Tag Archives: featured

Flowers, Holidays, Macro, WPC - Reminder

9/11

September 11, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

Today is the 19th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the plane that was ultimately taken down in Pennsylvania.

2,977 people died on that day. On the anniversary, I usually recount my experience on that day. I won’t do that today. I will merely point out that currently in this country we are losing the equivalent of 9/11 every third day. Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have experienced the equivalent of over sixty 9/11s.

I wish it still felt like this though:

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Here are some flower pictures I took back in June:

The Dahlias came from a baby shower that was “held” for Logan and Amanda for the baby they were about to have that they named… Dahlia. I don’t have any baby Dahlia pictures to share at this time. I have got to see her once, but I didn’t take any pictures. So you’ll just have to wait for that.

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

MACRO

A MACRO is a close-up photo. That is all there is to it.

Happy photo harvesting!

Mom, Railroad

Welcome to Boone

September 10, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

If my vacation is going how I hoped, today will be kind of a recovery day. I was hoping to spend Wednesday on a trip out to some place out west in the state. Maybe I’m spending today sleeping in. Maybe I’m watching the new Alfred Hitchcock 4K boxed set that hopefully arrived in my mailbox yesterday or before.

I know what you are thinking. Why did you need to buy a boxed set with PSYCHO, THE BIRDS, REAR WINDOW, and VERTIGO, when you already own PSYCHO on Blu-ray and DVD, THE BIRDS on Blu-ray, REAR WINDOW on Blu-ray, and VERTIGO on DVD. Because I don’t own them on 4K silly. In fact, even though PSYCHO is included in the boxed set, there is a fair chance I’ll also pick up the steelbook version of PSYCHO that is only available from Best Buy.

FULL METAL JACKET is coming out on 4K later in December. That is just a public service announcement.

But the photos from today have nothing to do with watching movies. It has to do with the second day of moving the train out to the intersection of US30 and Story Street to make a new “Welcome to Boone” sign.

It got moved in the middle of the morning, so even though the Computer Mine was battling 3 collapsed shafts I snuck out on my brake and snapped a few quick pictures before heading home for another joyous day of mining.

If you look closely, you can see my Mom in the last picture.

Nobody did anything stupid and tried to politicize the event. It was the one pure, good thing to happen in 2020. Oh wait, that isn’t what happened at all. 2020 sucks.

Drone, Nature, Panorama

Pixel 3 Test Flight

September 9, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

Last Monday, I took Rodan139 out for a quick flight in Ledges to test it with Teresa’s spare phone. I wanted to use her spare phone for a potential road trip I was planning for Labor Day. That way I could save the battery on my old timey Pixel 2 for other road trip fun times. Like the Snapchat or the Instagram or for GPS type stuff.

The spare phone did work masterfully. Here are some pictures from Rodan139’s test flight:

I don’t know if there is anything particularly special in this collection, but some of them are not without merit.

Flowers, Macro

Radiation of Happiness

September 8, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

This should be Day 4 of my vacation. I don’t have too much planned for today. I’m hoping that this will be a day of recovery after a fairly full and productive Day 3 of my vacation. But you know… the best laid plans of mice and men.

Today I’m sharing a collection of images that were taken in late July. Most of these pictures were taken with a flash ring. I can almost guarantee you one of these pictures will be featured in the 2021 Photography 139 Calendar. But you know… the best laid plans of mice and photographers.

Brown-eyed Susans. Lilies. Moonflowers. In that collection.

Andy, Becky, Black & White, Cathie, Dawn, Elizabeth, Jesse, Jodie Cue, Kim, Logan, Micky, Nature, Shannon, Teresa, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 260 – SKY

September 7, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

We did it! 49 straight weeks of double digit submissions! This week, I did have to pull over next to Ulysses S. Grant’s house and rattle a few cages, but we did make it to double digit submissions!

This is a wrap on the 7th year of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. There were 857 submissions for this set of 52 themes. If you want a walk down memory lane, click on the link below:

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – YEAR 7

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

Elizabeth Nordeen

Logan Kahler

Andy Sharp

Micky Augustin

Dawn Krause

Kim Barker

Cathie Raley

Jodie Cue

Jesse Howard

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Becky Parmelee

Teresa Kahler

Christopher D. Bennett

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:

Macro

MACRO! What a great theme! But what is a MACRO photo? It is basically a close-up photo of something.

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 close Monday!

Angie, Becky, Dawn, Jesse, Macro, Michelle, Micky, Vest, WPC - Reminder

WEEK 261 THEME REVEAL – MACRO

September 7, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

First of all, happy Labor Day. I hope you spend sometime to day thinking about how much better your life is because of organized labor movements. For example, you like weekends? Thank you unions! You like fair wages and relative income equality? Well, this has begun slipping away, but thank you unions for these things almost existing at one time. You like not having to send your 6 year old to work in the coal mine? Thank you unions! You like having widespread employer-based health coverage? Well actually, it is an extremely stupid idea to tie people’s health coverage to their job, but it is a vast improvement from before when next to nobody had health insurance. Thank you unions! Finally, do you like the Family and Medical Leave Act? This law requires employers to provide up to 12 weeks of job-protected unpaid leave annually to care for a newborn, newly adopted child, seriously ill family member or for your own illness. Thank you unions!

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If my vacation is going as planned, I’m somewhere on a road or in a park in eastern Iowa right now. Therefore, I will publish this week’s submissions later tonight or early tomorrow morning. Sometime after I get back to the Photography 139 worldwide headquarters.

However, just because I’m out gallivanting around, doesn’t mean you can’t start on this week’s theme. It is:

MACRO

MACRO! Wait, didn’t we just do MACRO 3 weeks ago? In fact we did. Last week’s theme SKY represented the end of Year 7 of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. With the end, I’ve decided I want to line up the beginning of Year 7 of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE with the beginning of the calendar year. The problem, it is 17 weeks until 2021. I know, that seems like forever and a day. But the real question was, what to do in the 17 week interim? Give you guys a 17 week break. Nah fam. I’m gong to have 17 weeks of Hall of Fame of themes.

What does that mean?

Well, I went through the list of every theme we’ve had over the 7 years of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. I compiled a list of the themes that we have used the most and created a list of 17 themes that have been used the most. Actually, the list ended up being 22 themes, and then 4 had to sadly be eliminated. I mean, they were sent to the farm to live with grandpa.

5 themes have been used in every set of 52 THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE themes:

1. SELF-PORTRAIT
2. SIGNS
3. MACRO
4. STILL LIFE
5. WATER

2 themes have been used in 6 out of 7 sets.

6. BLACK & WHITE
7. ANIMAL

15 themes have been used in 5 out of 7 sets.

8. FRAMED
9. REFLECTION
10. SHADOW
11. NIGHT
12. TREE
13. FOOD
14. FLOWER
15. ART
16. ROAD TRIP
17. RELIGION
18. MUSIC
19. COLORFUL
20. FACELESS PORTRAIT
21. RUINS
22. TRANSPORTATION

I randomly eliminated 5 themes from the third set to get to my Hall of Fame list of 17:

1. MACRO
2. WATER
3. STILL LIFE
4. SIGNS
5. SELF-PORTRAIT
6. BLACK AND WHITE
7. ANIMAL
8. FRAMED
9. TREE
10. ART
11. NIGHT
12. RUINS
13. FOOD
14. FACELESS PORTRAIT
15. COLORFUL
16. ROAD TRIP
17. TRANSPORTATION

Now you know the list and order for all the themes for the rest of 2020.

If you want to take a look back at the ghosts of MACRO past, here are the links to the 7 previous times that MACRO was the theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE:

RWPE #13 MACRO

RWPE Y2 #5 MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 50- MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 66 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 109 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 175 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 257 – MACRO

THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE was originally called THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT. It was first published on January 14, 2010. While I am not its guardian, it was originally more of an idea by Vest. Originally the submissions were published on both of our websites. Well, his submission and my submission were published on both websites. Then whomever else we got to submit were published on their respective websites.

On Monday mornings, a new theme was spit out by a random generator program that Vest wrote. The very first theme was USE OF SPACE. Now I write up the entire list of 52 themes and put it into a list generator website. Whatever it spits back out is the order of the themes.

THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT was for a from a success. I was lucky to get 3 to 4 submissions on a good week. I cancelled THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT after two years. The final theme was SELF-PORTRAIT. It was published on January 2, 2012. There were only two submissions. My submission and Vest’s submission. In fact, you had to go all the way back to November 21, 2011 to find a submission from somebody besides me or Vest. There was one submission by Jesse for the theme SIGNS.

I pulled the plug, and thought is was a fun attempt at getting participation for the website. However it failed miserably. However, every once in awhile, people would tell me that they missed it and wished I would bring it back. I mostly ignored these people, because if they enjoyed it so much, I’m pretty sure that they would have submitted. Finally after about the fifth different person pushed for its return, I reluctantly brought it back. This time, under the new name, THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE.

On September 21, 2015 THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE burst from its tomb like Lazarus. Resurrected by a groundswell of support. The theme for the first week was NIGHT. There were submissions from Angie, Becky, Micky, Michelle, Dawn, and Vest. It was good start, but I expected it to peter out quickly. Here we are, 5 years later. To my amazement, the strongest this weird little experiment that Vest and I started in 2010 is somehow the strongest it has ever been.

I thank everybody that participates. Either every once in a while or every week. It really is one of my favorite parts of running this website. To everybody that thinks about participating, but just hasn’t pulled the plug. Remember, it doesn’t have to be a masterpiece. The idea of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE isn’t to create a masterpiece. The point is to create!

House, Logan, Movies, Teresa

The Low Place

September 6, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

It is probably past time I shared photos of my basement clean up project. It isn’t really done, but it is pretty close to being in the ball park of being able to see the ending. Also, next Thursday the DAV (Disabled Veterans) Thrift Store is coming to pick up the donations that have filled up my guest bedroom. Plenty of which, came from the basement. While it should go without saying, veterans are not “losers” or “suckers”. Disabled veterans should be allowed to be in parades. Opinions of the current administration notwithstanding.

Here are the before pictures:

The main thing I did was “finish” the wall in the basement. Paint it black. Then re-orient the Union Street Theater. Logan helped with the wall. Teresa helped paint it and move the screen. While it is possible that it won’t look much better to you. It looks WAY better to me!

Here are the after pictures:

I also hung up some old dark room lights to provide a little bit of light for when the basement is in full theater mode. Also, the new movie posters came from Nader.

The idea of re-orienting the Union Street Theater is to be able to have a couple people over to watch movies or sports in a way that can be more physically distanced and with nobody sitting in front of anybody else. I eventually plan to upgrade my home theater screen and then in the distant future, upgrade the home theater projector to 4K. However, the new projector is well into the future. The new screen might happen later this year.

Also, the new sweet Hilton Coliseum rug? That was a sweet $40 pickup from the Furniture Zone. Brand new, that thing is almost $200. Bonus!

Black & White, Formal Portrait, Sara

2010-03-31

September 5, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

The pictures from the folder 2010-03-31 are from when I was officially given the title of Lone Wolf. Willy had been out there masquerading as a lone wolf for years. He had to have his wings clipped by Jay. Jay made me a mask that was presented to me and the title of Lone Wolf was officially bequeathed to me.

To celebrate a title that I have scientifically backed up over the years, I went out and had a photo session with the mask. Sara was the photographer.

Unfortunately, the mask did fall about a few years ago, but my claim to being the true Lone Wolf never has!

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:

The Story

Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve a transformer and a big red bat. Not together though.

Flowers, Macro, WPC - Alternate, WPC - Reminder

Oh But Still

September 4, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

You couldn’t have possibly thought that I didn’t have alternate FLOWER photos for last week’s THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE did you? Of course, I took lots of flower pictures last week, but only a few were contenders for my submission to THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE.

Here are the contenders that could have been somebody, but ended up being a bum, which let’s face it, is what they are:

4 hours from this post, I’ll be vacation. Sweet, sweet vacation!

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

SKY

A SKY photo is a photo where the sky is a major compositional element of the image.

Happy photo harvesting!

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.