A Rainy Evening

A few shots from after the rain came through this evening...

By the way, Digital Photography School has a whole thread dedicated to the 50mm. Seriously, the whole thread is a great example of its versatility. Have I mentioned I'm in love this that lens...oh, I have...like a hundred times...

The Perfect Storm for Photography

Last night, "the perfect storm" for photographing lightning passed just north of our home. It was really fun to play with manual camera settings and enjoy the beautiful show the skies were performing.

I set the camera up on the tripod and used the remote to control the shutter. For the pictures from earlier in the evening, I cranked the aperture nearly as high as I could to allow for a longer shutterspeeds without being over exposed. As night fell, I continued to lengthen the shutterspeed to increase my chances of catching a strike.

A Sky Timeline

Saturday evening, Scott and I were driving home from Danville. We were in seperate cars at the time, I was following, one eye in front of me and one eye on the sky. The sun shining through the clouds was beautiful. All the sudden Scott pulled over and said we have to get a shot of that...my thoughts exactly.

We enjoyed the little stop, took a few shots, and continued on our way. About the time we're rolling into Lebanon, 30 minutes up the road, Scott calls on the cell phone to tell me a funnel cloud was spotted a few miles north of Lebanon. Evidently, over my singing along with the radio, I didn't hear the tornado siren going off in town. I spent the rest of the ride home, about 30 more minutes listening to local talk radio station.

The radio advised of a possible tornado headed toward Sheridian at 8:45, just the time we'd be driving though! We decided to forge ahead. I took this shot out the window on our way into town.

We finally made it home where we proceeded to stand outside and take in the amazing depth of colors in the sky. Luckily, we never saw any funnel clouds or tornados, and the skys finally calmed down after the sun went down. These last two shots are from our place.

Anyone remember the end of Ghost Busters? Same sky...

Photo Week - Checkered Flag Style

Is it me, or does time go by insanely fast?! We're already here at Friday, the photo finish day of this Photo Week.  

The challenge this week was to take pictures inspired by the high contrast black and white checkered flag that will be waiving someone to victory next Sunday at the Indianapolis 500. 

This first picture is actually primarily black and white, for the other two I removed the color afterwards. These are flowers from a Lilly of the Valley plant we have out in the yard. 

What I love about black and white photography is how shapes and composition catch the eye. Black and whites always look so graphic. Love'em! 

A Long Way To Go...

Today, the eve of the Mini-Marathon, I've been having some anxiety about the monumental challenge ahead. Okay, "monumental" might be extreme, but I am in no way a skilled runner, therefore to me this is monumental.  

Then this morning, while on a walk through the neighborhood, we came across this guy.  Our little crayfish friend was at least a half mile from the lake and that's assuming he went straight through some yards. No joke, from the time we first crossed paths till this picture was taken, this guy had traveled more than three tenths of a mile in the curb gutter. So, I'm thinking, if this tiny little crayfish can travel thousands of feet on those little crusty legs and holding those huge claws in the air, I can do 13.1 miles tomorrow morning. Thanks, Little Crayfish!

Taken with my highly adored 50mm at f-3.2 with the camera on aperture priority. 

Spring in Action

I find it amazing how quickly Mother Nature snaps out of her bleak winter cover. In just a matter two weeks the small green shoots in the backyard bloomed into beautiful daffodils. Thanks to Sara for throwing down the challenge to capture this sign of warm things to come. 

While I was laying in our flower bed, also picked up these...


 

Spring, come on down!

The first sign of spring in my backyard!

The house work texture repeat! (finally...)

For awhile now, I've been wanting to experiment with texture repeats like those done by Daisy Janie. Finally, this weekend, while touching up some paint in the kitchen, I pulled out a can of paint dated 2005, which was suppose to be a mossy green. Low and behold, after so many years on the shelf the colors had separated out, and as I stirred the can, a beautiful swirl formed and within that my first texture repeat!

The original swirl

The finished product after 3 flips in photoshop.
(I really like the hearts that formed in the repeat.)

The next picture is just a shot I had to take today. After such a foggy, gloomy day, as soon as I got home, this was out my back door. The skies really rallied at the end!

Pink clouds on the horizon

Dahlia

A dahlia from the backyard of our old place in Lebanon. (It's an old pic, but it's a fav.)