23-APR-2008
23 Apr
This was not my PaD choice during the shoot, for some reason though, it grows on me during PP.
It would figure, one of 3 quick hand-held shots from underneath the bridge is the one I like best. The other shots were long exposures with the B+W ND 3 (1000x) ND filter again. It is beginning to become my favorite accessory.
Back to this photo, this is the underside of the General Sullivan bridge. This used to be 'the' bridge between Dover and Newington, NH. A simple two lane job, back when the Spalding Turnpike was only two lanes. Now it is a rusting reminder of sprawl. There are two new bridges beside this providing 4 lanes and that is woefully undersized for today (well, it's been undersized for about 12 years). There are plans in the works to increase the size of the bridge, possibly removing this old structure in the process. At $250 million, and ten years out, there are a lot of photos left of this old behemoth before I need to worry about it.
There is a park to the left (west) of this bridge that gives access to this area (Hilton Park).
The tides are pretty brutal, I got there as the tide just started coming in. I set up my tripod with about a foot to spare to the water, two shots and the end cap was under water.
It got into the 80's today. Its still April and we are having July weather. Normally we are bitching about the rain right about now. Actually a lot of people are bitching about the rain, rather the lack of it.
Here are the photos that I spent most of my time on, but didn’t make today’s PaD:
22-APR-2008
22 Apr
So my son was sick again today, I stayed home as my wife had to go to the midwest for a day. I worked pretty much all day (I am actually more focused at home, even with the kids) and took a short break in the afternoon for some PaD shots. This past weekend, the jonquils started blooming. I am sure I could have gotten the tripod out, put the center column into horizontal mode, and snapped a few really good shots, but it was a bit windy and I really didn't have a ton of time. So I handheld the 17-55, while sitting on the ground and shooting "From the hip" in that I didn't look through the viewfinder, I guessed, shot, checked the preview and adjusted.
I have a color version of this, I just like the BW better. PBase has a ton of yellow & white jonquils already.
Instead of bringing out the larger roll of black duck cloth, I took a black tee shirt and draped it over a log behind the flowers. I didn't get the shirt high enough to provide enough of a blacked out background so I compensated by pumping up the Black point during PP in Lightroom.
This is about an 80 to 90 percent crop.
21-APR-2008
21 Apr
So I had some extra time to kill this evening. I'd planned on sneaking out at 6pm and going towards the coast for a bit but my wife called to let me know I had to pick up our girls from softball practice. Not a problem, I decide to take a bit longer way home, up in the hills a bit with lots of farm houses. The road I planned on taking runs parallel to my normal commuting route for most of the trip, intersecting with the main thoroughfare a few miles from my house. So I head to this road (known locally as Rte 101) only to find that they are working on a stretch of the road near the beginning (southeast end) and they have us detoured back west onto my normal commute route. These are interesting tidbits of information that would have been nice to know before I went out of my way to come back to my normal route.
I did make it back to 101 and found this old house with plenty of room to park for photos. The sun was hitting it just right.
I've done something that I normally don't do, I have three completely different treatments to the three keepers. The other two are in my other gallery:
20-APR-2008
20 Apr
Here is a shot of a door at the Woolen Mill building, around the corner from our development. The name of our development "Old Mill" comes from this mill. As the crow flies, it's only about a mile from our house (tops).
I would love to have the chance to actually go into this old mill, I can bet there are plenty of things worth photographing inside.
I just finished reading
The Placenames of South Berwick so I am all historied up on our town. One of the benefits of the book is that I discovered a few parks/public use lands that I never knew existed.
The Woolen mill exists on the Great Works river. Just downstream from this building (and the falls) is Leigh's Mill Pond, on the other side of the pond are the
falls that I photographed for last week's PaD. Up river a way (about a mile of winding curves) is the area that we put in (canoe/kayaks) near our house. Canoe and Kayak weather is pretty much here and I suspect we will start soon (my oldest has been begging me since the ice began to melt). I haven't had the nerve to take my DSLR into the kayak with me yet, I might this year. There are miles of unpopulated shorelines rich with all kinds of life (turtles, frogs, birds, deer, etc).
19-APR-2008
19 Apr
Awesome weather today. I spent most of my day getting our pop-up camper cleaned, I am always amazed at the amount of dirt, grime, mildew, etc that accumulates on our RVs over the winter.
I took off for a short ride to find something for my PaD, I actually had more of a barn scene in mind, which is why I went out the way I did. The road that I'd hope to nab a barn on loops back to Emery's Bridge Road, on this road is the Emery's Junk yard, in front of the Junk yard is this old car that I've been wanting to stop and admire for a while.
So, the barn didn't pan out, the side I wanted to shoot was in the shadows. It would have made for a good HDR project, but I haven't purchased CS3 or the new Photmatix yet (though I am playing with Photmatix 3.0 and actually getting decent results).
I have no idea what kind of car this is (I am not really a car person). I do know that it looks pretty cool. I am a bit shocked at the windows, this car has been sitting in a dirt lot for years (trees are growing around it). It was almost like someone washed the windshield for me.
Here are a few more shots that didn't make the PaD:
18-APR-2008
18 Apr
I pass this marshy area 2 times a day (4 times today) and have wanted to get a sunset photo of it before pollen season AND before it dries out.
I think I rushed it a bit tonight, this shot is really screaming HDR to pull in the complete range.
I'm not super impressed with the high noise in this shot at ISO 400, but it was rushed and the exposure is not correct.
I did grab a bracketed set of photos and might give this a whirl as an HDR, but my HDR luck has been not so good.
17-APR-2008
17 Apr
I'm not usually prone to this over the top Post Processing, but it was the only saving grace for this photo and for my lunchtime shoot in general. I'd been past this old rail bed on the base a number of times and have found it pretty fascinating. Sometimes fascinating doesn't equate to photogenic. . .
I will admit tha the treatment is kind of interesting. It helped bring out the old rail and also brought out the animal footprints running across it (an unexpected benefit). I can only assume that this area of track washed out during our relatively recent spring time flooding. It has been abandoned for quite some time. When I was a full time guardsmen (mid '90s) we'd bike out this road, I don't remember seeing this back then. For all I know though, this could have washed out in the 70's, I don't remember ever seeing a train run on the base.
16-APR-2008
16 Apr
OK, sticking with a theme here. . .
I've been trying to figure out a way to incorporate the old base supply building into my PaD and it looks like I found a way. . .
There was a lot more to this building then this chimney, but it is pretty boring (trust me).
I'm cutting the story short here, I've been calling all my T-Ball players tonight and now I need to get an email together.
15-APR-2008
15 Apr
Tax Day in the US Today!
What better way of celebrating this most auspicious day than to post a photo of an old water tower!
This water tower is on a hill behind where I work. It sits at the highest point in the last area of Officer Base housing that remained (but was torn down in January - See my PaD's then for more photos). I'd been trying to photograph this damn structure for the past two years, but never really had a good angle. Today, I was driving around and found what I'd always thought to be a driveway to an old house, but was an access road to the tower. It's a beautiful spot, as I was walking towards the tower there were birds and squirrels rustling in the dried leaves. They obviously thought the area was theirs.
I used just about the same PP treatment that I did for last week's light tower shot. Had the same clear blue skies too. I think I will be back to harvest more rusty shots.
14-APR-2008
14 Apr
I stayed home today with my son who was sick, turns out I either had/have/caught what he has/had. Can't beat that to start your week.
We actually got out today to run some errands. Back in the morning when we still had energy. Errands to the tune of "lets find a toilet tank to bowl gasket so the upstairs toilet will stop leaking". Those kinds of errands. I replaced all the guts of said toilet (which had been leaking before its surgery) and noticed that the universal gasket wasn't quite right. So anyway, got that fixed today.
My energy and creativity level has basically bottomed out, though this shot doesn't look half bad (if I say so myself). My girl's have their first official softball practice of the season tonight (wife took them) and I got to thinking. . .
T-Ball starts up soon too, I coach my son's team. We started gathering up all the gear a few weeks ago, I've been informed that we are in need of new cleats (kids just grow and grow).
The ball on the glove is an official Major League ball that I got when I was a kid. We went to a Red Sox spring training game in Florida (1980?) and I tried real hard to get Yaz's signature (as in Karl Yastrzemski, #9). My baseball hero let me down, he wanted nothing to do with the kids. While I was begging for an autograph, this older guy tells me he will sign my baseball (he was in the seats behind me). I let him sign it, thanked him, and went back to trying for more Red Sox signatures. The guy who signed it, wrote "Johnny Pesky", someone I'd never heard of at the time. I know who Johnny Pesky is now! And I have forgotten that other player who ignored us (that same guy who was given a boat on his retirement).
The other signatures on the ball:
Dave Stapleton
Wade Boggs
For the longest time, I could not find this baseball, I'd thought my parents sold it in a yard sale after I left for the military. I would tell people the story, but got the 'main character' wrong. For some reason, I thought it was Ted Williams who signed the ball. I just found this ball in a memento box that my parents dropped off in the fall. My son was actually talking about it today, which is why it was on my mind come PaD time.
13-APR-2008
13 Apr
Here's the version that made my PaD. After running around a bit taking photos on both sides of the river today, I came across this tuft of light brown grass sticking out of this brick wall or foundation. I knew that it would make a great Black and White, so I spent a bit of time taking various photos trying to get it right.
After I got back and looked at it in Lightroom, I'd realized that I should have stopped it down once to get the whole clump of grass in focus. The effect is not lost, however, so it still 'won out' in the competition for today's PaD shot.
Here is a different angle from this brick wall:
Not PaD:
12-APR-2008
12 Apr
I went back to Leigh's Mill Pond today to take some long exposure photos. I had a bunch of keepers after my Post Processing so I added a new gallery for the one's that didn't make my PaD:
This was a tough choice, I went with this photo, a continuation of last night's SP PaD. The zoom technique is working quite well with this tripod.
Today's goal (at home) was to work on getting decent prints out of my printer from Lightroom. After a few tries with a snapshot or two, I decided to take a photo of the Gretag MacBeth color card and print it. I have come to the conclusion that the Epson RX580 was never meant to produce awesome photos. I had a hell of a time trying to find ICC profiles for it on the web. I never did find the profiles, I did find some profiles for a Japanese version of the printer (or so I am told) though they didn't turn out so hot. I really want to get the 2400, but am dragging my feet on it. It's interesting that I have so many digital photos and so few prints (less than 5, I'd say). We have lots of wall space for hanging them too. I plan to try a few local shops and an online service or two before dropping some $$ for the 2400.
Oh yeah, my son preferred the Black and White version of this, though technically, in the gallery, the Black and White is of a different photo.
I congratulated him on his taste. My wife liked the wider shot of the actual bridge and dam. She actually liked it before I processed it which got me to thinking about adding it.