Houston Fall Foliage 03

Downtown Houston has so many fantastic sculptures - I'd like to take a full day sometime just to concentrate on photographing them. The one in the background here is fascinating, though I don't know it's name or origins...

Houston Fall Foliage 02

One that contains branch patterns...

Houston Fall Foliage 01

Now for some Houston fall favorites. All of the pictures in this series were snapped downtown in a one-block area, in the northeast corner of the Bagby/Prairie intersection, across the street from the Aquarium restaurant. Each of the eleven in this series was taken with the 7000.

Very fortunately, it was foggy that day...

This particular shot was cropped in and a bit of work was done on the railing, including removing a seam in both tubes.

New England Fall 11

The first Wilmington snowfall of 2007...

New England Fall 10

This picture was quite dull until applying the "Auto Levels" feature in Photoshop Elements. Then it popped to life, exposing the color behind the trees while increasing contrast in their branches.

New England Fall 09

This and the next two postings are from the other side of the Brandywine River, looking into the wooded area.

Merry Christmas

New England Fall 08

Used a bit of flash fill on this one, so the bark pattern would show...

New England Fall 07

The same pathway, from topside, that was posted December 21st.

New England Fall 06

I was holding the leaf that you see in the lower right corner in order to achieve depth of field, with partial success.

New England Fall 05

...a trail that winds above the river's edge, about halfway up a hill.

New England Fall 04

The next four postings were snapped after crossing this bridge into a wooded area...

New England Fall 03

The sun, low over an afternoon sky, really lit up the leaves...

New England Fall 02

...from the same spot as the previous posting, tilted up and over to the right a little. This is one that I reworked for this posting - a birdhouse that was distractingly bright was removed, as well as a PVC drain pipe. The highlights were darkened by 7%, which served to simultaneously increase color saturation and contrast.

New England Fall 01

Haven't finished with '05 favorites, but decided to post fall pictures for a while. This is Houston, and the trees here are just now beginning to show decent color, so now that I'm in a fall mood here they are.

The first dozen or so postings will be from New England, taken at the beginning of December 2007, in Wilmington, DE. This particular shot was snapped from the balcony of a condominium right next to the Brandywine River.

All New England Fall postings were taken with the Fuji 3800.

From 2005 - Lighted Bags

Completely untouched, this was at the Children's Museum in Houston on a Girl Scout outing. As usual, the 3800 performed perfectly in white balance and exposure. By this time I'd developed a preference for spot metering, which helped in this shot...

From 2005 - New Ulm

In Colorado County, Texas, there is a resort outside of the tiny town of New Ulm. This is very near the entrance to that resort.

From 2005 - Letter Girl

At the University of Houston they have this piece of art with phrases in all kinds of languages. A cigarette butt and some other trash was cloned off of the ground near her feet, but otherwise this photo, taken with the 3800, is untouched.

From 2005 - Girl Scout Candles

A table was set up for a Girl Scout ceremony, and as usual I was tinkering around before the thing got started. There was light coming through a door in the background, which was cloned out with the surrounding darkness. This is the same type of setup that was used for the candle shot seen in the header for this blog (look up!).

From 2005 - Crayfish

A 3800 shot through glass at Moody Gardens in Galveston. Due to the darkness, crowds, and reflectivity, indoor aquarium pictures in general are a challenge.
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I never cease to be amazed at the diversity of life on earth. Growing up we all imagine fantastic creatures from other worlds, and perhaps even have drawn pictures of what life "out there" might look like. But really, what can compete with what we have here?

From 2005 - Neiko's Portrait

One of the very first snapped with the 7000, right after it was taken out of the box. White balance not too far off...

From 2005 - Rodeo Cowboy

Slowed the shutter speed to one-tenth of a second for this shot...

From 2005 - San Antonio Rider

The 7000 was brand new to me, and this trip to San Antonio was the first in which it was used. For this shot I was experimenting with the shutter setting while panning to track the rider (set at one-fifteenth of a second). Blown out in some places and generally overexposed but the desired effect is there...

From 2005 - SA Sculpture

Taken on the same walk, this is in downtown San Antonio - a serene image in the midst of a very busy intersection just underneath. Some bird droppings were removed, and the reds were desaturated by about 20%. The reds come out a little too red in both the 3800 and 7000, so almost always have to be desaturated in a shot like this.

From 2005 - San Antonio Church

Foliage can nicely frame a subject, as is loosely done here. The late-afternoon sunlight striking the top tier of windows was a stroke of luck...

From 2005 - Red Flyer

Sea World does a spectacular diving show, under cover for protection against the sun. Because of that roof it is necessary to arrive early in order to get strategically situated for the best shots - not in the front, where your camera would get soaked, and not on either edge, where the sun would provide too much back light. If successful, the reward is superb opportunity with action, animals, and shots that can be captured nowhere else...

Loaded with color, this girl was suspended with a thick blue strap, the proximal end of which can be seen in the upper right corner.

From 2005 - San Antonio Steeple

Taken from the street in one of those quickies as we were walking, this is probably my favorite steeple shot. Coincidentally, one of my photographer friends from church took almost the same picture years ago of the same steeple.

From 2005 - Blue Water

This was taken in the museum district of Houston, at the pool next to the Museum of Natural History. Taken with the 3800, color was saturated to intensify the blues...

From 2005 - Lakeside Tents

The great thing about theme parks is that the coloring has already been done for you. In fact, tons of study has been done on what to do with color in every location, so all you have to do is snap-and-go...

From 2005 - Walrus Feeder

Imagine having one of these guys as a pet! This is the first event in which the 7000 was used. After being initially disappointed in the indoor performance of the new camera, I was delighted that photos came out so well in natural light...after learning how to manipulate exposure control.

From 2005 - Colored Orbs

Some of Sea World's best shows take place under huge canvas awnings. This was on the stage before one of them began; the light was low but got there early enough to steady the 3800 on the back of a chair.

From 2005 - Decorative Dock

Taken on the same trip to Sea World, on the way back from the Sea Lion show from the previous posting...

From 2005 - Sea Lion Surprise

One of the luckier moments captured...taken at Sea World in San Antonio.

From 2005 - Hillary Duff

This is Hillary Duff at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. The 3800 had a pretty good spot metering software.

One of the positives about using good ol' point-and-shoots is that you can see in real time through the view finder what the result will be pre-capture. For this shot all I did was move the camera around until seeing exactly the exposure needed, pressed the shutter halfway down, recompositioned and fired away. Immediately the screen froze with the result, allowing me to judge whether to keep or try again. With an SLR I would have had to shoot first, then verify by moving my eye away from the viewfinder to look at the LCD...possibly losing an opportunity during those few precious seconds.

From 2005 - Galveston Opera House

My son's performance took place inside the Opera House in the Strand district of Galveston. It was a bit dark in there, but fortunately I was still shooting everything with the 3800, so white balance and exposure wasn't a problem. Even so, this photo required some post-capture work to brighten it up a bit.

Andrew hated to have his picture taken. He would run and hide whenever a camera (particularly mine) would point in his general direction. In family situations indoors, knowing that my subjects had to stay still in non-flash photos, he would remain in constant motion.

But on this day his photo-phobic tenacity actually was amusing. During his time on stage - and even during the performance itself - he would keep track of where I was in the auditorium and deliberately position himself behind someone, thwarting any attempt to have his picture taken (he was a percussionist, so not stuck in a chair). It was a cat-and-mouse ploy that had me laughing out loud by the time the performance was over...

From 2005 - Twin Steeples

There is something about capturing objects against the sky. This was taken on that same trip to Galveston...

From 2005 - Galveston Graveyard

I really, really love this picture...not just because it's in a graveyard, one of the more interesting places in which to hang out. This beautiful carpet of life over those who have passed on is the ultimate juxtaposition...

From 2005 - Red Light Dove

Occasionally a photographer will get lucky and see something that is worth capturing, even if there is no time to set up for a professional looking shot. This is a case in point. In Galveston for a band performance in which my son was participating, on Broadway I saw this dove. In a split second a decision was made and the brakes were hit hard. Fortunately there was a place to pull off to the side of the street, and in a few seconds I was out the door and fast-walking back to the scene - my goal was to make it back there before she decided to fly away.

With the 3800 a few shots were snapped off, but I realized that it would be more interesting if the red light was illuminated behind this mama bird. So there I stood on the street corner, camera in hand, waiting for the red light.

It may not be apparent here, but there is a "grainy" appearance due to the fact that it is cropped way in from a much larger picture. Since it was the 3800 there was a platform of only 3 megapixels to play with, but looks like it turned out fairly well in terms of data retention. With my electronic "pooper scooper" - the clone tool - some bird droppings were removed from the pole, and the photo was flipped horizontally since this was to be posted on the left-hand side of the blog page. The unsharp mask tool was used to increase detail in the bird and her nest.

From 2005 - Bessie the Cow

Leakey is way out in the country, a great place to take long walks, if you could stand the August heat. The road along the side of the field had these flowers (or whatever they are) growing along a barbed-wire fence. Bessie the cow looks on...

From 2005 - Walking With Rig

After flights that sometimes last an hour or more, soaring through the skies in acrobatic grace, the pilots are reduced to clumsily walking their contraptions back to the hangar...

In this picture some telephone wires were removed, but otherwise it's untouched.

From 2005 - Ultralight

This is one of my brother's two ultralights, though he wasn't the pilot at this particular time...