Blue & Gold

(For those who care: Nikon D70, 200 ISO, 1/750 @ f/6.7, Nikkor 24/2.8)

Most people think of winter as a drab and colourless time in Maine. Sunsets like this one over the finally frozen and mighty Sebago Lake prove false that notion. Summer and spring are the more monochromatic seasons in Maine to my way of thinking. Everything is brown and then green in profusion. Of course, our Fall season calls out to people all over the globe for its huge pallete of brilliant colour, and I really like trying to photograph it in new and unusual ways (and I end up with the same leaf peeping shots that everyone else gets more often than not.) But WINTER!... Ah, winter is all about Blue & Gold for me. The sunsets are spectacular in their warmth especially when reflected off the multiple shades of blue that the snow throws back at the sky. It really has my attention this year.

About the place: Sebago is Maine's second largest body of fresh water and she is the source for the state's largest 'city' of Portland...Sebago is pronounced as ... S'Bay-Go. I am blessed to live in the western edge of the realm in Maine on the other side of the lake from Portland so I get to pass it on the way in town and back home again, whenever I head to the metro area. Like all living bodies of water in Maine (well I guess anywhere really), the lake is a constant source of beauty and inspiration for me.

Here is a second shot taken a few moments later. It seems that someone else had been inspired by the lake. In the cleft of this rock, was a gold coloured vase with bright red and white flowers. I thought it an interesting offering to the spot so photographed it with the sunset in the background. Sol was emmiting a really neat vertical ray from the horizon too. Like most good photography, more right time, right place than any hugely perfected skills. :)


Same exposure details as photo above except I added Fill Flash for the rock.)

2005 - Week 4

(For those who care: Nikon D70, Nikkor 50/1.8. - 1/30 @ f/4.5 - Toned in PS.CS)

I belong to a PAW listserve and noticed that in looking at the excellent photos like those of the very talented Ms. Tina Manley (ASMP) that most of the shots I submit for the projects in the past largely lack any human element.

Because I want to get more photos of people into this PAW project I submit this week a snapshot that I made of my dear friend and grovemate Shaz, playing with a hand knit scarf that a mutual friend made for Yule.

Irony

I took this photo this last summer, uploaded it to my 'temp' file on my scratch drive and found it again this afternoon while doing some cleanup. I drive past the Maine Correctional Facility a few times a week. One evening on the way home I noticed this and had to chuckle at the irony of the juxtaposition from my point of view...

Pinhole Photos

Just for fun, I purchased a pinhole 'lens' this week. Basically this 'lens' affords me the ability to turn my $3200 Nikon Digital SLR camera into a pinhole camera. For those of you who aren't photo enthusiasts, the irony here is that pinhole cameras have traditionally been built of such quality materials as used Quaker Oatmeal boxes! The 'lens' was only about $30 including shipping and offers a 50mm view (75mm on my DSLRs) and ONE aperture of approximately f/180. That's a LOT of depth of field and given how soft the images are from this lens, all of that DOF is needed!


(For those who care: Nikon D70 @200 ISO. Finney Pinhole Body Cap. f/180 @ 2 seconds. mounted on Gitzo Explorer G2220 tipod. Toned in PS.CS)

After playing with this for a few hours and being disappointed (no, I don't know what I was expecting) I am hoping that I will be able to use it for some cool smooth water blur effects when the moving water in Maine is, well, moving again after mud season.

Inauguration Protests in Portland

Sadly, I was working on my business site until 3am on Wednesday evening (Thursday morning) and so I got up and into Portland in time only to catch the last few minutes of the demonstration against another four years of the GWBush Administration in Monument Square. From speaking with my friend and sometimes political sparing partner James W. Lindenschmidt who had shown up a bit before I did, there were over 100 people earlier braving the cold. This isn't the thousand or so who turned up on February 15th, 2003 to demonstrate for Peace before the Congress ceded its War Powers responsibility by voting to let President Bush commit our military to invade the Middle East again. However, considering that many times the hundred protestors in Portland who could take the day off to board busses at 3AM to travel to DC on Thursday and get their fair share of abuse (with no real coverage by any real media to speak of), 100 people isn't a bad showing for a political demonstration in Portland.

I don't pretend that I understand what the League of Pissed Off Voters and the others who showed up on Thursday hope to accomplish by such demonstration. Beyond letting the rest of America know that they are not happy with W in the White House and that they don't have to be quiet in this angst, what does this do? Maybe that is enough. It seems more than most Americans are willing to pry themselves away from the latest episode of "Wife Swap" and "24" for. As completely ineffective as it may be, it is at least some form of action over apathy.

Anyway. Posted here are two photos that I did make of the very quickly dwindling crowd before taking my family shopping at the mall and buying a lot of cheap plastic stuff that we don't need...


(For those who care: both images were made with my Nikon D2H, Nikkor 18-70 and tiny Nikon SB30 for fill. Toned in PS.CS)

2005 - Week 3



The Miss Portland was an original Worcester Diner in Portland for decades. Her friendly staff served hearty food for very affordable prices. About a year ago the city purchased her from her former owner and has plans to move and renovate the diner and reopen as a leased concern. As you can see, she is a bit delapidated at the moment. When she is restored to her former glory, I will endeavour to do a follow up series of photographs. (And maybe have 3 over easy with a side of bacon!)



Snowman and Fog

Technically, these were taken before the year actually turned over to 2005, but they have been sitting on my hard drive for a few weeks and I wanted to put them online. This was our first snowman this year. All of about 12" high.



I love it when we get a warm winter evening after there is some snow on the ground here in Western Maine because it creates some great fog and mist as some of the snow evaporates. It makes for wonderful just after sunset photos all in blue...

2005 - Week 2

For those of you who read my BLOG's description and don't know what a 'skidder' is...this is a skidder...



It is a really large and loud 4 wheel drive tractor that is used to pull felled trees out of the woods in logging operations.

In our case we have a local one man company sustainably cutting our woodlot. He's been at it on and off for over two years now. The trees are selectively dropped in the woods by chainsaw and then are limbed. They are then dragged to this 'landing' in our field with the skidder (several at a time) and cut into sections to be loaded onto a logging truck and taken to the local mills. There they are made into pulp for paper products, chips for composite building materials, cut into rounds and split for firewood or (when we are lucky) sawn into clear lumber.

We supply the raw materials. Our logger keeps our forest healthy and splits the profit with us. (Which helps us to maintain our tax burden.)

2005 - Week 1

We had an ice storm. It was not as destructive as the storm of 98, but it was very pretty when the sun came out later in the day.

We live on the northeast slope of the mountain and the sun sets at our house at about 15h30 this time of year. This was the view from the top that day. The sun sets almost an hour later up there.