Arlington, part II

I just wrapped up my post with pics from yesterday's Arlington adventures, but I have a few more pics that I took, just for fun.

These were taken from a park near my grandparent's old house (they lived on the street in the pic below). I loved this park, especially the round area with rhodies. They were a lot fuller then, and it was like a little fort (see the middle pic). I tried to do some motion pics with the merry go round, but wasn't sure how long to have the shutter open. I left my handy cheat sheet at home, but I knew I needed to keep it open a while to get the motion (see bottom pic). I wanted to take more pics, but it started to rain... another day then.

Whatever you call it, Arlington or A-Town, is my home. I haven't really lived there since 1994, and my sister claims that my a-town citizenship has been revoked. Whatever. It is a place that I can go to anyday of the week and not get lost. A place where you give directions according to where people live (or even where their grandparents used to live) rather than by actual street names. The pace is slower, the air is clearer, and life just seems better when I am up there.

ok ok ok. I give in. I might need photoshop.

I spent Saturday afternoon/evening up in Arlington, visiting my sister & her peeps. The pics below are some random shots that I took there. One of the reasons that I want to improve my photography skills is to be able to take really great pics that document the everyday family stuff. I want to be able to capture the feeling of the moment, so that, down the road, when we look at these pics our hearts are warmed with the memories of "back in the day" rather than looking at a scattered snapshot.

That being said, I still have some work to do :)

"Arg Treasure"

My little nephew turned two last month, and received this aquarium for his birthday from Grandma (currently being pronounced as "rama"). The first pics I took of this were straight-on... leading to a ghostly figure appearing in the background (me...boo!), so I moved my tripod around and took this from an angle.

"Blur"

It was sooo easy to take pictures of my nephew when he was an infant; he would just lay their peacefully and I was able to get great shots, in terms of lighting and composition. Now, that kid is on the move! Most of my pictures turn out like this...

"Viewfinder"

The little guy loooves any thing mechanical (hmm, wonder where that comes from?) and especially loves my camera! We tried having him stand next to me while I took pictures of the aquarium. That didn't last long - when I would put my eye up to the viewfinder, he would run around to the front of the camera and squint with one eye into lens. funny. (and I am thankful for my UV filter!) My sister gave him is own "camera" and all was well again...

"Blue Kids"

The next activity was visiting the neighbors. Man, shooting pictures of kids is tricky. First, you have to find a spot, then you have to get them to all sit still, and then look in the same direction. Since I am still rather clumsy with the new camera, I overlooked the whitebalance setting. The pic below was shot with a white balance for tungsten lighting and, well, it is rather blue. Will photoshop save this? Can it make it less blue? Hmm, maybe, maybe I do need photoshop.

"Ty"

My sister's little neighbor boys are always doing something active; riding their bikes, riding their quads, just, y'know little boy stuff. When I told them I wanted to take their pictures, they immediately went for the bikes. I figured, hey, why not, it would be a good chance to practice sports photography.

"Ty2"

Yep, my sports photography skills still need some work. I had the ISO way up to 1600, but probably would have had better luck with my tripod & a remote shutter release.

"Teeth"

While the bigger boys were doing their stunts, my little nephew was taking in the show from the sidelines. In order to get him to look up at the camera we asked him to show me his teeth.

"Jeans"

I thought that I would try an artistic approach by focusing on the wooden blocks with Ty blurred in the background. As I was setting up my shot and doing meter readings Corbin decided to help arrange the blocks.

"Jump"

The shot I had planned wasn't going to work out; I think if Iwere lower to ground, maybe? Anyway, here are the blocks for the jump...

"Boots"

This is one of those "last look" shots; I had put my camera and tripod away and had headed back in the house when I saw Corbin's boots. I loved the angle of the boots, and the way the evening light was hitting them. I don't know the story of how they ended up there, or what adventures those boots and Corbin had that day; but, judging by the smile on those boots, it was a good day.

Multi-tasking has its rewards...

Today's post is in two parts: A little bit of fun in the office & day-o-bonding with my tripod. Enjoy.

I brought my camera into the office today to show Lan and New Dan the fancy buttons, and we had a surprise visit from little Hunter! He is ten weeks old and completely adorable.

ROBIN - TO THE LUNCHROOM!!!

This, my friends, is New Dan's lunch box. Isn't it awesome? It always makes me smile to see it hanging out in the fridge; it breaks up the sterility of an office environment. Thanks, new dan.

I had stuff to do at home tonight, but didn't want to break my pic-a-day approach to using my camera, plus, I need to figure out how to use my tripod. I still have a weird bruise thing on my thumb from my attempts to use it at Rattlesnake Lake two weeks ago.

I was a bit surprised by one aspect of my new camera: taking vertical pictures. Until recently, Del never took vertical pictures. I am beginning to see why... I had my camera set on the counter and the pic to the right still turned out all goofy. grr.

Determined to get a cool pic of the olive oil, I put the bottle on its side, lowered my tripod and tried again.

Ever the multi-tasker, I continued to take pictures, while cooking. The picture to the right is of the top of my microwave. I love the little picture in the black frame. I found it at a streetfair years ago (maybe 12, 13? ago) and it reminds me of my sister & I when were kids, playing out in the yard of our house on Hazel Street; a place that will always consider "home." Also, the style of the house looks just like houses that I would draw when daydreaming (but I usually drew an ocean next to it...)

This chicken is another relic of the old house; my mom had the coolest red, black & white kitchen. I brought the little kitty back from Japan when I was in high school (um, I think. That's the story I am going with for now.). These guys hang out on my stove. I like the black and white/white and black contrast. That is why I am random. And yes, those are authentic beads straight from Bourbon Street. Another reason I am random.

I still had a few bottles of wine left over from my graduation party (actually, one is from my 30th birthday party!) so I set up a still life on my living room table. For future still lifes I need to move my lamps around; all of the lighting is coming from behind the bottles, but hey, they still look kinda cool.

I had trouble with this one; the reflection of my camera was showing up at the base of the bottle, and one lamp that I did relocate was reflecting in the neck of the bottle. Grr. I liked the repetition of "good earth fine wine" on the label.

And this, this is my favorite. I like the lighting, I like the background, and I like the grainy texture of the label.

Hello Hydrangea

Today's activities brought me to the conservatory at Volunteer Park... another place that I have wanted to visit for awhile. I've walked past it many times while hanging out in the park (which is one of my favorite places in Seattle due the beautiful surroundings, the Seattle Asian Art Museum, and EXCELLENT parking! Nature, culture & convenience - what could be better?). I ended taking about 130 pictures there...

I was in macro supergirl heaven.

Not only do they have gorgeous flowers, they have an entire, yes, an entire Hydrangea room. Now, I don't have a favorite flower (it is too hard to choose one!) but if I had to pick one, it would the Hydrangea. The pic below is just one of many pics that I took of the Hydrangia collection. I had fun changing the aperture settings and messing with the white balance. I had the best luck with a sunny white balance or on the shade setting.

I think that this one is a brugmansia? They had so many lovely pink and white ones. I tried to set up pics of them in a row, but really needed a tripod. I like the pointy ends of the petals. The only thing I would fix for this pic would be to tone down the white in the background. Maybe this is where photoshop would come in handy? ;) (oh, and p.s. I think it is poisionous. yikes.)

Ah, the jade tree. I love, love, love, love jade trees. Luckily, there was a pole near the jade tree, so I could steady my camera on the pole and get some really great shots. I couldn't decide which one I liked best, so I included three. Lucky you!

Ok, for this one, I don't know if the little blog picture is able to do it justice. Go ahead, click on it and enlarge it... nice, huh? I love the way that the light is coming through at the base of the palm.

The lighting isn't as great on this one, but I like the lines of the palm. It reminds me of a water slide...

This leaf was juuuust over my head. Each shot was a little shaky and I couldn't see the details in the veins, so I bumped up the ISO (to 800 or 1600, I think... way up there) so that I could have a faster shutter speed. I didn't do any cropping or other adjustments; this is the way I composed the shot.
For the cactus picture below, I knelt on the floor and set my camera on the railing of the flower bed (or whatever you call it). I had visions of it having an expansive depth of field, making the cactus look gigantic and making jokes about being stuck in the desert. Well, as you can see below... not so much. Still a neat shot, though. I also tried several white balance settings here resulting in some pictures being rather blue. I like the warm tones of this one though...

For the pic below I took a few shots in manual mode and then I wondered what the same shot would look like in macro mode. I switched my dial to the cute little flower icon, arranged the shot as close as I could to the orignal shot, focused, and clicked. I was both bummed and pleased to see that the pic I took in manual mode was equally in focus but with better color saturation. Bummed because it means that I can't be lazy and say "oh, I am just going to put this on macro.... it turns out better" and pleased because, well, I am a macro rock star. Take that!

This is the one taken in macro mode...

What do you think?

Well, there you go. I took a few more outside, too, one of the conservatory door (boring), a bunch of the lions out in front of the museum (cool, but, well, not too original. I had fun with my new polarizer, though!), and I managed to find some bees busy doing their thing, too (although, not as cool as my sunflower & bee pic from DC last year!). So, they didn't make the cut :)

Thanks again for checking out my pics and reading all of my random thoughts. Peace be with you.

Flexibility is key

For today's shoot, I wanted to go to St. Edwards Park in Kenmore. I am in need of a Cokin p121 filter and had heard that a camera shop in near the park might have it... well, a few phone calls later and I found out that filter is pretty hard to find. Shoot. I also ended up running an errand in Everett... the opposite direction of the park! No worries, though, the park will still be there; I just needed to find something a bit closer to home.

I remembered a place that I have been wanting to go to for awhile - North Creek Park in Bothell. Del and I have driven past it, but I think we were running errands or something, so we weren't able to get out and explore it. It was a perfect spot for a little photo shoot! I only have a handful of interesting pictures for today, but I had a chance to learn more about the dramatic changes that the ISO setting makes, and how it affects the shutter speed. Neat.

The pic below is of the fence; I literally parked right in front of it. I didn't bring my tripod on this shoot, so I steadied my camera on the edge of the fence and found the fastest shutter speed I could to minimize the shakes. I like the blurriness of the background, but wish I could have the front part of the log in focus a bit more... in time...

Much like the Skagit Wildlife Area, North Creek Park is very marshy and is surrounded by these wheaty looking plants.

HOWEVER ;) North Creek Park is very, very close to Mill Creek. So, unlike the marshy yuckiness and general-lack-of-trail at the Skagit Big Ditch, North Creek Park has lovely wooden paths. No fear of mud on the soles of visitors.

I am such a sucker for flowers. Really, truly I am. I went to Alki & took a great picture of an iris. I went to Mt. St. Helens and found some adorable little pinkish/purplish flowers growing near a rock. I went to New York City (insert your best Pace Salsa "New York City!" impression here) and sat on a bench gazing at the Statue of Liberty then taking pics of some cool daisies swaying in the wind. So, in the middle of marsh land, I found some cute little flowers. I couldn't resist. The pic below was surprisingly tricky to take, both in terms of camera settings and sheer physical access. Good thing the park was empty; I must have looked so strange crouching on the path, steadying my elbows on the walk way constantly adjusting my camera settings... any way, I had to use all of my macro superpowers to take this shot. Can you believe that this little flower is about the size of a pencil eraser?

See? It is tiny!

Another day, another shoot, another lesson. Thanks for checking out my pics.

First photo shoot...

I am now the proud owner of a Canon EOS Rebel XTi. Awesome, huh? I've been shooting a Canon Powershot A520 for just about three years and have had wonderful luck with my shots. I say "luck" because really, I kept it in program mode, set up the shot and let the little Canon work its magic. Even though it has manual functions, I still loved the way the program shots turned out... the challenge for me was setting up the composition.

In April 2007, I bought a Panasonic Lumix F7 from Del, my very dear friend and photographic partner in crime. The Lumix is cool. The LCD on that thing has a preview feature and you are able to see how the picture will look after each adjustment, before you take it. It always bugged me though that my pictures turned out yellow, and I would get frustrated at figuring out the f-stop & shutter combo. A few weeks ago, Del showed me how to change the white balance (to get rid of the yellow) and how to meter (insert heavenly sounds of a-a-a-a-ah here.) yes.

Metering is AWESOME! Once I figured out how to meter I went crazy on taking manual exposures of everything.. pop cans, children, buildings, bells, ditches... The pictures from Cama Beach were all taken in manual mode on the Lumix. But... I still felt limited on the aperture and shutter speeds; plus, the Lumix has a fixed lens.... there would be very little hope of getting those awesome, wide depth of field landscape shots that I am dreaming about, or the magnification I demand (demand...ha!) for the close up flower shots that I adore.

So, here I am, today, the proud owner of an XTi. But, I am a little bit scared. There is so much I don't know. For instance, I knew that my lense was 18-55mm. Didn't know that meant that I would need a 58mm UV filter, Lense cover & Cokin adapter. But, I remembered Del's helpful advice... "Best thing to do is shoot everyday, Lor." So, I picked up the last of my camera gear at Kits Camera in Alderwood, went to the Lynnwood library and picked up some photography books (I am SUCH a nerd), and headed to Sunset Beach in Edmonds for my first photo shoot with the XTi.

At 8 o'clock tonight I didn't even know how to turn the thing on by myself. Luckily, it is cleverly marked with an "on" and "off" switch. Phew. The picture below of some trees is the very first picture that I took with my new camera. Not too shabby. Ok,ok, not too interesting either.

The next pic is of a Washington State Ferry at the Edmonds ferry dock. A little dark, but not bad, composition wise. I also realized when I got to the lookout that I didn't have a polarizer. grrr.

The sun dropped so fast! One minute I was squinting because it was so bright & wishing for a polarizer, then I looked away briefly to mess with my tripod and the sun slipped away! I like the silhouettes of the people on the beach in the pic below.

After wishing for a polarizer (oh, and I also left my microfiber cloth in my Lumix bag at home), messing with the tripod, and almost missing the sunset, I realized that I didn't know how to adjust the shutter and f-stop! I randomly pushed some buttons, and came up with the pic below... rather dark, but kinda neat.

Ok, so here are two of my favorite composition tricks: 1) if it is out of focus or the colors don't go well together, then just print it in black & white, blow it up, mat it & frame it & call it good; and 2) if you can't get the shot you want in the distance, then focus on something interesting up close and use that to frame the stuff in the back. (Like the boat and thistle pic from the Cama Beach post). Ok, now, since I didn't have full command of the aperture setting yet, the pic below is the closest I could get. Hmm, not quite there yet :)

I returned home and grabbed my owner's manual. A-ha! Page 71 explained how to work the aperture function. Whammy, I am back in business! I set up these monkeys near a set of round lamps in my living room. I had taken some similar shots with the Lumix, so I wanted to set up a similar shot to see how the two cameras compare. Aperture, shutter & ISO functions were easy to use, but something is not quite right...

Yep. The white balance. I adjusted to Tungsten lighting, and had better results.

So, there you go... my first day of shooting with a dslr. Thanks for reading this and joining me on my path to becoming a better photographer.

Testing... 1, 2, 3 ...

(ok, this is my first post with pictures... let's see how it goes! Should be interesting, eh?)

On the way to Burlington on Thursday, I noticed that the exit sign for Stanwood had "Cama State Park" on it; I was a little stumped... I have been to the state park out on Camano, but didn't think that it was called "Cama Beach." Interesting.

The next day, I was chatting with a co-worker that lives in the Stanwood-area and he told me that Cama is a new park, brand new. Oh really? A little bit of googling and I found out that it is Washington's newest state park in 10 years. (intrigued are you? want to read more? check it out: http://www.cwb.org/CamaBeach.htm)

I was intrigued. The combination of something new, a beach nearby, a sunny day & a chance to practice taking pictures in manual mode meant that I headed to Cama Beach as soon as possible. Saturday afternoon. All of these shots were taken with a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7. It is a compact, 6 megapixel, digital camera. I also used a Sunpak 52 mm circular polarizer. AND, get this, I usually compose the shot using the LCD, but found myself using the old-school view finder. It was easier to meter that way.

Enjoy.

The picture to the left was taken at the top of the park; the roofs & chimneys are the rental cabins that the park operates. Yes, I know that they plants in the foreground are probably weeds, but they are pretty weeds. The mountainous looking hill in the background is Whidbey Island. According to my friends at Wikipedia, the body of water between Camano & Whidbey Islands is the Saratoga Passage.

Now I am on the beach. A beautiful day, no? I loved this gigantic piece of driftwood and ended up taking about 10 pictures of it from different angles. I liked this view the most, because the kids in the back have some kinda goofy stances and you can see the way that the shoreline wraps around the frame. Plus,with the sun behind me shadows were minimized.



As you can see, the shore is quite, well, clammy. Like a typical Washington coastal beach, there are tons of rocks on the shoreline. However, Cama also has a bunch of broken clam shells... not too cozy, but kinda cool. According to a Seattle PI article, the shells are "left over from centuries of use by native tribes." Neat. (If only I had a wide angle lens; then this shot would be even cooler.)

Although I didn't fully explore the beach on this trip, I am looking forward to heading back there again soon. As I headed back to my car via the fabulously maintained trail (um probably should be because it is new, but anyway....) I saw that the afternoon sun was shining through the trees and beautifully highlighting a very large rock. I liked it; hope you do, too.

Hey, its the end of the post. You made it! Thanks for reading this stuff! In case you are interested in reading a bit more about Cama Beach, check out some articles from: the Times & PI.