Night of the Fourth

Nevada City's Broad Street at night.

Last year after the fourth of July parade and when the sun went down Nevada City was quiet. A few cars remained parked on the streets, not another person was walking the streets and nary a car drove down the main thoroughfare.

With that knowledge in had I had an idea: I wanted to take a few long exposure night shots of Broad Street to make an HDR image (exposure of 2 minutes to 1/4 of a second). So after dinner I was at the top of the street looking down and I set up my tripod as usual.

Then cars started to come up the street. Well that was fine cars are allowed to use the streets I suppose.

They came up the street very slowly, very carefully and often with their high beams on. Then they slowed down when they neared me and looked very slowly as they drove by. These were attendees of the local fair coming home after the fireworks finished, and they celebrated with several choice beverages based on their driving habits of the evening.

In the end I did not get a photo that satisfied me in terms of exposure and lack of high beams. I shall endeavor to try again tonight in the hopes that many people will be home, have left town or perhaps driving a bit faster then seven miles per hour.

Fourth of July

The Great Republic of Rough and Ready and Ready to Secede Again!

This is why we celebrate the founding of our country, we can protest and speak freely about topics that could cause severe backlash in other countries.

In this case the Nevada City/Grass Valley fourth of July parade had a large swath of Tea Party members. In particular several from the small town of Rough and Ready who have already seceded once. Unfortunately before their letter of secession could ready Washington they decided to rejoin.

But still one of the greatest town names out there: Rough and Ready.

Late Night

Late night (sans Pirate) in Isla Vista.

Summer evenings on a back porch can be deceiving. One moment you are just sitting there in the semi-darkness and all of a sudden it is suddenly midnight and the furniture is that much more comfortable.

Starbucks Internet

A light starburst, and the post is about starbucks, see they are almost similar in spelling!

Many people may already know this but I did not (mainly because I do not drink coffee), there is a way to get mostly free internet at Starbucks.

The trick is to have an active Starbucks account. The best way to do this is to buy a gift card for $5 and then register it on the Starbucks website. The card and money have no expiration however the deal for the free wifi does. In order to keep the free wifi the card needs to be used or reloaded once every thirty days. The best way to do this is to go in and buy a seventy-five cent scone every week or so. This then keeps the card active and allows for the free internet.

I was initially led to belief that it was free and unlimited wifi, but it turns out to have limitations. From what I have read it is two free consecutive hours per day with the necessity of using the card. I do wonder however if it can be used at multiple Starbucks.

For some keeping the card used is no problem as they go to Starbucks often for coffee, I however do not partake of that particular beverage so have not had many occasions to go (though I like the Chai Tea Latte). I became interested in this since I eventually moving to Seattle and have an iPod Touch (I dislike monthly fees) and thought that free wifi around the city would be handy.

In a few months we will see if an iPod Touch and Starbucks (plus other free) wifi is enough to be comparable to an iPhone or other internet ready phone.

Thank You Notes

Driving across the Golden Gate Bridge in the summer fog.

I had a graduation party last Saturday with my family and family friends. I was just happy to have everyone there but it appears that many brought congratulatory cards and even gifts. I was completely blown away by the unexpected generosity. They ranged from cash to gift cards to local restaurants. The idea being that I could use these to help start myself up in Seattle for graduate school, sort of like wedding gifts for a college graduate.

One thing I have had ingrained in me since a young age is the importance of thank you cards.

While in recent years it would be easier to send out e-mails thanking for gifts, as all of my communication is by email, I find it more important to send out handwritten thank you notes.

Those who I have received gifts from have told me how they appreciated the thank you cards, often in light of them not receiving any from someone else.

Of course someone is more likely to get gifts in the future, or at least appropriate gifts (I have yet to receive a hand knit hat with ear flaps) when the person giving the gift is thoughtfully thanked.

Paper/e-mail

Art Museum

I once knew the names for this type of bronze vessel, it now escapes me.

I went to the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco today on the way back from dropping someone off at SFO. As always I enjoyed the exhibits (they had Samurai’s this time), but the trip highlighted the challenges of photographing in museums.

First I had all of my camera gear with me since I was unsure of what I would be doing before and after the museum, at this point that just constitutes at Think Tank Photo Streetwalker backpack. However there was a size limit on bags in the museum so I had to check my bag in the complimentary coat check. I was allowed to take my camera with me but not the bag. I had to decide which lens to take with me, knowing that no flashes are allowed I chose my 50mm f/1.8 for the high speed.

With no flash and no tripod I would have be limited mostly to all handheld shots and museums are surprisingly dark places (for the most part). I rarely went below an ISO of 400 and kept the aperture at f/1.8 the entire time. I would have liked a zoom lens for the wider angles and even a zoom but the kit lenses I have are far too slow.

With a high ISO I am pleased how the photos came out (the Samurai exhibit did not allow photography) the only problem I faced was the lack of an autofocus. Usually I am fine with manual focus, however it was combined with low light so I was below the standard 1/50s exposure time (since it is a 50mm lens) and was often at 1/20 or 1/40. It was necessary to manually focus with a shallow depth of field and steady the camera.

I utilized the usual trick of bracing against walls, pillars, signs and the odd chair though this museum had a dearth of conveniently located propping points. In the end I relied on the high ISO, an exposure compensation of -1 or -2 and the large aperture. I realize now that I should have set metering to be just at the focal point instead of factoring in the entire frame, the rest of the frame tended to be black if not dark and unnecessarily increased the exposure.

Back home when I went through the photos I found myself holding them to a different standard compared to other subjects. Instead of evaluating the photos of the art pieces by their content I did it by lighting, sharpness and focal plane. Only if a given piece had multiple sharp well exposed photos did I start to look into composition and even subject matter.

Now if I could only remember back to my Chinese Art History class to figure out what I photographed.

Boats

Colorful boats in Madison.

In iPhoto I have a running set of photos that I pull out for this blog. Ideally I use them for a given entry because they match the subject in some tangential way, in general I just pick the ones I like that particular day. Other times the timing of the day worked out that I have nothing important to say so I put up a photo and call it good.

Since I have almost been doing one a year it is a hard habit to stop.

So today (depending on which day you read this) I have a photo of a line of small sailing boats on the University of Wisconsin campus. The colors caught my eye as they lined up one after the other. It was a perfectly dreary overcast day, I guess I was lucky in that I had no shadows.

I like boats to photograph, but not to ride.

Heat

The east coast likes their "Pop".

A lot of heat has been coming into the Bay Area recently, in particular near my house it has been getting into the high 90’s and perhaps low 100’s (roughly mid to high 30’s (305’s) for those fans of Celsius (or Kelvin)).

That sort of heat starts to greatly limit the options of what to do. They are sadly reduced down to activities like siting inside a cool house with a computer and sitting around a cool pool with a book. Sometimes there are radical activities in the heat like getting up to get a drink and (rarely) moving around deck furniture.

However as I am soon to be in Seattle for a bit of time I am doing my best to embrace these arduous activities of summer, I must make sure I contribute to the appreciation of the heat.

Of course my opinion of the warm weather would drastically changed if I had to work or do anything in it. Let us hope that does not happen anytime soon.

New and Improved

This is not Pavement.

Twice in the past week I have had discussions about the phrase “new and improved”, mostly starting by someone saying that an item cannot be both. Let us look at this.

The way I see this phrase is that an object can hold the characteristics of new as well as the characteristics of improved.

If I have a drawer full of forks that are all used and slightly worn and someone gives me an identical model fork but right from the factory it is then a new fork. Even though I have many like it, this one has not been uesd.

Now if I take an existing fork and tape a guiding laser along the tines the fork is very much improved.

So if someone gives me a new from the factory fork that is the same as all the rest, except that it now has a guiding laser would it not then be new and improved?

I can see where the phrases can be contradictory and it is really all tied up in how the word “new” is interpreted. If it is read as being the first ever made or never before experienced then something cannot be new and improved. If improvements can only be made on existing items and new items cannot have existing before then there is indeed a contradiction.

But if I improve something in a new way then this particular object is new by improvement. Wouldn’t that be new and improved?

Civilization

The Roman Colosseum.

I had a large list of things I was going to do today.

Then I received Civilization IV Gold edition in the mail.

That shot my entire day.