Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Spring Blossoms


I went out this morning after yesterday's heavy torrential downpour to capture some shots of all the beautiful blooms here in Portland. I was particularly happy to catch these cherry blossoms.



This tulip was in my garden. Still is. . .



I had a hard time photographing forsythia blossoms. They're just so unrelentingly yellow--which is a good thing, just hard to get.



Dewdrops on some pretty green leaves



And at last, dewdrops on lady's mantle from my garden.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

To all the evil virus-dispersing people of the world. . .

This post isn't going to have much to do with photography. Instead, I'm going to write a letter to the black-hearted individual who so kindly placed a comment on one of my posts that was in truth a lovely packet of FIVE different viruses: 2 worms, 2 trojan horses, and something else that I don't recall the name of. First of all, I cannot believe that Blogspot doesn't have the ability to detect such viruses and delete them before they are ever allowed to infiltrate people's computers. But I cannot imagine that people would actually waste their time creating viruses to destroy other people's hard work and things bought with their hard-earned money when they are obviously intelligent enough to do things that actually BETTER our obviously sick society. Shame on you, if you are reading this. While I am lucky to have a husband who is an IT professional, and knew enough to start my own virus scan and delete the rotten things from my computer, many people don't have the access or knowledge to get rid of viruses, and millions of dollars are wasted each year on ridiculous creations just like yours. Why not be a hero, and HELP stamp out viruses, instead of a nameless, faceless LOSER of massive proportions, as you currently are? I challenge you to try to find something good to do in society. Otherwise, GO POUND SAND my friend. . .
To anyone else reading this: watch out if you post or even click on Blogspot comments, because they obviosuly DON'T protect from such onslaughts.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

More panoramic madness! and a couple of other side-ventures. . .

Una Pano cropped

So, last night after writer's group, I headed to a chic bar in Portland's Old Port section called UNA and took an 8 image panorama of it by night. It had slight stitching flaws on the top and bottom, so I cropped in to get the best part of the picture. I'm pretty happy with this! (In each image, you can click on it to get to the full sized versions!)

PTGui wooden Chapel

This is a better version of the wooden chapel I posted last time. Dad did it for me with PTGui, which I can't afford yet, as it costs over $200 and I have put too much dough into other photographic ventures as of late--namely the gallery show I'm going to have in July and August at Terrell Lester's gallery in Deer Isle. To date, I have spent more than $700 (ulp!) on printing, matting and framing supplies. When all those framing supplies arrive in a week or so, I have to get down to the drudgery work: putting them all together correctly. *sigh*

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception

I'm quite happy with this one too--this is the cathedral of the immaculate conception, the Catholic church my great-grandparents, Thomas and Mary Joyce, were married in 1905, so it means a lot to me. It is comprised of (can't remember how many) many images vertically shot to capture the amazing groined ceiling, and it is all built from white marble. The immigrant Catholic population of Portland scrimped and saved to pay for it to be built and it's quite beautiful and imposing.

Other news is that Dad gave me his currently unused macro lens attachments, a Raynox 150 and a Raynoc 250, which I used to make these nifty shots of crocii and bees last week:

Raynox Bee

Yellow Crocii

Purple Crocii

Purple Crocus

Little Miss Sunshine

Auntie Bee

I am thrilled with the Raynox lenses--they just sort of easily clamp onto the front of your lens and you move near your subject and snap away. Those bees were HARD to capture though--they move sooo fast!

Check back again soon to see what else I am working on--Spring has officially sprung!
Until next time, I bid you adieu!

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Panoramamania!

Well, thanks to a really great photographer from Germany, Phil Zucker, who posts on the Pentax SLR talk site I frequent, I've had a little renaissance with my panorama making skills! I hope very soon to make them even better, but I'll show you the newest ones here. The panos don't show at their widest lengths, so if you click on the image, it will take you to a full view of it. But you get the idea. . . Also--gave up on the namby-pamby pastels--I like basic black!

The first image here is a vertical pano of St. Luke's Episcopalian Cathedral on Portland's historic State Street. I particularly like this view:

New Vertical St. Luke's Cathedral Pano

Below this, you'll find a horizontal pano comprised of either 9 or 10 images of St. Paul's Anglican Church on Portland's East End that I took the other day:


St. Paul's Cathedral

This one hasn't been perfected yet, but my Photoshop Wizard (read: Dad) is going to work on it in the near future to make it look better. But this is the side chapel at St. Luke's. The entire thing is built out of highly polished, dark, carved wood, in a duomo or dome shape. It has an octagonal translucent skylight at the top. The priest was just about to lock the church up for the day, so after spending all the time I did in the Cathedral proper, I only had about five minutes to get one SLICE of the chapel. I intend to get back there soon and take the whole chapel in one pano, if possible.

Vertical St. Luke's Chapel Pano

Last but not least is the horizontal pano I did of St. Luke's Cathedral. I believe this is comprised of about 10 images as well:

New St. Luke's Hoizontal Pano

I also took what I call an "Omnirama" series of images of the cathedral, where I also captured the ceiling above the lower part--so it will be twice as large as the one above this. My father is going to work on that, too--then I will be able to post it here. In the meantime, keep checking back!

Cindy

Cindy
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