Head in the clouds, again. Just testing …
Author: leh
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Seven: In Dog We Trust
Just shooting nondescript images today as a matter of equipment & technique testing (including Corbin’s back button focus trick) …
Yeah, it’s true. Charlie is the only family member who has yet to audibly protest about serving as subject matter.
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Six
This morning, eight o’clock …
Retraction / Correction
Yesterday’s post characterized Kim and Charlie as “lost”. Kim offers an alternative, purportedly more accurate account: She and Charlie followed marked trails from a jumping off point on the southerly side of the mountain for a considerable distance through all sorts of terrain. But after an hour and a half or so, Kim realized that she was too tired and too far from the starting point to return the same way, and reckoned that heading in the Mt. Glen direction would bring her out of the trails and near a main road on the northerly side much more quickly with much less expenditure of time and remaining energy. So that’s what happened!
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Five: Weather
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Five: Some Experiments
First, we try to determine the smallest chunk of an original that can be carved out and still yield a usable image. Here was a medium-range shot of the kitchen, with Kim at work, cropped to just under 5% (yes, I did the math) of the full sized original, with a little color/tint play as well.
Next, I have been practicing a new trick for focus that Corbin taught me. In the case of Charlie, I forgot that I was handholding at 1/10 second — but maybe Ivi would still like to see it.
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Five: Pi Day
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Four: A Slight Misadventure
As I was taking a shower, I thought I faintly heard the phone. Turned out that Kim was requesting a rescue mission after she and Charlie had become “lost” (my term) somewhere in a canyon in the mountains north of town. As we maintained communications while I drove through the fog and mist in the general direction, she suggested that she thought she could generally make her way to the valley beyond, perhaps intersecting with me somewhere around Mt. Glen Road. Her final call before I sighted them, however, warned that she was accompanied by a strange dog that had refused to abandon them. When I spotted them up a narrow side lane, I approached and as the passenger door was opened the alien beast bounded past Kim and Charlie and leaped inside the pickup cab atop me. We were unable to extract the animal. So we bundled in together, all of us, two humans, two dogs, and proceeded to drive — while wrestling with a large, strong dog that interfered with steering and shifting and even forward vision — a few miles around to the other side of the mountain where Kim had left her vehicle. Only when we all exited the pickup, did the animal do the same. Eventually, we were able to leave the stranger at his origin and head back home.
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Three
Last night, we watched a Van Gogh documentary and I went to bed thinking about his use of shades of yellow. So when I awoke, I jumped up to join Kim on her early a.m. Charles walk (instead of just rolling over for another hour as usual), thinking that I might be able to catch some crazy yellow/golden sunrise action and do double duty by testing an unorthodox lens/camera combination. So we headed for Gangloff Park, where I made some nondescript test shots while Kim & Charlie explored the landscape and ventured into adjacent Pioneer Park as well.
But, being the old curmudgeon I am, I tend to prefer black & white …
Later on today, we took surprise delivery of a package from my old and marvelous photog partner, Bill (remember him?) — two ancient, pre-digital-era manual lenses that proved capable of being bolted up to my new camera body. In my eagerness to try these things, I started with a nearly 50-year-old macro lens and shot handheld, bypassing any judicious and warranted use of a tripod. And I was obliged to use totally manual control over shutter speed, aperture and focus (that last one is the real challenge!). But here are some early results …
rDay Three-Hundred-Fifty-Two
Sun barely visible, if at all, today …