12-10-12 The Little Angel

I wandered into one of our community's cemeteries today in search of photo opportunities and I ended up visiting the little angel that graces a 1911 grave site. I have photographed her before but I couldn't resist taking a few more pictures.She seems obvlious to the cold and snow that embrace her. . .

12-09-12 Experiment With Bokeh and Water Glass

As far as photographic experiments go, I would say that this photo represents a successful failure. I spent time yesterday learning about the quality of bokeh produced by various lenses at various degrees of focus. In the midst of this, I had the idea of putting a full glass of water in front of our Christmas tree. I imagined that the round bokeh would show up in the water glass, given the lens effect that water can have. But I imagined wrong. Oh, well. . .What I like about this photo is that everything is soft and round - except the way the light shows up in the water glass. Here, it is sharp and linear. Too abstract? Boring? Maybe. I suspect I will revisit this idea to see if I can end up with something better.

12-08-12 A Taste of Winter

"So what does winter taste like?" you ask. It's cold and bland, I suppose, though South Dakotans are a bit perverse when it comes to winter weather: as much as we might complain about snow and cold, we appreciate, and perhaps even savor, a snow storm such as the one that moved into our state today.What I have a hard time savoring is the fact that the snow that falls this weekend will probably be here for weeks to come. I like this shade of white a lot more. . .

12-07-12 Morning Stroll

This photo was published on Instagram a while ago but I think my audience is a little different here, so here you go. This is Katie and Brian strolling in their beautiful neighborhood in St. Paul, Minnesota.

12-06-12 Kinkankuji

I'll have to admit that I like this photo, which isn't something I'm inclined to say about my work. A photo should speak for itself, I guess.But I like this one because it's green, and South Dakota is anything but green right now. I also like it because I rescued it from the virtual dumpster. Finally, I like it because it helps me see the value of software processes in a photographer's work flow. I don't want to get technical in today's post but I will say that I started with this image (click), and ended up with the "adjusted" version in the blog. They say you can't fool Mother Nature. But she can be enhanced. :-)Kinkankuji is otherwise known as the Golden Pavilion, which is near/in Kyoto, Japan. Here's a satellite view (click) of the location. I wish I could tell you exactly where I was standing when I took this, but I wasn't in to GPS fixes in 2004, when we visited Japan

12-05-12 HDR in B&W (Variations on a Theme)

Yes, I repeat myself. But it isn't because I'm being lazy today. It's because I couldn't decided if I liked the color version of this photo (yesterday's post) or the black and white version. So I offer both.

12-04-12 Magical (HDR)

This is another HDR photo taken on the same outing as "Back To Lonesome Lake." This one was taken 15 minutes before the Lonesome lake photo. At sunset, a minute or can be significant in the look you get. And, as I think you can see, 15 minutes can be worlds apart as far and the light and cloud cover are concerned.

12-03-12 Still Life With Shepherd, Lamb and Bokeh

I like the fact that lowly shepherds play a role in the Christmas story. So when Deb was shopping for Christmas decorations, I couldn't resist buying two figures from a Nativity collection. I would have bought more sheep but they were $1.98 apiece and I didn't want to invest too much into what I knew would result in one photo.Incidentally, I have assigned a bokeh photo to my students and so I offer one here. And since I've done a holiday bokeh thing two years in a row (2010) (2011), I guess I've established an annual tradition by offering one now. . . .

12-02-12 Back To Lonesome Lake (HDR)

It has been more than a year since I have photographed near Lonesome Lake. That session resulted in the photo I donated to the "fireplace room" at Lake Area Technical Institute in Watertown, South Dakota.On this occasion, I told Deb around 4:15 yesterday afternoon that I was going to go looking for a photo opportunity. I wanted to see if I could get something in HDR at sunset that would look good. Then, I invited her along for the ride and she said "yes." What a treat!I started heading north of our town, all the while watching the sun and clouds off to the southwest. My vision for the photo involved bare trees and a beautiful sky just before or just after sunset. I also didn't want any clear signs of civilization. If you go 20 miles north and a few miles west of Watertown, that isn't hard to do.After one other stop, I ended up at Lonesome Lake. By that time, the sun had set, and the clouds weren't all that interesting. But I thought that I could at least show Deb the location. It was getting dark but I decided to try to take a series of photos, knowing that the camera sees light in ways that I don't. I also knew that if I put my camera on a tripod and bracketed the exposures properly, I had several software tools that might produce something worth sharing.And here's the result. There is a surprising amount of texture in this photo, especially given that this (click here) is much closer to what I was seeing when I took the series. Pretty interesting, isn't it?

12-01-12 Frosty

On this first day of December, I offer you a photo of something that Hawaiians would never see. Lest I give Hawaiians an inferiority complex for saying this, there are plenty of things they could photograph that South Dakotans couldn't find at home. Active volcanoes, rain forests, black sand beaches, plumeria trees,f and the Pacific Ocean are a few that come to mind.

11-30-12 here.i.m

If I were an M&M, I'd be brown. I am an introvert who would rather blend in. And, in most observable ways, I am a conformist. And, when I am immersed in my photography, I disappear. . . .Check out the Shutterbug article featuring my blog.

11-29-12 RGB

I would call this an editorial photo. Instead of creating something that is artistic and packed with emotion, I wanted to take a photo that would help reinforce the technical aspect of how cameras and photo editing software see color, which is referred to as RGB, or red, green, blue.This was initially going to be a full color photo with all of the RGB M&Ms clustered in the front. But my colleague Dennis (click to visit his blog) suggested that I use selective coloring in Aperture instead. And voila! Here you have it.Check out the Shutterbug article featuring my blog.And did you know that you can subscribe to my blog by filling in the email form at the bottom of the page? Yes, you can!