Monday, June 30, 2014


Honolulu-  A long lost work attributed to Jackson Pollack has been discovered in a local video arcade.  "After careful study, we believe this to be an early work of Pollack done before he began using paints.  The work is made entirely of chewing gum," said art historian Wulf Iddown.  The work hung for years in a local video arcade frequented by children and teens.  "Who knew?" said an arcade worker who refused to be identified.  The work is now on it's way to be restored by professionals although certain types of gum used by Pollack are no longer made.

Sunday, June 29, 2014

Sunday Final

So anyways, I started off late tonight.
Until the lights went out.

Or round about those parts.
Anyways, I loaded up the cameras and off I went!

Here I am riding around the park at night.
Check out my light:

Can you see it?
Squint yer eyeballs!

I got a freakin jaunty smiley face in my light!

Not sure if I should be happy or creeped out.
Very strange.

My first try,  a bit under exposed.
Foreground looks okay though.

That looks good.

That, for instance, is way over exposed!
What did I do?
I forget.

Now that's better.
So I'll have to go out and do more testing.
Stay tuned.
Oh, and I'll make sure to take some notes.

Sunday Early Edition

Sort of early.
Early for me anyways.
It's Sunday don't you know.
Anyways, the other day I got my first authentic Rollei accessory.
Seems that Rollei made a ton o'stuff for their cameras, the only thing is the real stuff costs some bucks.
Overpriced if you will, compared to third party stuff that does the same thing.
Especially now since it's all vintage.

This thingy set me back like fiddydolla, but it does do something practical.
It's a panorama thingy that attaches to the bottom of the camera:

The way it attaches is sort of important because what it does is it sets the focal plane back behind the pivot point of the tripod.
I read somewhere that it makes a difference.
When you are doing panoramas anyways.
The fiddydolla thingy also has ratcheting stops, 10 in all so I suppose that means 36 degrees each, that corresponds to the field of view of the lens:

That's a three shot pan.
So you set the bubble level on the tripod, then you set the bubble level on the fiddydolla thingy and shoot your set:

Those pictures are backwards by the way, the camera actually pans left to right.
The fiddydolla thingy creates an overlap so that you can put your panorama together easier.
In the olden days the method was to glue your images to something then take another picture of it so it came out seamless.
Today, there's panorama stitching software, your phone probably has it, to put your pictures together.
I don't have access to Photoshop since I'm not in school and Lightroom doesn't really stitch stuff together.
What LR does do in a roundabout way is create triptychs; you can put three photos in a row:

Sort of like that.
I'm not doing it right for I'm loosing a lot of file size, but I'm still figuring it out.
As far as putting the shots together you still have to go in and crop out the overlap so the three images fit a bit tighter:

Sort of like that.
Despite having the same camera settings in all three pictures, you can see the lighting change on the water.
It was a partly cloudy day and the sun was moving in and out the clouds so I sort of messed up.
Still, that fiddydolla thingy has some potential.
I'm gonna go out again and see what I can put together.
The only bad thing is that I gotta lug my tripod around and lemme tell you, it's made of carbon fibre but after a couple of miles it might as well be made of lead.
I think I need a lighter one.
Quest for Tripod (QFT)?

Saturday, June 28, 2014

Old and Faded

It's the new look!
All this nice and crispy digital stuff is so passé.
Instagram don't you know.
So anyways, I've been on a Mini Quest (MQ) for that Old School Look, MQFTOSL if you are following along at home.
Remember I got this:

Doesn't get much older school than that!
Well okay it does as I got older cameras, but them cameras are sort of high tech old school.
If you know what I mean.
That camera up there, that's like cheapo old school as you can't even focus it; just point and shoot.
Well okay it does have a couple of adjustments, but very minimal.
So then the other day I got these:

Olden days pictures!
Like from the thirties and forties!
Now them pics have a look to them, something I'm finding very difficult to replicate:

Turns out that cheapo camera takes pretty nice pictures!
I mean all in focus and stuff.
Just not getting that look I want.
Unless I do this:

Now that's what I'm talkin 'bout Willis!
Of course I'm not too keen on running the scans through software like this, but the results are pretty cool.
That last picture by the way is from where I used to live when I was shorter.
I forget which mailbox was ours.
Anyways, my MQFTOSL led me in many different directions, but I think I found my cure.
Cure for the Quest (CFTQ!)!
Stay tuned.

Thursday, June 26, 2014

The Something

I don't know what it is.
It sort of ended up someplace else, even though there really wasn't any direction.
It just sort of became:

Expanding on the same theme I started oh, seven years ago when I was doing my student teaching, this composite animal just happened.
I always try to demo my projects one, to show what I want, two, to show I got skilz.
One of my peeves in school was professors who just handed out projects, never showing what they got and critiquing work without showing their own.
So I always try to show:

The head is sitting a bit high on the body.
The difficult part is that you tend to lose focus because you still have to teach so inspiration comes and goes.
It's not like a process, were you conceive and execute an idea or theme, it's more like searching through a parts bin and just putting stuff together while at the same time watching someone else do the same thing.
If you know what I mean.
Anyways, I wanted to do some swim fin feet, but I forgot and moved on to shoes.
The tail/fin was an add on too as the body was drying out and I just needed to put something on there:

The spikes were also a last minute addition.
I should have done a giraffe neck too, like a periscope, I think that would have been better.
I also should have made some socks.
Since I don't have a wheel here, I'm thinking maybe I should do a whole series of these 'somethings,' at least to keep my hands in clay.
I like the goofiness of these things and they are fun to create:

There are a couple of more weeks of class so maybe I got time to put one more together.
With goggles of course.
Because I like how that sounds.
Stay tuned.

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Happy Trails

So recently, I've been exploring the other parts or these well, parts.
Usually I make a beeline towards Waikiki, but I've been taking different turns and staying mauka,
that's local for toward the mountains.
What I realized is that I'm within walking distance of three overpass bridges.
Okay, I knew they were there, I just sort of forgot.
Well bridges over the freeway are great for doing some light trails.
So off I went!

Those were all taken off the same bridge.
As you can see it was still light when I started so I had to use a neutral density filter to get the exposure time I needed.
I took a break and watched some folks play softball:

The three overpasses I went to are all within sight of each other, less than a quarter of a mile apart.
As the freeway flies.
Me, I had to go here and there to get to the next one:

This is the one I was going for.
I had shot this place before but those street lights were giving me problems with the exposure.
So tonight I took a graduated ND filter and that did the trick!
Well, not really as it was getting late and traffic was dying down so I had to wait to get the right amount of cars to pass in both directions.
I also shot the other side:

Something a little different.
Finally the last bridge:

I also shot it from the other side, but by that time, cars were few and far between:

Lack of traffic creates gaps in the light trails, gaps that I'm not too happy with so I'll have to go back and shoot it again.
Earlier this time.
It's also not really the last bridge as there is a pedestrian overpass, if you squint yer eyeballs you can see it in the distance.
I was going to try and do it that one too, but I figured without the cars I'd be wasting my time.
Besides, I was getting tired from lugging all the cra- uh, stuff around.
Okay, so there ya go!
The Night of the Three Bridges That Was Supposed to be Four.
I'll do no. 4 next time.

Sunday, June 22, 2014

Sunday Early Edition

Summer is just flying by!
So many things to do, so little time.
Business as usual.
So anyways, the other day, I headed the other way on my walk and ended up near Aloha Tower.
Not at the tower, just near.
I got some shots on the way:

Roadside pottery sale.
Actually all this stuff was stacked up in a semi empty parking lot.
I wanted to get to the harbor to catch the sunset I just about made it:

I like these color shots where it looks almost black and white and there's just a touch of color to keep it honest.
I also shot some real black and white:

There must be a GAGILLION photographers taking pictures of the sunset everyday.
Probably one of the most cliché shots ever.
So how to make it not.
Cliché that is.
I think adding foreground or silhouette makes it more interesting so that's what I've been working on.

Although just the sunset is kinda nice too.
I was about to leave when the sky turned red and some dudes came to fish so I stayed for just a bit more:

I actually prefer twilight over sunset.
I guess it's because its the real change from day to night and well, I like night better than day.
Sort of.
I'm scanning the night shots now.
Stay tuned.