A Quick Post

 

This image was made in the Sculpture Garden of The Metropolitan Museum In NYC with the Lensbaby Double Glass Optic, processed in Nik and PS.

This is just a shot I made on my last day run to NYC, while passing through Grand Central, handheld Lensbaby, run through Snapart2 Pastel filter.

This was a grab shot as we were walking briskly to catch the bus home,  I loved the stand up chrome topped pizza tables with no one there.

And for those of you who have been enjoying the oldies shots, (thanks for the comments and e-mails),  I have been posting here is my mom in 1927, a studio shot made in England. For all those studio photographers out there, just think your work will make it into some ones cherished files 100 years from now. Priceless!

I did no work on this image! Just resized it for the web. 

Thanks Just Thanks! For everything!

Nik Silver Efex Pro Ambrotype Filter on Red Maple Leaves

Generosity, Empathy, Sympathy and Gratitude, science now says makes us happy as human beings...well I see that every day on the FB community of photographers and friends. Sympathy expressed for loved ones lost, empathy for those that are sick and generosity in sharing, with gratitude for the lives we live.

How thankful I am to be touched by many great folks in the photography world. Just to name a few,
I think it was Tony Sweet who I heard first utter the words "Nik" like it was some magical photographic have to have and Barbara Kile who's beautiful textured flower images impressed me so that I inquired about her process, and she shared.  Then there is the amazing group of Baltimore Camera Club members who have shared their work, their techniques and their passion for the art of photography! and many more terrific folks I have met along the way. How about the talented Marie from Penn Camera, or the fun loving Darcy and my students so fun to work with! That is why I am thankful today.

I am also thankful for my beautiful daughter who lives in Seattle, the good parenting of my parents, and their love, I miss very much! It's the people in your life that make the difference! I hope everyone had a great day with their loved ones!

 Today I played with a few images, updated my sites and just hung out at home, a great day for an x- retailer who is now sympathizing with those still in the business having to work ungodly hours through the season. But I am grateful too that I had a good career in retail, there is nothing like it when it comes to the holidays!

Having recently added Nik Silver Efex Pro to my software options, (actually I added the whole suite), I processed these two images. The opening image is just a straight filter Ambrotype and the image below I had already processed in OnOne for the scratched film effect, and in Photoshop, but Nik's software let me see them differently by using some of their filters. Thanks Nik!

Before Nik

Nik Silver Efex Pro Wet Rocks Filter with Kodak Tri-x 400 TX Pro

My First Home 1958 Snow Storm Priceless!

I am also really glad my Dad was a photographer so I can share images like this from the old neighborhood!

Last of Lensbaby Loves New York

Just cleaning off the desk top and realized I processed but did not post these two shots from my Lensbaby Loves New York Photo Trip. One thing I love about NYC is all the advertising, yes, I do love the advertising from the Classic old Neon Script lights to the JumboTrons!
I will be repeating this photo day trip in March and will post info on it as soon as the Megabus schedule for March is posted to their site.

Easy Week??

Well this week looks like it might be an easier week so I can catch up around the house. Spent today outside getting the garden ready for winter and doing some domestic chores. Bagged 10 leaf bags from the garden bed, and called it quits to watch the Ravens play! I made some Thanksgiving cards for family that I have to get in the mail. Tonight I played a little with some "color" images from my New York City day workshop. The first image is a straight Lensbay shot created with the double glass optic, at the wholesale flower market. The next stop was the Nygard store front windows. I just love how electric the lights are in that store and the way the buildings across the street cast reflections. Locked is a shot worked in Snapart2 Impasto and building abstract was also worked in Snapart2 for a fun effect.

New York New York

Man I love that city! Yesterday I led a group around the city from the wholesale flower area on 28th and 7th Street to Central Park at the Met. It was a beautiful day in the city. I enjoyed helping the participants use their Lensbaby and make exposure settings, while finding subjects and compositions. We made images of the modern architecture to street scenes, and even a few shots in the museum. I suggested that the images they were capturing would also make good candidates for monochrome conversions.

 

The exhibit of Strand, Stieglitz and Steichen was pretty amazing. I will be repeating the same photo tour on March 23, 2011, and as soon as the mega bus posts it's schedule for that date I will have a link for purchase if you might be interested in the March trip.

 

While viewing the images I made note of the Carbon Transfer Process, as I enjoyed seeing those images very much. Man is that a real process. They also had on display the Stiechen image  "The POND-Moonlight", the most expensive photograph ever sold.
It was also very cool to see how important the New York Camera Club was in the history of photography in general. All the images here were made with the  Lensbaby double glass optic and converted in Photoshop and Nik Silver Efex Pro. The bench shot and Macy's was also run through Snapart2.

Fall Impression on Location Columbia, MD

Yesterday was a full day of tutoring. What fun  helping other photographers learn new ways to work with their images and camera. One session was totally computer oriented, selecting, sorting, sizing and editing images for personal use, and uploading to a site for calendar production. The other session involved a short time shooting around Lake Kittamaqundi, in Columbia, Md. and working on images from a previous shoot, selecting, sorting and processing. I wanted to at least carry my camera in the afternoon session to help frame up some shots for my client. So I chose to put on the Lensbaby with the soft focus insert. Being at the Lakefront brought back some memories of when I lived in Columbia, Md. 35 years ago, whew...that's a while back!~ Anyway, Clyde's Restaurant an old favorite, is still there and the plantings around the lake are now mature.

The old Rouse Company headquarters now boasts the name of General Growth Properties, the company that purchased the "Rouse Company" after the founding father James Rouse passed away.  Life size bronze statues of him and his brother Willard, now occupy space along the waterfront lake he made. He was quite a visionary, creating Columbia Maryland an entire town out of rural land between Washington and Baltimore.

We were working with the multiple opportunities to photograph interesting architecture and public spaces,in the late afternoon, as if you were on vacation and wanted to return with images of the area.

I made the opening yellow tree shot before the session started as the trees along the boulevard were just so beautiful with their fall canopies lining main street. All the images, here were made with the Lensbaby Soft Focus insert and processed with Snapart2 pastel application, which gave me the very impressionist images I had in my mind when I looked at the scenes.  Maybe it was the foggy memory of 35 years ago that made me see the place this way! But I also love Impressionism. My client on the other hand had tack sharp images of the scene, and lots of different compositions. We were working on the many ways to "see" a subject and landscape. Looking forward to a New York City Day trip tomorrow with some workshop participants!

Oh and wow a memory flash, I saw Jimi Hendrix perform at Merriweather Post Pavillion in Columbia on August 16, 1968. It was an amazing night; a huge thunderstorm rolled through, cracking lightening and thunder was all around seemingly striking and flashing as if staged. When we left the concert, the little stream we had to cross was flooded and people were swimming and jumping in it......I was soaking wet and drove home in a VW Beatle with some other friends!  Hows that for a 16th birthday! Did someone say Hippies??? Too bad I was not taking pictures then, but the picture is burned in my brain, so I can only share it with my words.

Seeing Red

It has been over a week since I actually made any images. I only know that because my down loading device was still packed in my photo bags from the beach workshop a week ago. Yesterday on the way home from Virginia the beauty of the weeping cherry tree along the road by the entrance to my neighborhood made me stop and turn around and get out of the car, but I could not frame up what I saw from the road, due to background distractions, so I did not make any images. However later in the evening, I thought about how else I could photograph the tree if I got a chance to go back. Yes I was thinking about that image when I went to bed; now that just may be obsession! Any way when I left my house today to go the grocery store my Japanese Red Maple was a glow in the soft overcast light. So I got my camera out and played a little before I went to the grocery.
What I envisioned the night before was getting under the weeping cherry tree and shooting up, so I did just that today with my red maple. I used the gray sky instead of running away from it by including it in the image as the background element. I worked to use that gray sky to my advantage.  Choosing a shallow depth of field and different focus points I was able to get these images. I also made a few swipes...I love abstraction and impressionism, just color, shape, form, texture and design.......

Mid Atlantic Nature Photo Expo

Today I had the great pleasure of making a presentation at the Mid-Atlantic Nature Photography Expo.
The Hylton Center for Performing Arts is a fabulous new building on the campus of George Mason University and it made a terrific venue for the expo.

It is a huge effort put forth on the part of the Volunteer Members that organize and plan the event and they did a super job!
Unfortunately Charles Needle was taken ill and I was asked on Friday to fill the hour long presentation on Impressionism and Creative Macro Photography. So I began to cull through images for the presentation. One of the fun aspects of going through old files is finding jewels that have been processed and filed away. I became involved in photography because I enjoyed seeing the wonders of nature up close through a macro lens. The images here represent the quote I used as an opening idea on Photo Impressionism, from Paul Klee "Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes visible."

The images here I made shortly after I shot them in January.  The literal image capture was only one quarter of what is "visible" here. The subjects were large icicles that formed along the banks of the lake and had trapped matter from the shore inside them as they formed. When I discovered them the sun was low on the horizon and the way in which the light was hitting the icicles created all these jewel like colors as the ice acted as a prism.

The technique I used to make these Kaleidoscope like images is mirroring in Photoshop, both on the horizontal and vertical. When I was a child I was fascinated with the unique effects the kaleidoscope made visible just by tumbling colorful glass chips. I am still fascinated by the patterns created here.

This week I am looking forward to conducting my New York Photo Day Trip Workshop. I still have a few spaces if you might want to go. It should be a fun day!

Farewell to the sea!

Just about ready to head back to the city and before unplugging, I thought I would post some work from the second day/evening shoot from the weekend workshop at the beach. On the second night of the workshop we visited Ocean City, and we had soft light that eventually broke into a pretty amazing display of color and light. The waves were amazingly large and frequent, slamming the pilings of the pier and break water jetty. The jetty shot is a straight shot with a long exposure.

The pier shot here is run through Snapart2 for an impasto texture, just for fun! and the a frame was applied in onOne software.

This is also a straight shot with a long exposure as the last light of day illuminated the rocks of the distant jetty.

This is also a straight shot, but one that reminds us as photographers to always turn around. At the beach the setting sun can create some spectacular effects on the eastern sky and shore as night falls. Here the very low angle of the sun lit up the bottom of the clouds and the tops of the waves while simultaneously creating a soft pink cast on the clouds on the eastern horizon.

This image is a swipe of the dune fence line and light poles in the inlet paring lot with an image overlay in the sky......my impression......of the scene......all images were made with the 70-200 2.8 Nikon Lens.

Looking forward to Spring and the next Beach Workshop in April! 

Time to lock up and hit the road!

Workshop Images

You never know where the road takes you or why, but just before I started the workshop here at the beach, I had been in communications with a Captain of a Schooner, working together on arranging a photo workshop aboard a Schooner on the bay for next year. We were talking about when and where and other things and I shared some images I made from the Governors cup, as an idea of what I would like to try and have on the sail workshop, "other sails on the bay to shoot." So he went to the link I provided and looked at my images. As I had to leave for the workshop on Thursday I explained to him I would probably not be in touch until I got back home.....and in some correspondence to me he wrote?

 "The spoken zen is not the true zen. Like the difference between the "photographer" who has all the latest gear, the best camera, all the filters, the great camera bag, the 10 gig card, the vest with all the pockets, the spot meter, etc... contrasted by the person who quietly brings herself into harmony with her environment, lets her surroundings speak to her, stands in awe of the angles and colors and textures and echoes of form... sees an image in her mind's eye, and slowly brings up the camera, hands working the controls without thinking, her mind focused on the shot... a soft click... and the image is recorded in her mind as indelibly as it is on the memory card in the camera.
How do you teach that? " ~A. N.~

Well.........I incorporated his words into the beginning of my slide presentation on Friday afternoon, as they described just exactly how I wanted my group to get in touch with the environment here to make their images.
I have to say I was bowled over by their creativity and talent. It was a very rewarding experience for me and I only hope they felt the same. I asked if I could share a few of the images they made on my blog and they all agreed...so enjoy these images from the workshop! I must say, we had great light, great weather and great shooting.

1st sunrise of the workshop

Yeah, thanks to the Atlantic and the sky! It was a pretty cool sunrise with big surf. Just processed a few in between sessions. Everyone had a good time shooting! Afternoon session starts soon......

Ist day workshop down...

It was a beautiful day here on the Delaware Coast! The group arrived and we  spent a couple hours going over some ideas on shooting the beach and preparation for shooting tomorrow...hope its a spectacular sunrise! We also had a nice dinner together before everyone went back to get ready for tomorrow am...

Here is a shot I made on the boardwalk the first night I arrived. Processed in PS then into onOne for some other texture work and then into Poladroid for the Polaroid look. ; - )

Ocean City

Arrived at the beach today late his afternoon. My beach workshop starts tomorrow at 4:00. I am looking forward to helping the participants make some images of the ocean The waves were pretty strong today and there were a few surfers in the water. The rain was letting up as dusk was falling and I headed toward Ocean City, Md.  I wanted to make some images down there with the wet road and boardwalk.

It really is pretty much a ghost town here at least on a week night. The character of the resort in the off season is very different! I walked on the pier and the waves were shaking it...a feeling I did not like so I headed back to the boardwalk. After making a few images I headed back to Bethany Beach...