Thoughts While Shaving - again

I got onto Photo.net and ran across an interesting series. Harold Davis is doing a series on creativity and inspiration. Gosh knows I am in need of a boot in the 'rear curtain' about now. It may be worth a look for you as well.

I also jumpped into a thread about camera gear. Someone has $1500 to invest in new Nikon gear and wanted advice between a high end consumer body and a lens (D90) or a low end pro body (D300). Regardless what you shoot you may want to look at the thread to see how people think about gear and why. Don't know about you, but $1500 is good money for almost anything.

I've gotten a suggestion on possible field trips in 2010: somebody in Lewiston has Clydsdales (don't know about a supply of Bud) and a nice farm on which to raise them. I can see a day imaging these beautiful animals. Maybe if the timing is right we can head over to Tabor's for ice cream and hit a bucket of golf balls off the driving range while other club members get some action shots.....

Then there is a Portland - Westbrook day trip. I'm to be incarcerated at a dog show with the woogums' next spring and it occurs to me that there could be some actin shots to be had at the show, and maybe an opportunity for some of you to help me escape to do some shooting in Portland. This isn't a plea, but the show isn't that close yet....

Please let me know if you have any interest in either trip...

Thoughts While Shaving

I never seem to be in the right place at the right time. I'll have some gear with me, and be on a tight schedule and not be able to take advantage of opportunities. Other times I've left gear at home and run across good opportunities with time for capture. Were I an optimist (or have better sense) I'd have my stuff at hand all the time.

Take a couple weekends ago. Me and the missus whuz in Montreal. I carried a camera body and two lenses around all day taking a few grab shots along the way. I got tired of lugging an SLR and left the thing in our room while we went to eat. Along the way I came upon a pretty person of the opposite gender sitting on the steps of a church. I had a terrific profile to look at from a distance and nothing with which to record it......

Speaking of gear, the Montreal trip reminded me of how much stuff I have that I seldom use. I have a few gadgets still in their original packaging....

Chris Cox brought up some shooting opportunities earlier this summer at charitable events. Hopefully he will keep us in mind whne he runs across future opportunities.

I hope all is well.

BlogDon

Oops!

I'm off to a less than flying start. I mentioned two of our members doing well, but got the the first name wrong on one of them. We DO have a Marty Hipsky, we don NOT have an Alan......age comes so quickly!

NECCC and BSF & Stuff

Ok, I'm going to give this blog thing another try. I've got to be wary of sliding into 21st century technology lest I just become another tweet--er.

I wanted to share a couple observations from the New England Camera Club Council Conference. First, this year they had a few presenters who are from New England and are members of camera clubs in this region. Though I've not met any of them I do know of them. The thing I appreciate most is the recognition of the excellent photographic talent we have in this region, and how well they share their expertise. I was not disappointed with their effort.

Second, the tenor of the programs was oriented less towards software and more towards image making, travel, night photography, macro photography, flash photograhy, and other techniques. There was some Photoshop stuff and suff on high dynamic range, but generally the thrust of the programs was for inspiration and getting better at composition and expression.

I hope we can get a bigger group to go down in 2010. It was a good social opportunity (other than the fixation on past reproductive experiences), and the food is very good.

One of the Nikon presentors talked about something that struck a chord. Personally, I dislike spending time on a PC flubbing around with my image files in one of the software packages I don't understand how to use. I'd like to blame someone else for my feeble skills, but the truth is it's my lack of interest in becoming competent with the many and varied manipulations a person can do to an otherwise poorly executed exposure (I have LOTS of those, maybe we should have an exhibit "Bad Idea, PoorlyExecuted") is behind my dislike. The Nikon guy addressed this issue by stating he captures images in both raw and jpg format, and seldom uses the raw files. His shooting philosophy is to get the image "right" in camera so all he needs to do is either print or post the result. He did state he does crop and sharpen for prints, but little else. What a concept! Capture what you want in camera, and show everybody what you did!!

I know some of you get enjoyment out of working with software, and I encourage you to continue. For the rest of us........maybe we should go back to shooting the best shot we can do and not worry about what follows....

On to the Bangor Fair. thank you for all your help during collection, judging and hanging. We had a very good hanging crew. I guess a lot of you enjoy a good hangin' after a hard days work! We had several club members do well in the competiotion, including Alice Frati and Marty Hipsky with Best in Show awards.

I am curious, hopw many of you would like a club trip to the Philidelphia area........just an off the wall idea....

BlogDon

UpComing

The Bangor State Fair is coming right up. We can use some help on Wednesday July 29 to hang images. Please contact Mary or just show up at 5:30 or so.

Submittals must be ready by this Monday evening. Collection begins around 5:30.

I've included a shot from June's slide film effort. I've gotten some comments about how much time I played with this subject. What do you think?

Transition at Hand

We are in the process of a transition. Before you get carried away, there is nothing personal going on here. All business. Mary was or chief blogger. Now she is the chief aperture of the club, the head ISO as it were. I, agreeable me, am in the process of taking on this blog stuff. Just call me BlogDon.

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