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These two images were taken using the Sony 18-70mm f3.5-5.6 kit lens.

This one was taken from the fishing boat while still tied to the dock

Click to see full sized image

This one was taken while underway. The water was very calm but with the boat moving there was some up and down motion. The built in image stabilization shines here.

Click to see full sized image

The last two photos are with the same lens at full zoom and center on these jetties:

I was using the 3fps auto-advance and auto-focus to track pelicans as they dove for fish.
Each of these shots is a 100% crop, meaning that if you click to see the larger image you will see an un-resized section of the actual photograph cropped from the original image.

With full zoom and being out at the mouth of the bay near the jetties the image stabilization came in quite handy and is very apparent in these shots.

Click for full size

Click for full size

This should be interesting.

My department, as part of our ongoing team building efforts, is going bay fishing today.
That’s right, a group of nerds consisting of hardware techs and software developers are going out on a boat for a few hours to catch some fish.

Cynthia suggests that this might be a ploy by the HR department to thin out the IT department.

If you don’t hear from me please send a search party.

I guess if something were to happen like say, getting stranded on a deserted island, I would prefer this:

rather than this:

With all the fuss of fundraising and prepping to go to Austin this weekend we really didn’t hype the Geek Gathering all that much.

Still we managed an excellent turn out.

Russell Holliman of MobilePodcast.org who has been tangling with Apple over the name of his company, Podast Ready, found some time to join us. Always a treat. Plus he promised some swag after modeling the new company shirt for us.

We also saw Lambo and Sketkar of Astrocast.net fame make an appearance.

All in all, a great evening. I had to cut and run to get home and get some sleep before heading to Austin for the Celtic Festival this weekend. More on that later.

Well worth clicking to see a larger version

The largest quilting event in the world happens in Houston every year at the George R. Brown convention center each November. The International Quilt Festival is something that Cynthia never misses.

From their web site:

The largest annual quilt show, sale, and quiltmaking academy in the world attracts more than 53,000 attendees with 2,000+ quilts, cloth dolls and garments on display; more than 1050 booths selling quilts, supplies, books, notions, antiques, and crafts; and more than 400 classes, lectures, and events for all skill levels.

It’s pretty impressive. In the past I have had to miss it due to obligations during the fall, but not this year. You might think it’s too girly or froo-froo or whatever but you would be wrong. Some of these quilts are works of art that are amazing to behold.

Here’s a picture of the entire quilt from the above photo:

Click it, you won’t be disappointed

Cynthia and I agreed that this was the coolest quilt at the show.
Just take a look at some of the detail:

Clicky and drool!

There was one other quilt that I saw that I particularly liked

More detail when you click

Cynthia was able to get some good fabric swatches for a quilt she is planning to make and we found some awesome fabric for a new custom shirt for me. All in all, a great outing and one I recommend to anyone.

Continuing to experiment with simulated tilt-shift.
I suppose I will eventually need to just break down and buy a lens.
This is infinitely cheaper, though.

Urquhart Castle from a picture I took on our trip to the UK a few years back.

This is the St. Angel Bridge in Rome from last years European vacation

It is helpful to use photographs taken from above. This tricks the mind much better because when we think of looking at a model we usually see it on a table top.

Tonight’s show was supplemented by an off duty police officer.

Meet Officer Munoz

Barrett scans the Internet with REAL security.

phliKtid was kind enough to bring candy to the radio station.

Click for full size candy!

It helped ease the tension and lighten the mood.

Clicky Click!

A scale model of the the Arc D’Triumph and the surrounding area?

Nope.

I used Photoshop to manipulate a picture I took from our vacation to Europe.

The original is here.

I’ve been reading about the technique and this is my first attempt.

A while back I wrote a very “tongue-in-cheek” post about Dooley, my African Gray parrot.
The post was titled Dooley and the ice cube and was a humorous look at Dooley as he struggled to eat an ice cube. Complete with hilalrious photos it still makes me laugh and is one of my favorite posts.

The cool thing about this WordPress blog is that it gets indexed by all the search engines which leads to my posts showing up as results to various search queries. That means that people Googling search terms like “African Gray Parrot” or “Timneh” will stumble upon my posts about Dooley.

Apparently a gentleman named Bob over at Pecan Acres Pets stumbled upon my post about Dooley and the ice cube from just such a search and took to heart my statement about the migration of African Grays to Antarctica to feed on the ice.

He e-mailed me for more information about this behavior.

I did a google search for Greys and cold temperatures and the heading under your website name had the following:

Another little know fact about African Gray parrots is that every winter
they migrate to Antarctica to feed on life sustaining ice collected from
the…

Please tell me where I can find additional information about this?

Thank you,

Bob

Ok, I am NOT an authority on African Gray parrots. But it does not take a genius to know that these birds do not migrate to Antarctica. To make matters worse, Pecan Acres Pets is an outfit that SPECIALIZES in breeding and raising AFRICAN GRAY PARROTS…

They should know better!

I would have thought the joke obvious, especially after the line “African Gray parrots are sustained on a steady diet of french fries which grow wild and plentiful in the deepest jungles of Africa.”

It just goes to show that you can’t trust the Internet. Obviously my site is leading people astray with false information about the migratory behavior of African Gray parrots and it is apparent that Pecan Acres Pets needs to redefine “specialize”…

I received an e-mail from my old friend Rich Davis indicating that his mother was in town visiting from Seattle.

Rich and I go back easily 30 years or so. We were inseparable best friends for a good portion of our adolescence. I knew his whole family and even lived with the Davis’s at one point.

It was good to see Mary. It’s been at least 15 years or so since I have seen her. She’s looking great! She had bypass surgery and has lost over 150 lbs and seems to be full of energy and great humor.

When people my age and older get together to reminisce the conversation quickly turns to what I call the “Litany of the Dead” where the two parties pretty quickly catch each other up on who’s no longer with us. I gave up the gory details on my little brother, my mother and my father who had all passed since we saw each other last and she filled me in on her husband, her mother and her daughter.

A grim but necessary conversation and ever so appropriate on this, The Day of the Dead.

Mary shared with me the story of how when her husband had died she had to make the decision to take him off life support. She expressed some of the agony that comes with making that decision and the doubt surrounding whether or not to try prolonging the life.

After he had passed she collected family members to go out and get some dinner. They went to a burger place and order some food and the most amazing thing happened when she received her change. She got this dollar bill (which she later had laminated):

If you click it you will see a larger view and you can read the handwritten text which says:

“Today is the day that I died, a day that was one of the best”

It gave me chills just holding it. I call it the “Dollar of the Dead”. It’s not every day that the dead communicate so clearly. What a blessing!

Feliz Día de los muertos everyone!

As part of our Sunday grocery shopping routine Cynthia always picks out some fresh flowers for the house. It’s a minimal expense that is well worth joy and warmth it brings to our home.

Los Skarnales played what has been billed as their “final performance” last night at the Continental Club.

That band is going to be sorely missed.

Ripped from the Daily Mail in the UK.

For those interested, it’s still available online at Tesco Direct.

Tesco has been forced to remove a pole-dancing kit from the toys and games section of its website after it was accused of “destroying children’s innocence”.

The Tesco Direct site advertises the kit with the words, “Unleash the sex kitten inside…simply extend the Peekaboo pole inside the tube, slip on the sexy tunes and away you go!

“Soon you’ll be flaunting it to the world and earning a fortune in Peekaboo Dance Dollars”.

The £49.97 kit comprises a chrome pole extendible to 8ft 6ins, a ‘sexy dance garter’ and a DVD demonstrating suggestive dance moves.

The kit, condemned as ‘extremely dangerous’ by family campaigners yesterday, was discovered by mother of two Karen Gallimore who was searching for Christmas gifts for her two daughters, Laura 10, and Sarah, 11.

Continue Reading…

I’ve been percolating this one in my mind for awhile. I wanted to play with perspective and thought that posing toy tractors moving pocket sized items would be fun.

I learned alot about using f-stops to give the illusion of size and distance.

click image for larger version

click image for larger version

click image for larger version

Click for larger version IF YOU DARE!

Camera: Sony Alpha 100
Len: 50mm 1.4 (aperature value f/2.8)
Assisted by 4x magnifier lens

According to the Census Bureau, America’s population reached the 300,000,000 mark sometime this morning.

So many people, so few brain cells.