Life: Through the Lens

 Happy New Year! On this cold January night, the moon shines brightly on the snow, creating a special kind of light.  It is a little mesmerizing.  Of course, I take it in from the comfort of my cozy room, with a fire burning in the grate (okay, maybe it's a gas fireplace).  It's a perfect night to sort photos and think about the opportunities a new year brings.  Where will we go this year?  What adventures might we have?  Will we stray far afield, or stay close to home?  Time will tell. Tonight I am doing a preliminary sort of some of the photos on my computer, thinking which to keep, which to put into book form, which to discard...and which to move to my external hard drive.  But I keep getting waylaid in the memories  of my experiences!  I know I have at least 8 photos of each of the locations above, but I like parts of each!  Sigh.  It's so hard to be cut-throat in hitting "delete." I use a Canon digital SLR, Daryl uses...

Hurray!  I was able to access the photos on my new point-and-shoot so can continue my comparison between iPhone photography, point-and-shoot, and a digital SLR camera.  Let the fun continue! I will admit to having purchased a higher end point-and-shoot - a Canon G7x.  So far I am loving it! First I want to know I can get strong colors.  In the photo of the Grand Hotel, above, I think it handled the colors very well - the yellow is true, as well as the color of the flags.  The flowers show up well, as well, and the white is not overly bright. In the photos below, the top one is not the "best" photo,  as the leaves were moving a bit, but it handled the contrast between the red and green well.  I do think the leaves are a bit washed out, but it cold have been a lighting issue.  Just keep shooting and see. The red on the side of the barn, below,  is very true and bright.  The sun was late in the day, so the light was quite good...

I think the iPhone handled this well, though I will admit the shadows were  quite dark and I lightened them a bit in post-processing. I am in the process of putting together some materials for a workshop I will be giving next month.  One of the things I am going to cover is the difference between photographs taken on the iPhone, a smaller digital camera  (point-and-shoot), and the DSLR. These flowers were in the shadows, which I find the iPhone favors.  The  more even the light, the richer the photos are.  The color in this photo is very strong. As most of you have found, the iPhone does take good photos, and it's biggest plus is the phone's size and portability.  Very convenient and it works well in a lot of instances.   I want to see how well it works under a variety of circumstances, so I take it on walks with the dog, shopping with friends, and to work. The photos in this post are the results of my first "formal" com...

The Nina, left, and Pinta, moored in the marina. Remember the day of the eclipse?   It happened to be the day we finally had a chance to get out of town and spend some time adventuring.  We packed up Kaycee, a cooler, and headed to Traverse City to see the hand-built replicas of the Nina and Pinta. The Nina was built using only adzes, axes, hand saws and chisels, in addition to naturally-shaped  timbers from the local forest. She stands 65' long, 18' across the beam, with a draft of 7'. The sail area is 1, 919 sq. feet.  She took 32 months to build. Both ships are exact replicas of those sailed in 1492, and they are called the Columbus Ships.  They were built in Valenca, Brazil by eighth generation Portuguese shipwrights.  There is no home port for these ships, as they are moving 11 months of the year, providing educational opportunities to everyone.  There is no Santa Maria because she never made it back to Europe, she is too big to mak...

By definition a portrait is:   a painting, drawing, photograph, or engraving of a person, especially one depicting only the face or head and shoulders.   A portrait is also  usually  considered more " formal" than other photographs. Who would have expected to run into someone you know, so far away from home? This is Allison, a young lady who grew up in our town, our families went to the same church, she was in band with my daughter,  and here she is working as a Park Ranger in Arches National Park! What a stroke of luck it was that I decided to wear my Michigan t-shirt that day.  It initiated the conversation that lead to our reacquaintance! As a photographer, I have been asked to shoot senior photos, business photos, weddings and special events. And I have done all those things.  However, I do not enjoy that process as much as I do creating portraits which show personality, and a sense of time and place. These po...