In the "olden" days...

Ceiling of the Mosque of Mohamed Ali, Saladin's Citadel Cairo

When you came home from a vacation, you dropped the film canisters off at the local grocery store, or maybe a photo kiosk and got your 24 or 36 4x6" prints back anywhere from 1 hour to 1 week later. You brought them home, to the next extended family function, and maybe to the office to share.

Sunset, Hyatt Regency Na'ama Bay Sharm el Sheikh



People would thumb through with maybe some "oohs" or "aahs" thrown in. If you were an organized person, they get filed away or put into a little album labeled "Vacation 1996" or something. (if you were me, they got dumped in a box :)


The Sphinx and Pyramid, Giza



With the advent of digital cameras, the equivalent is coming home, downloading the photos to a computer, maybe emailing them to friends and family, posting on a blog or a photo share web site such as flickr, pbase, yahoo etc.

Sunrise, 30 December 2006, Mt. Sinai



In either case, not many people take the time to do much editing in the form of throwing out the boring, the out-of-focus, or incorrectly exposed photos. Only if one or a few photos were chosen for reprinting and "blown up" was any effort made. I was one that usually made the effort to cull the worst shots, the ones that look the same as the others before anyone thumbed through. So by the time people saw my photographs they saw only my better shots. Usually they saw less than 1/2 (sometimes much less) of what was taken. One result is that I have received a number of complimentary comments over the years along the lines of: "Your photos are really nice".


View of Cairo and Giza from Saladin's Citadel with the Pyramids in the Distance



First, I'd suggest that if you throw out the worst 50%, everyone's photos will look better. Second, this was the long way of saying I've finished going through our vacation photos. I ended up "messing with" 35 out of 289 that I took. People that got to see all 35 saw a mere 12.1% (less than 1/8) of what I shot...I sure hope they look good :) These were a few more of my favorites...

Mt Sinai Sunrise

Sunrise from Mt Sinai
Shelby on the Hike Down

While in Sharm el Sheikh, Shelby and I took an overnight tour that took us out in the desert of the Sinai to climb Mt Sinai and visit St Catherine's Monastery. Mt. Sinai (or Mt. Moses as it is called there) is the site where Moses received the 10 Commandments. St. Catherine Monastery (another UNESCO World Heritage site) is supposedly the oldest Christian monastery in the world and is said to sit on the site of the "Burning Bush" of old testament biblical fame.

We climbed Mt Sinai by flashlight. It was cold, I had the hiccups and felt terrible. The "hike" was about 7 kilometers (about 4.3 miles) one way with 750 "steps" at the top. The steps were covered in ice and snow, which was actually more of an issue on the way back down. I wore two t-shirts, a long sleeved shirt and a baggy sweater (which I loaned to Shelby most of the time). Shelby was better prepared for the cold, but I think she felt colder than I did. It was cold enough that when the nice scarf she had bought to wear inside St. Catherine Monastery got wet, I told her to wave it in the now risen sun...it froze into a solid sheet.

I'm not sure I would have gone if I realized ahead of time, how far it was, how cold it was, and how bad I would be feeling. Above are a couple of photos from our trek. Unfortunately, I didn't feel well enough on the way up to get good photos of the streams of people and their flashlights winding through the desert and up the mountain.

One of Those Memories...

We saw the pyramids in Egypt on our much needed holiday vacation. The tour guide did his best to keep me from getting the photos I wanted. Rushing me, not stopping the van at a critical moment, (we were private customers, it wasn't like I was holding up the group). I still managed to get a couple good shots, including this one of the smallest of the three Giza pyramids, Menkaure's Pyramid. A storm was brewing over Giza and Cairo in the distance while the sun going down in late afternoon behind us. My memory of the pyramids will always be flavored by the "helpful" guide. It makes me smile now, but I was grumpy at the time!

Bonus - Messing with Perspective

This one was tilted because I was shooting up and from the left. I corrected the tilt in Photoshop, but I'm not really sure it works. It somehow looks wrong to me.

Goat-Head Man

I wonder if the Rolling Stones saw this one?

Twins? or at Least Sisters

Stone People from the Austrian Times

One of the neat things about Sarajevo and other cities where "east meets west" is that the culture in the form of architecture can make for some neat mixes. In this region, after the Ottoman-Turk Empire faded, the Austro-Hungarian Empire dominated until just after the turn of the previous century (remember World War I started here:). It shows in the buildings, the faces, creatures and just plain fancy designs that peer down on you as you walk the city streets. One Saturday a couple months ago, I started a project to take photos of the various things I see on buildings. Eventually, I plan to do a whole portfolio, in the meantime, here are three (well, five since two of the photos have two faces each) of the people that watch over us here in Sarajevo.

more of the graveyard

A couple more photos of the headstones in Veliki Park, Sarajevo taken in the fog at night.

The first one had three different light sources, all at different "temperatures" or colors. This made it fun to play with in Photoshop changing the hue, the saturation, adding a curves layer, using gradient masks etc. Most people would consider the result shown here as significantly different from the original out of the camera.

The second photo, with the silhouettes, was more straight forward; a temperature change, minor curves and some sharpening.

Novo Stari Most - Mostar, Herzegovina

We went to Mostar for a day trip Wednesday. Mostar is famous for the bridge...the "Stari Most" Old Bridge. But the bridge was destroyed during the war, now it is the "New Old Bridge" and the only UNESCO "World Heritage Site" in all of BiH.

The "old town", the Muslim portion of which is on the left, isn't so old anymore either.

Source of the River Buna - Blagaj, Herzegovinia

Not too far from Mostar...just like the source of the Bosna is just outside of Sarajevo. I think this one is a lot more water though. If I remember correctly, I read that 43,000 liters per second were coming out of the cave at the bottom of that cliff.

Blast From the Recent Past - Volcan Pacaya

Fired up my printers and scanners today, the first time since the big move. The Epson C80 printer isn't real happy, I must have cleaned the nozzles a dozen times, but it should be good enough to print letters, homework and such. The Canon i960 photo printer, which we use primarily for photos, seemed to work fine on the first try. Then I fired up the scanner, the Konica-Minolta DiMage Elite-5400. It made horrible grinding noises and wouldn't load the slide or the negative carrier. This has been a problem before, but it is now way out of warranty and Konica-Minolta is out of the camera and scanner business. I took it apart and could see nothing obvious wrong. Then I did a heap of research on the internet to see if I could find any reference to someone fixing this problem themselves. It was no trouble finding reference to the problem, but besides those who sent it back under warranty, solutions were so rare as to be non-existent. As I was giving up hope, I found an old forum posting and discussion, and tagged on at the end, relatively recently (Sept 06) the original poster with the problem came back to say that pressing control,shift and "i" as the scanning software loaded solves the problem. I was skeptical, since the grinding gears etc all seem to be clearly hardware problems...but try it I did...and shazaam! it cleared up the problem. Above is one of the slides I had loaded in the scanner. It is also my first scan using Photoshop CS2 vice the merely the scanner software and a little bit of Elements 2.0

Catching Up - Source of the River Bosna

As I get more comfortable with Photoshop and remember what I learned in August, I'm starting to go back over the photo's I've taken in the past 8 months or so. Above are a couple I played with today of the source of the river Bosna, just outside of Sarajevo. It is pretty neat to see a river basically coming right out of the side of a big hill. The moss was all very green, yet the leaves were for the most part off of the trees and finished with their color. Again, feel free to click on the photos to see a larger version.

Sarajevo Castle

Taken a few weeks back. As we came into the city, the sun was shining on the castle and rock faces with the ominous clouds in the background. Photoshop work centered on emphasizing that. This definitely looks best if you click on the photo to view it large.

Ghosts in the Graveyard

The city has been closed in by fog for the past few days. Flights have been canceled for 3 days running. But the fog is pretty cool, especially at night under the lights that the camera sees much different than the human eye. This was taken on the nightly dog walk, about 1/2 hour ago. Minimal manipulation in photoshop...cropping, selective sharpening and some curves/contrast adjustment. The colors are what the camera sees.

For the geeks among us, it was a 13 second exposure, ISO 200, 70mm (70-200 2.8L IS lens), an exposure compensation of -2/3 stop (inadvertent), shot and processed as raw.

Another HDR -Roman Ruins, Salona Croatia

This is a different type of HDR. A lot of photographers don't like the "cartoonish nature" of this type of HDR translation. Other people like the "painting" look it can give a photography. For the right subject, I think it can be appropriate (not saying this is the right subject though :) This is a combination of 5 exposures again.

Messing around with HDR

Messing around with Photoshop CS2's HDR function. I took a lot of photographs with HDR in mind since the workshop in August. This one is a composite of 5 exposures along with some layer masks, curves adjustments etc.

It Snowed !

they aren't masterpieces...
I snapped them on my morning walk to work.
But it was a crisp cold morning with a blue sky and...
white stuff on the ground and all around!

Santa Fe National Cemetery

This shot is with a "lensbaby", the blur is point of the lens. Photoshop work revolved around contrast on the gravestone and color/saturation for the tree and the crab apples.

Sculpture Garden - Santa Fe, New Mexico

This is a 30 second night shot using a tripod. Most of the sculptures moved in the wind. Photoshop work was primarily color balance and exposure tweaking.

Abandon Jail - Outside of Santa Fe

This is another one from the jail. Saw this door with the peeling paint, rust etc and the light hitting it from the side. Photoshop work was primarily moving the color more toward red (blood?), more contrast on the hand print, and some cropping to make the photo a little more abstract.

Abandon Jail - Outside of Santa Fe

This is where they filmed the latest iteration of "The Longest Yard".
I looked up and saw this "chimney" in the real part of the jail, not the set.
Photoshop work was a combination of multiple raw files, shot using a tripod at different exposures to get the windows and the walls to show up. Not true "HDR" but a useful technique when the range from light to dark is so extensive.

Tent Rocks - New Mexico

A very interesting landscape. Photoshop work was pretty much limited to making some portions slightly lighter, others darker, some sharpening and contrast/curves working from a "raw" file.

Photos from a workshop

I spent a week at the beginning of August at a photography workshop
in Santa Fe..."Real World Digital Photography". It was a lot of
fun, I learned heaps about Photoshop and photography. Here are
a number of the photos I took and worked on in Photoshop during
the week. Santa Fe Workshops can be found at:
santafeworkshops.com
The instructor, Sean Duggan has two web sites, his blog:
www.f1point4.com/f1point4/
and his main web page:
seanduggan.com
If you ever have the time and the money, like photography,
I highly recommend both the Sante Fe Workshops, and Sean's
classes (he also does workshops and classes at other locations.)

The Croatian Coast

The weather and and views were incredible. As a friend would say
"I could live here".

Mud Volcanos

Here's some mud volcanos...outside of Baku, Azerbaijan. They aren't hot, you can walk right up to them.

I'm back

still waiting on my computer etc. I have heaps of photos though

And a 3rd, El Paraiso Hot Springs Waterfall, Water is about 110 degrees F

Here's another one, from an airshow

During one of the processions, Notice the dad on a cell phone, the little boy wondering what is going on

A photo - to prove I'm still here

It has been a long long time, so here is something
from my new camera. A photo from Good Friday in
Antigua, Guatemala.

Nymphenburg Gardens - Munich Germany Photo Friday - "Soft"

finally another photo

I've been too busy to post, too busy to do much
with the scanner except run some tests trying to
figure out why the colors are all wacked out when
I scan negatives vice slides. But above is my
first PhotoFriday in a while....soft, a toddler
is soft, even when its concrete :)

The scanner is back!

My scanner came back this afternoon. Hopefully by tomorrow
I'll have my desk cleaned up enough to get it all hooked
back up...seems like taxes and bill stuff had encroached
on its space. In the meantime, the oven died (cooking/eating
is my one of my other two hobbies). It passed away shortly
after Pope John Paul II, taking a tray of 16 peanut butter
cookies with it...as it got hotter and hotter and hotter.
It seems the thermostat is dead and the heating element does
not want to turn off.

Dune and Sea Oats at Sunset - Pensacola Beach (Fort Pickens)

Its Friday Again

and I swore to myself I'd have a photo for
every PhotoFriday challenge. This week's
challenge is "glow". My scanner is not
back from being repaired yet (although I
did get mail saying it was being repaired
under warranty). So I, and any readers
out there by extension, are stuck with
what I can come up with from my library
of photos I've already scanned. I already
used the moonlit graveyard for "ghostly",
which may have been my first choice. So
instead, I'm putting up a sunset, but unlike
most sunset photos, I took this one facing
away from the sun, the "glow" of the sunset
evident in the dune and seaoats.

Faces - Masks of Venice

Faces - PhotoFriday

I'm up way too late, and the PhotoFriday theme is
already listed...faces. This took me a whole second
to know what photo I would use (because my scanner
is dead, another photo I'd consider isn't possible
today...er tonight)

IPod Rant

The straw finally came and broke me...I read yet another
article that held up the Apple IPod as the epitome of an
easy to use high tech device. I couldn't disagree more.

I'm computer literate, and am comfortable with all kinds
of technology, I have a Packet8 (8x8) IP phone (now that
is THE BEST/EASIEST plug and play high tech item I have
ever seen, a blind monkey could set it up in 10 seconds,
unlike competitors such as VONAGE, for which you have to
be a system admin, a programmer and a network analyst that
speaks a language other than english, all wrapped into one
person so you can deal with their tech support...but I digress),
a wireless network with 3 wireless laptops, a desktop, a
printer and a photo printer.

We bought my daughter an IPod mini for Christmas.
It was worse than putting a bike together.
Getting the Itunes software to install correctly was a pain in
the butt, it constantly was upgrading, like every 10 minutes.
The Itunes software and interface (GUI) is so clunky, I'd be
embarrassed if it was one of my programs.
Getting the songs to go from a CD or harddrive to the IPOD was
problematic (and remains so to this day, but at least its my
daughter's problem now :)
The Itunes format is also a pain, it would be much simpler if
the IPod just sucked in mp3 files from whatever source.
If mp3 was used as standard format, the IPod could be plugged
into the computer like a camera's card is now, and songs could
be simply dragged and dropped from your computer or CD to the
IPod.

I think Sony's new music players (using mp3) will eventually
take Apple to the same place with its proprietary IPod that
Apple went with what once was its proprietary computers...
essentially nowhere, a bit player with less than 10% market
share. I remember when everyone was hot for Apple...like
20 yrs ago, Apple dominated schools and desktop publishing,
Steven Jobs hasn't learned a thing in 20yrs.

Cemetery - Grindelwald Switzerland; You have to read my blog entry as to why this represents "obsession"

Obsession

PhotoFriday's theme this week....hummmm
obsession
Pronunciation: äb-sesh'-&n
Function: noun
1 : a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable
idea or feeling; broadly : compelling motivation

I'll go with the "compelling motivation" for my
photo this week.

First, a few things I've noticed about my photography...

I like photographing cemeteries, its one of my first
choices when I go somewhere new. I've already posted
a number of cemeteries photos here, and in fact the
first photo I posted was a cemetery photo.

I like really blue sky, I wear polarized sunglasses
and more likely than not, usually have a polarizing
lens on my camera.

I shoot the vast majority of my photos as verticals
(or portrait) orientation. I didn't realize how
biased I was toward vertical orientation until I
started contributing to avisualplanet.com
a web supplier of high-quality presentation graphics
in a standard 1024x768 horizontal (landscape) format.

And the last reason I chose this photo as opposed to
umpteen others I have that all illustrate the three
points above...the Swiss are obsessed with keeping
their cemeteries beautiful.

Cross at the End of Las Americas - Guatemala City

The Terry Fox Run

Today was the Terry Fox Run here in Guatemala
city. The route was Las Americas, with the
starting point right at the end by our house,
at the "pope". This is one of the many statues
and "plazas" which adorn the park-like middle
of the boulevard. Next to the pope is the large
cross I photographed a while back and is posted
above.

I did the 5 km portion as a walk, and with
my camera. It was amazing, the crowd was quite
large, well into the thousands. They normally
close one direction of Las Americas on Sunday,
but for this event, the entire boulevard was
closed, and for a much longer period of time.
The event was non-competitive, so there was quite
a range, young, old, on crutches, on skateboards,
on scooters and bikes. Even a large number of
dogs participated, along with local mascots from
various businesses...Pollo Campero for instance.
I have some pictures which will get posted after
two things happen...I get the slides developed
and I get my scanner fixed...it doesn't seem to
want to scan slides right now, so it is going in
for repair under warranty (that's my "bummer"
news of the week).

Cemetery - Under a Full Moon

My Entry for PhotoFriday's Weekly Challenge

This week's theme is "ghostly"...
I like cemeteries, they are one of my favorite
subjects for photography. There is a story
behind the picture above. I was living in
Germany (they have beautiful cemeteries) and
I frequently walked late at night. While I was
walking past a local cemetery, I noticed the
candles glowing, the snow stamped down from
all the visitors, and it was approaching midnight
with a full moon. I rushed home, got my camera,
tripod and my oldest son (about 10 at the time).
It was cold, perhaps about 20 degrees F, and I
would warm one battery up in my pants, while I
was using another for the shot. I did a number of
long exposures, measured in minutes. I don't
recall this particular exposure

When I got the slides back, I wished I had thought
to have myself or my son, or both of us, walk
through the frame...ghosts. I plan on doing that
type of shot someday when I find the perfect setting.

Teamwork - Ants pulling a dead bug straight up a wall

My Inspiration - Industrious Members of the Household

We actually got a lot done around the house
today. The laundry is all done, I got some bills
organized, and lots of pictures printed for Elesa's
scrapbooking days coming up. I think though
the inspiration came on Saturday. Shelby and
I worked a little learning her camera, depth of
field and shutter speed exercises using dominoes.

After putting things away, Shelby spotted a pile of
ants around a dead bug. The ants were dragging
the bug along. It soon became obvious, they had
a plan, and that plan involved carting the bug
carcass straight up a vertical wall, and then over
to a window, where the plan was to squeeze through
the crack, and then on home with the booty. I
grabbed my camera and took a few shots as the ants
scaled the wall. Then we politely opened the window
to make it easier for them to get out.

Ten minutes later, there was not an ant to be seen...

Gerber Daisies - Cut flowers are inexpensive and beautiful in Guatemala - no excuse for not buying some for Elesa on a regular basis - my lack of spanish can make the transaction a challenge though.

Testing a bigger picture for the blog...

Ripe Grain, Fields - Germany