EL & texture

There is something about texture that i like; mmmm ... maybe that feeling as i run my finger along the grittiness, the light contrast 'tween the light and dark edges and that it stands out.

Here are three items that i have loved seeing over the years. They are hand-made by EL when he lived at GGF. The building was an outhouse long out of use and sitting at the edge of the trees in the lower field. I have often thought of removing the hardware but just having them seems to be a bit uncaring as they were made for this building and that's where they should remain until . . .

  

There is a hasp on the door that i have in earlier taken photographs ... really, this is not only outstanding iron work but makes for wonderful textured photographs.

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This is my comment after posting, ie, i'm editing. I find the images flat and not very attractive; not much texture there nor are the colors very deep and this is exactly why i created this blog . . . to see how the created images look in a computer separate from the 27" Ultra Fine monitor ... they just don't do it! Now i know ... back to the darkroom!

What?

The previous post was a bit strange ... the formatting would not behave and all type after the 2nd photo was on the right side of this space and nothing i was able to do would create the type at the left margin. Which doesn't mean it could not be put there ... just that i didn't know how. There are a lot of pagination markings at the top of this posting most of which i don't know what they mean.

So - i shall do some experimenting in the next few days and learn what they are and how to use them.

Back to the photo work space in the previous posting; i have longed dreamed of such a spacious work area and now that i have one, i want to turn my attention to making better or fuller use of it. And how do i do that ... you and i will both find out in the coming weeks and months.

Oh, it would be helpful to me if you viewers -maybe all two or three of you- would comment on these postings. Both so i know the posting is working and also to let me know if i am actually communicating to someone.

And thank you.

Photo Lab

Thought i'd take a moment and post a couple of photos of my work space.

Closed up for the night ... the way i like to leave my work space.

Now open for work.

Chimney Rock

Two days ago, we went to Chimney Rock, a State Park in central NC which has an amazing rock formation which juts over the valley below.

It was a warm day verging on hot and just right for visiting such a site. The elevator was not working so we walked up the 480some steps (we had been forewarned) which was a challenge and it seemed that half the people climbing the steps took a breather a couple of times on the way up. 

Looking up from the bottom of the steps you can see about a quarter of the way up. Yes, that is flag rock on top of that phallic looking rock structure. It is good thinking on the part of the Park Service to put so many nooks to stand in on the way up ... they were well used.

We were fortunate in that this is still the off season and while there were a goodly amount of people there, it was not crowded and relatively few children and pets. (No, they are not in the same category!)

From the top, the chimney looked like this:

We had discussed going from Chimney Rock to Dupont State Park which is filled with water falls and trails but the climb was quite sufficient exercise for one day, so we returned home.

Swallows, feeding

I want to continue posting photos as this is, mostly, a photographic blog. These days i'm not doing so much shooting — still, i have a large collection of photographs that need working on and a few i have worked on. These two images i took about four or five years ago when i rented a Canon 100-400mm lens to see how i liked it.

I was walking in a field in the middle of which there was a fenced in area for reasons there were unclear as there was nothing other then more of the same on the inside as there was on the outside. However, i noticed there were a lot of swallows sitting on the fence and other birds buzzing close to them. And there were a lot! As i walked closer i saw that there were young swallows on the fence and adults were feeding them. Wow! how fortunate to have a long lens on my camera. Getting as close as i dare without chasing the birds away -they really were not paying me any attention- i was able to shoot a series of photos of the adults feeding the young and above are two of the better ones.

Clicking on the image will create a nice large photograph to view.

Raining

Today has been a rainy day which lead me to shoot photos from inside the house and as the sky was dark and overcast, the photos looked best in B&W:

It was a fruitful morning!

Orchids

Finally, it appears that i have connected with my current blog while in my photo machine; hence, i should be able to post photos much easier as i won't have to use Drop Box or something that makes it a two-step process.

Yesterday, we went to the NC Arboretum which was opening their annual orchid show and we attended a day early on members only day - which was good as it was quite crowded then and i'm guessing it'll be very crowded today and tomorrow when it is open to the public.

The amount of orchids was amazing and i wasn't able to take it all in and became jaded or overwhelmed rather quickly. The photo taking was interesting as there were so many people there and on most orchids were spot-lights. I had brought a flash defuser with me (Graslong Spark) so i could use flash but not have it too harsh.

Here are some of those efforts —

Three different orchids

I don't know anything about orchids other then liking what i see. They don't seem to have a strong aroma but the colors and designs are amazing. We went into the room where they were selling the plants but the ones we liked were in the seventy dollar range and we let them stay there.