Yesteryear

Some oldies, Where and what I was doing 1, 5 & 11 years ago yesterday respectively.

From 1 Year Ago New Haven, Connecticut

New Haven, Connecticut

New Haven, Connecticut

From 5 Years Ago Yellow Springs, Ohio

Yellow Springs, Ohio

From 11 Years Ago Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

I've Been Busy

Very busy...including a trip back to Sarajevo...

Sarajevo Skyline At Dusk



Veliki Park Tombstone - Sarajevo

Buckeyes!

I'm from Ohio..."The Buckeye State" and when I was little it was a great joy to find a buckeye tree and the pretty smooth shiny brown buckeyes beneath it. Here in Sarajevo, especially Veliki Park, the buckeye trees (horse chestnuts as they are known in Europe) are common and HUGE. They hurt when the spiked balls land on your head in the fall. The trees are flowering furiously right now, no doubt doing their part to contribute to the pollen and general "hay fever" and itchy eyes around town.

Buckeye Blooms - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Tree Bark

For some reason, tree bark has captured my attention for the past year or so. I guess because it is easy texture. I noticed this tree about a week or so ago, as they started digging up the paths in Veliki Park. Today I couldn't stand it any longer, and after I got home from work, I grabbed my camera and went right back out there and took a couple photos. One of the great things about digital cameras, instant results.

Tree Bark - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Discarded Paradise

Haven't been too good about posting lately...running into some troubles with my backup disk.

This is a cellphone shot I took on the way to work this morning. In addition to the new fountain, which still isn't complete, they started to repave the pathways in Veliki Park. They are progressing at a pretty good clip, more than half-way done in a little over a week. I've always known that some of the old Turkish "turban" tombstones were paved over during a previous pathway paving as I could see bits poking through the blacktop. I didn't realize it was so many though. During the latest paving effort, they have uncovered some (but not all) of the previously paved over markers to paradise. This is just one of the piles of uncovered tombstones from the Ottoman era (roughly 1450-1870's)

The Old and New - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Spring is Finally Here???

Today's weather is so nice and sunny and warm that I am going out on a limb and proclaiming the end of winter here in Sarajevo. I think by next week, some of my photos can be of budding trees etc. In the meantime, these were all taken less than a week ago...


Snow Encrusted Tree Limbs - Sarajevo




Snow Covered Tree and Blue Sky - Veliki Park, Sarajevo




Snow - Koševo Šehidsko Mezarje, Sarajevo




Tombstones in Snow - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

More Red Bugs...

Last week I went back and took more photos of the red bugs. The first shot I posted from a few weeks before was actually a pretty severe crop as the rest of the photo wasn't in great focus and the glare off the bugs was fairly distracting. The other shots suffered the same shortcomings....so now you know.

It seems the bugs are called "red bugs". aka Cotton Stainer, Firebug, and Pyrrhocorid Bug. This time I used a tripod, used a polarizer to take some of the glare off of their backs, increased the f-stop to get better depth of field and also tried the to line up the shots so that the field of view was in the same as the plane of focus. Even still, in a couple of shots the bugs are moving too fast and are a bit blurry.

Red Bugs - Veliki Park, Sarajevo




Red Bugs - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Tree Fungi Cropped

Then, after looking at it a bit, I think I like a crop such as this a bit better. To my eye, it seems to bring out the intricate patterns in the fungi a bit better...

Tree Fungi - Cropped Version

Tree Fungi in Black & While and Color

I don't know which version I like better...the straight-on center composition is usually not my style...but in this case I at first I thought I sort of liked it....

Tree Fungi - Veliki Park, Sarajevo





Tree Fungi - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Bugs Get Ready for Spring

the next warm day that I have a chance, I will re-shoot this photo and post it. At that point I will tell you why :)

Red Bugs - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

On the Walk To Work

this is what the gravestones looked like in Veliki Park this morning. I took the same basic photo with my cell phone (it sucked). I can't decide how I want the color temperature or even if maybe I should do this in black and white...

In the meantime, at the rate the snow is coming down, I suspect that tomorrow morning some of these gravestones will be completely covered.

Gravestones and Snow - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

More Cell Phone Snaps

From walking home and walking the dogs in the snow last night...


Tree Limbs at Dusk





Snow & The Color of Light - Veliki Park, Sarajevo




Snowy Path and Empty Benches - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

The Sun Was Out Today

Sun Through Glass - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

More Snow

It is dumping down snow tonight. Walking the dogs, it really didn't feel that cold. I took some more cell phone camera shots. I find it hard to hold steady to get a sharp photo.

Snow at Night - Veliki Park, SarajevoNovember 2008

At The Other End Of Madness

My "good" camera is a Canon EOS-5D. a model that came out 3 years ago. After 3 years, it is finally being replaced with the 5DII which should be available any day now. 3 years is a VERY long lifetime in the universe of DSLR cameras. Quite frankly, I don't need a 5DII (probably didn't need a 5D:) The limitations and any general suckiness of my photography can't be blamed on my camera as it is rarely, if ever, the weak link.

In the meantime, I have this new cell phone for work that has a camera. I've taken to messing with it while I walk the dogs at night. Below are a few of my creations. On one hand, they probably won't be mistaken for high art from a high end camera, but on the other, I find the camera and the results interesting...

Shadow - Self PortraitNovember 2008



Pine Tree with Snow - Veliki Park, SarajevoNovember 2008



Tree Branches - Veliki Park, SarajevoNovember 2008



Tombstones at Night - Veliki Park, SarajevoNovember 2008

A Theme - Shades of Two Colors

Like this past entry and this one. The photo below is basically comprised of just two colors, in this case gray and green and shades thereof. Like a huge chunk of the photos on this blog, it was taken in Veliki Park next to our apartment...maybe at some point I'll tag the Veliki Park photos. The three or four acres (my wild guess only) that comprise the park sure give me a lot of photo opportunities.

Up is Green - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

March Madness

...the first day of spring, started off with winter having the upper hand, but my money is on spring over the long haul :)

Forsythia with Snow - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

A Light Dusting of Snow

Mistletoe - Veliki Park, Sarajevo

Following the Path

This was shot the night before this one. I tried to get the exposures right for an HDR merge but I was never really happy with the results. I do like the higher contrast and the dark edges of this one exposure by itself though.

Fork in the Road at Midnight - Veliki Park, Sarajevo BiH

Black and ...

white...

I thought of this past entry the other day when I was walking through the park. It was one of those days with the beautiful pure blue sky we had recently. I started thinking how I could take various photos in the park during the year that were essentially only two colors. I was too lazy to run back and get my camera at the time for "Black and ...Blue". Hopefully I'll get another opportunity

However, as chance would have it, the temperature dropped 40 degrees or so and it snowed a ton of very sticky white stuff. So this morning with all that in mind I saw this interesting shaped tree and took a photo...a natural black and white.

Veliki Park - Sarajevo