18-MAR-2009
Day 077 - Suspended
I hit up the boatyard that I visited for my PaD back on the 20th of January. There is a lot less snow at the yard now. In fact, some of the boats are working their way back into the water. Someone was backing a boat in (behind me in this shot) while I was walking around taking photos. I was on the bike again, I was doing that "crazy guy in the balaclava thing" this morning, bumped into a number of people, some at the boat yard, and a few joggers and dog walkers. I pulled off the road and had to work on my kick stand so that it wouldn't sink all the way into the mud/muck.
17-MAR-2009
Day 076 - Shadow and downspout
I've been here before (9 Jan 2008) but at a different time of day and with a different composition. I was in my riding gear when I took this, I'd pulled into the parking lot & took off my gloves & helmet, but had my balaclava still on (think ski mask) because it is a pain to get back on right. So here is this guy in a ski mask, toting a telephoto zoom lens & camera, taking photos of a transportation building. One car full of people pulled into the parking lot and soon exited, not sure if they couldn't find a space or if they were worried about me ;-)
16-MAR-2009
Day 075 - Riding Season
This is the obligatory "I'm out pretty early" kind of shot. To call this vain, would be an understatement. When I left the house this morning, I had this Church's Parking lot in mind as a destination. I needed a large pile of snow, larger than the bike, and it had to be clean. Most of the snow that is hanging around right about now is this dingy black/grey stuff that wouldn't make for an interesting background.
I am also going to file this under my
"Agile Group" as I have something that I would have (should have) done different. I should have parked in the snow (I actually wanted to this morning) and I should have taken a tighter shot, perhaps of the front wheel, so that it looked like the entire bike was engulfed in snow. Perhaps I will stop by again tomorrow to see what snow is left.
15-MAR-2009
Day 074 - Levels of rust
Old fire escapes on an old factory building in Dover. Taken from an angle that puts each level almost inline with each other. It helped that I was able to step on a snowbank for this shot. I had to crop it pretty tight as I was on the North side of the building in the shade, the sky was pretty blown out. I realized this while I was out there and tried to compose it in such a way that the intricate curves on the escape would make the crop. While I was out there I noticed the rust but didn't pay much attention to it. During Post Processing, I can see that theses landings were pretty rusted.
14-MAR-2009
Day 073 - Decaying
Even though it is weekend, I still found myself on the Tradeport for my PaD. My oldest & I were in the area and noticed a very beautiful sunset as we were getting into the car to leave. I realized that the sunset would be gone by the time I got to a spot where I could actually capture it. I tried anyway, had to get onto the Tradeport, when I realized it wasn't going to happen, I decided to catch some of the yellow/orange tones from what was left of the sunset. I find it fitting that I converted the image to Black & White & then added some split toning (so it's a Quad tone now) effectively removing the natural coloring. This is part of a wall on a building right beside the flightline. It has not been in use since the base closed, there are bushes growing out of it and birds living in it (according to my daughter who saw birds flying into a hole in one side of the wall of this building).
13-MAR-2009
Day 072 - More than Fore
From a distance, I thought these were golf carts, though I should have known better. I was driving into work and hadn't found anything to shoot. I saw what I imagined to be golf carts off in the distance on the Pease Golf Course (so there is a good reason for me to think they were golf carts). As I got closer, I realized what they were (and was reminded that the golf carts are secured in a fenced in area). The picnic tables were still interesting enough to make the PaD though.
12-MAR-2009
Day 071 - Upstanding
Had to take a different way into work today to find something interesting to shoot. I left my snow boots at home thinking I wouldn't be doing any trekking around. I got lucky here as the ground was still frozen and there was no snow to traipse through to reach these lines from the road. I imagine there were a lot of morning commuters trying to figure out what the heck I was doing near these poles. Big honkin iron things shot with a very Wide Angle lens. I had no filters on the lens, the inconsistent blue sky is natural (due mostly to the inconsistent exposure across such a large field of view.
11-MAR-2009
Day 070 - Down the road
For some reason, this morning I just wasn't feeling it. I worked pretty late last night, I wasn't feeling so hot this morning, and it was raining out. I told myself a little lie that I would skip out at lunch and find something to shoot. At 3ish, I was able to nuke a quick lunch and return to my desk before heading into a long meeting. I skipped out with some sunlight still left but no idea what to shoot. It all worked out though, while riding out to the flightline, I spied this stretch of road (the flightline is off to camera left) and was able to pull over, setup the tripod, and grab a number of shots from this angle and from right on the double yellow lines. A car finally showed up as I was packing up. As I was driving away, the available light dropped to render this scene only a memory (but captured on Digital).
10-MAR-2009
Day 069 - Blocked
And to think, I was actually pulling into this used car dealer's lot to turn around and head back to shoot some snow covered pine trees. While pulling through the lot, I did a double-take when I saw this old camaflauged vehicle. The best part was the fact that this truck was beside and slightly behind the dealer's building so I was able to pull over, grab my camera and have unfettered shooting access without getting bothered ("Can I help you?"). Technically, he could have helped me if he had a reflector to get a tad bit more light on this side panel. ;-)
09-MAR-2009
Day 068 - Tell me this is a dream
Yesterday I was riding around on my motorcycle, welcoming in the new riding season. I'd expected to ride in this morning to work. I don't follow the news or weather. I don't usually have time to watch TV. While the snow we received this morning was beautiful, I'd have enjoyed a ride in a lot more. At this point in the season, however, this snow will simply not last long. (At least, that is the hope).
08-MAR-2009
Day 067 - Bike season
I was able to chisel away a large enough pathway through the ice on the driveway to official open biking season. I took the Harley out for a spin, mostly to start working through the Sta-bil in the tank. The VStrom started right up, no real need to prep it, though I will go lube the chain after posting this. I took about 100 photos from about 5 different angles to arrive at this shot. I didn't realize it would be so time-consuming. . .
07-MAR-2009
Day 066 - Ice Fishing
The ice is still about 18" thick, but with temps reaching 60 dgrees (F) today, we had to slosh through about 3 inches of water and slush. Spring is almost here. From this photo, it doesn't look safe or wise to be out on the ice today. It was very safe, not sure about the 'wise' part though ;-) The Cub Scouts had a blast baiting the hooks then rushing off to go sledding (that whole patience part won't kick in for another few years). My son only popped out onto the ice in the final 15 minutes that we were there, he managed to become entirely soaked sledding down the slush and mud hill.