All posts filed under: Photography

Chasing the Sky

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I tried. I really did. New Orleans was at about 75% of the solar eclipse, yesterday. Unfortunately, we also had clouds and some rain. When I say that, don’t mistake it for total overcast. Or, a massive storm. Around here, one street has rain and clouds and the next one does not. So. I went to the French Quarter. I thought it would be very cool to use the Quarter as a background for the eclipse. While I was waiting, I made a bunch of pictures. Mostly good daylight stock for one of my agencies. The time for the big event arrived. Seemingly nothing. Clouds were blocking most of the sun. I was listening to NPR’s radio broadcast. One of the moderators was talking about leaves functioning as a pinhole camera. Aha, I thought. I headed towards a leafy section of Jackson Square. No joy. There was just enough cloud cover for the light to look a little weird, but it wasn’t strong enough to create shadows through tree. A lot of people in other …

Another Experiment

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I always say that Storyteller is a place for experiments. This is a big one. Yes. Sure. You know this place. You know the subject matter. My go to place when the sky does something interesting.  That’s why I selected the original base image. I used a new app. One that was recommended to me by a guy that does most of his image processing on a smart phone. Since this app is only available to iOS users, I assume that he’s using an iPhone, as I do. It’s called Stackable. I’m still learning how to use it. It has a lot of interesting editing tools. One is the cropping templates. They allow the user to make really extreme crops, like this one. Or, long panoramas. Another is the control over adding texture. It’s very fine tuned and allows you to make gentle edits. It’s more than just filtration. Finally, there is the export function. You can send this picture to just about anywhere directly from the app’s software, including Snapseed, which is how I …

Summer at the Lake

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A summer day at the lake. A southern summer day. A New Orleans summer day. A summer day in New Orleans that folks who aren’t from here probably never think about. They think about the French Quarter. Maybe Magazine Street. About parades. Mardi Gras. And, food. We have our peaceful places too. This is one of them. Just about anywhere along Lake Ponchartrain. Sure, the lake can get pretty violent during a storm. It was storm surges from it that actually flooded New Orleans 12 years ago. But, on a nice hot summer day with a little breeze blowing… This picture is for Sunday. A peaceful Sunday. I thought that after yet another week of turmoil, presidential stupidity, protests and terrorist attacks, we could use something calming. If you open this picture up real big, and play some quiet music, I promise you’ll think you are some place else.

Summer Water

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Water. Again. Why not? It’s the lifeblood of nature. Of you. Of me. I thought this picture was equally balanced. I’m glad that it’s not. Look closely, there is a dark gray border on the bottom with bubbles on it. It keeps the bottom of the picture heavier than the top. It sort of gives it an anchor. Something to hang on to, while the top is all light and airiness. A quick little discussion and question. Any answer is fine because you know that Storyteller is experimental and I mostly share pictures to test them. Some of them please me. But, sometimes I just want to see what they look like on this space. Of course I care what you think. But, like anybody else, I post some clunkers. It’s that old baseball thing again. The best hitters bat about .300. That means they failed two out of three times. A friend of mine, with whom I attended high school, looks at my images on Facebook. I’m not sure if he actually reads Storyteller. …

The Bridge

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It was the cloud that I wanted. The cloud that was reflecting the setting sun. The silhouetted bridge and power pole are just added bonuses. You know. Luck. Photographer’s luck. Keep moving. Go outside your door. Luck just sort of happens. Unfortunately, I miss a lot of pictures like this. I’m not often any place with a really great subject when this sort of light happens, as it did last night. Sort of another kind of luck. The luck of the draw. Maybe. Eventually, I’ll get back to chasing pictures for their own sake. I am on Monday. Not just for their own sake, but that’s another story. But, guess what? Weather predictions for Monday are for heavy overcast. The “Big American Solar Eclipse” may be blocked from our view. I’m not worried. The weather changes so much around here that five-day forecasts are meaningless. On the other hand… You know all those giant supermoons? I haven’t made a picture. We’ve had heavy clouds for every one of them. The picture. Sort of F8 and …

Mystery

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A little layering. Because. Just because. I had the images and I pretty much saw the picture in my head while I was actually pushing the button. I had a vision. Then I saw… oh, never mind. For this image, it’s about layering. Again. I haven’t done this in a while even though I like it. And, you like it. Besides, it’s something the lives in my head. I’ve seen a couple of you try layering with good results. If I had a critique, it would be that you aren’t pushing it far enough. The steps are simple. Make a couple of pictures. Use some editing tool to stack them. Adjust them for depth and brightness. Fine tune them. You’re done. But, really push them. And, for gosh sakes don’t use the histogram to guide you. Once you start doing this everything looks clipped and too heavy in the shadows. That’s only natural. You are piling up the dark side of the image. Oh yeah. One more thing. Do you know the Yiddish word, “schnorrer?” …

Hobbitville

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This made me smile. The bright red mushroom made me think of a hobbit. All bright and colorful. Attractive. Pretty. Seeing them made me smile. And, I’m pretty sure if you ingested it, you wouldn’t like the effects. It’s called the Fly Agaric. It’s the classic toadstool of children’s books. Often, their caps are more round and have yellow dots on the tops. There are two toxins in it. Muscimol  and Ibotenic Acid. They act on the central nervous system. They can cause lack of coordination, agitation, drowsiness, nausea and hallucinations. In other words, after about an hour when they kick in, they cause craziness. Imagine being sleepy and agitated at the same time. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. They also kill dogs. Luckily, the dog who finds stuff has no interest in them. But, some dogs do. Be forewarned. The picture. It’s pretty much as you see it. If anything, I toned it down a little since the sensor wants to see the mushroom as bright red, when to my eye, it is a little golden. …

SCBT Company

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Uh, what? Twenty two. I found this on what I thought was a pole supporting a power line. It’s not. It’s a pole supporting very old school telephone land lines. I had no idea what SCBT Co is, or was. So I did the Google thing. Turns out it was the logo for the South Central Bell Telephone Company. It was located in Birmingham, Alabama. It was created in 1968, when Bell telephone operations were split off in Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. The two companies were reunited in 1984 and as part of the AT&T system in 1992. All of this was a big part of the 1982 Bell breakup as ordered by the Department of Justice which resulted in seven Baby Bells. By the way, AT&T did not survive. It is owned by what was Southwestern Bell or SBC, and operates under the name of AT&T Inc. I have no idea what the number 22 means in this context. I suppose it means, uh, well, 22. There’s a bunch of lessons to …

Mushroom in Black & White

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This is what happens when we get a lot of rain, combined with summer’s heat and normal humidity. Weird mushrooms. And, black and white art. I made this picture in between storms. In some areas of the neighborhood, water was still standing. What am I saying? Was? We haven’t had heavy rainfall in a couple of days and water is still standing. We are saturated. Supersaturated. I suspect if we have another heavy rainfall next week, there will be more flooding. With or without the water pumps. Sheesh. We aren’t even half way through hurricane season. Yet. The picture. I made it in color. It looked fine. I tested it in black and white. It looked much better. Besides, the color of the mushroom is a light pale yellow on dark brown ground. It looked about the same in terms of color and hue. This one just feels more weighty.

Sometimes…

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Sometimes… you just don’t feel like it. I was feeling pretty good this morning. So good that even the threat of a nuclear war or Nazis marching through my streets didn’t bother me. So good, that after the dog who sees stuff and I went for a walk, I took a nap. So good, that I almost forgot to post today. I like posting. Today. Tomorrow. Everyday. But, relaxation set in and I didn’t feel doing anything. Then, I remember I have you. I don’t feel like I have to please you. I do like to talk to you. So, there. The picture. A walk through this little forest-like park with the spaniel girl. She wasn’t sure what to make of this. All I know is that we must have been on the north side of the tree. Oh yeah. The same old thing. F8 and be there.