On the 4th

I meant to post these a while back but I’ve been a slacker.  Bad me.

Anyway, these are pics from the 4^th taken from the Bossier City side of the Red River.  My first attempt at taking firework pictures.  Not too bad I guess.  Still need to work on timing a bit.  I’m glad there was a breeze though because from what I understand the hardest part, especially later in the show, is that the smoke starts getting in the way.  The wind blew most of that away so it wasn’t an issue.

***CLICK THE PHOTO FOR LARGER VIEW***

By the way, one of the boats at in the top pic and the boat with its lights off in the bottom two belongs to a coworker of mine.  I didn't know he was there, just happened to be in the pics.  Small world.

Sunflower Garden

We are participating in a community garden that's just down the street from us. We're growing various veggies but another plot has some very large, beautiful sunflowers growing. Here are some pics. I'm very happy with these and I may actually print them at some point to put on the wall.

-CLICK FOR LARAGER VIEW-

Downtown Couples Photoshoot

Part of our “final project”, if you will, was to go to downtown Shreveport and take photos of a couple. This is Chris and Sara, a soon-to-be-engaged couple who was willing to get dressed up and walk around with the paparazzi on a hot Sunday afternoon. It was my first time doing something like this so I’m really happy with they way the came out. I don’t really like people because it’s a lot of pressure to get that “One” shot. They were very open and understanding and I think Sara had done some modeling before; she definitely had the posing down.

Our Gallery

Last Sunday was our Gallery at the church. It was a culmination of both our photography class as well that of the art class and a chance for us to display our works. I don’t think anyone but Perry displayed any photos taken during the class, but everyone’s photos came out very nicely. I got a little carried away and ended up printing out 13 8x10 photos, 12 of which I mounted on foam board and one I framed, with the intention of gifting it.


Well everyone gushed over my photos as they do and I tried to play humble as I do but as a Words of Affirmation person, I soaked it all up. Everyone one encouraged me to sell them (though no one offered to buy one) but I still have no idea how to go about doing that. I was tossing the idea of setting up a booth at one of the many crustacean related festivals around with Kristy. Who knows, we’ll see.

Because of the recent craziness I’ve been neglecting both of my blogs and I have a back log of photos to share. I’ll work on doing that in the next couple of days.

The Slow Shutter Waterfall Effect

We had been talking about trying to get the cool effect in falling water in Photo Class. While on our trip to Missouri we stopped at a little roadside park that had a creek running through it. I took the chance to try out this technique. The photos aren’t anything spectacular but I did manage to get the effect. I got it by switching the camera to Shutter Priority mode and leaving the shutter open for 2 seconds. I also changed the Auto White Balance to the Cloudy setting. It got the cool cascade while maintaining the light levels and not washing everything out.

The Other Side of Me

Come see my other blog with all the thing that I can't talk about here!  Go Here  http://seekingmychazown.blogspot.com/

A Bridge to Photos

That was a terrible title but I'm sleepy. Anyway, after work last week I stopped by the Diamond Jack's casino. Not to gamble away my hard earned money, but because there is a train trellis over the Red River right next to it. I'd drive by that bridge twice a day and have always wanted to stop and photograph it but have never taken time to do so. Well I finally did go and got some great photos. I was constantly looking over my shoulder for the train to come barreling toward me at any moment, but I edged my way out.

For the ones below I actually just sat on the tracks.  I tried using my tripod but it couldn't get low enough and I just ended up holding the camera.

I thought that the pictures were very cool until I got home and realized one glaring problem; no subject.  If I had thought about it at the time I would have found a flower or at least a weed growing between the tracks to focus on.  Right now they are just kind of cool photos with nothing in particular to pull your eye to.