2. Daily shots for the dailies forum on Dgrin

Dailies

These images are ones shot to post in the daily community on smugmug. I've been participating in this community for about twelve years. For the first few years, I tried to always post a shot taken either that day or the day before. Now, although I try to shoot everyday, I don't necessarily post the images on the same day they are shot.
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Welding - yesterday I had a chance to capture a welder at work.<br /> <br /> Thank you all for your kind response to my hot air balloon kaleidoscope. What a dummy I was to ask people to guess what it was and then put the answer in the keywords. Oh, well, live and learn.<br /> <br /> Christmas certainly seems to bring out smugmuggers' creativity...so many terrific images. Many of you seem to find it quite easy to take wonderful shots of Christmas ornaments, but I confess I find it rather difficult. But, I'll keep at it and eventually I may get a worthy shot. Only ten days until Christmas! And so much left to do! I'm sure many of you are feeling the same way. Well, I hope you make progress on all your tasks today!
1201 / 1959

Welding - yesterday I had a chance to capture a welder at work.

Thank you all for your kind response to my hot air balloon kaleidoscope. What a dummy I was to ask people to guess what it was and then put the answer in the keywords. Oh, well, live and learn.

Christmas certainly seems to bring out smugmuggers' creativity...so many terrific images. Many of you seem to find it quite easy to take wonderful shots of Christmas ornaments, but I confess I find it rather difficult. But, I'll keep at it and eventually I may get a worthy shot. Only ten days until Christmas! And so much left to do! I'm sure many of you are feeling the same way. Well, I hope you make progress on all your tasks today!

  • Welding - yesterday I had a chance to capture a welder at work.<br /> <br /> Thank you all for your kind response to my hot air balloon kaleidoscope. What a dummy I was to ask people to guess what it was and then put the answer in the keywords. Oh, well, live and learn.<br /> <br /> Christmas certainly seems to bring out smugmuggers' creativity...so many terrific images. Many of you seem to find it quite easy to take wonderful shots of Christmas ornaments, but I confess I find it rather difficult. But, I'll keep at it and eventually I may get a worthy shot. Only ten days until Christmas! And so much left to do! I'm sure many of you are feeling the same way. Well, I hope you make progress on all your tasks today!
  • Waterfall, taken at 1/60th second. I took a whole series of shots, thinking I might use them for the flow dgrin challenge. I did not end up using any of them, but they are rather interesting in that I took shots from about the same perspective at 1/60th sec., 1/250th sec., and 1/2000th sec. If you look at them in the largest sizes, you can see the differences. The other shots can be found here: <a href="http://fotoeffects.smugmug.com/Other/Odds-and-Ends/7032233_9SbQx#1125881653_WtGkH">http://fotoeffects.smugmug.com/Other/Odds-and-Ends/7032233_9SbQx#1125881653_WtGkH</a><br /> <br /> I was really surprised at the response to my shot of the little cookie decorations being poured into the goblet. I liked the idea but wasn't as pleased with the focus in any of the shots I took and did not end up using any of them for the challenge. Your nice comments really made me feel much better about the shot. Thanks. We had hoarfrost on our trees and plants this morning and I took a lot of shots, so I hope to have some processed by tomorrow. Hope you are having a good photo op weekend.
  • Solids flow, too. - Another one of the shots I took thinking I might use it for the most recently closed dgrin challenge, frozen or flow. Best viewed in the larger sizes.<br /> <br /> Thanks you for your comments on my shot of the welder. It is always a thrill for me to get to photograph someone working in a field that I don't normally get an opportunity to see. Hope the weekend brings photo ops for you!
  • Top Hat? One of a series of photos I took to get an entry for the current dgrin challenge, frozen or flow. This is honey that has been poured into a shot glass until it overflowed.<br /> <br /> I was really amazed that so many of you liked my kaleidoscope today. Thanks for the kind words. Like many of you, I seem to running at full tilt these days. Hope all your hard work pays off!
  • Another of the shots I took thinking about the dgrin challenge, frozen or flow. I did not enter this one, but I liked the detail I was able to capture in the flow of the waterfall stream. Best viewed in the largest sizes. I took this at 1/2000th second in order to freeze the flow and splash.<br /> <br /> Thanks so much for your warm response to my shot of the honey overflowing the shot glass. I actually did not enter that particular honey shot in the challenge, but I did enter another of my honey overflow shots. Thanks for the good wishes on the challenge. I'll need all the help I can get. There are a lot of great entries in the challenge and also lots of wonderful images in the mega-challenge, which is also running now. If you haven't checked them out and voted, they are worth perusing.
  • Another kaleidoscope - Can you guess what it is?<br /> <br /> Thanks to everyone who commented on one of my shots today. It was a strange day, with one of my older shots of frost on a window, ending up on the first page and many other older shots getting new comments, too. I appreciate those of you who have taken time to browse through some of my galleries and post comments. <br /> <br /> Hope everyone's week is going well. We were supposed to have snow tonight, but, so far, nothing.
  • One more kaleidoscope. Now, can you figure out what this one is? And I did not give you a clue in the keywords.<br /> <br /> Thanks for the comments on my shot of the waterfall. Hope you had a nice weekend.
  • Another kaleidoscope from my "playtime." This one started as part of the red poppy pic I used as my daily post recently. I think these are useful exercises for photographers because they force us to see things differently.<br /> <br /> Thanks for all your comments on my shot of the hibiscus. I loved Gene's response to my comment to him regarding how he managed to take so MANY outstanding shots...that he was good a deleting. Like most professional artists that I have talked to who work in different media, that has a lot of truth to it. A woman who was a wonderful potter told me that she smashed about 80% of her work because it did not measure up to her standards. I have a tendency to want to try to salvage many pictures that I should probably delete. I try to be more discriminating but certainly don't always succeed. Having said all that, I'm certain that Andrea is right and that Gene's experience and skill gives him a sixth sense about where to be to capture those astounding action rodeo shots, as well as his terrific bird shots. He posts a photo nearly every day that I would KILL to have taken. It is just business as usual for him.<br /> <br /> Have a good week as we countdown to Christmas.
  • Clematis - decided to take a break and throw in one of my kaleidoscopes.<br /> <br /> Thanks for your response to my snowstorm shot. I never seem to tire of taking snowstorm shots. We're having lovely weather, although they are saying it is going to get bitterly cold by Monday, so I'm trying to enjoy the respite. Hope you are getting some joy wherever you are!
  • I spent most of the afternoon playing around with kaleidoscopes and trying the technique on a wide range of subjects. Really a lot of fun. I have a new gallery of kaleidoscopes. If you have time, check some of them out and let me know what you think. I'm actually thinking of using this one for my Christmas card. <br /> <br /> Thanks for the nice comments on my shot of the Botanic Garden Light Show. We drove over to my grandson's bus driver's house tonight. He has a twenty minute Christmas light show choreographed to music. It is just fabulous and done with such a great sense of humor. I'm always amazed at how creative and clever people are. So much talent in this world. I probably won't get the shots processed for a couple of days because tomorrow I'll be spending most of the day with my daughter, who is having her student "Mini Nutcracker" performance tomorrow night. I have to take photos at the dress rehearsal and help out with some last minute arrangements. Have a great Saturday!
  • Shot some weeks ago, I was trying to get specific refractions (thanks to John and Angela Larkin for the correction from reflections) to show up in the water drops. Best viewed in the largest sizes. This one was a failure in that sense but I rather liked it, nonetheless. This exercise was probably the most difficult thing I've attempted. The distance of whatever you want to reflect from the water drops has to be just perfect. I was going through all sorts of things to try to adjust the distance. Then, the camera must be directly over the drops on a tripod or some sort of support and perfectly level. After working at it for a couple of hours, I thought my back would never be the same. However, I'm definitely going to try again. A couple of other shots from the same session are here: <a href="http://fotoeffects.smugmug.com/Other/Odds-and-Ends/7032233_9SbQx#1114893227_giKSw">http://fotoeffects.smugmug.com/Other/Odds-and-Ends/7032233_9SbQx#1114893227_giKSw</a><br /> <br /> I see some of you are asking about my setup on this. Unfortunately, I did not take any pictures of the various setups I used, but, basically, these are the things I tried. First, I quickly learned that the size of whatever you are trying to get to show up as a refraction in the water drops is very important. The other key factor is the distance from the water drops to the object to be refracted. You need a glass plate of some sort. I used a piece of glass from a picture frame. Then you coat the glass with a little bit of Rain-X. Just put a few drops on Rain-X on the glass and then polish with a dry paper towel. This causes the water drops to bead up very nicely on the glass plate. You can use several methods to put water drops on the plate. I used an eye dropper, but you can also spray water from a water bottle. I found that smaller water drops actually work better than large ones. This was counter-intuitive for me, at least, and, at first, I was trying to get bigger water drops. Then, you have to have a way to place the glass plate some distance above whatever you want to be refracted. I tried a number of different things for the refraction object: a quilt; cutouts of quilt squares from a book, etc. As I said, the size and distance are the critical things and you just have to experiment. To get perfect refractions in every single drop, you have to have your camera completely level. You need something that will hold your camera directly over the water drops, perfectly still and level. I tried a number of interations of my tripod and none worked too well. If you extend an arm of the tripod out over whatever you are photographing, the camera tends to make it too heavy and will tip over. If you use the tripod in the position where the camera is hung below the plate, the legs probably won't spread far enough apart to straddle the refraction object completely, or, if they do, then they may not allow you to raise or lower the camera to the level you require. It is also hard to look through the viewfinder when using this setup. The ideal thing, which I do not have, would be a special arm with a tripod kind of base. The base needs to be weighted to counterbalance the weight of the camera extended out on the arm. Then you have to maneuver the camera into a position above the water drops where you can see a perfect reflection, while keeping the camera perfectly level. I am a very short person and I found it very difficult for me to get my head far enough over the plate to actually see through my viewfinder. That is why my back hurt so much at the end of this exercise. You also really need to have a way to raise and lower the plate. I did not have anything like this and tried a bunch of things, such as stacks of books to hold up the plate, two stereo speakers to hold two edges of the plate, an upside down stool or chair with the plate placed on the legs, which were sticking up. None of these worked really well. I'm guessing that the people who do this sort of thing really well may have built a special apparatus to hold the camera, as well as the plate. Of course, you could also have something you could crank up and down that would hold the object to be refracted in the drops. I can now definitely see how someone can get the perfect refractions, but the implementation is pretty complicated. If anyone out there knows a simpler way to do this, please let us all know. I had seen some tutorials about how to do this, but they all left out these nitty gritty details. Still, it is a fun and challenging exercise and I urge you to try it out. Be sure to allow yourself several hours at least. I could easily have spent all day on it if I had not gotten so exhausted trying to keep the camera steady, level, focused, etc. If I do this again, I'll try to remember to take a photo of the setup for you all.<br /> <br /> Thanks very much for the enthusiastic response to my shot of the hoarfrost on the bird feeder. Hope your week is going well. I can see how focus stacking would work on this, too, but you would have to be very careful to keep track of every area you had focused on. Also, it seems to me that you would, of necessity, have to move the camera a bit when you changed the focus to a different section and that would complicate the effort. At least, I think that would be the case. Perhaps someone who has done focus stacking on something similar could explain very precisely the process of taking all the different images, while still keeping them lined up so you could use the focus stacking software. I actually have some of the software but have not had a good subject, as yet, to try it out on. I was thinking a spider web with water drops.
  • Here Comes the Train! - I decided to make a composite of shots I took of a train approaching me. I originally took the shots for the dgrin "Nine" challenge but realized none of the shots would work well in the required size for the challenge.<br /> <br /> Thanks for your comments on my dusty miller shot. Hope you are having a nice weekend and a productive one. It is very cold here. I'm just catching up on some processing, as well as house cleaning and Christmas decorating.
  • Reflections in a glass overhead walkway create art; best viewed in the largest sizes<br /> <br /> Thank your for your comments on my shot of the clematis. You guys are the greatest!
  • Dusty miller looks like a plant made of snow; really MUST be viewed in the largest sizes to get the full effect of the velvety leaves.<br /> <br /> Gosh! I really appreciated your response to my shot of the poppy. Soooo many terrific shots on smugmug today. And such fantastic variety. I feel like I'm traveling the world with you guys as my guides. Have a great day!
  • Romance Under the Kissing Camels in the Garden of the Gods - this is my daughter and her husband; Kyle actually thought of the idea for this shot, but I was eager to execute it.<br /> <br /> Thanks to those of you who stopped to comment on my shot of John Moulton's barn. I truly appreciated the comments.<br /> <br /> Hope everyone is enjoying the Thanksgiving weekend.
  • Duncan - one of the shots from last week's mini photoshoot of Quinn and Duncan.<br /> <br /> I belatedly realized that I commented on about twelve pics tonight as "challenges." By the time I realized it, it was too late to remedy it. Sorry about that.<br /> <br /> Thanks, as always, for your comments on my most recent daily shot. Seems like many of your are unusually inspired of late...such wonderful images and processing. You keep me inspired!
  • Duncan and Quinn, another shot from their little photoshoot.<br /> <br /> Wow! I was amazed at the response to my shot of the Grand Tetons and Jackson Lake at dusk. It is really encouraging to get so many positive comments. Thanks!
  • Quinn and Duncan, two of my grandchildren. We did a small photoshoot today because Quinn wants a photo or two to give as gifts this Christmas.<br /> <br /> Phil really appreciated the nice comments on his jewelry boxes. Thanks for taking the time to comment.<br /> <br /> We're supposed to go to a woodworking show this morning, but Phil has been sick today so I'm not sure if we'll make it. Hope you all are feeling well and can enjoy your weekend.
  • Horseback Ride - I was driving through the Garden of the Gods and these two young ladies rode across the road in front of me. I jumped out of the car and waited a bit until they were away from the road and snapped this shot. <br /> <br /> Thanks for all the comments on the train composite. Made me feel it was worth doing. I'm posting a bit early, since I have to read Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory" to a club tomorrow morning. I've got to get up early to get ready. Hope you have a great day!
  • I don't usually, but today I'm going to do a bit of bragging. My hubby, when he's not driving me to places to take pictures, likes to make furniture and he just completed this fairly large jewelry box affair for me. I think it is quite splendid and am quite proud of him! It has taken him about nine months to complete this project and countless hours of work. Now all I have to do is get to work filling it!<br /> <br /> Thanks for your comments on my most recent daily photo. I really appreciate your support. I must beg your indulgence as I confess that I was not able to finish commenting on all your great photos today. I did not get to the task until later in the evening and then smugmug went into read only mode and just came back up. I'll try to catch up on all of them later today. Hard to believe it is Friday already. Have a good day!

  • BIRDS-WILDLIFE-AUSTRALIA

    on August 26, 2016

    Fine composition and superbly exposed ! Fascinating shot !

  • ava laurie

    on July 14, 2015

    I have always found welding to be very interesting. They is something cool about going to work and star welding giant indestructible pieces together. I would love to internship at a welding factory to see how it is to work in it everyday,

  • Hershy

    on December 31, 2010

    Great shot - the colours look perfectly natural! Nice PP!
    Thanks for the info on kaleidoscope effects!

  • Tim Voss

    on December 20, 2010

    I like this. A lot. Excellent bit of work!

  • Ethan Winning

    on December 19, 2010

    I love this shot! I'm not much on humans, but work fascinates me. You skulking around fascinates me.

  • Chuck Beehner

    on December 18, 2010

    Nice even lighting, even the light of the weld arc is perfect.

  • WildeLifePhotography

    on December 18, 2010

    Great welding shot. Don't you wish that you could always carry your camera with you at work when walking through the shop.

  • Howard's Photography

    on December 18, 2010

    Great capture, I like that welders' arc/smoke!

  • Andrea Kaus (ChaosGraphics)

    on December 18, 2010

    Super shot!

  • paulbellinger

    on December 17, 2010

    Looks like a nice shop! Great shot!

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