Sweet Dreams are made of this.
A dream is a wish, your heart makes.
Thunder only happens when it's raining.
I believe you can get me through the night.
I thought of the theme today and four songs came into my head, in this order. Can you name them all or at least give me artist or movie they came from?
For more stories about dreams, click here.
The truck had been abandoned in the field. You could see the tires were worn and peeling from too many years in the hot sun. The nearby shack was in a state of "arrested decay," whatever that meant.
The rain clouds were piling up against the nearby mountains. It was going to rain, and probably rain hard, with possibly some hail thrown into the mix for good measure. The animals knew. They were already out of sight, hunkering down for the long storm that had been building all afternoon in the summertime heat.
The only thing that was moving was an older man, with a limping gait staggering along as best he could. He was going to get wet. The truck was totaled and he had nowhere to go. The shack was empty, but it was going to give little protection against the clouds that were within minutes of dropping their moisture upon him.
He thought to himself, "How had it gotten this bleak this quickly?" The answer was quite simple. Too much booze and not enough bongos.
For other stories about booze and bongos, please click here.
One of the things I love about photography is the freedom to explore different areas where I wouldn't have gone 5 years ago. In 2011, I joined the 365 Project which challenges photographers to shoot at least one shot every day for 365 consecutive days.
Now, for those of you who know me well, when I dive into something, I dive into it full cannonball mode. Not only did I do an entire year, I did a second year, not missing a single day of picking up my DSLR camera and taking at least one shot.
Looking back on some of those early shots, I think I would be embarrassed to even show those shots the light of day today. I can distinctly remember a shot of three different kinds of hotdogs. Who posts photos of hotdogs anyway? Yeah, well I did.
One aspect of photography that has intrigued me over the years has been street photography. When I first started doing the project, I rarely took candid shots just walking down the street. Over the course of the first year I became bolder and now I find myself enjoying taking street photography. This particular shot is one of my better street shots I've taken. Because I feel street photography works better in monotones, that's how I usually process them. Every now and then, I'll post a street photograph in color, but most of the time, I find the black and white aspect of the shot gives it more detail and dramatic effect.
Please check out others interpretations of the theme Photograph here.
I tried to think about what I might be able to use to write about this prompt. I thought to myself that I wonder what kind of photo I could use with this, so I decided to let the fates decide. I went to my Flickr account and thought it might be interesting to just post a photo of the last shot that got faved there and write a story around it.
I actually got very lucky since it could have been one of my more recent shots, but someone apparently found the shot of downtown Los Angeles in the archives and faved it today.
I enjoy going to LA, mainly because there's a lot to take photos of there. I can take the train in from where I live and it drops me off at Union Station, right next to Olivera Street. A couple of blocks over and I'm in Chinatown. Three blocks the other way, I'm in Little Tokyo. Up a couple of blocks a third way and I can then walk all the way around Walt Disney Concert Hall. It's like you're in a time warp, where the day after last night keeps happening over and over again, you get to see different cultures and yet never really do any kind of traveling.
The other thing I enjoy about this area is it affords me to practice my street photography. I know not everyone is comfortable taking photos of random people on the street and at times it can feel very intimidating. But I've found that I can document life on the street in a variety of ways, not all of it nice, but all of it real. Sometimes I post those shots in color, but most of the time, I'll post them in monotone. For whatever reason, I feel that the monotone gives the shot a more authentic look to it, almost like something out of the past.
Street photography has its own rewards and it can present problems. Most people don't like other people taking photos of them. I understand that, but if no one took any photos how could we document what's happening out there? I've tried a technique with a varying degree of success. I'll see a shot, compose it in my mind, then walk by it with my camera in my hand upside down and fire off shots as I walk away. With the zoom lens and the auto focus, I can sometimes get some very interesting shots that way.
Other times, I'll just take a shot, because it looks interesting. Many people don't really notice when you're taking your shot, especially if you don't get in somebody's face about it. That's another reason to carry a zoom lens along. It makes for a less intimidation factor when you're in a crowd taking shots.
No matter what day I go, whether it's yesterday, tomorrow or the day after last night, I find the subject matter in the downtown area has always changed, so there's always new shots. But at the same time, the subject matter is also constant and doesn't change. I hope that makes sense.
When I saw this prompt for the 20 days of Chill Challenge, I knew my answer would be Yosemite. There's something about this place that just speaks to me. My first visit was when I was four years old. I don't remember much of that trip, but I do know that I've been back numerous times in the course of the last 50 years. I know I will go again in the near future. I don't think I could ever get enough of this grand spectacle.
I've been to Yosemite in all sorts of weather and all the seasons. Most of the time I've gone in the summertime, as that's when I have the most time off in which to travel to this scenic spot, but I've done a one day weekend trip to the park in the fall with my daughter. I've also visited in the spring time with my dad when we were scouting out colleges for me. I walked on the valley floor during one of the heaviest snowfalls on record on a late December day back in 1988.
Each season changes this park, but you just can't beat the scenery at this place. And there's the constant that attracts me, the scenery. I know there will be detractors out there who will say that it's too crowded. And they would be right. But that's not going to stop me from going. Each time I visit, I go to my favorite spots, take in the view, compose photo shots and just enjoy myself. Many of my favorite shots are along trails, which don't have as many people. The people that venture out on a trail away from the valley have a different sense of purpose and a different respect for the park. We know the masses are there for a day or two, to take in the sights and to move on. We have a different feel for the park.
Every time I camp there, it's for at least a week and there's still so many things to see there that I never get it all done. Just another reason to get me to come back later on I guess.
I took this shot from the valley viewpoint as you exit the Wawona tunnel on a June day in 2014. I have to say I've been fairly fortunate in that most of the times I've been to Yosemite, there's been weather. The clouds just help the shot, no matter where your taking a photo, but here, it just makes the spectacular shot even better.
Here is is, the end of the month already and P.J.'s monthly challenge is upon us. This month, the theme is spring. I will be the first to admit that I didn't use my camera very much this month, nor did I even use the cell phone camera, but I did take enough shots that I think I can come up with five shots that pretty much epitomize springtime. That being said, here are my entries into this month's challenge.
1. Fiesta
Every Mother's Day weekend, our church has its annual fiesta. This fiesta is likely the second or third largest event in the city of Claremont every year, so a lot of people attend and there were good crowds even though there was a large threat of rain in the air most of Friday night when this shot was taken. For the past couple of years, I've usually set up my camera on a tripod somewhere around here and get some light streak shots. This year, I walked down to the fiesta, only to turn my camera on and find out I had a dead battery. I knew it was low, but wasn't aware it was that low and so I was totally unprepared for this circumstance.
However, this year, because I'm now part of the 21st century and I have my own smartphone now, I used the camera in the phone for some shots. Not quite the same thing, but since I have several shots for the past couple of years with light streaks, this is a little different from my normal shots at this time. It worked out well, mainly because the sight angles this year for the various rides weren't the greatest in the world and the best angles were right in the middle of high pedestrian traffic, which is not good for a long exposure with a camera on a tripod, so it probably worked out better that I did have a dead battery. Still, that's just a rookie mistake, one that will not be repeated again.
2. New hobbies?
For whatever reason, it seems like springtime is the time when new hobbies can be explored, that is unless you have a hobby that involves winter gear. Most hobbies tend to be warm weather hobbies however and so I've got anew interest, one that might not come to fruition for a couple of years, but there's a large spark of interest here.
One of many photo projects that I've participated in over the last couple of years is the 100 Strangers project. I haven't taken a stranger photo in over a year, but when I saw Stephen here piloting a drone over the fiesta, I figured I wanted to know more about the drone, how it worked, etc. Push came to shove and I walked over and starting talking with him about the drone. Eventually, Stephen said the magic words, "Would you like to fly it?"
Oh man, that was very cool. I got to hover, I got it to go straight up over the fiesta and just about the time I was ready to really start watching what the drone was seeing, the app lost contact with it. Oops. Fortunately, it didn't just plummet to the ground and Stephen was able to guide it in to a safe landing, but at least I can say that I've now piloted a drone. Oh, yeah. I plan on doing that again, sometime I hope in the near future. Perhaps my children can pool their money together and get their old man a drone for Christmas. That would be pretty cool. At least here in California, I wouldn't necessarily have to wait until springtime to try it out.
3. Walt Disney Family Museum
Springtime usually means the beginning of the traveling season, at least for me. Early in the season, during my spring break, I went camping in Death Valley, the first time I'd been there in about 20 years. But I digress, since these photos for this challenge have to be taken in the month of May.
Usually in May, I go visit my older two children over Memorial Day weekend. This year I traveled up to the Bay Area to visit with my daughter and her fiancé. My older son drove over from Merced for the weekend and we had a very enjoyable time. Most of Saturday was spent dealing with little wedding details, mostly finding the right suit for the two dads. I remember several years ago, when one of my good geocaching friend's daughter got married and he bought a suit for the occasion. If I remember correctly, he hadn't worn a suit in a very long time and probably won't ever after. My daughter commented that she couldn't really remember ever seeing me in a suit either. Well, I now own a suit, but once again, I'm digressing a little bit since that story doesn't deal with the photo.
Sunday, we drove up to San Francisco into the Presidio. Our goal was to visit the Walt Disney Family Museum. If you are a Disney aficionado, or have next to no knowledge of Walt Disney, you will enjoy yourself at this place. The entire museum is obviously dedicated to Walt Disney, set up by his daughters and it contains all sorts of memorabilia of the man. The museum is very interactive and pays attention to all sorts of small details.
At one point we were walking down a hall that had a grand vista view of the Golden Gate Bridge and my daughter commented that she felt that all of a sudden she was in a ride at Disneyland. Not coincidentally, we turned the corner of the hallway and were in a room that featured everything Disneyland, including a scale model replica of the park. Having worked at the park for five years in the 80s, this was just fabulous and I could have stayed there for the rest of the afternoon, but there were other things to see.
The photo that I've decided to show here doesn't have anything to do with Disneyland, but with the early pioneering that Disney did with sound cartoons. This shot shows 348 frame enlargements form the film Steamboat Willie, the first talking cartoon, and the first that featured Mickey Mouse. The 348 shots represents less than 15 seconds of animation time of the film. And these were all hand drawn at the time as well, no computers to help them out. Talk about labor intensive work. It's no wonder that a feature length film, such as Peter Pan, was only released once every three years or so.
4. Street photography
As most of you know, I enjoy taking street shots of total strangers. Outside of the Disney Museum, the green between some of the buildings was hosting a massive street fair. Food booths surrounded all sides of the green and all of us took advantage of the massive amounts of good food. If any of us went hungry, that was our own fault.
Springtime in San Francisco is dicey at best. There's always a good chance that Carl can show up at anytime. Who's Carl? Believe it or not, Carl is the fog that shows up in San Francisco. He even has his own Twitter account. The day we were at the Presidio, Carl was still off shore, but was threatening to come in at any time. Still, people came to the street fair prepared for the weather and most everyone was enjoying each other's company, which is why I find this shot so amusing. All sorts of things are happening all around and this guy was totally absorbed in his phone, probably checking his email or something similar. Maybe he was checking out the latest tweet from Carl.
5. Kanka
While we were eating lunch on the green, my daughter told me to turn around and look at this massive Great Dane that was walking around with his owner on the other side of the green. This dog was the size of a small pony. After we'd finished eating and they had found a place to park themselves, I walked over and asked if I could take some photos of the dog. After getting permission, I took several shots before the dog got bored and didn't want to have anything more to do with me. This shot turned out the best of the bunch. He has a better expression in another shot, but I cut off his ear with some poor composition, so I'm going with this one.
His owner said the dog's name was Kanka, which apparently means best friend in Turkish. Nothing better than going for a walk with your best friend on a beautiful spring weekend up in the Presidio.
Well, there you have it. Five shots of spring. Please stop by P.J.'s post to see his offerings on the theme. There's also links at the bottom of that page where you can view other blogger's springtime offerings as well.
Every now and then, I take a photo that I just really love. Almost all the time, what I seem to like, isn't what others seem to like. I'll get likes and faves on photos that I take that I'm not even sure should see the light of day.
Other times, I'll post a photo that I think is something that everyone should comment on and just ooh and ahh over. That's the idealistic side of me thinking I'm brilliant when I know for a fact that I'm just an average photographer who every now and then has splashes of brilliance. And the every now and then should actually read once in a blue moon.
Then, there's this photo. I took this shot from the Harmony Borax Works in Death Valley last month while on Spring Break. It was late in the day, the sun was low, so the light was perfect, not too harsh, which is what photographers really want. I didn't really think much of it as I was probably already concentrated on other shots, some of which I haven't really processed yet.
I posted it to my flicker account and really didn't think anything of it. I liked the shot in black and white and thought it was a good quality shot. The next day, when I went back to Flicker, I was amazed at the number of views this photo had and also by a couple of comments.
Someone, somewhere in cyberspace liked the shot and the shot went viral at least in my small little space of the web. Not viral in the sense that it got millions of views, but enough that it seemingly took on a life of its own. If one of my shots gets more than 200 views on Flicker, I figure I've posted a pretty good shot. In the first 24 hours this shot was up, it had over 3000 views. People were favoriting it left and right. For whatever reason, this one seemed to have struck the right chord with a variety of people and once that happened, it got shared around and the shot got more and more views. I'm sure I could self promote at this point and get more but I don't think that's necessary.
I think what I'd really like is a little more consistency out of my photos. In the past 5 years, I know I've grown as a photographer. I look back on my first year of my 365 Project that I did and I'm not sure most of those photos would see the light of day anymore. But I'm not going to take those down because they help define how I've progressed. I need those to keep me going. And so it goes.
Oh yeah. If you want to see the full size version of this shot, please click here. There's my self promotion.
