Waiting for Spring to Arrive

While spring has arrived in the D.C. Area, it has not arrived in the nearby mountains.  I spent the last 2 weekends hiking in the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia.   The trees are starting to leaf out at the lower elevations.  I’m looking forward to shooting wildflowers, waterfalls, and streams in the next few weeks.    

The photo above was taken on the Rapidan River last spring, an area I hope to revisit this year.  

Dogs Love Trucks

And so do I.  It’s not that I spend much time thinking about my love for trucks but when I see one like this I stop in my tracks.   While I consider myself primarily a landscape photographer, I could easily take a year off and shoot nothing but old rusty cars and trucks.  Unfortunately I just don’t know of enough places where I can find these magnificent machines.  When I do get a line on something like this I don’t hesitate to shoot them.  Experience has taught me they will not be there forever.  A favorite I used to call the “car farm” recently sold their entire collection because steel prices were just too good to refuse.   I can only hope that somewhere people are parking today’s old cars so another generation will have the opportunities I have had in another few decades.   After all it takes time for them to age in place. 

Blue Poppies

Yesterday I took a day off work to go to Longwood Gardens to shoot the Blue Poppies with a couple of friends.   Having heard that this year’s display was the best in recent memory I was not disappointed.  Also known as the Himalayan Blue Poppy,  it is my understanding they can be difficult to grow and perhaps the reason why the displays at Longwood vary from year to year.  One of my other challenges is to try and capture something I find compelling and yet different from what I have shot in the past.    Yesterday was a good day!  

Tropical Paradise

What seems like a several months ago now,  I was in Key West taking a well-deserved vacation.  It was not a photo vacation, but I did take some equipment because I was hoping to visit the Dry Tortugas.   There are 2 ways to get there, by boat or plane.  As I recall the boat ride takes 2 ½ hours each way, the plane was about 40 minutes.  I chose the sea plane and I’m really glad I did .  The ride was fantastic!   I really enjoyed shooting Fort Jefferson but wish there was a way other than camping that would allow me to shoot there for either sunrise or sunset.  

The Fabulous Tuckers

A couple of weeks ago an article came across my desk about a collection of Tucker cars in Alexandria, Virginia.  I grew up in Alexandria and was a bit surprised that I had never heard of this collection.   After reading the article, I started making some inquiries and was soon put in touch with David Cammack who is the owner of this impressive collection.  That’s Mr. Cammack in the picture above with car number 1001.   

For those who are unaware the Tucker was the dream of Preston Tucker who created 51 prototype vehicles of which only 47 remain today.  The Tucker was a revolutionary automobile for its time.  For instance, the center headlight turned with the steering wheel when making more than a 10 degree turn.  Only recently have some high end vehicles added headlights that project into turns.  

If you look at my photography you might notice that I shoot old cars whenever I get the chance.  That’s because I love cars!  I have spent my  entire adult life working in the automotive industry and my interest in cars is more than skin deep.  I love design and color, but I’m just as fascinated with the technical aspects.  I spent 3 hours with Mr. Cammack ,only about half the time taking pictures.  As he gave me the tour he kept asking if I had questions, but truthfully, I had few.  I was just trying to soak up everything he was sharing and marveled at some of the unique engineering on these vehicles. 

Photographing these cars was quite a challenge.  The cars do not move and photographically speaking I was not thrilled with the distracting backgrounds.   So I decided to turn out all the lights and shoot with flash.   This offered me a way to control the light and minimize distractions.  

If you want to learn more here is the link to the TuckerClub Website.  

Shooting with the iPhone

When it comes to cell phone photography there seems to be 2 types of people.  You either love it or just don’t get it.    I certainly fall into the “love it” category.  The other day I was listening to an episode of The Grid on Kelby TV and heard a quote attributed to Jay Maisel.   It was something to the effect of  “if you want to be a better photographer, you have to take pictures every day”.  That might not be the exact quote, but it certainly brings home the point I want to make.  The iPhone lets me take pictures almost every day!  That is something that is just not possible with my DSLR. 

In the shot above I was driving down route 7 in Tysons Corner and the road was detoured under the new construction for the Metro.  Traffic came to a stop and with iPhone in hand I got this shot of the massive horizontal crane they are using to construct the above ground sections.   After capturing the picture I later finished it with an app called Painteresque. 

I often post my iPhone pictures on my Facebook PhotographyPage and my Twitter account.   If you want to see what I’m shooting be sure to follow those accounts.  

Tulips Under Ice

Two weeks ago I did a post on shooting tulips in a macro studio.   After spending an hour or so working on the tulips on my workbench, I submerged them in water and put them in the freezer overnight.   Working with flowers in a block of ice is a lot of fun, but at the same time it can be a little limiting.  The composition in ice is set, the only variables are camera angle and lighting.   Still this is something I really enjoy doing when time permits.