Help me, I've got GAS!

Gear Acquision syndrome. I bought the Yashica camera off Ebay a little while back, and I've been trolling Ebay pretty badly since. Got a Rolleiflex and Rolleicord TLR, they're both out at a repair center getting a pretty thorough going over. My aunt sent the two SLRs you see on either side of the Yashica, specifically an Olympus OM 10, probably from the late 70s early 80s and the Kodak Retina Reflex, from the late 50s. Both are cool cameras. I'm interested in finding a Rangefinder 35 mm camera like the Canon Canonet too! I'm definitely interested in a medium format folder like these. If you have any old school cameras that are laying around, feel free to send them my way!

Why I love the Canon 5D MkII

I shot this photo at ISO 3200, 1/50th of a second, F2.8 on my 50 mm lens. It was pretty dark in the room! Available florescent light about 3 feet away on the right side of the photo. I opened it in Lightroom, color balanced it, hit the noise reduction in Lightroom and output it. Looks pretty good to me! Most point and shoots start to get unusable at anything over ISO 400.

This photo of Peaches and Mary is of a pretty much nightly thing with them.

Two more I missed

Stop sign at Scarlet Circle

Stop Sign and Lightpost

Artsy Snow Shots

The top 5 here were done around the big flower box in front of my house. Just working the scene some.





These three were down at the bench in the development. I really like the abstract feel of the second one.



Details from the drifts. I imagine the ridges are less than half an inch tall. I like the leading lines


I wasn't sure about this when I took it. It feels like something from the movies though.

Blizzard of 2009 Snapshots

Some stuff from around the house yesterday and today. Yeah, we got socked in pretty good!



I liked the swirls around the mailbox


Quite a difference between this and summer!


About 4:30 yesterday afternoon, full on snow!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

Generally speaking, I've got no use for snow. It's snowing like crazy today. Over a foot on the ground. I expect it to shut down the state for a few days. Can't fight it, I guess so might as well take some photos!



This Blue Jay has to make his living 24hrs a day. I'm always fascinated by that.




Two views taken about 6 feet apart. Two different stories.


Obligatory shot of Peaches in the snow. She was having fun!

Say What?

Read the last sentences. A proof reader skilled in the language of the people likely to be buying your product is a good thing.

I swear, I'm turning into a girl!

I go the chance to work with Bryce and his parents again the other day for some Christmas photos. Aren't these the cutest pics? He was such a sweet heart!

After the photo session, I went to see the Nutcracker at the Schwartz Center in Downtown Dover. My grand neice was in the performance, for a very brief part of the show. The Center is small so it's more intimate that other stages. I wondered if they'd have enough room to do it right. The show was wonderful! I was suprised to be honest. I knew nothing of the Dance Conservatory before the show. The dancers certainly looked professional to me. Of course the lead performers were good, but I was more interested in the secondary ones. They were working just as hard and doing their best. It made me think about them paying their dues dancing their hearts out in supporting roles to the lead dancers. Amazing stuff. I was impressed by the dancing of the girl playing the Spanish dancer and another dancer that did the Greek Goddess. The "Spanish" girl did some wonderful moves and finished her solo dance by ending in with both feet and one arm supporting her weight with her back arched over and the other hand in the air. She made it look effortless, and it clearly wasn't . The greek goddess was very graceful and did something that I can't really describe, but of course I'll try. She had both hands clasped together in front of her and twisted them one way while she moved her head and feet in opposite directions to each other. It was amazing to me. The lead male dance had amazing muscles in his calves and wonderful control during the lifts. The lead female seemed to float in the air when he lifted her. She was in kind of a split position and he seemed to just effortlessly (for both of them!) raise her up and spin her. It was poetic. The lead female did this amazing series of spins up on her toes as she did a complete circle on the stage. Her strength, control and timing were awesome. How she stayed up on her toes seemingly effortlessly and didn't fall out on her butt is a mystery to me. I remember thinking she reminded me of a jewelry box ballerina. It looked like she could just keep on spinning around in a perfect circle endlessly
A few more things I noticed. At one point the dancers representing different coffees were all spinning around and twirling at the same time. It was a kaliedescope of colors and motion. It was like an impressionist painting came to life. I was enthralled. I was impressed with the kids in candy cane outfits with hulahoops to dance with and through. The kids were young and they were doing this kind of jump rope thing with the hoops. None of them missed a beat. It was brave of the choreographer to have them do it. A failure or mistake would have been obvious and embarassing, but not a one of the dancers missed. Cool stuff.
So yeah, that's my unsophisticated amateur review of the show. (Maybe I should stick to making photos of dancers. I know I'd love to shoot the dancers ala the Degas impressionist paintings someday.) I enjoyed the show! Now I'd like to see some future stuff at the Schwartz. Does that gushing and the baby photos make me a chick?

My New Logo

What do you think? Will it put me over the top as a real photographer? I can get a franchise for this for either $25k or like $25. Should I do it?

Benches and Fences

More from the park in New Castle. Joy and I were about turned into popsicles when we stopped shooting. I was ready to drive off when I decided I had to tough it out some more and try for these photos and some from my new (40 year old) camera too. Those might get posted after they come back.









The last photo here is actually near the amusement park up by NCC airport.

Joy: Photos with a story

I've been working toward photos that tell a story or have some kind of emotional impact, rather than just being pretty girls. Nothing against pretty girls, mind you, but... anyways. Joy and I took advantage of the opportunity to shoot in Old New Castle, in the rain, and snow to do a few of these.



I told joy to "look homeless" for the two above



I wanted some impressionist feeling images here. These are actually more somber, and certainly not happy as impressionist paintings usually are, but, I really like them.

Joy is tough!

I wanted to try some techniques with Joy, and they came out pretty well. It was freezing cold, with rain that switched to sleet. We got some cool stuff before we had to quit shooting in the craptastic weather.

Glasgow Deli

I've been wanting to do some shots up here for a long time, ever since I noticed the bench on day riding by. The timing was never right, or I was in a hurry or there were a bunch of cars there, or... something. Anyways the stars aligned the other day, so I got to do some photos of the bench and building.

A few more from Downtown Dover