Mavericks Christmas...

Christmas Day at Half Moon Bay. After dropping my wife and her mother off at the airport for a trip to Hawaii. I grabbed my camera gear and headed to Mavericks. A swell moved into the area on Christmas eve, and just like Santa Claus it gave a present to Northern California. Swells coming in from the North Notrhwest and giving Mavericks a 20~30 foot swell.

These photographs were taken from a elevated position that I climbed to in order to get high enough to shoot the surfers behind the closest waves. Even with my 300mm fixed lens and a 1.4x extender it was difficult to get good close-ups.

Lets do a little math. 300mm x 1.4 = 420mm now when you add the 1.5 conversion by the DX chip you end up with a 630mm lens. With a 630mm lens equivalent the surfers still look like ants. take a look. Click on the slide show to see larger images.

Happy Merry Chrismakwanzakah...

It's time to be PC, Happy Merry Chrismakwanzakah.

And now for a little Xmas humor.

Effulgence…

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

I have spent the last few nights working on a project for my wife. She is a school teacher and she has a weekend news report segment that everyone participates in on Mondays.

She and I take pictures of what we are doing on the weekends. She then makes a slide show on her MacBook and then shows her students every Monday. It is always a hit with the kids. I wish I had my wife as my teacher when I was in elementary school, she really makes learning fun.

However this week since it is Christmas… I mean Holiday season, and this will be the last week of school before the winter recess. My wife has requested pictures of holiday displays and lights. I have spent the last few evenings freezing my arse off in what feels like sub-artic cold. The other night I took pictures until my hands nolonger had any feeling.

I managed to capture a few good images. The best time to get the images is just a few minutes after sun set. The sky still has great light. The brightness of the bulbs are offset by the ambient light in the sky. Also there is not such a stark contrast between the bright lights and the black night. Unfortunately, time is short before your surroundings go black and everything gets blown out.

Photos by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

effulgence - a shining forth brilliantly; brightness; splendor (noun) the quality of being bright and sending out rays of light [syn: radiance]

Makeshift...

wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
Definitions of makeshift on the Web:
something contrived to meet an urgent need or emergency
improvised: done or made using whatever is available; "crossed the river on improvised bridges"; "the survivors used jury-rigged fishing gear"; "the rock served as a makeshift hammer"

This would describe the small studio I set up in my attic. This would be located next to all the broken-down moving boxes and the boxes that still haven’t been unpacked.

The attic is actually a cool little space, small but cool. A 6’0” man would not be able to stand straight up without cracking the scalp. It’s “A” framed shape, open beam with hard planked wood flooring. Did I mention I share the space with field mice? Yes, I do. When it rains they come in from the cold and run up the interiors of the walls to the warm attic. At least it’s warmer then outside. I know that they have come for a visit, because I find little rice shaped black scat on the floor.

The attic has no insulation. I have to dress for winter just to go into the studio. A few entries back I took some pictures of my new MacBook Pro. I shot those in the “Studio”. The studio needs a little more refining but it will eventually work out.

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

view images from the earlier post "It's Here"

Brain Scan...

I was reading my current issue of Popular Photagraphy, yes, yes, don’t laugh I was reading. Well, what was I saying oh yea! I was reading PopPhoto and came across an article on a new company that is providing a scanning service. OK, if time is money what is 24 cents worth to you? You will want to check out ScanCafe'.

In the past I would take my slides to have them professionally scanned an it would cost me a fortune. Now there is a online service that will offer Professionly scanned images for $.24 per image. This company will even do some minor color corrections and touch-ups.

According to the web site :

The ScanCafe Revolution

ScanCafe is a revolutionary company that is turning the negative scanning, photo scanning, slide scanning, and photo restoration business upside down.

First, you only pay for the scans you want to keep (50% minimum of scanned images). Thus, we have eliminated pre-sorting. This means you no longer have to spend hours sifting through vast negative, slide, or photo archives to determine which images are worth scanning. Simply put everything in a box and send to us.

Second, we are unique because our photo scanning, slide scanning, negative scanning, and photo restoration services are a fraction of the cost of historical scanning services. Our free value added photo services include manual color correction, cropping, and scratch removal. Whether you are
digitizing slides, negatives, an photos to pass along to family members, creating slide shows for a big event, or simply protecting your memories against natural disasters, ScanCafe will deliver superior results for you. read the article here

Observation…

Lick Observatory sits on the peak of Mt. Hamilton just East of San Jose, CA. It used to be one of the best spots to view the Heavens with its massive telescopes. However in the past 100 years, San Jose has grown from a sleepy agriculture town to the largest city in the Bay Area. The population explosion has caused some pollution problems. The usual pollution from cars, noise and waste are expected. The pollution that is the biggest concern for the Lick Observatory is Light Pollution. Light pollution makes it very difficult to peer deep into the heavens from Mt. Hamilton.

This wasn’t supposed to be a political lesson, nor do I want it to be. So I will get to the topic I was originally going tot write about. At the Lick Observatory they have two working web cams. On clear mornings these cameras provide spectacular images of the sunrise. The cameras are in a fixed position. Hamcam #2 looks East by Northeast. In the view you can see the six domes that are located on the 4200’summit. West facing Hamcam #1 has a panoramic view of San Jose and the valley it sits in.

On October 24, 2007 at 10:12 AM, I observered a giant monster attacking the City of San Jose. The monster turned out to be a small spider on the protective cover of the camera.

Flight test…

On Saturday while my wife was taking a mid-term, I took advantage of the time and made a trip to Palo Alto and Keebler & Schucat Photoagraphy. It was my lucky day. Not only were they having a huge sale, but reps from all the big name vendors were there to parade their wares.

Once I became aware that is was a rep/demo I scampered to the Nikon counter like a kid that was given a dollar for candy. Yes, that’s right… I did… I got to play with the new but rare Nikon D3. If you ever wanted to know what $5,000.00 looks like it looks like this, minus the lens. I spent 15 minutes playing with a camera I will never own. I am sure my wife and I could find many more useful ways to spend 5,000 clams. If I was pro… I could write it off, but I am not and it would never pay for itself. However, I did enjoy toying with it.

The new Nikon D300 is more my speed and price. I remember when the Nikon D70s was $1,799.00

It’s Here…

It’s here, it’s here… The new phone book's here! The new phone book's here!

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Well not the new phone book but my new MacBook Pro. With its slick polished aluminum case and newly updated OS. I was so excited, it felt like Christmas morning. I spent all night, moving my profile from my wife’s MacBook that took an hour and a half. Next was the loading of Leopard. I was a little disappointed in Apple Inc., for not having this already loaded and configured. This process took almost two hours. After that I had to down load all the updates to the various programs, security and Leapord updates this took another hour or so.

Now the fun begins. I uploaded my copies of Photoshop Lightroom and CS. I am now ready to do a little photo editing and posting…

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Big Canoe...

I have been working here in San Francisco for almost seven months. This is one of the largest ships I have seen go past our window. I have a great view of the bay from our office and I can see the entire western span of the Oakland Bay Bridge.

This is an image I just took not more than five minutes ago. The vessel is the Alaskan Explorer. She is 941 feet long, or longer than three football fields. She has a 164 foot beam. Features a double hull to prevent the 1.3 million barrels of crude oil from leaking from her bowels.

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

She was built in San Diego, California for the the BP Oil Shipping Company, USA. The Alaskan Explorer was delivered in 2005, and is the sister ship to the Alaskan Frontier. Both will be operated by SIU-contracted Alaska Tanker Co.

Dumpr What...!

A few weeks ago I told you about a cool new website slide.com. I showed you an example of it with some images I took while in Half Moon Bay.

Today I have another great website Dumpr.net. I have been playing around with the musuem page, and came up with some really great ideas and images. I created this museum looking image within seconds. It is easy to use and you will be very entertained by the results.

I shot this image of a Mayan woman and her child in Antigua, Guatemala. I could see this image up in an Art Gallery. Personally it looked better then some of the photographs I viewed a few weeks ago at the S.F.M.O.M.A.

Surf City…

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Surf City here I come… Jan and Dean immortalized Surf City, written by Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys. I imaging they are talking about Huntington Beach and not Santa Cruz.

There is a hot debate going on between the two cities, about which city is to be claimed as Surf City. The debate started in 2005 when Huntington Beach decided they wanted to patient the Surf City U.S.A. for themselves. Christina Glynn says "Wherever the waves are good and you're feeling in the mood to enjoy the surroundings, that's where Surf City is." I think Christina may have something there.

If you would like to read the article and decide for yourselves here it is. Settling the Surf City debate through 80-year-old news article.
"Surf City" article - found reference as early as 1904

Monarch…

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007
The butterfly species Danaus plexippus is commonly known as the Monarch butterfly. The western population of the Monarch butterfly overwinters in various sites in central coastal California, United States, notably in Pacific Grove and Santa Cruz. In San Leandro they have set up tours to view the Monarch butterfly.

In San Simeon I took a few images of the Monarch butterfly while I was waiting at the entrance of the Hearst Castle visitors’ center. The butterflies really like this yellow daisy looking flower.

The images I took were not the greatest. I was hurried and didn’t have the proper equipment. Typically I would have a tripod, cable release and my macro lens to capture the best “Tack Sharp” images I could. However, I had to work with the tools I had at hand. I had my 80~200 mm f2.8 Zoom attached. I had the ISO set to 400 with a circular polarizer attached to the lens.

The zoom lens was perfect for this type of image. It allowed me to shoot closer to the subject without physically being close to the subject and disturbing the butterfly. The focal length and the large aperture allowed me to create a very shallow (DOF) depth of field. This allows the subject to stay in focus and the distracting background to be slightly out of focus.

A macro zoom lens would bring out more detail.

Tripod…

Copyright© 2007 Kirk Howard

Tripod, monopods choose your weapon…

One of the most important items in the arsenal of a photographer is a tripod. In photography, a tripod is a three-legged stand for a camera, used to stabilize and elevate the camera. The word stabilize rings loud in my mind. Unfortunately I didn’t have a tripod with me on our tour of William Randolph Hearst’s San Simeon home.

I spent the last weekend in Cambria and San Simeon, with my sister, her son and my wife. We all went for a tour of Hearst Castle. We decided to embark on the Tour number two. All of us had already been on tour number one. Tour two is 95% and inside tour of Casa Grande, and mostly on the second and third floors. The California State Parks Service will not allow the use of camera flash inside any of the buildings. You are forced into using available light only.

Copyright© 2007 Kirk Howard

My sister and I had an opportunity to go back and do the night tour. If you ever get the chance I recommend the night tour. It is a longer tour and the interior of the rooms are better lit then during the day. The art work and tapestries’ are more vibrant and colorful. I didn’t have my tripod on this tour either.

Copyright© 2007 Kirk Howard

I order to allow enough light in to expose the image properly; the shutter has to be left open longer. Unfortunately without the use of a tripod it is most likely you will have a picture that is not “Tack Sharp”.

Copyright© 2007 Kirk Howard

I was forced to hand hold my camera and hold my breath as I tried to capture a properly exposed image… You win some, you lose some…

Copyright© 2007 Kirk Howard

Paradox…

Last night my wife and I had the opportunity to view the Olafur Eliasson, Take your time: exhibit at the SFMOMA San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. It had many interactive and visual illusions.

Two exhibits that stood out were the 360º room of Color. The other was the BMW 2HR Art car. The car is a Hydrogen powered race car that has been wrapped with a wire grid and entombed in Ice. The BMW 2HR display was exhibited in a 3º F giant freezer.

As I returned to work and starting reading about the artist and the BMW 2HR I found myself immersed in the technology of hydrogen fuel and how it works. In an article I read it stated and very interesting “Environmental Paradox” that it takes “Dirty Energy” to make “Clean Energy”.

Technology… What a Concept!

In another blog that I read it had a new slide show feature that I really liked. I liked it so much I had to have it and use it. It comes from a Web 2.0 application at slide.com. It is very easy to use and best of all it will automatically give you the proper html code to add to almost any website. I used the Blogger feature to automatically add this slide show to my blog. Man… I love technology!

The Characters and events depicted in this photoplay are fictitious. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Photos by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Dia De Los Muertos…

November 1st… the Europeans call it “All Saints Day” the Mexican and Latin Americans call it “Day of the Dead” or “Dia De Los Muertos”.

Happy Halloween…

Halloween is upon us, and the Great Pumpkin will rise from the pumpkin patch and shower all the gools, goblins, witches and vampires with candy riches.

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

While at Arata pumpkin patch in Half Moon Bay with my newest nephew and his mom and dad, I snapped this image of a few gourds just laying around in the afternoon sunlight.
Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Samhainophobia is a fear of Halloween

Happy Halloween

Holy Fires…

Now that it has been over a week since the fires started in southern California, there seems to be very few left burning. It is not that the fires have nothing left to burn, which fires can always burn something. The fires have been put down, due to the tremendous efforts of the all the fire crews that worked tirelessly to extinguish the deadly flames.

According the Blog San Diego County Wildfires 2007 just a couple wild fires remain. To see all the statistics go to San Diego County Wildfires 2007 Blog. I included a couple images that I pulled from the SFGate.com website. Even in destruction and tragedy you can find some beauty.

Jay Tyrrell...

What’s in a name? Well I have been inspired and intrigued by one of my coworkers. He is an older gentleman that has been working for my company for a few years. I really have just met him.

One day while he was standing looking out one of the large plate glass windows, I approached him. I was just curious to inspect what had caught his eye on the San Francisco Bay. There was a large Norwegian flagged container ship passing in front of our office building. On this container ship were very large blades of those ginormous wind turbines that you would see stalking the windy hills and ridges of the East Bay.

It turns out that this co-worker is an avid photographer. He specializes in large format panoramic images. He is still shooting on film. He has been shooting with one particular camera for years. He says “It’s perfect for the type of shot I am trying to capture”. “The camera gives me more of a cinematographer feel of an elongated movie screen”.

He is working on a series called Wind Army. It is a compellation of Images that he has taken of wind turbines at various wind farms. He was interested in the ship carrying the blades from a turbine, because he said it would fit in his Wind Army series.

You can check out more of the images of Jays “Wind Army” series on his website. Plus you can check out some of his other work there as well. You can also check out Jay’s work on LensWork DVD: LensWork Extended - 72

Website: Jay Tyrrell
LensWork

Transonic...

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Today is the last official day of Fleet Week in San Francisco. The planes are all gone, and are in route to their next shows. Most of them will be heading to the Miramar M.C.A.S. show in San Diego. The Blue Angels are heading to Hawaii for their next air show.

This was the first time I attended the Fleet Week Air Show in San Francisco. We purchased reserved seats to view all the flight demonstrations. Even though the stage was very scenic, our seats were located across for the Marina’s outer jetty. The jetty blocked our view from some of the low flying acrobats.

On Sunday I returned alone to take some more pictures. This time I walked out onto the Jetty and set up camp just in front of where we were sitting the previous day. This proved to be a much better location. Especially if you are trying to capture a low level high speed pass by a Blue Angels solo pilot as he edges his aircraft just past the sound barrier envelope at 751 knots also know as transonic speed mach 0.8~1.2.

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Photo by: Kirk Howard Copyright© 2007

Looking Forward…

Based off the title of this entry. One would thing that I would have a deep inspiration forward looking thought in mind. Actually I don’t want disappoint, but I will. Looking forward, is just what it sounds like. I am really looking forward to this weekend. Why? Because it is fleet week here in San Francisco and that provides a million photography opportunities.

As I sat at my desk yesterday I was reminded that the U.S. Navy Blue Angels would be in town to perform their incredible in-air acrobatic ballet. It was like a bell went off at 12:15 PM in my head as an F/A-18B Hornet painted blue and gold went streaking past our office windows at mach speed. Our offices are on the top floor of the Ferry Building looking out onto the bay towards the Bay Bridge. This gave us a shoreline seat to watch the Blue Angles doing their practice runs and survey flights.

In the afternoon today the Blue Angels will continue to do practice runs in preparation for Saturday and Sundays shows. Today I brought my camera gear to catch some action outside our windows.

Have a great weekend, I know my wife and I will.

Dismissed…

If you plan on coming to the San Francisco Fleet week Air Show or any Air Show and plan on photographing some of the displays and acrobatic acts here is a article I think is a good read on Air Show Photography.