I strapped on the trusty macro lens yesterday afternoon and spent a very hot half hour shooting some of the plants my wife has done such an excellent job of nurturing through our continuing drought. Below are images of hibiscus, bougainvillea, and lantana. I’ll leave it to you to figure out which is which.
Little Porch of Horrors: Return of the Bling
Experimentation with animated GIFs continues, this time with some selective desaturation* and background blurring. *Desaturation is just a fancy way of saying removal of color. But you knew that.
Little Porch of Horrors: The Sequel
I’m not going to quit until I get this right. Or something. I tried my hand at a timelapse sequence of a blooming hibiscus about a week ago. The sequence was OK, but my camera’s battery pooped out before the bloom opened completely. Yesterday, a new camera housing arrived, one that will allow me to… Continue reading Little Porch of Horrors: The Sequel
Chicago: 40 Years Later
On Tuesday night we went to the Chicago concert at the WinPAC, along with however many other people it takes to fill that venue (oh, it’s 1,827 folks, according to the technical specs). The show was announced as a sellout and while I did see a few scattered empty seats, I’m sure it was due… Continue reading Chicago: 40 Years Later
Little Porch of Horrors
We had one of those rare mornings with not a breath of wind, and I noticed an unopened bloom on the hibiscus on our back porch. I decided this was a great opportunity to create a time lapse using the GoPro Hero 3 camera so I grabbed the tripod and camera and set things up.… Continue reading Little Porch of Horrors
Flight Behaviors in Young Animals: More Questions Than Answers
I observed a couple of instances of unusual behavior on the part of some young animals this week, and they made me wonder about whether such behavior was learned or instinctive. My drive to work each day takes me for a mile down a street called Mockingbird, the length of which on one side is… Continue reading Flight Behaviors in Young Animals: More Questions Than Answers
Cruising the Interwebz
Note: This is an old timey blog post, the kind you might have read in the early Oughts, where people were still sharing interesting finds on the web. It’s not done much anymore. I’m not sure why. I’ve been accumulating links over the past few weeks, primarily from Twitter but also from some random exploring… Continue reading Cruising the Interwebz
My Experience as a Pawn in the Health Insurance Game
Hardly a day passes that I don’t hear a news report or see a post on social media or talk to someone who complains about the high cost of insurance and/or medical treatment. I guess I’ve been somewhat naive about the reasons, but something happened to me today that brings it into crystal clear focus.… Continue reading My Experience as a Pawn in the Health Insurance Game
Lauding Lund (Corb, that is…)
Much to the chagrin of my professional musician friends, I don’t usually buy albums. In the age of digital downloads, I pick and choose the songs I like best, and ignore the rest. I realize this is a symbolic slap in the face to those artists who put a lot of time and thought into… Continue reading Lauding Lund (Corb, that is…)
Riot (Florally speaking)
In the midst of a brutal drought, and on a day of 100+ degree temperatures, wildflowers still find a way. This image is a composite of three photos of the same plant I found growing in the pasture west of our neighborhood, taken at different focal lengths and slightly different angles. I overlaid them in… Continue reading Riot (Florally speaking)