The Mighty Pen

The end.. or is it?

2010-07-23T15:56:00.000-07:00

That's about as far as it goes really.Ninety plus days with my new camera, I actually got to 111 before I missed a day. A picture a day for 111 days. Something I thought I'd never be able to do. I've developed as a photographer in that time. Discovered new ideas and concepts and as such it's time to move on and explore those. So I present to you blur-o-graphy A blog about my fascination with taking blurred pictures. There's some interesting stuff over there. I hope you'll go and take a look.

Thanks for watching this blog!

Day 92 Clouds

2010-07-01T18:27:00.000-07:00

One of my favourite photograph books is "Horizons" by Craig Blacklock. I which he set up a camera on the top of a cliff overlooking Lake Superior and photographed the Horizon. A super selection of pictures and something I was reminded of when I looked out of the window this morning. So, "What the heck" I thought if its good enough for Craig Blacklock then its good enough for me

day 91 picture

2010-07-01T18:26:00.001-07:00

I found a scene with a strong diagonal stress to it. I wondered if blurring it would work. I'm not entirely sure if it does or not. The colour seems strong enough Perhaps its just the diagonal blur thats disconcerting. Ah well it's an experiment and a lesson learned...

Day 91 Withdrawls.

2010-07-01T12:13:00.000-07:00

Day 91 came. There was no pressure to take a picture. But out of habit the camera went in my bag as I headed out to work. But I was busy at work and never got a chance to take any pictures. Still wasn't bothered. However, as the day wound on and I got home I started to feel like something was missing. The need to take a picture grew and grew and by 7pm I was getting quite desperate. I hunted around the garden looking for plants weeds, bugs anything to excite me into a photograph. It was Doctor Who on BBCAmerica at 8pm surely I could hold out until then and once that was on I'd be so engrossed in the show I'd forget all about it.
Not so fast. Every commerical break I looked out of the window longingly at the evening light (the fact that this Doctor Who story involved Vincent Van Gogh did nothing to curb my artistic feelings) So one break I got up and went outside and shot pictures.
It made me feel better.
The pictures? You'll have to wait until I process them

Day 90 Sunset Blur

2010-06-30T16:59:00.001-07:00

Well, I did it. I made it to 90 days, a picture a day. For this last shot I waited til the end of the day to capture something symbolic of coming to the end of the task. I'm really quite taken with what I call "blur-o-graphs" so I tried out the technique as the last rays of the sun shone on the woods next door.

Day 89 Tomato waiting to ripen

2010-06-28T16:37:00.001-07:00

My wife has a tomato plant in a pot on the deck. This is the first tomato to appear. It's about golf ball size. It still has a way to go before it can grace one of her salads...

Day 88 Red Lily pad

2010-06-28T16:34:00.000-07:00

Sunday I was sat on the dock in the gorgeous sunshine and saw this red lily pad a few inches below the surface of the water. I'd never seen a red lily pad before. So I thought it an excellent subject for the day

Day 87 the elusive hummingbird

2010-06-28T16:33:00.001-07:00

Saturdays picture is an attempt to catch a hummingbird feeding at the feeder on the deck

Day 86 reflections

2010-06-28T16:30:00.000-07:00

Playing catch up today. I was away up at the lake all weekend. This is the reflection of our neighbours speedboat in the water

Day 85 Peeling Birch Bark

2010-06-24T17:16:00.000-07:00

Seen this morning as I put the garbage out. Peeling bark from the Paper Birch in our front garden

Day 84 Feet up

2010-06-23T18:32:00.001-07:00

Nothing clever, nothing creative. Just what I saw today in the car park at work

A fool and his money

2010-06-23T10:54:00.000-07:00

Look at this. A Lubitel camera for sale at Amazon for $300 dollars.
What on earth?
Who is going to be stupid enough to pay $300 for one of them?
I bought one when I was first interested in medium format photography. I paid the equivalent of $50. It was a cheap way into medium format.
Cheap is the operative word. They are cheaply built with suspect quality control and prone to light leaks for starters.
But market these flaws correctly and associate the Lomography name with them and all of a sudden you can pay through the roof for them.
These cameras are not worth $300. Not in a month of Sundays. Amazon and the retailer must be laughing all the way to the bank...

Day 83 Infinite monkey theory

2010-06-22T17:30:00.000-07:00

I don't know why I was thinking of the Infnite Monkey Theory when I saw this picture but I was. For those of you unfamiliar with the I.M.T. it is that if you stick a monkey in front of a typewriter for an infinite length of time he will, in time, type the works of Shakespeare.

So by the same token if a person picks up a camera and without looking takes a picture he will, in time, come up with a good shot. This one isn't too bad and it only took me a dozen attempts...

Day 82 cloud

2010-06-21T16:29:00.000-07:00

Nothing more than a snapshot today.As I came out of work my eye was caught by this rather interesting arrangement of clouds.

Day 81 Underwater

2010-06-21T04:00:00.000-07:00

I've been away up at the lake this weekend which always gives some kind of interesting photo opportunity. Like these weeds underwater. I've seen people like Jim Brandenburg and Craig Blacklock photograph this subject and fancied a go myself and while out running I saw this chance. So after I'd run I picked up my camera and went back to the spot

Day 80 VerndaleRail

2010-06-21T03:59:00.001-07:00

On Saturday I was out with a group of fellow railfans on the Staples sub in Northwest Minnesota only a handful of miles from where the tornadoes struck on Thursday. We saw no evidence of any damage anywhere so we had a great time watching and photographing trains. A couple of my fellow enthusiasts children got into this shot. Which kinda sorta makes it echo some of the marvellous English railway posters from the golden age of trains

Day 79 bark

2010-06-18T14:13:00.001-07:00

Something a little calming after yesterdays excitement. I took a stroll in the woods out the back this morning perhaps hoping to find a tree down or something. No luck on that count but I did discover some fir trees with some remarkble bark.

Day 78 Storm

2010-06-17T16:48:00.000-07:00

Total and utter fluke this.

A big storm went thought town this evening.

You can't beat a big heavy storm for some great clouds so I stepped out in the rain to take a look and while I was taking this shot of the clouds over the road I snapped this...

Day 77 Prairie... Not

2010-06-16T17:28:00.001-07:00

A sliver of land underneath a big sky it could only be the American Prairie. Except it isn't It's by the entrance of my office building. to the left and right are other offices and over the horizon is Highway 169 bustling with cars at rush hour...

Day 76 beheaded

2010-06-15T18:23:00.001-07:00

I thought I wasn't going to have anything to show for today, everything I tried didn't work out then in desperation while walking around the garden I saw this impatiens head stripped from the hanging basket above during the previous nights storm that had fallen into some hosta leaves.

Day 75 you choose

2010-06-14T16:37:00.000-07:00

I'm having way too much fun with this little camera. It makes me want to go out and try all kinds of things. Today from some reason I was thinking of those long exposures where you zoom while the shutter is open. I had a go and I got a result I liked on my second attempt. (I did keep going but 'skeeters and the rain put a stop after about a dozen more goes.)
Anyway I pulled the picture into CameraRaw and then elements and had a play.
Not much of a play I only upped the saturation. But then in one shot I upped the clarity and in the other I knocked the clarity all the way down and now I can't decide..

Above: With the clarity set at +100 things become harder and the zoom is more apparent
-100 makes things softer and gives a more impressionist feel

Day 74 tree-o

2010-06-13T18:15:00.001-07:00

I saw this whilst out at Riverside park today checking out the bridge demolition The three tree trunks just seemed to line up nicely. I've also been experimenting with this one as a blur-o-graph...

The result of the weeks work

2010-06-13T12:38:00.001-07:00

Quite to my surprise this is entry 100 on this blog.

I've just returned from reviewing the scene at the bridge demolition. As you can see from the picture below it's as good as gone.

This section of wall below is about all that remains untouched.

Day 73 another blur-o-graph

2010-06-12T13:44:00.001-07:00

A really dull rainy day today. The perfect opportunity to try some more "blurography". There's little information out there on how to do it so I have to learn by experiences. I probably shot a good dozen or so of this one area and this is number 12 thats why I stopped.

"Quit while you're winning" say I.

I'm formulating some theories on this blur-o-graphy lark and grass seems a pretty easy subject to cut your teeth on. Being vertical it's easy to tilt the camera vertically and not loose sight of what the subject is.

Day 72 what I was waiting all week for

2010-06-11T14:57:00.000-07:00

Now come on. I was there for over a hour. You didn't think that I missed a close up of the side panel being lifted away did you?

Friday at the Bridge

2010-06-11T14:49:00.000-07:00

I arrived at the bridge about 2pm on Friday afternoon expecting that the side facing Riverside Park would be removed. In fact I was hoping quite desperately that it hadn't happened yet. I was not to be disappointed. When I arrived a good sized crowd had gathered as the removal of the side was underway.

Things were naturally proceeding quite carefully and a closer inspection of the pillars revealed that there was a rather ominous crack in the pillar.
Still after much to-ing and fro-ing and careful winching the side ended up on the south bank of the river where it would be broken up into rubble.
Leaving the pillar still standing precariously by itself.

Thursday at the bridge

2010-06-11T10:50:00.001-07:00

On Thursday evening I was greeted by the sorry site of only the central section remaining and even that had most of its decking removed. Yesterdays picture of the day showed that happening to a section of the deck.

I watched the process intently and looked up at the crane jibs silhouetted against the cloudy sky...
The section was lifted onto a couple of steel trestles in the river where it was carefully watched into placed by one of the workmen
Then the section of deck was roughly hauled up the bank to be broken up...

Wednesdays Bridge work

2010-06-11T10:42:00.001-07:00

Time for a bit of catch up. Here are some shots of the bridge demolition from Wednesday. As I arrived as the sun was setting I was expecting to see the middle section removed but no, most of the south bank sections had been taken instead.

and the decking sections were piled up on the north bank of the river.
While on the south bank workers stood around one of the excavators peering into the engine compartment as they are wont to do.

Day 71 Removal

2010-06-10T18:03:00.000-07:00

I was pretty lucky when I went down to check on the latest bridge removal progress this evening they were actually removing a section of the bridge deck

Two fer... Day 70

2010-06-09T18:23:00.000-07:00

Bit of a treat for you today. Two pictures. The first was taken first thing this morning as I spied the sunlight caressing the heavily dew laden grass. I thought "I bet there's a picture out there" and rushed out with my camera in hand and took some shots. Examining some I discovered that I had accidentally set the camera to f22 and a slow shutter speed, blurring everything. But I really liked what I saw so I carried on like that. Here's my favourite of the bunch.

Then tonight I went down to the river to record the days results of the bridge demolition, of which more another day. After finishing there I was drawn to the flow of the river over some rocks. I could see there was a picture in there and hoped I could record it. So I set my camera up with as slow shutter speed as I could waited until the exposure time got down to over 3 seconds and click.
I was right there was a picture there. This is exactly as I hoped it would look. I've never been so pleased with a picture in my life before.

Bridgework Tuesday

2010-06-09T03:57:00.000-07:00

Here are some views of the demolition work going on on the bridge as for 6pm on Tuesday. As you can see one section of deck has been removed and is being demolished on the river bank in the second picture. I expect to see the middle section removed when I go back on Wednesday evening.

Day 69 Drilling

2010-06-08T16:52:00.001-07:00

A grey day in town is apt conditions for the demolition of the Dunn bridge. Here a worker drills some preparatory holes for the removal of the centre span

The bridge is coming down

2010-06-07T15:49:00.001-07:00

Well as I've alluded to in a previous entry the Dunn Memorial Bridge in town is coming down sad but necessary as it may well fall down. Work has now started a feeling more like myself after a mornings rest I drove down to riverside park to see what was going on. Here's a few shots of the start of work.

Above and below: Sides are as good as removed

Above: This pillar remains to hold up a safety cable
Above: Excavator works at dumping rubble into the river for some construction purpose

Day 68 paying the price

2010-06-07T15:45:00.000-07:00

Tough day the day after a marathon all I wanted to do was rest. So this morning I hobbled across the road to collect the mail camera in hand and snapped this temporary road sign associated with the tearing down of the bridge in town

Day 67 another day, another marathon

2010-06-06T14:50:00.001-07:00

Just some shameless self promotion today. Today I ran the minneapolis marathon, my 14th marathon. It was a tough day that necessitated a trip to the first aid tent due to the conditions and on top of that I stepped in a pothole at mile 23 and limped the rest of the way in so I deserve this medal.

Day 66 Starfish

2010-06-06T14:48:00.001-07:00

My in-laws have quite the selection of items lying around their home. Like this old starfish for example.

Another leaf Day 65

2010-06-04T11:36:00.000-07:00

Well as I'm on a roll with planty type shots I might as well continue

The return of the Pine cone Day 64

2010-06-03T16:50:00.000-07:00

As a result of this picture a day project I've developed something of a fascination with pine trees and developing pine needles and cones and today I found a very young pine cone. I've never seen a green one before. it had to be todays picture

Day 63 The great Contradiction...

2010-06-02T18:25:00.001-07:00

...about this P.A.D. project is despite the fact I profess to being a general disliker of all things plant-like I seem to be photographing a lot of them...

Day 62 Hosta leaf up close

2010-06-01T16:47:00.000-07:00

I really like Hosta leaves close up there's a quite the feel like the colours were slapped on there with a palette knife in some kind of impressionistic way

Day 61 Iris bud

2010-05-31T15:28:00.001-07:00

Well day 60 on the picture a day project passed by with me realising. I've taken a photo every day fro 2 months. I'm pretty pleased with myself...

Anyhow it was a gorgeous day today so I was out and about looking in some of my favourite places for something but nothing jumped out at me. I took a few shots but they were all so-so until I got home and heard this Iris bud shouting at me in the sunshine from the front flower bed.

Day 60 Windblown Wild Rose

2010-05-31T08:00:00.001-07:00

Once again I've no idea what it is I just like the colours. The bloom was being battered by a breeze too which made it doubly difficult to get a picture. But there is something rather pleasing about the motion blur in the petals and the stamen(?) being sharp

Day 59 Trainspotting in Staples, MN

2010-05-30T08:56:00.001-07:00

OK as promised a train picture for the picture a day project...

Quite the caboose

2010-05-28T11:23:00.000-07:00

As you may know I'm a railfan and I do like to photograph trains, in fact there is close to a 100% chance that tomorrows picture of the day will be of a train. Anyway as I drove into work this morning as I passed through Osseo I saw a quite unusual sight. A caboose. A bright blue caboose. Now cabooses. cabeese/cabii (take your pick) are are a rare sight since the introduction of through braking on trains and to see such a swish looking one was a surprise. It had been holding the crew of the Schnabel car that had taken a rather large piece of equipment up to Monticello Power station the night before and had rested here, in Osseo, overnight. Alas I missed the Schnabel car but you don't see a bright blue caboose everyday now do you?

Day 58 quirky

2010-05-28T10:46:00.001-07:00

Its the start of a holiday weekend. Lets look for some fun.

Day 57 You'll either love it or hate it!

2010-05-27T16:38:00.000-07:00

What is it?

Exactly.

You have no way of knowing what it is (you can make a pretty good guess if you look) You certainly have no idea of the size of it.

It's the light fitting in the foyer at my workplace. Its about 12 feet long. I've had my eye on it for a while for a picture. Wether to show it as it really is in a light airy high key shot, or just totally destroy it was the decision I had to make. Today I was in the mood to destroy it. So I metered off the light to throw everything else into darkness and then bump up the blacks in CameraRaw. The white dots are some small spotlights in the ceiling.

It might grow on you.

Here comes another one Day 56

2010-05-26T16:30:00.001-07:00

This is the picture I've been wanting to take all week. Every day I've been outside photographing I've been sizing this one up. Checking angles and viewpoints. Today I went for it and took the shot. I was drawn by the big powerful curve running into the vertical pillar and then diagonally across the rest of the picture.

The Workplace day 55

2010-05-25T18:20:00.001-07:00

Following on from yesterdays workplace exterior shot I present two today. The same shot. One in black and white and one in colour. Normally I don't think much of black and white but it stresses the graphic qualities of the image in this instance.

"W" day 54

2010-05-24T18:09:00.001-07:00

This here inter-web thingy is a marvellous place. There are these wonderful places called forums where like minded individuals hang out and share opinions and advice on all manner of things.

One such great place is the the micro four thirds site Mu-43.com lots of micro four thirds camera users swapping advice and inspiration. Yesterday I saw a particularly interesting picture an abstract building exterior shot and thought I'd like to try something like that. So today I looked for some interesing abstracts around my office complex. There was plenty to choose from on this large concrete, glass and steel slab and this view appealed to me. SO there we go. PLenty more to choose from where that came from I can tell you...

Hidden barn day 53

2010-05-23T12:36:00.000-07:00

I found this barn hidden away amongst the trees whilst out for a drive and thought it might make a worthwhile picture. I'm a tad annoyed that I couldn't totally crop the bland sky out of the picture being as it is such a cloudy day. But you can't have everything

Dead tree stands proud (day 52)

2010-05-22T16:33:00.001-07:00

After yesterdays ghostly watertrail picture experiments I'm sure you're expecting me to produce more of the same today. Well its not for want of trying. It was just too sunny so that was a no starter even though I went to have a look and see if I could do anything. But as I drove away from the lake my eye was caught by this dead tree lit up in my rear view mirror. So I stopped and out came the camera and tripod and I snapped away.

Back for more

2010-05-21T18:30:00.000-07:00

So, as well as posting the first pictures here I posted them on the mu-4/3 forum where I very quickly got some excellent advice on what to do to improve the pictures. So as the location is only 11 minutes down the road Fired up with reckless enthusiasm I headed back.

Now reckless enthusiasm is NOT a good thing because I forget everything I know. Good stuff like use the self timer to release the shutter. I blew the first half a dozen shots like that they were shaky.

I'm also looking at some of these close up and I'm thinking that perhaps I should have manually focussed as well rather than rely on auto. In the fading light I was getting exposure times of 1.5 seconds which has given me more of what I was looking for. I'm definitely really pleased with the way these have gone. I look forward to going back to Elk Lake again and honing my abilities

Watertrails

2010-05-21T15:17:00.001-07:00

One type of picture I really, really envy are those pictures of water running over rocks where a long time exposure has been used to turn the water, once bouncing and splashing over the rocks into ghostly trails. But I've never been in the right place at the right time to do anything about it. Whenever I've been in waterfall locations it's always been in bright sunshine and I've not been able to get a slow enough shutter speed to blur the water. Until today. This afternoon I went out for a drive looking for pictures and ended up passing by Elk Lake near Baldwin Township. The afternoon was cloudy and I wasn't expecting much until I drove past the end of the lake and saw the water dropping (plunging is too much of a word the water only fell about 15 inches) over the outlet. I immediately knew what I was going to try to do. So I had enjoyable 40 minutes or so just trying things out with as slow as possible shutter speeds, adding an ND2 filter etc: to try and get the effect I wanted.

The pictures aren't exactly how I'd like, the water trails aren't as "ghostly" as I'd like. That might be down to the amount of water or the shutter speed I don't know yet, but for a first attempt they keep me happy.

Day 51 an Olympus viewer 2 experiment

2010-05-21T11:44:00.000-07:00

I knew what I wanted to photograph today. I'd seen these piles of landscaping materials on the way to work every morning and knew it would make a good shot however being alongside the freeway made getting a shot difficult to say the least. So I had to set up on the frontage road on the other side of the freeway and use my PL 45-200. It was then the enormity of the task I'd set myself hit me. It was going to be one long thin panoramic. But that would give me a chance to use the new Olympus viewer software I downloaded the other week.

So there are 4 shots here, the joins seem pretty obvious but could be softened in photoshop I expect.

Rocks and Hosta Day 50

2010-05-20T16:23:00.000-07:00

This morning I was up bright and early scrabbling around amongst the trees looking for interesting shadows to make a cracking picture to celebrate reaching day 50 on this project. But then as I left work this afternoon I saw this arrangement of some rocks and a Hosta. I thought it was too amusing to pass up.

Playtime so shoot me (p.a.d. 49)

2010-05-19T17:17:00.001-07:00

There's a lot here to learn about in Adobe CameraRaw and Photoshop Elements 8 and if I don't mess about with it I'll never know how to use it. So today I decided to have a bit of fun and try the b/w conversion and convert my picture to infra red.

Of course it helps to know a bit about infra-red photography so you know how to get the exact effect you want.

Anyway I needed to blow off some creative steam and I feel better now...

forest floor

2010-05-18T18:35:00.001-07:00

I suffered for this shot. I was running out of time, light was fading I was being bit by mosquitoes. I wanted to do a bit of gardening on the shot to tidy it up a bit but the skeeters were driving me crazy...

Its a bit grainy but to be honest I find the grain rather pleasing in places especially on the pine cones.

Shrub and mulch

2010-05-18T03:51:00.000-07:00

I'm going to quit photographing plants just as soon as I can. But as you walk to the office door and are greeted with these crazy colours you can't pass it up. I think there is more to get out of these colour combinations. But I didn't have time to do much more than a grab shot as this is a high traffic area at work

Red Columbine (pad 46)

2010-05-16T14:06:00.000-07:00

Yet another example of doing things I wouldn't normally do for the sake of the picture a day project.

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the wildflower the Red Columbine. I didn't know what one was myself until this morning. I saw one while I was out on Friday at Sherburne and it took an email from my brother in law this morning to tell me what one was. So now knowing what it was I decided to try to get another picture of this plant. As you have seen from my friday shot the flower points down and I though it would be an interesting shot looking upwards in the structure of the flower. We have several of them in our back yard in the shade of the house so you'd think getting a picture would be pretty easy.

You'd be wrong. Most everywhere I tried to shoot from the eaves of the house got in the way, (the plant likes shade). It took ages to contort myself into a position where the roof didn't destroy the bokeh. Then it took at least another half an hour to get a shot I was happy with as the flower got blown all over the place in the breeze. To be honest though I wonder if this is the right shot. I've focussed on the wonderfully twisted stamen of the plant. I now wonder if focussing on the backlit petals with their delicate veins might not be a better shot. Decisions decisions... But this shot does make me happy so you'll have to wait for another day for some delicately backlit petals.

Some Holiday snaps

2010-05-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

So here are a few more pictures from last weeks jaunt up to the North Shore of Lake Superior. On the Monday we headed up to Grand Marais and the scenic Artists Point.

above: Nice pile of stones with some bright orange lichen growing on it caught my eye immediately we stepped onto Artists Point.
above: We are clambering over Artists Point making our way down to the lighthouse there in the distance. What this picture dosen't show is the fact that 10' to my right is Grand Marais harbour and 15 yards to my left is Lake Superior
above: More Rock, Lichen and a clear blue sky at Artists point. Artists Point is a beautiful place to explore . You'd never run out of thgings to photograph.
above: The very scenic Cascade River falls. Cascade is a very appropriate name as you can see from this picture

Prairie Violet (I think) p.a.d.45

2010-05-15T13:28:00.001-07:00

I am a changed person since starting this picture a day lark. I go out in the rain and photograph plants I hate, for example.

Then today I went out and took a shot of this what I think is a prairie violet in our back yard which I was more than happy with until I got it on the computer and looked at it closely. All of a sudden the bokeh bothered me and as much as I tried to cut the corner and hit "upload" on photobucket, I couldn't. I had to go out there and do a bit of gardening around the plant to make the bokeh less obtrusive and re shoot the image. Now some of you might still not like the bokeh but now I do and I think it really makes the flower pop. Actually, it's not so much of a pop more like a BOOM!

Back to Sherburne

2010-05-14T14:58:00.001-07:00

So after I had done my 6 mile run, mowed the grass. It was long grass so it was a long job. With the sun out and lovely clouds in the sky I decided to head over to Sherburne Wildlife refuge and take some pictures. I'd not been over there for a while and things were decidedly dead and bleak then so I was looking forward to seeing some life. My first visit was to the trees I named "the three witches" on my first visit my how they've changed.

Next I look a tour around the wildlife drive, open now that the Eagles have finished nesting. The Wild Lupines are blooming and I was rather intrigued by the somewhat abstract view of the plant from above.
Photographing them from above was easy compared to getting a side on view as every plant I chose seemed to have ants in the shot...
After a while I drove around to the woodland walk looking for some different ant-free plants to try my abstract close up skills on. Trillium perhaps they are starting to bloom. They are one of the few Minnesota plants I can recognise. But no. No Trillium. Just this thing.
I've no idea what it is. The shot is remarkable for being hand held and manually focussed on the E-P2 whilst the plant was blowing in the breeze. Manual focus on the E-P2 is great because as soon as you turn the focus ring the viewfinder automagically zooms in to 7x magnification to aid your focussing.

So, there we are, another trip to Sherburne. Another great time.

Dunn bridge on The Rum River (p.a.d. 44)

2010-05-14T07:46:00.000-07:00

This morning, I was out bright and early looking for a picture in the morning light but nowhere I went for a picture "spoke" to me. Them some clouds rolled in so I headed home with the thought of a six mile run ahead of me. As I drove into town I saw that the water level was well up in the river so I thought it worth investigating. As I roamed about Riverside Park a sucker hole appeared in the clouds and lit up the bridge. There we go there's my picture.

As the bridge is due for demolition and replacement with a new structure this summer the picture serves as a nice scenic memento.

Lilac in the rain (p.a.d. 43)

2010-05-13T09:34:00.001-07:00

Harumph.

This picture a day project makes me do things I wouldn't dream of doing.

Take todays picture for example.

Lilacs.

I hate them. With a passion. Smelly weeds. I say.

Then what on Earth am I doing stood out in the rain for 30 minutes scrutinising the Lilac blossoms for a picture? I wouldn't do this in the dry, but the wet? Anything for a picture...

Not a bad picture at that...

Half a barn. (p.a.d. 42)

2010-05-13T08:03:00.000-07:00

Bit of an oddball shot for Wednesdays contribution to the pad. On the way home from Duluth I was struck by this scene. I don't know why. Was it the half a barn? Was it the bright red end of the barn firing up as the sun shone on it? Or was it that plain old weird sky in the background? I have no idea. But when an opportunity like this strikes you take it.

A photograph is a photograph

2010-05-12T05:41:00.000-07:00

So, on Tuesday we visited the gallery of Jim Brandenburg in Ely, MN. It was a treat to see so many great pictures. The last time I saw an exhibition of his work was for his "Chased by the light" book over at the U of M many years ago.

However, I did see something there that sort of disturbed me. There was a selection of his photographs that had been reproduced as Giclee prints on canvas so they took on the look of an oil painting. Now you're quite welcome to disagree with me but a photograph is a photograph. It shouldn't masquerade as an oil painting. No matter how much the subject matter looks like it could be an oil painting.

Just my twopenn'orth

Driftwood and Rocks (p.a.d.41)

2010-05-12T05:32:00.001-07:00

I was looking forward to today. For today we headed over to Ely, MN to visit the gallery of world famous nature photographer Jim Brandenburg. The weather was dull and overcast so I knew there would be no opportunities for landscapes with beautiful blue skies in them. But this presented me with the opportunity to concentrate on individual elements in the scene. To that end there were many, many photo ops. So many in fact I doubted we'd get home we stopped so many times and back tracked to get a picture. When we returned to our lodgings I couldn't select a picture for the pad. So I left it to my wife to select one. She chose this one of some driftwood and rocks near Lake Kishwashiki (spelling?) I reckon she made a good choice.

Split Rock Lighthouse (p.a.d. 40)

2010-05-11T05:44:00.000-07:00

As we are away on the North Shore of Lake Superior for a few days there was ever only going to be one subject for todays picture a day. Split Rock Lighthouse.

Tranquility (p.a.d. 39)

2010-05-10T05:35:00.000-07:00

I awoke up at the lake on Sunday morning ready to do a 12 mile run (and no I didn't have to use the outhouse) and was greeted by the glorious sight of mist burning off the lake. The lake was mirror calm and I knew I had to take a picture. The mist was burning off very quickly however and by the time I got my camera and made it down to the lakeshore the scene infront of we was quite different to the one I originally saw. It still says tranquility though I think.

Outhouse (p.a.d. 38)

2010-05-10T05:30:00.001-07:00

Few things say "Up at the lake" more than the outhouse.

Really a vestige of the past more than anything as modern septic systems and waste management make them a bit of an anachronism. But many folks keep them "just in case" and they will get used a few times a year. Owners individualise them with painting and decorations. This is the one at my in-laws lake place.

Pot-Pourri (pad 37)

2010-05-07T11:50:00.000-07:00

It's raining out there been raining since I got up. It's going to start snowing soon.

Snow in May.

So today I am resigned to shooting some kind of still life inside. That's tough. Still life takes lots of thought, technique and equipment I don't have so I plod on and try my best shooting in the cold natural daylight of a rainy day. I tried half a dozen different subjects and angles and treatments before settling on this.

This pot-pourri is actually the remains of the first bunch of roses I sent my soon to be wife on our first Valentines day. So there's a little added backstory for you

A nature lesson (p.a.d. 36)

2010-05-06T16:26:00.000-07:00

So after yesterdays experimentation. Something a little more normal.

I've often wondered just how pine needles grow and over the past few weeks I've had a chance to discover how.

What I thought was a baby pine cone (like in p.a.d. 22) would appear to be a pod from which the needles spring from. Perhaps some of the pods do turn into pine comes I know not. I'll be keeping a close eye on the pine needles for a while.

Anyhow this picture illustrates the development quite well with some pods burst through and one not quite done with.

Messing around again

2010-05-05T17:42:00.001-07:00

I'm soon going to loose count on these pad numbers I think...

So to todays experiment for thats what it is. There was a bit of planning involved here as the weather forecast for the day was unsavoury and I didn't expect to get outside and photograph.

So I was looking at the top of this lampshade the other day and I thought that the framework at there might make some kind of interesting composition. So I took the picture first thing this morning and messed around with it when I got in from work.

The file is a RAW original and I can't tell you exactly what I've done but the most important thing I did was set the clarity at -100 and I really liked the effect that gave by softening everything up. This was quite the opposite to what I was planning to do with it. I thought I'd be saturating it and increasing the contrast to make the centre "matchstick man" stand out but for some reason the opposite appealed to me.

Anyway I'm quite pleased with it. You don't have to like it but if it makes you think a bit then thats OK

Reflections (part 2)

2010-05-05T11:05:00.000-07:00

Sorry, that title sounds like a Kenny G instrumental...
I just realised I haven't publicly reflected on the first month of the picture a day project.
I bored the folks at the mu-43 forum with some thoughts about it but now I've had a few more days to reflect a bit more.
There were good times and bad times.
Incredible highs when I produced a picture that received a positive reaction even though I thought I was aimlessly messing about. Then there was the lowest of lows when faced with the choice of cheating on myself and submitting a picture from a previous day I submitted something taken on the day despite how dull it was. I'd say that 95% of the time I've been happy with the shots I've taken.
Do I have some favourites? The woodpecker holes in the tree are a particlaur favourite as I'd never seen such a thing up close. What with April being a month filled with great weather I got outside a lot more and got to photograph a lot of nature. Which is not anything I've done before. Many of the shots I feel would be better served by having a macro lens but you can't have everything. That's not to say I don't like my flower shots. I'm proud of all of them. I'm just being overly picky I suppose.
If I've learned on thing from this first month it's more about nature than the craft of photography. Because I've never actually walked around and really looked at flowers and trees and seen how they are growing and blooming. Like when I was following the flowering cherry for a week.
So what does the future hold? How long will I be able to keep going? Who knows. Carrying a camera is easy for me. Seeing the picture is pretty easy too. I hope I have the time to keep going for another month and longer.

New light through old window p.a.d. 34

2010-05-04T16:55:00.000-07:00

As I was getting ready for work one morning last week I had cause to go into the garage and was greeted with this sight of the sunrise shining through the window. Alas I didn't have my camera or the time to take a picture then. So I had to wait another six days for the conditions to be favourable for the shot. I think the six day wait was worth it.

Hangars, Princeton Airport (pad 33)

2010-05-03T17:01:00.000-07:00

This is a scene I've had my eyes on for a while. A selection of old hangars at the airport. I was originally planning a closer in view but then I saw the marvellous clouds working their way into the shot and couldn't pass them up

Some reflections

2010-05-03T10:36:00.000-07:00

I've had the camera for some 6 weeks now and completed a month of pictures for my picture a day project. So its time to sit and reflect a while.
Firstly the camera. I couldn't be happier with it. I'm now getting used to the controls and the small 3-way control dial that seemed so small when I first got the camera doesn't seem all that bad. In fact I can quite easily change settings while looking in the viewfinder.
Oh the viewfinder. It's a gem. I'd be lost without it. Several times on the p.a.d. project I've found myself in situations where setting the camera up made using a conventional camera quite awkward. With the EVF I just tilt it and bingo! Viewing is easier.
I've spent the first 6 weeks exclusively using the 14-42mm lens. Pictures are sharp colours are great. It's an excellent lens.
Two weeks ago I uploaded firmware 1.1 to the camera and did notice an improvement in the performance with the autofocus.
I've now added the Panasonic 45-200 lens to my outfit and though I've not had much chance to use it yet, the results seem pretty good, certainly sharp. The one thing I have noticed with it though is the sluggish autofocus in dull conditions. The duller the light the slower it gets. Is this all down to the lens or is some of this to do with the camera? I don't know. But the lens is certainly fit for purpose, witness the picture from May 1st.
So six weeks in I can't complain. I'm taking some pretty good pictures. Though I do miss not having a swish looking DSLR strapped around my neck. But then I think how heavy that would be and I don't miss it anymore.

Not as easy as I first thought (p.a.d. 32)

2010-05-02T12:55:00.001-07:00

Running 20 miles is tough. Pretty well saps your energy for the entire day. So please excuse me if I don't make all that much effort today. I was out at 6:30 this morning plodding around town. It was beautiful. Blue skies, low sunlight. Even the Taco John looked like a good subject. But it's now the afternoon. I'm somewhat recovered and the clouds have rolled in. So the best I can do is to hobble the 30 yards to the building up the road. With its striking evergreen on its corner, it's a subject I've had my eye on for a while.

But when I got there and set up the camera a whole host of problems appeared. The evergreen is not lined up perfectly with the corner of the the building. A little bit to the left and a window with an air conditioner in it appears. A little to the right and a tap/faucet and some pipes appear. Most annoying. This is about the best I could do and now the downpipe starts to annoy me. But I'm too tired to do anything about it

Northstar commuter Rail (p.a.d. 31)

2010-05-02T12:47:00.001-07:00

And so another month begins. Will I make it through the 31 days of May with a picture a day? Hope so. It's quite fun.

One of my favourite subjects to try and photograph are trains. I'm a real trainspotter. But because of the original slow autofocus of of the E-P2 I'd held of photographing trains at speed. But now I have a firmware update as well as a panasonic 45-200mm zoom lens. I wanted to have a go. So a quick trip down to Elk River netted this neat shot of the Northstar commuter rail on one of its Saturday turns.

Notable for being a picture of a double headed train. On a 4 car commuter train this is overkill but the second loco Northstar 504 was dead and UTA #12 was doing the work.

Back at Henry's Barn (p.a.d. 30)

2010-04-30T12:06:00.001-07:00

Day 30. I made it. Thirty Days. A whole flippin' month.

After yesterday I doubted I'd make it. I was feeling pretty low at work and even though it was a half day it dragged. Looking outside the window I could see heavy dark clouds I was resigned to not getting an outdoor shot today. Doing something indoors beckoned.

However I should know better than to trust the Minnesota weather for as I was leaving work clouds were breaking and by the time I reached Henry's Barn in Hassan patches of Blue sky were noticeable. I decided to stop and cheer myself up with a picture.

Old fuel tank (p.a.d. 29)

2010-04-29T18:14:00.001-07:00

It's been grey and cloudy and very windy all day today. I'd been expecting a storm and hadn't had much of a chance to take any pictures. So when I got home I dashed across the road and took a shot of this old fuel tank. Before the heavens opened.

Now its a couple of hours later and any storm passed well to the East of us. So I needn't have rushed. I HATE being rushed taking a picture.

splash of colour (p.a.d 28)

2010-04-28T16:47:00.001-07:00

So today I returned to the scene of the image that grabbed me by the scruff of the neck yesterday. Close inspection made it clear that the exact picture I wanted wasn't there but this one is pretty darned close.

Last minute p.a.d. 27

2010-04-28T03:56:00.001-07:00

Well when I went back to check the scene I saw at lunch time It wasn't exactly how I wanted it to be, (notwithstanding the fact there was a big white truck in the background). So I had to come home and find something to photograph. I have no idea what this plant is. I just like the swirling pattern of the leaf. It would have been nice to have a macro lens to get in closer on the swirl.

Don't you hate it when that happens?

2010-04-27T11:24:00.000-07:00

I like running. It's good for me. It keeps my Doctor off my back.
Strangley I like running marathons too. You can't beat the feeling you get when you cross the finish line after 26 point 2 miles.
Training works well for me as when I'm out running I often look around to see if there's anything that would make an interesting picture.
Today it happenned. I saw one. A total and utter belter of a scene that grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and yelled in my face.
"TAKE A PICTURE OF ME!"
The lighting and the colours were perfect. But of course it's hard to carry a camera around your neck when you run. It was in my bag by my desk.
So I'll return to the scene after work but of course by then the light will have changed and the scene will have lost its magic.
Perhaps tomorrow...

Seen better days (p.a.d. 26)

2010-04-26T17:24:00.000-07:00

I'm always drawn to fading and cracked paint so when I saw this hydrant whilst out walking at lunch the subject of picture of the day was never in doubt...

Born of frustration (p.a.d. 25)

2010-04-25T13:40:00.000-07:00

I don't know wether it was the fact that I'm still tired out from yesterdays model railway exhibition or that it's just a grey day that has sapped me of my energy. But I just can't be arsed to do anything. But this afternoon I had a cuppa and forced myself to take a picture.

A well developed sprout on my wifes' Spider plant. I took the photo, it looked OK I guess but not quite what I was looking for, not inspiring. It didn't do anything for me at all. It looked even worse when I viewed it in iPhoto so in frustration I just messed around with the sliders.

Ooh...

Hang on a mo...

I might be getting somewhere now. So in all honesty all I did was aimlessly "faff about" with the sliders and effects. I blew the highlights out totally probably oversharpened it and meddled with the noise too. I don't know what on earth I was doing but I sure as heck like the finished article at lot better than the original picture.

Concentration (p.a.d. 24)

2010-04-25T06:17:00.001-07:00

One of my other hobbies is model railways, and yesterday my wife and I were at the Granite City Train show in Saint Cloud, MN showing one of my many layouts. At one point a friend I hadn't seen for a while stopped by for a chat. So Lorrie took over operating duties and when I looked over and saw her deep in concentration I knew that this was my picture of the day. It came out well more by luck than judgement as the mix of lights played merry hell with the white balance and I was holding the camera way above my head in order to get the angle I wanted for the composition.

Not what I was expecting (p.a.d.23)

2010-04-25T06:07:00.000-07:00

Got some more catching up to do. Busy weekend you know...

On Friday I was looking forward to getting out with my camera. I just downloaded the firmware update for the camera the night before to improve the autofocus speed and also on Wednesday my new Panasonic Lumix 45-200 zoom lens had arrived so I was planning on trying to shoot some trains at speed in Elk River.

But that was not to be. Track maintenance work mean that there were no trains running while I was there. So I drove home looking for something else to photograph. Once again working on the theory that I'd know what it was when I saw it. I was driving down a back road looking at a beat up old grain silo in the distance when suddenly I saw this.

A fence post with some coils of barbed wire. Immediately I knew that it was the picture. So I set the camera on the tripod on the side of an embankment and took the shot. It has to be said that the task was made much easier with the tiltable EVF of the camera. There was no way I could stand behind the camera to compose the shot the way it was sited on the embankment.

Hello old Friend (pad 22)

2010-04-22T16:28:00.000-07:00

This subject, what I call the "baby pine cone" is a dear subject to me for, a few years ago I photograph of a similar subject won me first prize and a special award at the Mille Lacs County Fair. In fact I only lost out for the grand prize to a four foot square painting. My 8" x 10" didn't stand a chance as "a good big 'un allus beats a good little 'un". As we like to say back home. Still It's a great subject that I'm sure I will revisit many more times.

Gnarly tree trunks (p.a.d. 21)

2010-04-21T16:21:00.001-07:00

The twisted gash in the main trunk really caught my eye and I tried desperately to find an angle where the background wasn't too "busy". This is probably the best I could do, and there's still too much going on in the background.

Iris (p.a.d 20)

2010-04-20T18:12:00.000-07:00

Found it in the garden this evening. Well actually loads of them. I figured it wasn't a weed. But I didn't know what it was. Until a member of the micro four thirds forum versed in such technicalities as flower identification pointed out it was in fact an Iris.

Iris. Nice flower.

The Cherry Blossom (pad 19)

2010-04-20T18:09:00.000-07:00

OK Have to play a bit of catch up Here's yesterdays picture from the p.a.d project.

The complete flowering cherry. Now that it's finished blooming. The blossom is falling even as I write this

The old lodging house (p.a.d. 18)

2010-04-18T16:39:00.000-07:00

I've had designs on taking a picture of this building for a long time. I've even swung by the place three or four times already this month in order to get it into the p.a.d. project but the sun had been in the wrong place or worse there had been cars in fron't of the building. However this morning things fell into place. The Sun was quite favourably positioned and the place was deserted.

Everything came together quite nicely for this shot of an old Princeton lodging house.

Return of the blossom (p.a.d.17)

2010-04-17T14:08:00.000-07:00

The weatherman lied!

He said the wind was going to drop today.

He lied. It didn't. Not yet anyway.

But with some of the blossoms already starting to die off, I waited around for some 20 minutes or so in two shifts to wait for the wind to even ease off so I could get at least one more progress picture. Like I said before I could never be a nature photographer. I don't have the patience to wait around for that moment to get that perfect picture. But eventually the wind did ease and by holding the branch out of shot I at least got something.

This is still the same blossom that I photographed at the start of the week I just changed my viewpoint ever so slightly so the blossoms opened out more.

I think there's still a couple of days more photographs in the blossoms yet. So perhaps a few more pictures will appear. Though the speed at which the tree blossoms ad then turns to leaves is quite amazing.

Can you hear the ghosts of your childhood? (p.a.d. 4)

2010-04-16T11:27:00.001-07:00

Something different from me today.

Knowing that the wind was going to play havoc with my plans to photograph the Cherry blossom again until dark. I decided to go and look for something to photograph. I didn't know what. I knew I'd know it when I saw it. After about 12 miles on the road I saw it. An old derelict abandoned Schoolhouse.

I explored the scene, saw my shot and took it.

But I was not content with that. As I saw the scene I knew what I wanted to say with the picture and I was eager to try out some tweaks and effects to put that feeling across.

I don't know if the image is too contrived or what. But to me it puts across what I wanted to say. So its fine by me.

Bossom #2 (p.a.d.15)

2010-04-15T16:24:00.000-07:00

So today I reach picture number 15. Half way though the month. I'm a bit surprised I made it this far.

Anyway today I took a quick look at the Cherry blossom and decided that it was worthy of a shot.

Getting a picture was a surprisingly difficult task. For a start it was windy. Very windy. So the branch was blowing all over the place. I even tried holding the branch out of shot to stop the movement. It made little or no difference, so I just stood around and waited until the wind dropped. I think that the blossom is actually in my shadow so while holding the detail a bit it looks rather dull.

Never mind though I'm sure that I'll be back shooting the same subject tomorrow judging by the progress of the flowering.

Old swing (p.a.d. 14)

2010-04-14T16:23:00.000-07:00

Not much to report today. Torrential rains at lunch and blowing wind leaving work meant I couldn't re-visit last Wednesdays location to see how that had bloomed.

So I had a quick explore in the abandoned garden next door to see what there was.

Surprisingly little actually, just this old swing

The yellow and the blue do catch the eye in the rather drab colours otherwise. Which upon reflection I do quite like.

The Cherry Blossom (pad 13)

2010-04-13T17:15:00.000-07:00

We have a cherry blossom in our back yard that when it blooms is quite beautiful. So I thought it would be interesting to record the progress of an individual blossom as it blooms. Like time lapse photography except simpler. I won't do it every day just when there's real noticeable progress. (mind you that might come fast...)

Anyway here's todays shot

It was really breezy out there today and I had to really persevere to get a shot that didn't have any motion blur in it. Hopefully next time the breeze will be down.

Woodpeckers at work (p.a.d.12)

2010-04-12T16:39:00.001-07:00

I've been hearing a lot of woodpeckers nearby the house lately. I like woodpeckers. Especially pilleated ones. I think they are a quite beautiful yet angry looking bird. Last year we had one pay a few visits to the suet feeder we keep in the garden.

Some of the pecking has been close to the house, some not so close. However when I was shutting the garage door this evening I saw that one fellow had been very close. He'd been plying his trade on a tree right next to the house!

These are some big holes. You could fit a quarter in the bottom one easily. I wonder if this means our pilleated woodpecker from last year has returned?

What? Whaat? Whaaat!

2010-04-11T11:03:00.000-07:00

When I'm not photographing or working I run Marathons. I have 13 of them under my belt so far. Many early weekend mornings are spent pounding the roads around my home town getting in my long runs. Todays run was 15 miles. Not too difficult. Running is great, I get time to think about things or even look for photographs. The best thing is you never know what you're going to see out there. Things like this...

Yep, thats an airplane in someones front garden. OK I didn't take the pic while out running. I came back later.

It's not just an airplane it's a bit of modern aviation history. It's a Foxjet ST600. From what I've been able to research three ST600 mockups were made in the late 70's to illustrate the concept of a small lightweight executive jet that could fly out of smaller regional airfields. So I assume that this is one of those three mockups from 1977-78.

The concept was years ahead of its time and was only really hampered by the choice of power its Williams WR44 turbofan was also selected to power the cruise missile and thus the US military decided that a civilian concern couldn't have access to such a piece of military hardware. Thus killing the project.

So there we are a bit of aviation history in my town. A pretty interesting run.