting is 80, the less light or 1600, the greater amount of light.
All ratios, all easily manipulated to your choosing, your creativity. And, when you learn these three, you can then choose to place your subject in focus or out of focus. But that is another subject, called depth of field, or depth of focus.
A squint, or small hole, greater the in focus. A druggie, with dilated, wide open eyes, less the in focus.

Simple

One bird, a row of jasmine, clouds. The simple landscape. Trying to cut down on the clutter continuously.
Often a difficult exercise when one is taken in with a scene. The tendency is to try and take it all in, go with a wider lens. But then, in the end, when the download has occurred, the ones I tend to gravitate toward are the simple. So why do I not always take simple shots? Because often, it demands more. It requires one to see through the wide and down into a macro sort of way.

Today I pulled from storage the old Yashica Mat-124G 120 camera. In the coming days I hope to go to the Freestyle Camera site and order a changing bag, some Acufine or Dektol, stop bath and such. I then plan on ordering some pan film, either Ilford or Fuji in 120. I hope then to be able to shoot negatives, and somehow scan them into the computer, printing them, either through a lab online or up to 8x10 on my bottom of the line Epson printer. It will be a good blend of the old and the new.
I hope this venture plays out and I do not put it off like so many other projects I have good intentions for, bad follow through.

Balance

Continuation of seeing sideways exercises. I had to update on Facebook what it was. Terry said it was pretty. I do wonder if she even noticed if it was sideways? Goes to show. The day was spent at the quiet gallery, almost quiet, as Rex and I sat it out. What a crock. The print I thought had sold last week still sat on the desk, never picked up. I called the customer and he said he would be down. He never came.
Tonight I went through the prints I currently have at home. I plan on switching out all the prints tomorrow.
What to place in the gallery?
We shall decide tomorrow.

Mercy Drops

The back yard is once again a pond. We thought the dirt we had hauled in several years ago remedied the situation. We just have to wait it out and soon it will recede. In the past, the back yard would get so deep, it would come into the house. I had a sump pump to drain some, but the constant use burned the pump up.
I took the Canon S95 out for some azalea shots this morning in the short time the sun and blue sky appeared. Later on, I traveled down to Alligator Lake and walked along, spotting some remaining white pelicans and two ospreys. Earlier, I was at Watertown Lake trying to out wait two eagles on the limb, waiting for them to fly. Unfortunately, I was using the D40 with the dust spots galore on the sensor. Upon downloading, few if any were usable. I will just have to stop using the camera that got me started in digital DSLR. It would cost more than a new D40 would cost if I sent the camera to Nikon for repair.
I am also coming to the conclusion that the 180mm 2.8 is a hit and miss, sometimes sharp, other times terribly fuzzy. But...that could be attributed to my poor focusing ability as well.
It would be nice to invest in the 70-300 or a 400mm.
Melanie had two interviews today from home. One, at Columbia Correctional, nine miles down the road, offered her a job. She is hoping the other, which would be what she is doing now, from home, will offer her the job. She really does not want to work in a prison and I cannot blame her in the least.
My prospects for a job remain dim, but hope I hold out that sometime before I die or get too old to work, I will find a job I do not mind doing. I have little hope for that.

Learning to See

I am re-reading, but it seems like I am reading for the first time, Freeman Patterson's book, Photography and the Art of Seeing. I have yet to make it through the second chapter. I guess you could say that I am still on lesson one, learning to see sideways. Patterson gives several exercises in thinking sideways:
1) Draw up a list of some photographic rules; then go out and break them.
Rule 1. Always hold your camera steady.
Rule 2. Be sure the centre of interest is in sharp focus.
Rule 3. Follow your light meter.
Then, take this list and, with various subjects, make pictures in direct contradiction to the rules.
Breaking Rule 1.
Jump up and down in the forest, and press the shutter release as you jump.
Run as fast as you can toward a parked car, and press the shutter release as you run.
Make sure the strap on your camera is absolutely secure. Set the shutter at a slow speed, and activate the self-timer. Then, swing your camera in circles, or back and forth, until the shutter has released.
Breaking Rule 2.
Make a series of pictures in which the main subject matter is clearly out of focus, but other things are sharp.
Shoot a sunset, a flower, and the surface of backlighted water, entirely out of focus.
Breaking Rule 3.
After you have read your light meter, make a series of photographs with five different subjects in which you overexpose each one the equivalent of two full f/stops or shutter speeds. Overexpose ever more if you are using black and white film. Then repeat the exercise while underexposing two full f/stops.
When you look at the resulting slides or negatives or digital images, you must view them in the same frame of mind as you took them. If you don't, you may reject them all as disasters. Keep on behaving as if the old dominant ideas no longer exist. Remember, the whole idea of these exercises is to break away from what you've been doing.

And so you can see, lesson one on learning to see sideways can go on and on.
We are reluctant to become rule breakers. I am one. I get stuck in ruts of doing the same shots over and over with the same predicted results. There is comfort in that. But there can also be burnout, or boredom. If all you ever did in a relationship was every night, sit at the same table quietly and eat your meal silently, soon, the relationship would end. The same with photography. Turn over the tables, look someone in the eye and start fresh.

Adopt An Artist

The thought recently occurred to me when visiting the Art Co-Ops in Cedar Key, how patrons blessed with means could be such a blessing to the arts. It is truly a blessing when a patron who has a heart for the arts,   give of their means to advance the arts, benefiting the entire community. Can you imagine the wondrous works Rembrandt could have produced, had he not spent his days in poverty, painting government officials portraits to make ends meet, or if Theo, Vincent's brother or a patron could have supported Van Gogh?
If you are such a person and find that you have a heart for the arts, take the initiative, or gather a circle of your friends and invest if you will, in an artist. If you are not familiar, visit the Co-Op's and local galleries. The two in Cedar Key were full of wonderful works. Most artists are by no means people of means. A few are. They dabble in the arts as a leisure past time. I am not speaking of these people. They have their own means of support. But seek out a true artist, one who would paint or photograph or sculpt in poverty, because it is their passion, their life force, their testimony. Who knows, you may be discovering the next Adams or Monet, hidden in some obscure gallery in Levy County.
Help this person by purchasing their work, by commissioning them, by gifting them with creative support funds so they can continue in their endeavor, purchase paints, paper,etc. Many artists, unfortunately, were not given the gift of being financial wizards, of dabbling in stocks and bonds and investments. There is a reason they are artists. They long ago found little interest in the analytical, but gravitated toward the spiritual, the ethereal, the mysterious.
You, the patron, if you will, can help these wandering souls to find some security, to find shelter from the harsh world they are attempting to interpret for us, allowing them to pursue the interpretation of our dreams.
A true artist will paint a scene, often with a passion, forgetting or even abhorring to bring into play the distasteful subject of funds. That is where you, the Patron must step in and partner with the artist. Place a gift in the offering plate, if you will. No true minister would refuse to preach until the plate was passed. No true believer would dare receive a gift, a blessing, without doing their part in giving the free will offering.
 In the least,  give to your adopted artist, the tithe, if you will, in the form of purchasing their work, offering studio space, promoting their work to your friends.  There are many creative ways to help, even if quiet and anonymous. It will be a blessing to you, knowing you have carried along the torch of  the arts, and it will be a blessing to the artists, as a few perhaps will know that they are appreciated and  the yellow lights can swirl  under a starry, starry night.