Doug's black and white photography

Evony

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 21:14:00 +0000

This has nothing to do with photography but you have to try this game. I am so addicted to it now. Here is the site. It has my name as a referral http://kirkgrove.evony.com/

Smoke photography

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:31:00 +0000

Talking about the previous post on smoke photography.I will post a link at the end of this post. I never heard of smoke photography until I came across this site when looking for ideas and this seems like a pretty cool idea. There is a lot of editing involved. Generally, I'm not a big fan of editing,however, lately I've been seeing some of the very creative and cool stuff that can be done with editing(If done right of course). Here is the link to smoke photography, you have to check this out it is really cool stuff. Here are examples. http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/10/05/celebration-of-smoke-photography-and-smoke-art/

Here are techniques http://digital-photography-school.com/smoking-allowed-investigating-smoke-art-photography and here is another one http://photocritic.org/artsmoke-photographing-smoke/.

Home all week

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:28:00 +0000

Well, since I am laid off from work this week I get to spend some quality time home alone with my son. Hopefully I get some creative ideas for photos. Maybe we'll go out somewhere. Or I have been contemplating some smoke photography. Who knows maybe I'll come up with something.

Lightning

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:18:00 +0000

Maybe I will get lucky and have a lot of lightning and get some good shots.

Rainy Day

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:16:00 +0000

I had high hopes about going out on a hike today. I was looking forward to taking some photos. But the darn rain has ruined my plans for today. Oh well there is always next week.

Sorry

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 21:37:00 +0000

I apologize for the long delay in posting. It has been a real busy summer thus far and I assure you that I will have a new post either tonight or by the end of the weekend. I thank everyone who has visited my blog and I hope you enjoy the photos.

Starved Rock

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 19:23:00 +0000

I'm going to be camping at Starved Rock state park next week for a couple of days. I'm hoping to get some awesome shots.Wish me luck.

Articles

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sat, 30 May 2009 13:08:00 +0000

Here are some great articles that were sent to me on taking photos of space. I hope everyone enjoys them.If you come across any spam or pop ups please let me know and I will take the link out. http://www.photography-colleges.org/100-free-online-tools-and-resources-to-take-pictures-of-space/

Fire got me into trouble

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Wed, 27 May 2009 22:40:00 +0000

The infamous backyard fire.

The trees are on fire!

Well I was sitting in my grandmas back yard playing with matches and before you know it the little brush that I was playing with turned into a big fire. By the time the fire department got there the whole back yard was up in flames and I was scared to death.

So if any kids are reading this remember playing with fire is bad.

Missing shots

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Wed, 27 May 2009 22:24:00 +0000

I missed some great shots this past weekend but they were uncontrollable circumstances.

Holiday weekend

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Wed, 27 May 2009 22:22:00 +0000

I hope everyone had a great Memorial day weekend.

SLR vs. Point and shoot

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Fri, 15 May 2009 13:36:00 +0000

Well I've finally got my first SLR camera and I have a great point and shoot as well. Lets start with the point and shoot.

The point and shoot I have is the Fujifilm s1000fd which has some great features. It has manual controls but not really full manual controls like an SLR. The picture quality with this camera is excellent. It has a 12 times zoom and the macro feature is pretty good for not being a true macro.

Problems with this camera are very long shutter lag, no image stabilization,can't shoot in raw and not many accessories for the camera,like filters which would be a big plus for the camera.

Now moving onto the SLR. I bought the Sony A200, the camera so far is great the features are better then the Canon XS which I did a comparison between the two. There is virtually no shutter lag on this camera at all. It has a 9 point auto focus,it has face detection eye focus. The camera takes excellent photos in raw and has great manual features as all SLR cameras should.

The only downsides that I have found with the SLR is that it is much larger than my point and shoot which I don't mind that. And dust dust dust is a problem. I have had it for about 2 weeks and I have already had some dust on the sensor which was easily blown off but still a pain.

I highly recommend buying an SLR over a point and shoot.

This is by no means a complete list of pros and cons for both cameras.

Sorry

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Thu, 07 May 2009 01:55:00 +0000

I apologize for no new posts lately.I've been very busy . I got my new DSLR a few days ago and I'm playing around. Hopefully this weekend I will have some new photos to post.Just bare with me.And thank you for visiting my blog.

SLR

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sun, 03 May 2009 12:17:00 +0000

Well the SLR is on it's way. I can't wait for this thing to get here. I didn't go with the big boy but instead I got the cheaper model.

I was going to buy the Canon XS but after doing countless hours of research I chose to get the Sony A200. The features are better and I like the way the camera looks and Sony is having a credit deal right now. The only thing it lacks is the live view but who cares about that.The image stabilization is built into the camera which I hope I like that.

All and all I can't wait to get this.

COCO Keys wasn't as fun as you'd think

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Fri, 01 May 2009 16:32:00 +0000

Unbelievable, my wife and 3 year old and I go to COCO Keys water park this past weekend. We get there,now mind you this is an indoor water park,it's raining outside like cats and dogs and a little lightning,well they tell us it will be a hour or an hour and a half before we can get in the water because of lightning. What the heck I thought the purpose of going to an indoor water park was to have fun in crappy weather.

So finally, we got to get in the water and I wanted to send my son down one of the four water slides they had. Come to find out they are only aloud to open one slide at a time because of safety reasons. Now I am so damn furious at this point but we continue to play in the water and go in the lazy river. Well, 20 minutes later everyone has to get out of the pools again because of lightning. RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR So we left.

We paid 25 dollars a person to get in this place and what a terrible time. My wife is supposed to call and try to get our money back. We'll see!!!!!

Saving

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 13:05:00 +0000

I've been saving and selling some unused items so I can get my new SLR. I am so exited,I can't wait to get this thing. Not to much longer to go now.

This WII is just taking up space

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 20:56:00 +0000

And the wife is right again

Here ( Wii ) Go

I would have to say the most useless thing in my house would have to be the WII that I insisted my wife and I buy. We rarely play it.

What a waste of money. It looks fun on TV but most of the games are just boring. And yet again the wife is right.HA HA

One day I'll roll in a new Camaro

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 02:10:00 +0000

The dream car.

Camaro Concept

Most would say Lamborghini,Bentley, maybe even Porsche.

I live right by Ogden Avenue In Illinois and you can find every car dealer imaginable down this little stretch of road.

The other day I was driving past the good old Chevy dealer and I see this beautiful black shiny new Camaro.This car had my mouth down to the floor and wishing and trying at the same time to talk my wife into letting me buy it. Well needless to say I am still driving the same old vehicle I have been for the past two years.

If pot is legalized, I expect increases in tax revenue

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 23:18:00 +0000

Although, it will never happen but if it were to the government would make so much revenue in taxes we might pull ourselves out of this economic turmoil. MAYBE.

Lyman woods in Downers Grove Illinois is lovely this time of year

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 01:48:00 +0000

My favorite outdoor spot.

This is a little forest preserve that I like to go to. It's nice and quiet and there aren't many people. There is a good abundance of wildlife as well, the wildlife includes deer,coyotes,owls,hawks,ducks,geese, and many different species of birds.

What to use to clean lenses and LCD screens.

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 23:47:00 +0000

I have found in my experience the best thing to clean lenses, is the lens pen. I highly recommend this product. You can use it on point and shoot cameras as well. I use the lens pen on my camera as well as my telescope eyepieces and I am just amazed at how clean it gets them especially after a good night of dew. Here is a website to check out the lens pen. http://www.lenspen.com/

Now to clean LCD screens I recommend a soft micro cloth. You usually do not need and kind of solution but if you do only use a little bit. You can usually buy micro cloths at any local store. But I'm going to recommend a site here of a telescope dealer because his service is just outstanding. The name of the company is Camera Concepts. http://www.cameraconcepts.com/store/

Oh, to be in Hawaii

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 22:06:00 +0000

My vacation-honeymoon

It was actually our honeymoon, but it was a vacation as well.We stayed in Maui.

The weather is beautiful there, everyone was friendly and the food for the most part was great.

If you go there do not go to any fancy restaurants, the dive places were the best. We went to a couple of fancy restaurants spent about a hundred dollars at each one and the food was terrible.

If you ever go take the road to Hana trip you will love it.The waterfalls were great the air even had a different smell to it.

My money's on the pack of hyenas

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 23:30:00 +0000

Although gorillas are very strong, I think hyenas are little more agile and they are very efficient predators.If the pack were large enough I don't think the gorilla would stand a chance.

I can hear them laughing as you are reading this post.

Which is better?

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 21:43:00 +0000

Everyone who owns a camera probably knows what image stabilization is. So you understand the concept.

Well the big question is for SLR cameras, is internal or lens image stabilization better?

If you have a standard point and shoot camera you probably have some sort of image stabilization. Now your camera may have what is called picture stabilization which is not the same thing. What picture stabilization does, it turns the ISO speed of your camera up to compensate; now in turn that degrades the picture quality, the higher the ISO speed the worse the picture. I don't recommend using this feature.

Now the big debate in SLR cameras is whether or not the image stabilization is better inside the camera or inside of the lens. Personally I think the lens should have the image stabilization. Why you might ask. Well if you were to buy another camera and it doesn't have image stabilization built in then your saved.

Solar Observing and photography

noreply@blogger.com (Doug) — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:52:00 +0000

To begin, when solar observing do not and I repeat do not look directly into the sun and defiantly do not look at the sun with a telescope without a proper solar filter. A proper filter will fit in the front of your telescope. Now the best time to view the sun is when there is activity on the sun aka sun spots or solar flares. Now solar flares require a special filter(H-alpha) that we will not discuss here but here is a website for more info http://www.thousandoaksoptical.com/.

Now solar photography is basically the same as moon photography but you have to be a little more careful when observing and photographing. You will need a tripod and a little Patience. Now your photos will not give you true color because you are using a filter but they will look cool. Especially if you have a H-alpha filter that can view solar flares. Here are several websites with more info.

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/objects/sun/3304286.html http://sungazer.net/photo.html http://blog.wired.com/geekdad/2008/01/amazon-solar-ph.html http://www.daystarfilters.com/