Slump

hi.  I know I haven't posted for a while, I am seriously in a slump. A few months back (ok maybe a year or more) Ashes gave me an awesome gift of a photography book. This book described not the "how" of photography, but talked about the "why." It delves into why people take pictures. What is it they are trying to say? What is the message they want to leave behind with the taking of that image at that moment? I have read this book a few times and now and I love it. It has made me think of the purpose of photography and I try to get more meaning out of my images. Today, however, it reminds me of  how I am stuck. I have soooo many thoughts rolling through my brain that the background noise is leaving me crippled, and I realize I haven't taken pictures just for me for a while because I truly have nothing to say. I don't have any message I want to leave with any one. I just don't really care if I have anything to say or if I have anyone to say it too. My creative voice is gone. Muse is missing. I know I am the play maker in my family. I know that if anything happens around here it is because I am the one to make it happen. I know that I must make all the changes needed before depression and anxiety consume my little family and full on destroy us. On one hand I want to make sure everyone has clean clothes, and good grades and is exercising, and eating right, and I will take lots of pictures, and I will make them all look like Natalie Norton's, and I will clean the house, and plan all the girl scout activities for 3 of the 5 age groups, and sew on all the badges, and pack the lunches, and refill the prescriptions, and pay the bills, and do the shopping, and play with the dog, and I will make everyone's life sunny and bright, and  I won't mind when I get growled at, or yelled at or flat out  ignored.  Today, I am tired of fighting.  Today, I just don't give a %$#@. Thank you for listening to my tirade. I am going to go take a nap. :-)

Canon Country Landscape/zoom

Yesterday we went to Hardware Ranch. There is hardly any snow, and consequently the numbers of elk are significantly down as well. Our guide told  us that last year there were over 600 elk wintering at the ranch, while this year the highest count has been about 130 elk. Last year a dozen or so big Bull Elk came in for feed, but this year only two little spike males have made the trip. No snow means they can still access the meadow grass, and don't really need the free meal. It also means less elk for humans to look at. It was Still a good opportunity to play with my new telephoto lens. The first image was shot from the Visitors center, with the 75 mm portion of the lens. The other two images were at full zoom of 300 mm. I liked how the lens felt in my hand, and even though I did not have a tripod, and light was fairly low I didn't get a lot of camera shake. I think this will be a great lens to take to Yellowstone. As for over all every day use though, I prefer the 18-55mm kit lens, as I found 75 mm was still just TOO CLOSE for everyday shooting. 

To see the photos from the rest of our super cold day, check out my flickr page here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tlcbull/sets/72157628912104937/

Canon Country No flash mode

The Girl Scout Cookie Kick Off on Friday night, provided me with a great opportunity to use the camera in the "flash off" mode. This mode takes pictures in nearly fully automatic mode, with the exception being that if low light is detected the flash will not fire. Fortunately there seemed to be enough ambient light that a flash was not necessary. Because of no flash, movements are blurred. In photo 1, we see JB and one of her friends (we will call her M) being silly for the camera. You will notice their waving hands are not in focus. I am ok with this, because of the low light/no flash situation, and because I like the feeling of movement the blur provides. In photo 2, I cropped in a bit closer, but did not make any other changes.

Photo 1

Photo 2

Photo 3

Ok, Ok, I know I said I wouldn't do a lot of post processing, but photo 3 is an example of where I just could not contain myself. Jb and M pulled M's younger sister into the frame, and are waiving frantically. There is a red bag  lurking distractingly in the back ground, a person in a purple shirt is also in the background, along with a lot of extra wasted space and wires plugged into the stairs. Irritating! So I cropped the photo in tighter, eliminating the red bag and wires. I then darkened the area with the purple shirt person, and cloned over the frantically waiving arm. JB is still staring into space which is mildly annoying, but my photoshop skills are not yet at the point where I could replace her eyes with ones that ARE looking at the camera. Something I will work on later. But for now, I am pleased with the result shown in photo 4.

Things I would do differently? Wait for JB to look at me BEFORE taking the shot. Well, I am now headed out to Hardware Ranch to see the elk and test out my telephoto lens. More on how that goes tomorrow.

Canon Country landscape mode

Thanks to the inversion we have some fairly spectacular sunsets in Good ol' Logantown. I played with the "landscape" mode on the new camera. I did not use a tripod, but am still pleased with the results. I tried shooting a bunch of photos on the same plane and merged them together in photoshop to make a panorama. Sadly the image file is too large to upload here, but you can see it on my flickr page http://www.flickr.com/photos/tlcbull/6691502903/

Just a note.... I am going to try REALLY hard to not doctor my photos in photo shop until I have really learned to use the camera. I am going to allow myself to crop and merge, but no tricky lighting techniques or artificial blurs because that just feels like cheating.

Canon Country

For years I have suffered from "lens envy." I have hauled around point and shoot cameras and watched longingly as my friends and family members and cousins all had awesome super cameras. We take trips to Yellowstone, and rather than look at the animals I was always scoping out  that guy with the backpack and a lens as long as my arm. Well, when Clint received a nice bonus for Christmas and asked me what I wanted, in true Ralphie fashion I blurted out,  "A Canon Rebel T3i." He told me no. Told me I already had a pretty good camera, besides, I'd probably shoot my eye out.
Well, he went on a business trip, and while on the plane he struck up a conversation with the lady seated next to him. He got off the plane, and called me. He didn't tell me what they had talked about, but said during the course of the conversation he realized that I should indeed go get the new camera if that is what I really wanted. So I hung up the phone and drove to Inkleys within the hour. MERRY CHRISTMAS to me.
Now I have the delightful task of learning how to work the thing. I am going to take a class, and take lots and lots of pictures until I am so familiar with it and so good at it that I won't be embarrassed to ask questions of the awesomeness that is Natalie Norton.  Until that day, bear with me as I do my homework assignments and please feel free to critique my work  (nicely of course) as I am trying to learn. If every picture is absolutely perfect then I won't be learning much will I? I promise I won't take your thoughts as being unkind, but given in the spirit of aiding me with my quest to learn to use this equipment to the very best of my ability. Here we go!