Category: Photography

Photography

Waxing Full

Shelly

The moon is nearly full. It was especially pretty last night, above the treetops, with a whisp of clouds cradling it. My cheap camera is limited in what it can do in low light, so I played around with Photoshop filters to add even more graininess. When all else fails, pretend that you meant to do that, right? Or, as a friend’s mother likes to say, if something is an eyesore, “Paint it purple.”

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According to my–yes, he is all mine–local weather guy, when there is a halo around the moon, it means there will be precipitation in the near future. It’s caused by ice crystals high up in the atmosphere. It isn’t fool proof, but it seems to be a good general rule.

Speaking of, I’m blaming my lack of productivity on the weather. It’s oppressive–still and humid and hot–and, while I haven’t looked at the weather forecast, based on last night’s moon halo and the viscosity of the air, I suspect it’s going to storm. This sort of weather makes me apprehensive, so I have a difficult time focusing and getting anything accomplished. I dealt with it today by watching mindless television and baking brownies. Yes, I required chocolate, so the Brownies of Dqqm have returned. I also made a big batch of roasted veggies: potatoes, cabbage, onions, carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, and peppers. Why on earth I was suddenly craving baked winter vegetables in the middle of July is a mystery, but I’m not about to argue.

Photography

Two-faced

Shelly

Joyce pointed out in comments that Ms. McTurtlePants is sporting an enlarged reproduction of her lovely face on the backside of her shell. How cool is that?

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Addendum:

I went a-Googling and found that she’s an eastern box turtle. Judging by her size and orange coloration, she’s an older model. A younger turtle would likely be yellow and black instead of orange and brown, as their colors mellow with age. Box turtles live to be about 80 years old in the wild, with some individuals living up to 100 years. They are protected in Indiana, so it’s illegal to keep wild-born individuals as pets. The shell designs vary widely in pattern and coloration. As far as I can tell, the face on the back of her shell is pure coincidence, which makes it even more amazing. Thanks, Joyce, for pointing it out!

Photography

Ms. McTurtlePants

Shelly

I did some mowing this evening after work, and was rewarded by a visit from a very disgruntled neighbor. I can’t blame him her. I’d be pissed off, too, if someone covered me in grass clippings then took my picture.

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Miss McTurtlePants was trying to get through my fence. I was afraid, if she managed to get into the yard while I was mowing, that she’d get hurt, so I picked her up and stuck her in a Rubbermaid tub while I worked. During one of my breaks, I got my camera and took some pictures. She was unamused.

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I also saw the world’s smallest bunny baby. He was about the size of a roma tomato, ears and all. He was too young to really understand the art of running away, so I got to get within a foot of him. My camera was inside, alas, so I didn’t get any photos. I got to bask in the cuteness, though, which was nice.

Photography

Found

Shelly

Ferns

American Flags

I found these two photos in an old book I bought at a thrift shop. There’s a detail of the flags, here.

Based on the star pattern, I’m guessing that the left-hand flag is a 49 star “Alaska” flag (7 rows of 7 stars). The 49th star, for Alaska, was added on July 4, 1959 and the 50th, for Hawaii, was added on July 4, 1960.

Photography

Sweet Serendipity

Shelly

Earlier today, I posted a link to a website on lightning photography. Well, this evening, I managed to snag my second ever lightning photo. Wheee!

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For about thirty minutes, thunder had been rumbling. Then, I suddenly noticed that the sky to the southwest was a little pink, from the sunset. At the same time, a large, dark cloud mass had crept in from the north, creating a dark band of land, a light band of pale pink, then a dark band of clouds. I thought the contrast was lovely, so I grabbed my camera. The lightning strike was pure serendipity.

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A few moments later, I noticed that a fringe of rain was falling from the southwesternmost cloud rim. It was dry where I stood, and clear on the far side of the rain sheet. (Both images were taken at about the same time, but with different exposure lengths.)

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The backside of the storm spewed gumball-sized hail. I went out to check on my car and gathered up some specimens.

This therapy-through-photography thing is pretty damned cool. I’m scared to death of storms, but instead of getting sick, worrying about tornadoes, I actually found myself getting excited about the fact that there was lightning and hail. Not a lot excited, mind you, but any bit helps.

Photography

Between the heaves of storm

Shelly

We had an amazing storm in the early evening yesterday, with high winds, lots of lightning, and heavy rain (4 inches in one hour). The trees around me were bent over with the force of the wind, and I may have lost my largest sapling. When I went out to take pictures, after the worst had passed, I found the 8 foot tall tree bent over, with its top touching the ground. I wanted to cry, but I reminded myself not to get too attached to the baby trees because I’ll be moving soon. I can’t exactly take them with me, can I?

While I was out taking post-storm photos, I noticed an area of mammatus clouds to the south.

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Then, I noticed a break in the clouds to the southwest. A bird was wheeling around, appearing to circle the small patch of light. Right after I took this photo, he flew off to the east.

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To the south, there was mist rising from the trees. During the worst of the storm, this ridge was completely obscured by rain.

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A few hours later, another squall line moved through, less intense than the first.

Photography

Stormblogging

Shelly

A storm cell just passed overhead. Hoo-boy! It moved through quickly, thankfully, and we didn’t get the worst of it. North of us, there was a lot of rotation and tennis ball sized hail. We didn’t get any hail–in fact, we only got a few drops of rain–but there was rotation and a lot of movement in the clouds. Eeep!

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After the storm passed, the sun came out and lit up the towering cloud bank. Whew!

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Pets, Photography

And then there was one

Shelly

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I just got back from the vet. Rory had another blockage last night, so I took him in as soon as they opened this morning. After sitting up all night with him, trying to decide what to do, I felt like the best thing for him was to have him put to sleep. I’d hoped that the PU surgery would stop the blockages, but it didn’t. I couldn’t stand the thought of him having to go through this over and over and over again, especially knowing how painful UTIs are, and how excruciating a complete blockage must be. I just didn’t feel like his quality of life would be acceptable.

This is the first time I’ve had to make this decision. The rest of my animals have had the good sense to choose their own times and to leave on their own terms. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be–not the procedure itself, which was amazingly low-key and uneventful–but the stress of having to make the decision to have it done. I got to stay with him while he was sedated, and for the final shot to make his heart stop. He was calm about everything. The initial shot didn’t bother him, but then he’s been poked with so many needles, I’m sure it was old hat. He curled up on the table, with his head shoved under my arm and his body resting against me, and started purring gently. It may have been stress purring, but it didn’t seem frantic enough for that. His breathing eventually slowed, then nearly stopped. The vet came back in to give him the final shot and that was that. I paid the bill and brought home an empty carrier.

Now we’re the house of girls, which feels very odd. Pandora is my sole remaining cat. First and last and always, I guess. She outlived three younger cats–Echo, Polkadottie, and Rory–and one dog–Elliott. I sometimes think she might outlive us all.

So goodbye, Rory O’Nubbin. You were one hell of a cat: sweet, feisty, exasperating, and endlessly entertaining. You should have had a long, long life, dammit.

Photography

Photo Salvage

Shelly

What do you do when a photo doesn’t really turn out the way you’d hoped it would? You go a-Photoshopping, of course!

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I took this photo last night, just as the sun was setting. The summer sunset is usually pretty boring from my vantage point, because a large stand of trees blocks the view. We occasionally get interesting cloud formations, though, and I’d hoped that this would be one of them; but it ended up not being very photogenic, so I did some Photoshopping to try to salvage what I could of it.

I started by desaturating the image, darkening it, and ramping up the contrast. Because I intended to put a black frame around it, I wanted to make sure the foreground trees were a rich black, not a washed out sorta-black. So I used the Levels setting to select the tree value as the darkest in the image. Then, I used Color Balance to add reds and yellows, to fake sepia tones. Finally, I added a grungy border around the image.