More Opportunities

Still working on the photography leads. Trying to figure out where and when I can have pictures hung up. I'll definitely be hanging more artwork in the future, but for now, I've got some pictures at the Dunn Bros. in White Bear Lake. I need to follow up on a couple of ideas, and see where it goes too.

Other news: we were in Jackson for Thanksgiving. We came back Saturday so we had a day to recuperate. We all have colds, so it isn't any fun to travel while sick. But, I did get out on Friday for a couple of hours and drove around Jackson County. I had a county map in one hand, and my camera in the other. It was pretty fun; now, I need to get county maps of about 20 other counties, and I'll be all set. I'll then be able to mark the maps with different locations of where I've shot, and where to explore, and I'll have plenty of places to go shoot.

My friend, Shawn, bought a digital SLR camera. He ended up getting a Nikon D80, which is a great camera for what he wants to shoot. When he wants to upgrade, it will make it that much easier to move into a higher-end DLSR, if he wishes to. But the D80 is pretty nice. Played with it a bit, mucked around some of the features, and it's similar enough to my D300 that it wouldn't be hard for me to tinker through it and figure it out. but he's got his entry into digital photography now, so I'll have someone more consistent to go shooting with.

What a weekend!

So, the weekend started early for me. I took off about 10:30am from work, as I already had over 40 hours in for the week. Woo hoo!

So, I run around and take some pictures. All is good. Get home, check my emails, and my Flickr stuff, of course. And hey! New comments on my pictures!

So, I check them out. And I've got a new comment from Southern Minnesota magazine! Seems that they want to use one of my pictures in an upcoming issue! Woo hoo! Published! The image they are going to use is the one below- the wind turbines in southern Minnesota.



Then, on Saturday, I get up early to go shoot some pictures of C, a little guy whose Mom works with Becky's friend, Sarah. I wake up to a great morning - sunshine, and decent temperatures. I headed to their home, and started taking pictures. After it was all said and done, I took over 800 pictures of the little guy! We had a blast - pumpkin patch, the park, and playing with leaves in his front yard.

Sunday was the "relaxing" day. We took it easy, and I finished processing the pictures I took from Saturday, and generated the online gallery for the family to check out. It was a blast to shoot this little guy - he loved playing and running all over the place, and didn't mind to get his picture taken so much!

Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!

Shooting. I picked up the Nikon Nikkor 50mm 1.8 lens on Monday afternoon. Why? I was asked by a co-worker, who is part owner of Senor Wong's in St. Paul, to take some pictures of food for him. He was really looking for the shallow DoF, which I can get somewhat with the 18-200, but I wanted it to be REALLY noticeable. So I went to National Camera, and picked it up. The pictures turned out pretty well, mostly because of the lens. I didn't even put any other lens on the camera - just kept the 50mm on, and it worked out beautifully. I have 5 pictures on my Flickr stream, and I think they turned out pretty nice. And I even got to keep the food!

It will also come in handy this weekend, when I shoot pictures of the toddler C. C is the son of a woman who works with one of Becky's friends. She saw some of the pictures I took at a "Welcome Home" party that was at their house, and liked how they turned out. So, I get to take some fall pictures of her son in different places this Saturday morning. So, I'm hoping that it will pay itself off in the long run. And as it wasn't that expensive of a lens in the first place, I'm really hoping it won't take long.

Another weekend...

In the bag. I was supposed to go out shooting the hot air balloons at Aamodt's Apple Farm in Stillwater with Kellie and Kyle, but the weather didn't cooperate, so we moved onto other places.

We stopped at the waterfalls that I wanted to go to, but Kellie decided she didn't feel like climbing.

So, we moved to Arcola Mills. Unfortunately, they had the gate closed and padlocked. Bummer.

At that point, I decided to bring them to the "secret" bridge location. I've been talking to the woman who owns the property the bridge is on, and we get along great. She told me last time I was there that I "could bring anyone I wanted to there". So, we went.

We ended up heading back up to Arcola Mills again, to check if they opened up yet, but they did not. We went to Joseph's for breakfast, and MK met us there.

I'm itching to get out and shoot the fall colors. I've been checking the MN DNR site to see where the colors are, and what percentage they are turned. It is a pretty cool site. I've got a location in particular I want to shoot at, so I'm waiting for the map to be updated for that area, and I'm heading out.

Has it been a week already?

Wow. Time sure does fly by lately.

On the photo front, I did take a bunch of pictures this weekend. Posted most of them on Flickr. Upon checking my Flickr stats this morning, I found a website that linked an image of mine to a blog they have. While I usually wouldn't have a problem with this, asking me about it first is something that people need to do. Flickr isn't just a "free" photo site, especially when I have all of my photos marked "all rights reserved". Simply asking me about it first would have prevented me from downloading the hi-res version, and replacing it with the same picture, so the image now shows up as "this image is not currently available" on their site.

Going to be shooting some this weekend too. We'll see how that turns out. Also going to meet up with a bunch of people I used to hang out with BITD on Friday night. Should be interesting, as I haven't seen most of them for over 15 years.

Another Update

I've been having issues with shooting lately. I can't seem to get the one lens I have wide enough to fit whatever I'm shooting into the frame without getting a bunch of stuff in the frame with it. the lens I have is the 18-200mm VR, and for some of the stuff I've shot recently (Stella Maris Chapel and the old bridge) ,I really wanted to get in closer, but couldn't, because of the lens limitations. Researching online, I realized I needed a wider-angle lens. Checking my options, I decided on saving up for the 10-20mm Sigma 4-5.6 lens. I can use it for funky close-ups, and use it to fit in scenes that I want to capture still. I was going to save up for it, and I did - I had $300 towards it within a couple weeks (sold some prints, sold some skateboard stuff that was collecting dust). Digging around on Flickr, I came across a "for sale" posting in the Nikon D300 group. And of course, someone in Chicago had the exact lens I was looking for, used for a short time, for about $100 less than a new one would go for.

So I jumped on it. It arrived yesterday. I haven't had much of a chance to play with it, but from what I've seen so far, it's going to be a fun little lens.

I've also been shooting the old bridge. I can't say much about it, as I told the person who currently owns it (it is on her property) that I wouldn't talk much about it. But, it's an amazing bridge that she is trying to get restored to the original state. The problem is, local kids seem hell bent on destroying it. They trespass on her land, and try to kick some of the limestone blocks off of it, and even place M-80s in parts of the arch to try to blow it up. Yes, kids will be kids, but you'd think that even after a talking to the parents, they'd stop. And the more traffic the bridge gets, the more she fears it will be damaged and unrepairable. So I've been very quiet as to where it actually is, but have taken a bunch of pictures of it.

New Lens!

I've finally broke down and decided I needed a second lens. There have been too many shots that I cannot seem to get as I can't get the lens I have (18-200) wide enough.

I was going to buy a brand new Sigma 10-20mm. I've been looking at the camera porn sites all week.

Checking Flickr, in the D300 or the D200/300 usergroups, there is a posting of stuff for sale. A guy in Chicago has the exact lens for sale, for $100 less than the online stores. I thought about it and thought about it. Since I emailed someone on Craigslist yesterday in MN about one, and he sold his already, and it was the same price, I decided to pull the trigger.

It will ship out UPS on Monday, and should be here by weeks' end for sure, as it is only coming from Chicago. Woo hoo! Can't wait to play with this one.