Category Archives: Nature

2009-02-18 – Arizona Day 3

My photo organization for early 2019 is a complete mess. I’m trying to reorganize it a bit on the fly. Today’s collection of images come from the folder 2009-02-18/Arizona_Day_3.

These pictures were taken in Arizona as the vacation part of the trip was starting to wind down and the business part of the trip was getting ready to start up. Lowell and Eric came into town and we met up with them and checked out some more Spring Training.

Here are some pictures:


Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

Arizona Day 3

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

Arizona Day 3 – Part A

Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve more from the trip to Arizona.

2009-02-18 – Arizona Day 2

There are several folders inside the folder called 2009-02-18, so rather than having one of those fifty photo journal entries, I’ve decided to break them down by the subfolder. This subfolder is called ARIZONA_DAY_2.

The pictures in this folder are from when I went to Arizona with Jesse on a trip that was 50% work related and 50% for fun.

Day 2 of the Arizona trip involved checking out the Chicago Cubs Spring Training facility and then hanging out on this weird rock-hill-miniature mountain type thing:


Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

Arizona Day 2

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

Arizona Day 2

Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve even more of the trip to Arizona.

Naima Takes Dickcissel

Dipping into the backlog again. This post finishes off all of the backlog from May of 2018! WooHoo!

It once again draws on a consistent theme. Me taking pictures of Naima at Dickcissel Park.

You might be wondering why I took so many of these pictures last year. The reason is because I spent a considerable part of 2018 trying to get the perfect picture of Naima running at the camera. Ears in the air. Tongue sticking out of her mouth. Silly dog smile on her mug.

I also had an obsession with getting a picture of her in the water. From underwater. But that is a project that will continue into 2019, I do believe.

Here are some more Naima pictures:


Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Naima at Dickcissel

Gotta keep hammering away at that backlog!

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Also, since the purchase of the drone, I’ve decided to start actually adding some content to my YouTube channel. In the past, the YouTube channel has only really existed so I could like other YouTube videos. Over it’s 10+ year existence, I’ve only uploaded like 30 videos.

That will hopefully change in the coming months. ‘

I recently put up my first “test” video. It was mostly a test of if I could figure out how to do it. I’m not particularly good at video editing and it shows in this video. What also shows is how terrible I am at sound recording.

I hope my video editing skills improve. We’ll see about the sound recording skills. Actually I have no choice but to improve on sound recording. You’ll see when you watch the video.

So below, checkout this YouTube video I made on DJI Mavic 2 Pro Quickshots with Bethany as the guinea pig:



If you don’t subscribe to my YouTube channel, please do because when I hit 100 subscribers, I can customize my channel’s URL. In the future, there will be more drone videos and I have plans for more videos revolving around the birthday present I’m giving to myself.

Also, a big shoutout to Joe who is helping me with video editing. The video is edited with an open source video editing program called OpenShot.

Selfie Project – April

Seems like a good time to share my favorite pictures from THE SELFIE PROJECT from April.

I’ve been trying to be more interesting with the pictures, or at least more interesting with my life, since it felt like in January and February I didn’t do anything.

I don’t know if I’m accomplishing that or not, but at least in the month of
April I did leave the Cyclone State once. So that is something.

Here are my favorites from April:


April 1, 2019
April 1

April 3, 2019
April 3

April 5, 2019
April 5

April 6, 2019
April 6

April 7, 2019
April 7

April 8, 2019
April 8

April 9, 2019
April 9

April 12, 2019
April 12

April 14, 2019
April 14

April 16, 2019
April 16

April 17, 2019
April 17

April 18, 2019
April 18

April 19, 2019
April 19

April 21, 2019
April 21

April 23, 2019
April 23

April 24, 2019
April 24

April 27, 2019
April 27

April 28, 2019
April 28

April 30, 2019
April 30

As of this writing, I haven’t taken my picture for today, but my May 1 picture does involve a giant check, so May is shaping up to be quite the month!

A Photo Journal – Henry Carroll – Page 32

Last Saturday Logan stopped by to show me his super sweet gimbal and to borrow my Rode microphone to see if it is something that he wanted to add one to his arsenal in the future.

I hadn’t actually touched the Rode in probably 4 or 5 years. I guess that isn’t 100% true. I picked it up and put it in the Photography Closet. But I haven’t actually attached it to the microphone in several years.

When I pulled it out of the closet I was shocked to find out that the battery was still alive. Which was a good thing because I was also shocked to discover it used a 9 volt battery.

After playing with the gimbal for a bit, Logan and I went out to McHose Park to take a picture for Page 32 for THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT:


Photo Journal - Page 32
Page 32 – Contrast movement and stillness in a single frame.

We took a few other images while we were out there:


Photo Journal - Page 32

Photo Journal - Page 32

Photo Journal - Page 32

Next week when we check in with the PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT, we might check in with one of these pages:

Page 36 – Use shutter speed to capture anger!
Page 37 – Use aperture to capture melancholy.
Page 43 – Take a picture that only works in black & white.
Page 84 – Photograph a lie.
Page 109 – Photograph a word to change its meaning.

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This is your reminder that this week’s WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is DESSERT.


WEEK 189 - DESSERT
DESSERT

A DESSERT photo is any photo involving a delicious, tasty DESSERT.

Happy photo harvesting!

Selfie Project – March

It has been awhile since we checked in with THE SELFIE PROJECT. I figured today was as good of a day as any to check out March before April is over.

I’m not sure I did more interesting things in March than I did in February or January where it felt like I never left the house. I think I’ve continued that in April. I actually even left the state in April!

Here are my favorites from March:


March 1, 2019
March 1

March 2, 2019
March 2

March 3, 2019
March 3

March 4, 2019
March 4

March 6, 2019
March 6

March 7, 2019
March 7

March 8, 2019
March 8

March 9, 2019
March 9

March 10, 2019
March 10

March 12, 2019
March 12

March 14, 2019
March 14

March 16, 2019
March 16

March 17, 2019
March 17

March 19, 2019
March 19

March 21, 2019
March 21

March 22, 2019
March 22

March 23, 2019
March 23

March 24, 2019
March 24

March 26, 2019
March 26

March 28, 2019
March 28

March 29, 2019
March 29

March 31, 2019
March 31

No doubt you already excited to see my April “adventures”.

Back to Harrier

A couple Saturdays back I took Rodan139 back to the Harrier Marsh for a bit of a joy flight. I’m not sure I really had an agenda. Just wanted to take it out for a bit of a flight and snap a few photos.

It was on this trip that I did decide that I would like to actually post some drone videos on YouTube. I don’t really enjoy video editing and I’m not much of a vlogger, but we’ll see where this takes me. Probably not that far, but when I do get my first drone video up I’ll let you know and then you can subscribe to my YouTube Channel. Right now I’m a mere 980 subscribers short of being allowed to broadcast live on YouTube.

Here are some pictures i took at the Harrier Marsh:


Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Since these pictures were taken, they have burned out much of Harrier Marsh. The new plants should be coming in shortly and it will look very different next time we visit there, I’m sure.

A Photo Journal – Henry Carroll – Page 90

A couple weekends back up I went to Minnesota to check out the Final Four festivities and check-in with a few people I hadn’t seen for a long time.

On Sunday morning I hit a donut shop with Becca and Shawn. Then I went to Minnehaha Falls to kill sometime before meeting Sarah, Shawn, and Addie at Revival. I figured that this trip was a great time to knock out Page 90 of THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT. Even though it was absolutely just pouring down.

I made the walk to from the parking lot to Minnehaha Falls, protecting the camera as best as I could. I took a few pictures and then it really started pouring down. By the time I got to the car every inch of me was completely soaked.

I was so soaked that even after a 30 minute or so wait at Revival and about an hour eating and talking, my shirt only had a few dry spots on it.

Here is the picture that will be physically adhered to Page 90 of the physical PHOTO JOURNAL:


Photo Journal - Page 90
Page 90 – Create ambiguity with a blend of artificial and natural light

Pretty much every camera (even your cell phone) has white balance. This is where you set the kind of light that is dominant in your scene. It is set on Auto White Balance so that you don’t have to think about it. This is the type of thing that in the olden days you had to do with film. Film was balanced for different kinds of light. Pretty much all consumer film was balanced for daylight. Which is why when you took pictures inside, there was often a strange color cast to it.

The same thing happens when you take your color balance off of auto and set it for a type of light that isn’t in your picture. For example, in the picture of Minnehaha Falls, I set the white balance to tungsten. Since the lighting of this picture could be best described as shady, it the camera cast a blue hue on the image, thinking it was seeing tungsten light. Different kinds of lights have different color temperatures. You can make surreal images by setting your white balance against type.

One of the advantages of shooting in RAW is that you can change the white balance to whatever you want it to be. So I changed half the white balance from the image above to shady, so you can see what the image would have conventionally looked like:


Photo Journal - Page 90

Admittedly, I did play up the blue cast of the images a bit in post.

Here are a few other images I took at Minnehaha Falls:


Photo Journal - Page 90

Photo Journal - Page 90

Photo Journal - Page 90

Photo Journal - Page 90

Photo Journal - Page 90

I’m still on goal to knock out one page of the PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT a week. This week I’m looking at knocking out one of these pages:

Page 97 – Photograph a human as though it were an animal.
Page 84 – Photograph a lie.
Page 43 – Take a picture that only works in Black & White.
Page 37 – Use aperture to capture melancholy

You could be featured in just such a picture.

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Reminder that the theme for this week’s WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE is RELIGION:


WEEK 188 - RELIGION
RELIGION

A RELIGION picture is any picture that involves the practice of a RELIGION. From a picture of a religious building, to a religious symbol, to a religious book, to a religious service.

Happy photo harvesting!

Lazarus Come Out!

A few weeks back Rodan139 took a tremendous tumble from the sky. According to the flight log, Rodan139 fell out of the sky from 190 feet. It was going 40.3 MPH when it hit sweet, round, Mother Earth.

Rodan139 was a hurting unit when I got to it. A couple arms were broken off, the camera was barely hanging on, and most of the body was considerably damaged.

To be brutally honest, it sucked. However, Rodan139 is just a machine. So I picked up his pieces and threw them in the Sir Pixalotmobile and Jason and I drove to Luther to have a tasty lunch.


Whatcha Smoking Tenderloin

Let me tell you, nothing mends the cracks in an emotional broken heart while at the same time clogs up the plumbing of a physical heart like a tasty, tasty tenderloin*.

After lunch I went home and did some research on the level of fiscal pain this accident was going to cause me. I knew it wasn’t going to be cheap, but the worst case scenario was that I was going to have to push off the purchase of the Sony RX0 that I have been coveting for a few months now (but that is another dilemma for another time).

I contacted DJI Repair and they sent me a UPS Label to send Rodan139 into them. I boxed it up and sent it off and waited. What happened next surprised me.

They covered the whole thing. All the parts. All the labor. All the shipping. Covered. And what was covered wasn’t cheap.

Here is a list of everything they covered and what it would have cost:

Item List

Gimbal Axis Arm Module (Pro)

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 160.00

Total Price: 160.00

Upper Cover Module

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 11.00

Total Price: 11.00

Middle Frame Module

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 13.00

Total Price: 13.00

Core Board Module

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 320.00

Total Price: 320.00

Vibration Absorbing Board (Upper)

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 2.00

Total Price: 2.00

Rear Arm Module (Left)

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 21.00

Total Price: 21.00

Front Arm Module (Left)

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 24.00

Total Price: 24.00

Front Arm Module (Right)

Quantity: 1

Net Price : 24.00

Total Price: 24.00

Repair Service Fee

Quantity: 2

Net Price : 65.00

Total Price: 130.00

Tax

0.00

Shipping Cost

0.00

Total Amount

705.00

Discount

705.00

Total Payment (USD$)

0.00

You read that right. It could have cost me $705.00, but it cost me nada. Zilch. The big goose egg. Hmmmm…. I wonder what also costs about $705? That is a discussion for another time though.

What is not a discussion for another time is how amazing DJI’s Customer Service is. I was very impressed and I was glad that I decided to go with DJI when I decided to take a stab at aerial photography.

Yesterday at approximately 4:05 PM I was reunited with Rodan139. Now that I am complete again, I feel I can share a couple of pictures taken from that last fateful flight that ended in carnage of twisted wire and broken plastic.


Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Yesterday it was a little windy, so I took Rodan139 out for another very shorty maiden voyage.


Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

Drone Photography

The last picture I took in my backyard as I wanted to test a night photography setting.

I definitely was the most nervous I have ever been on one of these little flights. In particular, there was a moment when I was out at the Harrier Marsh when Rodan139 was surrounded by a flock of birds. Visions of a bird smashing it to it and it tumbling to the ground danced in my head. I quickly rose above the birds, but I was shocked out how close they came to it. A mental note was made for future trips out to Harrier.

The weather on Saturday and Sunday does look promising. Although Saturday, Baby Got Rack might be doing a little research project. Oh… I’ve said too much.

*At this time, there will not be a review of the tenderloin. While I have very good perspective on what is actual tragedy and what is just “well that sucks”, I still wasn’t in the proper state of mind to properly assess the tenderloin.

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 185 – WATER

The high submission rate hit a second straight week. If we get a third week that is called a streak. If we get a streak going, we might just force a one game playoff with the Yankees where our catcher calls his shot but it is a fake and he bunts and our streak centerfielder scores from second base. He will look like Wesley Snipes, but next season he will look like Omar Epps.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about baseball season (Padres are 3-1 by the way), you came to see the submissions:


WEEK 185 - WATER - BECKY PAREMELEE
Becky Parmelee

WEEK 185 - WATER - CATHIE RALEY
Cathie Raley

WEEK 185 - WATER - CATHIE RALEY
Cathie Raley

WEEK 185 - WATER - CHRISTOPHER D. BENNETT
Christopher D. Bennett

WEEK 185 - WATER - MICKY AUGUSTIN
Micky Augustin

WEEK 185 - WATER - CARLA STENSLAND
Carla Stensland

WEEK 185 - WATER - KIM BARKER
Kim Barker

WEEK 185 - WATER - TAMARA PETERSON
Tamara Peterson

WEEK 185 - WATER - MICHELLE HAUPT
Michelle Haupt

WEEK 185 - WATER - ANDY SHARP
Andy Sharp

WEEK 185 - WATER - ANDY SHARP
Andy Sharp

WEEK 185 - WATER - ANDY SHARP
Andy Sharp

WEEK 185 - WATER - ANDY SHARP
Andy Sharp

WEEK 185 - WATER - JODIE CUE
Jodie Cue

WEEK 185 - WATER - JODIE CUE
Jodie Cue

WEEK 185 - WATER - STEPHANIE KIM
Stephanie Kim

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:


WEEK 186 - TOOL
TOOL

TOOL! What a great theme! But what is a TOOL photo? A TOOL photo is any photo of a TOOL. A TOOL at rest. A TOOL in action. Of course there is more than one definition of TOOL.

I look forward to seeing you interpretations!

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. 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 tooly Monday.