Category Archives: Animals

That Wasn’t Me

September 22, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett Leave a comment

Every once in awhile, and it is a very rare every once in awhile, people ask me where I come up with the titles for my “An Artist’s Notebook” entries. The once that aren’t glaringly obvious. Frequently they are taken from quotes. But frequently they are taken from songs I’m listening to while either editing the images or while I’m typing up the entry.

For example. “That Wasn’t Me” is a Brandi Carlile song that has some of my favorite lines in it.

Hang on, just hang on for a minute
I’ve got something to say
I’m not asking you to move on or forget it
But these are better days
To be wrong all along and admit is not amazing grace
But to be loved like a song you remember
Even when you’ve changed

This is the opening verse of the song, and it crushes me every time I hear it.

Well any ways, here are some pictures I took in late June. Some are of the official bird of the state of Iowa being confused by its reflection. Or maybe it loves its reflection. It should get to know its Greek mythology better. Get to know the story of Narcissus.

The other pictures are of flowers from around my yard. Well one is from my Mom’s yard. One is from Stan and Noreen’s yard.

The bird harassing my Mom’s car, I’m taking that as a win for not keeping your car very clean. I’m talking to my car, which birds never seem to harass.

Animals, Iowa State

2010-04-08

September 19, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett Leave a comment

The pictures from the folder 2010-04-08 are from around the Iowa State campus. I liked to stop around there to photograph the wildlife back then. I still like doing that, maybe not now with a pandemic going on, but you get it…

By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entries to their original glory:

Wilder

Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve my birthday party invitations from 2010.

Animals, Flowers, Mom, Naima, Railroad

Town Sign Upgrade

September 3, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

As you know, I am a big fan of town signs. So much so that I’ve even created a project dedicated to my love for town signs. Part of this love comes from a sign I remember as a kid. It was up on Marion Street as you were entering Boone from the west from the Logansport area. I believe the sign was a guy fishing and the sign said something like “Try Boone. You’ll Stay”.

This could 100% be a false memory. I have never been able to find a picture of the sign. I don’t know that anybody else even remembers it.

What is beyond contestation, however is that Boone’s town signs have been less than stellar for years. Currently there are some boring brick sings on US30 that just declare “Welcome to Boone”. They aren’t well lit and sometimes the letters fall off. It is very disappointing.

Then the Boone Rotary Club stepped in and stepped up Boone’s town sign game. They raised funds to move a train from the Boone & Scenic Valley Railroad out to the intersection of US30 and Story Street.

It ended up being more work than they thought. They had to split up the move into two days. On the first day they moved the coal tender and a passenger car. On the second day they moved the engine.

Here are some pictures from the first day:

The last two pictures are really connected to the movement of the train, they were just taken on the same day and I like them.

Animals

Kit

September 1, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Last week the wind blew a baby squirrel of my Mom’s neighbor’s tree. I took a few pictures of the incredible cuteness.

The interwebs said to just leave the baby squirrel alone and eventually the mom would come back and get it. Sure enough, the little guy was gone in a few hours. The mom must have came back and got them. If you think anything else happened to the baby squirrel, that evil is on you!

Animals, Flowers, Macro

If I Told You My Story

August 25, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

This is a collection of flower pictures I took in early June at my Mom’s house. Daises. Alliums. Clematises.

So many flower pictures! So many more still in the hopper!

Animals, Art, Flowers, House, Macro, Monica, State Fair

The Gladdest Thing Under the Sun

August 19, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Way back in May, Monica searched out my photo services. For probably about 20 years (no joke) to enter the Fine Arts Show at the Iowa State Fair. This year, the year the Fair got cancelled due to mismanaged pandemic, she finally entered. However, she needed an image to send to the fine people at the Fine Arts show. So she came over and I snapped some pictures for her. This painting is the one that ultimately made the show:

Yes, you heard that right. Made the Iowa State Fair Fine Arts Show. You see, despite there being no Iowa State Fair, the Fine Arts Show is still going on, via the interwebs. That means you should click on the link below:

Fine Arts Show

You should then find Monica’s painting and click on the “Vote” button below it and cast your ballot for Monica and the People’s Choice Award. I believe voting lasts until Sunday. You must have a Facebook account to vote, which sucks, because Facebook sucks. But you probably already have an account that Russia is mining for data right now. So you might as well use it to help out Monica. Who knows? Maybe she will get a big following in Omsk!

What are you still doing here? Go vote for Monica.

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Here is a collection of pictures I took around the Photography 139 Studio back near the end of June. Hollyhocks, daisies, lilies and a beetle that surpasses them all in beauty!

That bowl of raspberries was made into a delicious pie by my Mom. Raspberry pie was my Grandma’s favorite and my Mom always used to make her a pie out of my raspberries. It wasn’t a great year for raspberries because of the drought, but there was still plenty enough for a pie. It is good to be a self-sufficient. I had a bountiful harvest of rhubarb, raspberries, and cherries this year. Looks like there will be plenty of garlic and maybe a record amount of grapes!

Alexis, Andy, Angie, Animals, Becky, Birthdays, Black & White, Brandon, Carla, Christianity, Dad, Elainie, Elizabeth, Ernie, Jason, Jodie Cue, Johnathan, Kim, Macro, Mom, Shannon, Tamara, Teresa, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 257 – MACRO

August 17, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

I need to start today by wishing my eldest sister Teresa a happy birthday. Happy birthday Teresa!

I hope your birthday is as amazing as you want it to be!

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Can you believe it? 46 straight weeks of double digit submissions! I thought for sure the derecho would maybe put a hitch in THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE’S giddy up this week. But it was barely even a bump in the road for most of you. The rest of you, I’m going to assume you still don’t have power and your roof is lying in your neighbor’s field.

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

Andy Sharp

Becky Parmelee

Angie DeWaard

Carla Stensland

Jodie Cue

Christopher D. Bennett

Jodie Cue

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Tamara Peterson

Kim Barker

Elizabeth Nordeen

Logan Kahler

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:

RELIGION

RELIGION! What a great theme! But what is a RELIGION photo? A RELIGION photo is a photo of anything that deals with the practice of a RELIGION. From a picture of a holy book or a place of worship or a worship service or a symbol of RELIGION.

I look forward to 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 religious Monday!

Animals, Equipment, Fisheye, Flowers, Formal Portrait, Jesse, Logan, Naima, Nature, Night, Self-Portrait, Still Life

Red Fish, Blue Fish

August 16, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

I meant to publish a post on this subject a week or so ago, but the derecho put those plans on hold. I’ve meant to be more proactive about writing about when I get new equipment, even equipment that is fairly small or seemingly inconsequential to most people. Hopefully this post starts just such a new era for “An Artist’s Notebook”.

The most recent thing I purchased was a fisheye lens for the mirrorless camera setup. Have a look:

Here are some specs for the lens:
FOCUS TYPE: Manual
CLOSEST FOCUSING DISTANCE: 7.9″
FOCAL LENGTH: 12mm
ANGLE OF VIEW: 180
MAXIMUM APERTURE: f/2.8
MINIMUM APERTURE: f/22

On a 35mm camera or a full frame sensor camera, a 50mm lens is the same as human sight. When you look through a viewfinder with a 50mm lens on the camera, what you see should be about the same as when you aren’t looking through the lens. Your angle of view won’t be the same, but objects should be about the same distance.

To illustrate how a fisheye lens, I took pictures of Jesse with a 50mm lens and with my new fisheye lens so you can see the difference between human sight and a fisheye lens.

50mm

Fisheye

50mm

Fisheye

50mm

Fisheye

50mm

Fisheye

I wanted to make this example to be more scientific, but I couldn’t find a football field in Boone with yardlines already painted that wasn’t being used. So these distances are mostly eyeballed, but they are pretty darn close.

Now that you know what it is and what it does, here are a few sample pictures I have taken:

The next piece of equipment I will talk about is a macro bellow I recently picked up. Then maybe a remote camera trigger. Then I need to purchase some stuff.

Animals, Black & White, Drone, Nature, Panorama, WPC - Alternate, WPC - Reminder

So Many Stories of Where I’ve Been

August 7, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

I took plenty of NATURE photos that just weren’t ready for the world on Monday. They needed a little bit more time in the oven. These pictures were taken at Summerset State Park, Harrier Marsh, Neal Smith Wildlife Refuge, and Honey Hollow.

I haven’t even thought about this week’s theme yet…

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This is your reminder that this week’s THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is TRANSPORTATION:

TRANSPORTATION

A TRANSPORTATION photo is any photo that involves the TRANSPORTATION of people or goods. A car. A train. A boat. Your feet. A road. A bridge. You get the idea.

Happy photo harvesting!