Category Archives: Techniques and Skills

Sunrise, California Route 58

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I was lucky to participate in some fall surveys in the Mojave desert.  It was a brief venture south, but a fruitful one where I got a taste of a seemingly mysterious event in this parched landscape. October is a hot, dry month.  It is a time of brutal tedium, anticipation.  Especially if you bear the heat all summer and are waiting for the nights to finally cool the earth a bit more.

It’s also a month that’s known to celebrate the summer monsoons (or Southwest monsoons).  This year we had some decent rain and enjoyed some late season blooms that contrasted sharply with the otherwise dessicated matrix of creosote.  Here’s a celebration of Pectis paposa, cinchweed. Continue reading →

Touching everyday with a flower’s mind

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A Quick post.  On intimacy, on transience.

A reminder of fall in Yosemite.

Dogwoods bleached in flower.

A peek of the “flower” flowering.  [Click for a larger image.] Enjoy.  Cherish.

These true flowers will only stay open for a day.  Carpe Diem. Live and love baby! Live and love.

A Study in Mitts

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Last weekend included some nice times with friends at Tahoe Memorial State Park.  Our most notable event was the pre-burn celebration wherein we burned a stack of kindling that was inspired by the famous Goldsworthy’s “Egg”.  We took that egg and gave it a couple of extra curves and turned it into an hourglass.  So, really, it’s um, time burned.

Hourglass, burned

We also spent some time shaking a bit of bouldering rust off.  It wasn’t pretty.  There are some good color full body shots, but really, its amazing how overworked our hands must have been – out of shape and knowing it.

So here’s a shot of three peeps (well two and a wifey) at work –  Jereme, Dan and Drea.  I love how the black and white bring these “tools” into focus.   How they sing of strain and struggle.  Just hands.  Body, balance, difficulty are irrelevant.  It’s nothing but mitts here.   Click on a pic to enlarge.

Enjoy.

Spiders

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I Still Believe in the Tooth Fairy

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Following up the longest blog post I’ve ever done – I’ll go short.  Real short.  This is my office at night.  Coyote Ridge.  I love long exposure and this one is my longest. Let’s call it 5 hours long.  But it’s not one exposure.  I used a software program called Startrails written by Achim Schaller from Freiburg, Germany.  It combines multiple exposures into a single image and it’s a powerful, powerful program.  Lots to play with in terms of both user controls as well as which images to input into the analysis.  I learned that one or two lighter images will really brighten up the finished product quickly. Thanks Achim – this program is a gem.  Click on photo to enlarge.

Can you guess what the brightness in the right part of the frame represents?

I Still Believe in the Tooth Fairy

Celebrating Independence… from Cars – Transit and Trail Triple Threat Photojournal

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Sky Islands in Mt. Hamilton country

I’ll start this one off by thanking the Bay Area Open Space Council & Transit and Trails for helping create a movement in which people are excited to enjoy the outdoors without contributing to our carbon-pregnant atmosphere.  This celebrates American independence in so many ways.  It celebrates ingenuity.  It celebrates access for all.   It celebrates the kinetic power of human flesh.  Our bodies are amazing tools for enjoying life.  We must take care of them.  Yeah, human flesh, that’s pretty cool huh?

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Giant Expectations with Carly and Jason and Family

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So this was my first time meeting Carly and Jason, and it was memorable afternoon outside of PacBell dodging baseball fans, cars, and singlespeeds.

Carly (the bride) is seen here hanging “on” her sister Layne.  They’re definitely a dynamic duo.  They like to smile, laugh, and generally incite “good-timedness”. We had a ball outside of the game trying on a few different “engagement session” poses. You kn0w, the usual stuff – the Willie Mays, Abbey Road.   Continue reading →

Portrait of a Pincushion as a Young Forb

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A reprise of a recent Flickr post.

Here’s the text I posted with the original photo:

Chaenactis, or pincushion, litters the desert floor. Its dainty top-heavy heads are known to wave in the wind. It’s an inconspicuous little aster. But all so important for the desert tortoise. Studies indicate that pincushion is the number one food for desert tortoises in the Mojave. I can just imagine how many hundreds of these a grown 50-year old desert tortoise has consumed…

Texture by Nasos3.  Files combined and layered in Photoshop Elements 8. Amazingly these two photos came together beautifully with little additional manipulation.  The combination setting was “overlay” for combining the photos.  100% for both photos – flower on top of texture.  Simple is great.

Single umbrella, lovely lady

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So here’s my homage to one good light, one fast lens and a beautiful lady (eh hem, she’s my wife).  Simple set up in the living room with a blanket hanging from the doorframe.  One off-camera Canon speedlight (580 EX) and a 33″ shoot-thru umbrella.  Canon 50mm prime set at f2.2.  I have a little bounce (small light disk) on camera left to provide some fill.  I think this baby just sings.  And I think my babe is beautiful.  Single umbrella, lovely lady.  I’m a lucky dude!

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Istanbul AND Constantinople: merging images

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I’ve been enthralled by the act (and art) of merging images.  There’s just so much you can do with this process, both artistically and message-wise.  I think this technique has become so much more accessible with digital cameras. Like a whole lot.

Just think, about 10 years ago, the only way to get this image was to take a picture, (not forward the film), snap another, (still don’t advance film), and finally a third photo – with probably some travel in between photo locations. (Then you hope and pray the photo turns out!)