Category Archives: Naima

Birthdays, Candid Portrait, Flowers, Jesse, Jorge, Macro, Mom, Naima, Self-Portrait

Before the Swallow Dares – 2020

June 4, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Today is Jorge’s birthday! Happy birthday Jorge!

I hope your birthday is as wonderful as you hoped it would be!

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Here is a quick update on Naima. Her surgery went well. The mass they removed from under her shoulder was even bigger than expected, but Dr. Stephanie said that everything went well. They don’t think it is cancerous, but they sent it away to get tested anyways.

She was very excited to leave the vet.

She was pretty sore.

Naima napped mostly when she got home. But then around 8 PM, the doorbell rang. My neighbor Stan had stopped by to check on Naima. Stan is the guy in the picture with Naima from my submission for FRIENDS for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. She ran (as much as she could) out the front door to greet him and readily chomped down the snacks he had brought for her.

Then Naima refused to back inside the house. She begged for a car ride. She stood by her car door (the back driver’s side door) and refused to budge. This is the only door she will get in. So I opened the door and I helped her into the car.

We made a quick trip down to my Mom’s house. She is used to going down there several times a week. She went in and saw my Mom, Teresa, and Mocha. She drank all of Mocha’s water. Stood around for a bit. Then she was ready to go.

Naima will only go out the front door at my Mom’s house. So we went out the front door. I helped her down the steps. On her way to the car she sniffed out a ground squirrel and chased it up a rain spout.

For a minute or so she danced around the rain spout. Forgetting that she was sore and drugged up. Finally I had to pull her away, otherwise she surely would have knocked the rain spout off the house.

I brought her back home and she followed me around the yard as I watered the flowers. Then she came in and begged to go on a walk. I had to break her heart on this one. Maybe Thursday night she will be ready for a short walk. Maybe Friday night. We’ll see.

After that, she laid down and took it easy the rest of the night.

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Back in April I took a few pictures of my Mom’s daffodils. My daffodils didn’t bloom this year, but that is okay. Daffodils are not my favorite, but they are okay.

A long time ago, I decided to name pictures of certain flowers all the same name. Daffodils were going to be “Before the Swallow Dares”. I think I’m going to get back to that.

Black & White, Contests, Naima, Self-Portrait, State Fair

Be True

June 3, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Today, a little after 8 AM, I dropped Naima off at the vet for surgery. She has a fatty deposit growing under her right shoulder that is getting pretty gigantic. Hopefully by the time this publishes, she will be out of surgery and I’ll be getting the phone call that she is awake and doing well. But I’m sure that call won’t be coming until this afternoon.

She will have to be fairly inactive for a few days while she recovers, which isn’t something she does all that well.

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Back in January, when I didn’t know that a horribly mismanaged global pandemic would completely alter our lives, I took some self-portraits while my beard was at its most fierce. The idea was to take a picture to use for the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon. As of now, the Iowa State Fair is still on, but I would be surprised if it goes off. Minnesota and Wisconsin have already cancelled their fairs.

Iowa is going to make an announcement on June 15 on what they are going to do. I imagine, that it will be to cancel it. However, I think there is a chance that they could still cancel the Fair and still have some of the competitions. I guess we’ll wait and see what is announced on June 15.

Until then, here are some self-portraits I took to potentially enter into the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon:

If you are interested, this is what the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon sent out on May 15:

To: Iowa State Fair Photography Entrants
From: Iowa State Fair Competitive Events Department
Re: Photography Entry Deadlines and Procedures

In light of the current and ongoing situation regarding the COVID-19 virus, adjustments are being made to this year’s Iowa State Fair
Photography entry process and dates.

• The preferred method of entry will be by mail.
Please do NOT mail before Monday, June 22. Entries by mail must be postmarked by midnight on Friday, July 3. To
enter by mail you must include your entry form, entry fee and photos in the same package. Make sure to wrap your
photos with plenty of packing materials to prevent them from being damaged during shipment. You can use either of
the two shipping addresses below.

Standard Mail: Iowa State Fair, Photography Salon, P.O. Box 57130, Des Moines, IA 50317.

UPS or FedEx: Iowa State Fair, Photography Salon, 3000 East Grand Avenue, Des Moines, IA 50317

• The date for entering in person at the Iowa State Fair Cultural Center is moved back to July 11 & 12
Saturday, July 11 and Sunday, July 12 from 10:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. at the Cultural Center.

To help reduce lines and allow for social distancing the process of dropping of entries will be different. Drop off tables
will be located at the north and west Cultural Center entrances. Photos need to be packaged with your entry form and
entry fee all together in a sack, envelope, etc. Please make sure you have the entry form complete, labels completed
and attached to the upper left-hand corner of each photo, and exact change for payment before you arrive. There will
not be an area available to finish putting entries together.

• To eliminate the handling of cash, we will ONLY be accepting payment by check or credit card.

• Entries will be accepted at the alternative dates and locations. Please refer to the above information to have photos
ready for drop off.

o University Photo – 7128 University Avenue, Windsor Heights, IA 50324
Monday- Friday 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. Call 515-223-5462 to confirm hours before delivery
Photos must be delivered by July 3.

o Iowa State Fair Administration Building Entry Department – 3000 East Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA 50317
Monday, July 7 thru Friday July, 10; 8:30 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Entrance to the Entry Department is located on the east side of the Administration Building and down the
stairs. (Handicap access is available thru the Administration Building lobby)

• The Photography Salon book will not be available for pre-purchase. We are still determining if we will be able to
print the salon book this year due to the condensed entry calendar or what the alternatives may be.

• The Pre-Fair awards ceremony and reception will not be held. Award winners will be able to pick up their prizes
during a ceremony held during the Fair. If not present at the award ceremony prizes will be available during photo pick
up or mailed after the Fair if postage is provided.

• Updated Photography rules and entry forms can be found
here: https://www.iowastatefair.org/participate/competition/how-to-enter/#fine-art-photography

Please share these changes with anyone that may be interested. We appreciate your help in spreading the word.
It is our full intent and hope that the 2020 Iowa State Fair will occur. The environment and recommendations are constantly
changing and we understand additional changes may be necessary. We will continue to monitor and re-evaluate the situation
and make additional adjustments as needed, while continuing to do what is best for our exhibitors. We appreciate your
understanding during these unprecedented times and will do everything we can to make sure the show will go on.

A good weekend project, besides working on the basement, will be picking out some pictures to enter.

Andy, Angie, Becky, Blogging, Carla, Elizabeth, Naima, Shannon, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 246 – FRIENDS

June 1, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

You are probably wondering why this post didn’t come out at 12:01 PM, on the nose. The reason is simple, my website broke overnight. It didn’t exactly break, but it stopped being able to produce new information.

The Photography 139 is build on love, passion, photography, God, and support for all oppressed classes. But it is also built on a MySQL database. Problem is that the data structure for the MySQL database is allegedly limited to 100 MB. However, the Photography 139 database hit 150 MB last night. Apparently I got away with an extra 50 MB of data before I got shut down.

That meant, I had to export the data from the existing database. Create a new database. Import the data into the new database. Then point the website to the new database. All of that might have been pretty simple, except for the import the data part was a disaster. It was tons and tons of reading help forums, trying to find the answer. You picked a fine time to leave me Webmaster Vest!

However, I survived the process and the website seems to be fully functional again. I guess we’ll find out in the next day or so.

And that, is that!

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This week just barely made it to double digit submissions. Barely. 35 straight weeks and a sigh. I’m sad that so few of you have FRIENDS. I would offer my friendship services, but you know global pandemic that is being horribly mismanaged and the fact that I am the True Lone Wolf.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Tamara Peterson

Angie DeWaard

Andy Sharp

Becky Parmelee

Christopher D. Bennett

Elizabeth Nordeen

Carla Stensland

But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:

SIGNS

SIGNS! What a great theme! An easy theme! While very few of us have friends, everybody has access to SIGNS! A SIGNS photo is simply a photo of a SIGN(S). Any kind of SIGNS.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

I now allow people to text me their submissions. In the past, I had made exceptions for a couple people that aren’t real computer savvy, even though it was an inconvenience for me and required at least 3 extra steps for me. I am now lifting that embargo because I have a streamline way of uploading photos. I’m not giving out my phone number, but if you have it, you can text me.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very friendly Monday!

Andy, Animals, Art, Black & White, Derrick, Elainie, Flowers, Iowa State, Macro, Mission Trip, Naima, Photoshop, Politics, Sabas, Saydie, Shannon, Youth Group

#63

May 28, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

I only have one image to share today. It might not seem like much of an image at first glance. It is just a wet gazania. But this is a focus stacked image. It took 63 pictures just to combine all of them into this one image.

I repeat, it isn’t that I took 63 images and this is the one I like the best, I took 63 images and combined them into one image.

I’m sure I’ll be doing more focus stacking in the future. The photo rail makes it way easier to focus stack. In addition to making it way easier to do super macro.

Now I have yet to do a super-macro photo stacked image, but that is coming. Very soon.

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Thought I would reveal the latest collection of images that have been added to the CANVAS WALL PROJECT.

12X16

12X8

8X10

There is one more order of canvases that are their way to my front stoop. Once those are up, the CANVAS WALL PROJECT will be finished!

At that time, I’ll publish a picture of it.

9 Emotions Project, Alexis, Andy, Baby Got Rack, Bethany, Bill, Black & White, Blogging, Boone County Fair, Boone FUMC, Candid Portrait, Dory, Elainie, Formal Portrait, Iowa State, Jesse, Johnathan, Jorge, Kalista, Kelly, Mission Trip, Naima, Railroad, Road Trip, Saydie, Scottie D., Self-Portrait, Self-Portrait Project, State Fair, Taylan, Willy, Youth Group

An Artist’s Notebook Post #3751

May 19, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

We have hit another milestone in the history of “An Artist’s Notebook”. Post #3751. I would normally make these statistical look back at the past type posts on even numbers, but I felt you guys were probably chomping at the bit to see the entries for RULE OF THIRDS.

This blog/online journal burst onto the world on August 9, 2006. Nearly 14 years later, it is somehow still around. That is success of some kind. At least it is perseverance.

As you know, I like meaningless statistics. That is what these posts are usually about. That and to take stock as to how I’m doing with my original mission to:

#1. Write in it.
#2. To be truthful as possible towards my true thoughts and feelings.
#3. Produce something that makes me worthy of having a pretentious sounding journal title like: “An Artist’s Notebook”.

I’m going to say that I continue to manage all 3. You probably wouldn’t know if I was being honest with you on my thoughts and feelings anyways. You’ll just have to take my work for it.

The last time we looked at these stats in Post #3500 on October 4, 2019 these were the 10 most popular categories on “An Artist’s Notebook”:

10. Photography – 311 Posts
9. Teresa – 312 Posts
8. Carla – 314 Posts
7. Shannon -351 Posts
6. Black & White – 390 Posts
5. Weekly Photo Challenge – 394 Posts
4. Jesse – 404 Posts
3. Animals – 477 Posts
2. Portrait – 516 Posts
1. Flowers – 537 Posts

Here are the current “standings”:

#10 Miller Triplet 1st Birthday Party – 13751 Views

#9 Family Happenings – 14222 Views

#8 Iowa State Cyclones Football – 2019 – 15711 Views

#7Naima– 16108 Views

#6 Taylan Howard -2020– 21320 Views

#5 Autumn Sharp – 2020– 21852 Views

#4 Weekly Photo Challenge – Year 6– 29218 Views

#3 Selfie Project – 2019 – 40726 Views

#2 9 Emotions Project – 43867 Views

#1 Weekly Photo Challenge – Year 7 – 48433 Views

These are the 10 Most Popular Images (by Views):

10. 973 Views

9. 1056 Views

8. 1063 Views

7.1082 Views

6. 1116 Views

5. 1141 Views

4. 1635 Views

3. 1261 Views

1283 Views

1. 2283 Views

I’m surprised that THE 9 EMOTIONS PROJECT is still so popular, since I haven’t touched it in over a year. But I do hope to get back to it. In fact, I have purchased a few things to make it possible to get back to THE 9 EMOTIONS PROJECT while safely physically distancing. So if you are interesting in being a victim… err… a subject. You know where to find me.

9 Emotions Project, Aaron, Andy, Becky, Black & White, Carla, Cathie, Elainie, Elizabeth, Jodie Cue, Kim, Michelle, Micky, Monica, Naima, Shannon, Still Life, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 243 – EMOTIONS

May 11, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

32 straight weeks of double digit submissions! The fourth straight week that I didn’t send any reminder text messages this morning and still made double digit submissions, easy.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the EMOTIONS submissions:

Jodie Cue

Kim Barker

Tamara Peterson

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Becky Parmelee

Aaron Barnett

Christopher D. Bennett

Monica Henning

Elizabeth Nordeen

Andy Sharp

Michelle Haupt

Carla Stensland

Elainie Stensland

Carla Stensland

Cathie Raley

Micky Augustin

RULE OF THIRDS

RULE OF THIRDS! What a great theme! But what is a RULE OF THIRDS picture. First you need to understand the RULE OF THIRDS:

“The guideline proposes that an image should be imagined as divided into nine equal parts by two equally spaced horizontal lines and two equally spaced vertical lines, and that important compositional elements should be placed along these lines or their intersections.[2] Proponents of the technique claim that aligning a subject with these points creates more tension, energy and interest in the composition than simply centering the subject.”

Most cameras by default have a default grid of the RULE OF THIRDS on the viewfinder. So RULE OF THIRDS should be one of the easiest themes yet!

If you are still struggling with the concept, look at the theme reveal picture. The goal here is to get the subject out of the center of the frame.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very off-center Monday!

Naima, WPC - Alternate

A Spectacle Monopolized

April 22, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 5 Comments

Since Monday’s reveal of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE submissions I have been flooded (virtually) with questions about what Naima listens to when she has her headphones on.

To be honest, she doesn’t listen to music on headphones. She finds them to be incredibly uncomfortable, as the pictures below will surely indicate.

but when she does listen to music it is usually angry political driven music like Public Enemy or Rage Against the Machine or early N.W.A. or the Dead Kennedys. She thinks it is disgraceful that Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos have as much wealth as the bottom 50% of Americans. She thinks it is horrible that the richest 5% of Americans own 67% of the wealth. That is is atrocious that the richest 1% own more than half of stock and less than 5% of debt.

If dogs ran things, this type of wealth inequality (which is completely unsustainable) would never happen.

She also enjoys Thelonious Monk, Led Zeppelin, and Lecrae.

But what was she listening to on the headphones. Her favorite podcast: “Pod Save America”.

As you can see, she is not a fan of headphones.

Andy, Angie, Becky, Cathie, Elizabeth, Kim, Michelle, Micky, Monica, Naima, Shannon, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 240 – EARS

April 20, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

Going to start today with a quote. Those of you who get it, will get it. Those of you that don’t, ask somebody:

“I think we should legalize marijuana in this country. Just so potheads have nothing to talk about ever again.”
-Daniel Tosh

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WooHoo!! 29 straight weeks of double digit submissions!! I didn’t even send out any text message reminders this morning. Maybe it is the better weather. Maybe it is the quarantine. Maybe it is the fact that almost everybody has access to ears. But I had received double digit submissions by 7 AM this morning.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Angie DeWaard

Michelle Haupt

Tamara Peterson

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Becky Parmelee

Christopher D. Bennett

Kim Barker

Micky Augustin

Elizabeth Nordeen

Andy Sharp

Kim Barker

Elizabeth Nordeen

Cathie Raley

Monica Henning

NOSE

NOSE! What a great theme! What is a NOSE picture? A picture of a NOSE. That is really it. Almost everybody has one and everybody has access to a NOSE.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very nosy Monday!

Animals, Naima, WPC - Reminder

Wild Goose Chase

April 17, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

Delving into the 2019 backlog. This is a collection of pictures that span a couple different trips to Dickcissel Park with Naima. Most of the pictures are from the second trip where we encountered a wounded goose.

The goose had been injured some way above its leg. It was out there for a couple more days, but then it was gone. I’d like to think that it recovered enough and eventually flew off. I didn’t find any signs of a struggle or goose remains any way and every time I saw the goose, it was hunkered down in the same location.

While there is a fair chance it eventually became victim of a predator, it did have a pretty good system of working its way out onto the pond on the thin ice. Too thin for a creature that weighed much more than it to get to it.

Here are some pictures:

This is a meaningless statistic, but it is a huge milestone for the backlog. I am now down to two rows of folders to curate!

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A reminder that this week’s THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is EARS:

EARS

An EARS photo is any picture that involves EARS or things that are used by EARS.

Happy photo harvesting!

Animals, Naima, Underwater

Raggle-Taggle

April 16, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

This morning’s post is a collection of some rando photos I took across a couple of days. A couple are of Naima, but most are taken in the Boone County Hospital Pond.

Feels like we are getting down to the nitty-gritty of the 2019 backlog. But there are still some big photo shoots left to curate out there.