DVD cover

Edit** my last snap of the year is the 2 family's. Dave, Margy, Sheila, Lance, and front row Payne, Kate. Bring on 2010. Many memories over the past year. My dad calling me on my birthday and telling me about my mom's cancer, me getting the Adobe Fellow recipient, our travels down to Oklahoma, My dearest mother passing on to heaven, my inner sole saying move on, my family's health concerns, and my daughters needs. 2009 was filled with good memories and ones I will remember forever but are not memorable. Death happens as stark and sudden as it is, it does not make it any easier, it does not make it any better, it does not make it any more smoother, but it is what it is. I thank you few folks that have commented on my shots over the last 365 days. As others have said, at times it has been a chore and at times it has been a great learning experience. I hope to think it has been more of the latter.I challenge those that read my blog to "pay if forward" Pick a non-profit organization and give. Material is not everything.

I will end with this moving on to the new decade: I am s spiritual man, I know someone somewhere is looking out for me and my family and I wish everyone a happy and healthy 2010.

I wanted something on the books before the day got away from me. I will more than like post another shot but it might not be until tomorrow. I am entering a Photoshop contest and the theme is to create a dvd cover about the tools in photoshop. Here is my first try at it. The image is my daughter and myself put into the cover. This is a progress in the works and will be tweaked throughout the month on Jan.

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364 and then there was one

I went outside tonight and it was a full moon. Beautiful to see as they said it might be a cloudy night. Had to get a shot of the christmas lights before Saturday as my wife and I will start taking down the Christmas decorations. Getting ready to ring in the new year.

Cheers to all.

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Special effects shot k 10 f16~~10sec~~ISO400~~28 slow zoom to 75 over the 10 seconds.

Mr. & Mrs. Claus

Yesterdays picture Chirstmas list: Easy bake oven, splatster (link), trampoline, watch, baby, and Merry Christmas, Jan you were nearly perfect.

My mom made these for Sheila in 1985. Twenty-four years ago. Every year we display them with pride. Most years we push the hair and jewels around to make them presentable. The past few years they've watch over our dinning room table.

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Lighing top picture off camera flash camera left 30 degrees. bottom picture is off camera flash 45 degrees camera right. My new Bokah lighting toy used as well with the lights into hearts.

k 10 f1.4~~1/20~~ISO400~~50mm prime

Decipher this

My daughters Christmas list.
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k10 f1.6~~1/40~~ISO200~~50mm prime

Ginger Bread House

The breaking down of the house. It is as almost as fun as building it. She enjoyed building it but now she gets to eat the roof. Best part in her eyes.

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k10 f1.6~~1/20~~ISO200~~50mm pentax prime.

Easy Bake Oven

It doesn't get much simpler than this. Here is a piece of cake my daughter made today for my birthday. She was so proud to bake and then share with me. Her expression of acceptance filled her 5 year old smile when I took my first, and by the look of things my only bite. Her expression of love and giving of this first creation was a priceless memory living only between my ears, which is where some things should reside. May my next 50 be as grand as my last 5.

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k10 f1.6~~1/60~~ISO200~~50mm prime, the fitting lens for the day right Tim ;)

Merry Christmas

And the big winner was....drum roll please.....easy bake oven.

Merry Christmas everyone.

The whispers of St Nicholas

Keeping a High tech eye peeled for Santa Claus. Uncle David, or Father David, is searching the net for The big guy. The kids look on in amazement. I remember in the day we would have to listen for the sleigh and 8 tiny reindeer to land on the roof. That is how we did it in the old days. We then knew "HE" had arrived!!!

And the 3 Beautiful wise ladies keeping their eye's peeled on good food: sister-in-law, loving wife, sister-in-laws mother-in-law.
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Eric's #1 shot

Do you have an Eric favorite?
Eric told a fun story all year long. We are days away from the Dec 31st 365. He had hunreds ;) of shots to chose from and I finally narrowed the field down to this one.



It shows me a new chapter, love, expression, thought, elegance, happiness, sparkle, lighting, depth of field, and a true "the moment it clicks", "every picture tells a story", "A picture is worth a thousand words." You name it, a novel could be written here. An English teachers story starter to be sure.

Tim's #1

What is your favorite shot from Tim?
I am sorry I could not just pick one as both of these would be anyone's number one, let alone one guy shooting both. Interesting contrast in my picks. Both took a lot of patience, one in the blink of an eye, the other, trying to keep your eyes open late at night. Both of these shots were taken days apart, both in April, it must have been a good month for him.

water drop: lighting is perfect, ripple is perfect,color is vibrant. But if you have attempted this shot you know the most important thing is timing. nicely done thus my pick for Tim's number one shot.




Stars:



How did you get the stars to circle perfectly the cross. How cool is this shot!!!! Again patience on the opposite end of the spectrum

Alan's #1

Which was your favorite from Alan?

I could have picked his smoke shot on April 24th, I didn't...I should have chose his bee shot on May 28th, I didn't...His waterdrop on Aug 7th...again I didn't.

I did choose...drum roll please


This takes a lovely assistant to pull this shot off. If Alan's daughter is anything like mine I am sure it is hard to get her to cooperate on a moments notice. Composition is fantastic in this shot. Alan has a real eye for this, in what I consider his stong point. The shot is a bit different as it takes my eye from right to left, backwards to how we normally see life. This makes it even more powerful. The lighting was fantastic. (my guess is offcamera flash camera left) It shows good motion and action. This truely shows a moment in time.

Daddynobucks #1

I am sure you have a favorite shot of your/his. Please feel free to reply to this post and tell me the one I missed.


Click on the thumbnail to take you to his blog shot.


I remember seeing his pictue a day on Oct 4th. I think this is the coolest idea but next to impossible to do. A lot of patience and a lot of bubble blowing had to take place to gain this shot. And he posted two to boot. The reflection, color, light all has to be perfect to get a shot like this. I will practice this one a lot in the next few years and may never get a shot like this.


There are some great shots from DNB and I tried to narrow it down to my favorite 5-ish. He started his 365 days in early Feb so I had 35 or so days less to pick from. It was fun watching his shots evolve over the past year. I am sure, like me, he has learned a lot about composition and lighting. Way to go DNB!!!!

In the Mirror

This family unit is much like ours. Mike, Jill and Julia are friends of ours that share the older parents--not grandparents questions as well as we are all teachers, Mike is my age and Jill is Sheila's age. We both started our family's late, late, late in life. There is are a lot of similarities with each family so it is nice to see them and get together. We need to do more of this as we get along so well with this family, but it seems to go back to the old "where does the time go". I guess we need to make the time in 2010. Cheers and here's to you Mike, Jill and Julia. We spent the night downtown with them and did some shopping, eating, looking at the gingerbread houses and walking the streets of Seattle. It was nice spending time with our friends.

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K10 f2.8~~1/200~~ISO200~~75mm

Making a list, checking it twice

My daughter was so relieved to find her name on 'The List" in the major mall in downtown Seattle. She only had to flip to the second page to find her name and already a big check mark well before the big day. A big sigh of relief sweep over the stage when she saw the name and got really excited to know that the Easy Bake Oven was on the sleigh. I knew she would be on the list without her even looking. My daughter is perfect. No reallly, she is...those that know her know I am telling the truth, she goes as far as telling on herself. No proud papa talking here, as I am looking through the educator's eye.

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k10 (still) f2.8~~1/20~~ISO800~~75mm

Figured out special effect

I finally wrapped my head around the shape effect using the lights and bokeh.
Here is a quick shot and check out my video tutorial as to how I got my image.
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f1.4~~1/20~~ISO400~~50mm

And the runner up....

This post is rather long but these four guys deserve it. I lot of effort was put into the past year.

I would like to start this post with a plea for those that visit this week to reflect on the past 365-ish days. Please take a look at these 4 photogs blogs as they have put much blood, sweat, and tears into the past year or so. In sickness, family obligations, family support, equipment problems, weather issues and a number of other problems they all seemed to stay focused. For anyone that has attempted to take a picture a day it is at times very fun and rewarding and at times its "ok turn the camera on and snap the shot" I see you smiling on that as you know exactly what I am writing about.

These 4 individuals have taken some awe inspiring shots over the last 365-ish days. and if you were to mulitply that by 4 there is a great book in the works, well over 1400 images to pick from. So please in the next week or so, relax with your favorite morning beverage, or late night snack and brewse these gentlemans images. And remember "Every image tells a story" and they would love to share there thoughts on their day.
And as an educator I will list in alpha order, sorry DNB I don' know your real name.
Alan, Daddynobucks, Eric, and Tim

Enjoy what I feel are their 2nd best shots of the year. I will be taking a day off from posting tomorrow to be with my sweetie but will share my favorite of the year on Dec 23rd.

I have attempted to link the thumbnail (click on thumbnail) with the day they shot it and you can see the comments posted on each shot. (I did not read comments on each persons shot when choosing their image but I will go back after all is said and done and read what others thought of the snap)

I am going to mix it up on this post and start with Eric and end with Alan.

Eric has 2 images at the number 2 spot of his 365 images of the year. This first one was taken of me. It is not the reason I picked the image, but the lighting technique used and the fun we had setting up and playing with light. It is always a learning experience when hangin with Eric. We had fun taking other shots as well hanging speedlights out of patio umbrella's, rolling out 50 foot extention cords right up the the waterline crazy I tell ya as we kept a close eye on the tide, and holding our own lighting gear. Much fun.

And this shot taken March 19th. Great light, Great background color, great subject, shadows, motion, depth, everything!!! Outstanding shot!!!

Tim's shot at the 2nd spot was his photo walk shot on July 18th. This was one of the coolest shots I have ever seen done and want to meet with and him have him walk me through the photo process from beginning to end, everything he did in the camera to the post work. Awesome shot.

Daddynobucks has a tie at the number 2 spot. Another strawberry shot tonight. A true awesome food shot is one that makes you want to eat it. All I can say is this shot makes me so hungry for summer. This shot ws taken April 21st a bit early for strawberry season but by the looks of this it came early this season.

This shot taken may 10th. Way cool color and lighting. DNB is rather modist and might say it was a lucky shot, but this as a great play with both color and light and a photog needs an eye for this or it would never be captured. I LOVE it.

Alan comes in at number 2 with a double shot. Once again he has a great snap of water drops. The reflection, color, fill frame all make this a coffee table cover shot!!! He took this shot feb 25th and was my first fav from this guy. He rocks the his Nikon machine!!!

The Cookie. This could be a bookcover for an Alfred Hitchcock novel. If this booth could talk, oh the stories it could tell. I could easily have picked this as the Image of the Year for Alan, but I think he will love my first choice. You will have to stay tuned for his number one shot.

And at number 3...

Alan's: Water drops and the science of refraction.


Daddynobucks: You don't see this every day in New York!!!! I believe this is a Dominican shot. What are really in these brown packages in a third world contry?




Tim's: another 2 shots night for Tim. It was hard to narrow it down to just 5 total shots from this photog. Feb smoke shot, at this point in following him this was his hands down best shot he had of the year....and then his spoons taken in April. Reflection of the spoons is awesome!!!!





Eric's: A tie from Eric as well. Very nice comp of the trees. Contrast is nice. And playing the poor man on the street, very creative.

Five days to go

My daughter is over the moon. She is wishing it was tomorrow.

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k10 f1.4~~2 sec~~ISO100~~50mm prime off camera 540 flash camera right.

4th best shot of the year

Alans 4th spot in the countdown:
A shot he took in Sept. Again, he fills the frame, uses great color and cool idea!!!! Contast is appealing to me. Very creative. Kept me thinking as do a lot of his shots.



Daddynobucks 4 best shot IMHO:

I love this shot, it shows movement, prespective, leads your eye into the distance wanting to know what is farther down the image. And again what a great vacation spot as my wife and I loved Dominican.



Tim comes in with a strong 4th shot of the year in fact a tie.

This shot was taken in Jan and and the light, color, crop in camera, contrast all make this a great composition and could tell a great story.


The other shot was a great division of color and inspired me to try this effect. His use of the Flag or Gobo was great in keeping the colors apart. shows freeze action and makes you take a good look to try and figure out what it is you are looking at. This was one of his Sept shots.




Eric spot in the top 4 was a shot he took in Oct. Lighting was great, effect was awesome and hands had to be sore after using these tools on this particular day and still find the energy to set up for this shot. The arrangement in different heights in the equipment was appealing in the image as well. The foreground is lit and it goes to black nicely.

Walk a mile in these shoes

My daughter loves here ballet slippers and took them off and left them right in the middle of the floor just like all kids. We need to work on this habit.
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k 10 f.11~~10 sec~~ISO100~~63mm

5 day special

With about 2 weeks til the end of the year....

I had this idea early on in the year. I wanted to pick my favorite shots of others work over the course of the 365 days. As the year progressed I starting getting 4 fairly faithful photogs follow me. Thus I chose these four. I figured I would return the love in my five day special. Day number 5 (today) will feature what I think is the photographers 5th best shot of the year according to me. (not that I know what I am doing but it was fun going through their shots of the year) It would be interesting to get feedback as to what they think of the chosen 5. I will tell you now it was hard to widdle it down to 5 shots and in some cases I had to create a tie as 5 would not work.

Here are the 4 guys in review

Alan I believe is English and has some great shots. Alan has a great since of composition. He is big on filling the frame. If you take a look at his year in 2009 he has a strong sense in getting close. I Love his color and also lack of color (b & w) He does a great job with water and motion. He as been very fun to follow and appreciate his feedback and critique in my shots over the year. Congrats in getting a shot a day for the 2009 year. I would love to see more of a story a day from him and know what he is thinking about his shots.
My number 5 best shot from him is his trumpet shot. I think he has mastered filling the frame and has a real eye for this.

DaddyNo bucks
He does a great job of taking picture of the NY skyline and building in NY city. He also is an avid fan of the Yankees and has some nice shots his his home team. However I did not pick any of those shots even tho there as some great ones. He does a great job of telling a story a day and I like to refer to this as "once upon an image."

I picked as his 5th best shot his 50th birthday shot was chosen because it holds dear to my heart as I will be there in a few days.The lighting is nice and shows motion as well as emotion. Nice capture, I wonder what it would look like in b&w, maybe more dramtic?

Tim
I can tell Tim is a Mac guy and also is a true graphic artist and his shots show that . He is very creative and has some of my favorite shot of 2009. Music,night and harbor shots are his strong points. In the 5th spot in my countdown: The bokeh cloths pins. Nice lighting in this shot and an early winner from Tim in January.

Eric, I have known Eric for darn near 20 years. He is about as creative a guy as I know. Real right brained. I emailed him about a year ago and told him I was going to attempt to take a picture a day and wanted to know if he was interested in trying as well. Boy here we are days away from getting to the end of the year. I think Eric took a snap a day,...did you miss one though while sick in Ethopia? Eric has a knack for understanding light. The power of light and the little use for need of light. He does a lot of research and often sends me DIY websites or information web sites to gain more knowledge in getting a better shot. It was once again hard to pick just 5 shots out of 350ish shots. His number 5 shot for me was: A tie

Great work with light in both shots. Both very thought out and set up took some time and careful placement of light not to mention cooperation of family memebers ;)

These might not be in the top 10 or even 50 of the photogs picks but there is my number 5 pick of the year. Stay tuned for number 4 tomorrow.

I would love to hear from you!!!!

Lighting

I drive by this store every morning to workout with my buddy Monte. I figured since this was the last day of workout in 2009 and it was decked out in Christmas lights I would stop and take a shot. Believe it or not at 5:15am I had people walking by wondering what I was doing. Now mind you this was not a safe, normal, neighborhood, but downtown inner city in dangerville. I kept my eye on the walkers as well as my subject. I didn't feel I could spend a lot of time getting my shots but did capture this one. Meey Christmas, and hope everyone has a safe holiday season. Cheers, Lance Happy 92nd birthday to my late grandma Cadena.
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22~~15 sec~~ISO200~~28mm

O Christmas Tree

Another shot of our tree, this time with my fish eye at 17mm. It is hard to believe that my daughter was performing one year ago in her first ballet recital. Santa Baby was so perfect for them. If you care to see the video again, here it is, enjoy.

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f4.5~~.6 sec~~ISO200~~17mm

Vacation for two

Our tree is covered with ornament memories. 95% of our ornaments were either given to us or we bought while on vacation. When we decorate the tree every year we pull out the ornaments and say, remember when? This one was purchased on a mexico vacation a few years back. Well it's been more than a few years as we ahve not been south since our daughter's birth.

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k10 f16~~5 sec~~ISO200~~75mm