Saturday, June 20, 2009

The Nina, the Pinta and no Santa Maria

                                                     The Pinta
On Friday we went up to Oswego Port to see the Nina and the Pinta. They are exact replicas of the ships hand made in Brazil by Portugese shipwrights. I was surprised to see how small they were and how open the rear forecastles were to the weather. The captain had a private room with 4 foot of headroom, but that is the only private space on the ship. The men slept anywhere they could. The animals and supplies rode below deck in the cargo hold.
Of course we took pictures. Here's our gallery of photos.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

Wide Angle Astro-photography

I had to wait a whole week for a clear sky with no moon. It was worth it, I'm pretty happy with the results. I set the camera up in the middle of the yard, next time I get all the way out back, more open sky. This is pretty simple to shoot. It takes a little trial and error, but as long as you can get the shutter to stay open long enough you can shoot the stars. You'll need a camera and a tripod, a dark field or yard and of course spectacular skies.
You might think that I posted the same image twice, but the second one I shut the camera off and skipped the high pass that the D50 does to cancel out the hot pixels. Can't tell the difference, don't worry most people won't. Never let them tell you "you can't do it". These are 30 second exposures at f/4.5 at 1600 ISO.
Update:
You can pick out the constellations Corona and Bootes. If your really sharp you'll spot Virgo and Serpens Caput as well.

There are still some places in the world where it is really dark at night. Check out this great video from William Castleman. This is worth seeing at full screen.

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo.

Friday, June 12, 2009

Old School Portraits


I've got a stockpile of real film. Time to clear it out. Here's the scoop: Get your portraits taken on real film, and we're offering 5x7's and 8x10 prints. The sitting fee is $20 and the prints will be, $12 for a 5x7 and $18 for a 8x10. If you're interested, give us a call 315-663-1094. I'm cleaning out the closet.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Dance School Portraits

I had a lot of fun at a local dance school tonight. We did quite a few portraits. Here's teaser shot from tonight.
There are plenty more frames and dancers to process. I'm not sure that this one's even quite finished, but I like it so far.

Monday, June 1, 2009

Wow! Contest!

Scott Bourne is giving away stuff all the time!
Tomorrow I'll be giving away $500 gift certificate to ScanCafe.com. Here's more info - http://bit.ly/f6mnU
Easy enough to enter. 


from my Twitter feed: http://www.twitter.com/oracleondelhi