Last Commented Photography Blogs (166)

According to NASA, the Lyrids are one of the oldest meteor showers. They typically peak during late April. Best seen in the Northern Hemisphere after the moon sets and before dawn.
The shower was most active Sunday night through Monday morning and I was out a 2am checking, but I'm in the city and the streetlights made it impossible to view the night sky.

April's full moon, known as the "pink moon," will crest at its full phase Tuesday at 4:49 p.m. Pacific.

I was able to zoom in on the moon from the parking lot. Not a clear shot, but something I couldn't photograph at all with my previous phone/camera.




Lyrid meteor showers...

My parents collected photos. Mostly family relatives and friends... no too many landmarks or scenic views. They were attached to pages in albums with names, dates and sometimes marked with the locations or occasions.

Most of the photos were glued to the pages and others were attached with small 'corner holders' so it was easy to remove and read the information on the back, usually written in pencil.

When we moved from New York to Miami, the albums were kept in a tweed suitcase in a storage room in the back of the house and only a few photos were in the living room on display. Sadly that part of the house was an addition before my parents bought the place and an undetected the roof leak damaged a portion of the photos stored there.

Sifting through moldy pages stuck together, I salvaged as much as I could. They were moved to a storage shed and when I sold the place, they were moved into plastic bins and are on my screened in back porch.

I have 2 cousins who retired from New York and moved to Florida, both a few miles from me. During WWII, my dad was in the navy and their dad was in the air force. At one point, the brothers met up and I've got 2 photos of the meeting. Not sure of the location and exact date, it's believed to be the only photos of them together in uniform!

I high-res scanned the photos and emailed them to my cousins who were 'blown away' by this, as their father was shot-down on a mission in Europe and a POW for several years.

A niece contacted me last night asking if I had photos of her father. Yes, of course and also one of her aunt she often stayed with. I'm not sure how a torn portrait of the woman came into my possession, but I scanned it and fully restored the digital image. I'll send those out later today.

Years ago, some of the old photos were scanned and copied to hard drives and backed up on portable drives. I'm taking a few days off this week and should be able to get more photos scanned and uploaded to my collection.

My ex-wife did some part-time modeling and met a clothing designer who invented a dress that could be worn in several different configurations. He gave the dress to her and as far as I know, it's the only one of it's kind. He claimed to have a patent on it. She's not interested in keeping the studio shots or the dress, both are in my collection. I'm sure the designer has passed on some time ago and there isn't anyone to confirm the history of the dress... I'm sure when the time is right, that dress may make another appearance.

I witnessed the birth of my grand daughter and took photos. This Christmas, I put a few of them on a thumb drive and brought to the party. She's 12 years old now and we played them on a laptop to the enjoyment of guests there.

My mother once showed me a photo of her father (my grandfather) driving a 1939 Packard. That's one of the photos I'll be looking for when I start digitizing another batch. Why? Because I'm the keeper of old photos.

I have collected a few paranormal photos during my work .
Captured via smartphone during paranormal investigation & ritual, unedited.Here are a few that are not confidential.
Ghost of an old man. Demons. They tried smashing my head. During a curse removal ritual. Jinn/ GenieEmbracing fairy couple.

Or suggest your own photo caption for the following photo.

Have fun.

Here are 5 of the 12 photos that I presented last week in my photo club.
They loved them. Perhaps you might enjoy one of them too.
All were taken with my Canon T6i and a Sigma 50 to 500 mm lens.

The first 3 are somewhat difficult. They are of a flying hummingbird feeding from a flower.
They were at a huge garden, where there were literally thousands of flowers.
So, one has little idea as to when the bird would appear, or which flower the bird would feed from. In addition one needs to choose a very high shutter speed (these were taken at 1/3200 of a second) and thus a high ISO ( = 3200).







The next one was of a Monarch Butterfly.
However, while I was just about to press the shutter button, I noticed (something?)
out of the corner of my eye to the right of the butterfly.
So, I shifted the camera a bit to the right to include it in the picture.
I was very happy that the butterfly turned out very well and the other
tiny insect turned out well enough to at least get a look at it.
However, I still don't know what the heck that tiny insect is.



Lastly, I went to a jazz festival last month. Got right up front, center stage and met
a couple of the band leaders. One a female singer and the other one a terrific guitarist,
that I own several CDs of. His name is Mark Whitfield.

While I was taking photos, I sat right next to the guy the festival hired to take photos of the
event. I asked him if he was familiar with Mark Whitfield. He was not. I told him, that I had
never seen him in person, but I owned several of his CDs and that he is an excellent guitarist.

We both took hundreds of photos of each band. After Mark Winfield's band was done, the other photographer commented to me, "Man, he just gave us his all." I said, "Yeah. But the challenge with him, as I saw it, was that whenever he plays, he plays with his eyes closed." He responded with, "Well, I took a lot of photos of him. I'm sure I got several with his eyes open."

I then saw him go through all 84 photos he took of Mark, and not a single one had him with his eyes open. Because I noticed the challenge early on during his set, I got 11 photos of him with his eyes open. While I got plenty of his eyes closed while playing, I intentionally waited to the exact moment that he opened his eyes, to get several of those too, giving options for perhaps a CD cover. I did hand Mark my business card after the concert.

What the other photographer said next, made absolutely no sense. He said, "Well, we just looked at the JPEG photos. Some of the RAW ones probably have his eyes open."
I did not reply, because the RAW and the JPEG photos are exactly the same photos,
simultaneously stored onto the same memory card, except the way the image is stored is different.
I just let him 'save face' (pun intended).

Here's one of the photos of Mark, with his eyes & mouth open.



And here's a short little taste of some of his solo guitar work;

Or suggest your own caption for the following photo, if you like.
Or simply enjoy the captions eventually submitted by others.

Here's the photo;

Lets face it. You are one lucky person. We all are.
All those sperm & only 1 egg, and somehow, one beat the odds and combined to make you and then you made it out alive. Way to go !

Another reason you are lucky, is because today, of all days, you get to see
7 of my recent nature photos. OK perhaps not quite like winning the lottery of life,
but perhaps a lot less pain in seeing the photos, than what you might encounter in some other aspects of life.
Plus, not everyone can see....at all. Lucky you !

First here's some background music for lucky people to enjoy, while looking at the photos;



All photos were taken by me with my Canon T6i camera with a Sigma 50-500 mm lens.

First photo up is of a female Goldfinch. Goldfinches are the state bird of New Jersey.
Their diet is almost entirely seeds.
Like cuckoos, there is another bird, that lays eggs in the goldfinch nest.
However, after they hatch, they only survive about 3 days, because, unlike the goldfinches,
they can't survive on an exclusive seed diet.




Next up is the male goldfinch. None his black wings and black patch adjacent to his beak;

Each couple has their own unique call, which
helps them distinguish their partner from others.
Within the couple, the calls are almost identical between the pair.




The following photo is an adult frog in the water between some lilypads




Let it bee... A close-up of a Bumblebee on some flowers




The next photo is of a little baby frog, only about an inch in length




This is a small Sulfur Butterfly on some flowers;




And last is usually a slow running stream, except this was the day after Hurricane Ida;



Not everyone was so lucky as to survive the storm.

Or suggest your own caption for the following photo, if you like.
Or just enjoy the inventive suggestions of others.

Here's the photo;




No mention of other CS members.