Meet the cast.

I have seen a number of folks who photograph Lego Minifigures.  Some put Lego Minifigures in interesting scenes while others recreate famous photographs with them.   I am a fan of this kind of work, and as an adult who has indulged in the joy that is Legos, I thought maybe I too would have fun adding them into my photography.

So day 1.  Here's the gang.  (At least some of the gang.  I pulled most of my favorites out of their 'Lego scene' just to see what my different lenses would do with them.) 

First up my 16-85 mm lens.  The light's not perfect - I'm using the overhead dining room light, a happy light, and a small headlamp - so it's not ideal but I'm learning here.  It's hard to know what works and what doesn't until I see it on the computer screen.

Oh, and yeah, this is the most in focus I got all of them in one shot.  I played, briefly, with decreasing my aperture, but frankly those looked worse.  Excuse coming...  I had only about 30 minutes to play around tonight, so worked really quickly to try out all my lenses.  (Focusing on good content will be later.  Apparently.  Since I didn't even come close tonight.)

Next up my Edge 80 Lensbaby.  Interesting.  I was not successful in getting one group in a diagonal line that was exactly in focus, but I came close. That was enough for me tonight.  (I seem to have trouble with manual focus.  My next camera will have a larger viewfinder and a larger screen which is said will help my focus ability.  I suspect it won't be some magical sort of improvement in my ability to get the focus right.  Mostly I think I need to keep practicing.)

I tried getting the front guys in focus in this shot, sort of got it - but you can see on the backend of my photo I actually photographed off the edge of my 'stage'.  Nice going.

 

I love my Lego fisherman, and thought he would be cute with the Lego mermaid behind him.  Notice my issue with the background again.  (But cute idea yes?)

 



 

Here is my Lensbaby Plastic lens.  I like how everything has kind of an otherworldly vibe.  Nothing is in sharp focus, which bugs a lot of folks, but it's actually the point of the lens and it can work perfectly in the right situation.  (I'm not sure this is the exact right situation, but again, just playing around here.)

So now I just have to come up with inspiration for a photo with one or more of these little guys.  Plus I think I need more Minifigures.  Have you seen the chicken suit guy?  Awesome!

See on,
Julee

Reflections.

Today my goal was a picture of the Big Sioux River.  (Spoiler alert, here is my favorite shot of the day, captured after more than two hours, and three destinations of searching.)

Anyway, I started off bright and early with a visit to a spot near the zoo.

There is a cool, wooden bridge along the river right there that I thought might make a neat photo.  Traveling to that destination required some back-woods hiking, albeit just a few meters of it. But in those few meters I got one of my white shoes full of mud (which I didn't let slow me down) and then I cut open an almost healed burn (which did slow me down since I had nothing except my white jacket to slow the bleeding).

That outing was kind of a fail.  Although one of the shots I did end up finding interesting.

 I thought I did an all right job of capturing the repeating pattern.

After a relaxing lunch at home, during which I enjoyed Hotel Transylvania - nothing like a good cartoon movie to lighten the mood - I was ready to try again. 

So I headed back out toward the river.  It took about 15 minutes of shooting photos capturing nothing much when suddenly in my viewfinder were three tree with a neat reflection in the river.  It was perfect, there were annoying buildings and city stuff around, but still, I could see the beauty.

I next headed over to a park that runs along the river.  Jackpot.  Another wooden bridge, that was my top picture, plus my favorite rock bridge and more trees in reflection.

What a great end to my day. 

See on,
Julee

South Dakota Countryside

This morning I wandered just a few miles outside of Watertown, then turned off the main highway onto a dirt road. (I love late fall/early winter trees.  Without their leaves they are a bit wild and dark looking.  Today  I wanted to see if I could find some cool photos of trees.)

Who knew how rural it could get, and what luck I could have, just one mile off the beaten path?

I love the giant tire out in the middle of nowhere.  Why is it there?

And next up 'The Rural Stop Sign.'  I've been wondering where one goes to practice shooting, and now I know.  You just drive around the countryside and aim at signs.  Can do!

It is probably one of the last lovely days in South Dakota before winter really sets in.  (I say lovely despite the 20 - 25 mph winds.  But a stocking hat helped and as you can see the winds were not apparent in my photos since it was partly sunny so I could use fast shutter action on my camera.)

Heading out shortly to see what else I can find. 

See on,
Julee

Pumpkin Snowman.

My friend told me about this adorable guy...

It was nice we got an early season snowstorm right before I photographed him.  Thanks Rose.  He's awesome!

I actually emailed to my husband that I hoped it stayed cold because I wanted to capture the snow on the tree branches during my lunch break, but most of the snow was melted before my noon outing so I did not capture anything exciting.  (I should have taken the time before work when the snow was probably an inch deep on most branches.  It was one of those lovely mornings when everything is white.  But no, instead I showed up for work a half hour early.  Someday I'll learn to take the shots in the moment when they are there.)

I was driving along a rural road when I found this tree.  After shooting this photo and turning my car around I noticed from another angle the tree was "S" shaped, like a funky Dr. Seuss tree.  But there were power lines and other distractions behind the tree so I didn't take the photo.  (Leave it to one day after the S-Curve Challenge for my to find one in nature - my entry to the S-Curve challenge is  below.)

All of the snow should be melted by the weekend, but there will be plenty of snow photo ops yet to come.

Here is my 'S-curve' entry.  I called it "Highlighting the S-Curve".  I thought maybe I would get a point for creativity.  Nope.  This is on track to be my worst photo entry yet.  (And I was second to last in one challenge.  Maybe this will be my personal worst.)  Ah.  What can I say.  I was learning was an S-curve was and it was the best I could come up with in three days.  Plus I like the pink.  I suspect I should have had the camera angle lower and at the far end of the S.   

This last photo was one of my first shots at drawing an S-curve.  In retrospect maybe this would have been received better, although it's only sharp right in the center and I figured the shot needed to be in focus throughout.  Photography is really awfully hard.  (And liking and not liking a photo is so personal.)

But as long as I'm learning and still having some fun with it, I'll keep trying.


See on,
Julee

Pumpkins in a wagon.

One of my goals for photos is to capture interesting, seasonally related photos that I can rotate into frames around the house to help highlight the season.

My mom has this neat photo of pumpkins in an old, gray cart.  It's a fabulous photo.  So I wanted a photo like that!

I came across a neighborhood in Watertown where they've got a wagon full of pumpkins.  My first photo-shoot out there was around a month ago.  I tried my Lensbaby lenses but none of the photos looked good.  So I ventured back out and tried again with a more traditional lens.

I desaturated in Photoshop and came up a photo I really kind of liked because it made the wagon look a little more old-timey.  Below is how the wagon looked in real-life.

It's not terrible, but none of the photos I captured left me feeling excited or particularly interested either.  But I am pretty happy with the processed version at the top.  Thanks Topaz! 

Tonight I am playing around with photographing candy and S-curves.  Stay tuned!

See on,
Julee

The search for leaves.

The DPChallenge presented the group with a 'fall foliage' challenge.  But unlike most challenges where you have just a couple of days to capture a winner, this challenge was a month long.

On the upside, during that month I was able to determine that my main lens for shooting these types of photos was broken.  I had time to replace and try out the new lens.

I think I have been on at least five outings where I have been looking for pretty and/or unique scenes. 

And yet still I remain slightly dissatisfied.  I am aiming for beautiful and unique.  The tree full of yellow leaves below is pretty, as is my giant tree with red leaves.  But I suspect there will photos of entire countrysides with trees full of color, so I'm not sure one lone tree from me will be enough to make a decent showing.  (There will also be those who capture the one lone tree, but they will have sun rays shining stunningly through the branches.  I did not capture anything that magical.)

 

 

Then I found some sort of sad-looking leaves, often the last leaf on the branch.  Not bad.  Not beautiful, but maybe original at least.

 



Or here is a still dirty-but-red leaf that has fallen.

Then there were these gorgeous, almost fluorescent green leaves with just the start of some red.  These might have been fantastic shots had I been able to get a whole shot in focus.  (It was a typical South Dakota windy day, winds of 20 mph. No matter of quick my shutter, always some blur.  Darn it.)

Finally I captured some shots looking up into the trees.  Who knows what will turn out a winner once I get home and can view on the big computer screen.  

 

Pretty much all I'm striving for is a 5.  (The range is 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.)  I am just thrilled when my photo is at least 'average'.  But even getting this score during voting can be tough.

Not sure what I'll choose yet.  There are still ten days remaining in the challenge, although most of the fall colors near me have now either turned to brown or have blown off onto the ground.

But thanks mother-nature for giving me some brilliantly colored outings this fall!

See on,
Julee



Miniature Halloween. (Also fitting in a chance to play with new lens.)

Halloween week was busy.  There was bad weather, which means I stay in the town where I work rather than driving home.  (I hate ice and slippery roads, and am lucky enough to have a place to stay, so I do.  But this means extra time packing and extra time working since there are no cats or computer or TV to entertain me so might as well work late.  Plus it was rainy and gray, not good for photography.)

Then for Halloween I drove down to Sioux Falls to pass out treats for my parents who were on vacation.  (My folks are known for handing out pop and full size candy bars and chips, so it's a favorite stop for kids and we hated to let them down.)   But another night away from home.

All the craziness meant little time to look for photographs.  But no time to try my new lenses.

One lens replaced my lens that died.  (Okay, okay.  It was kind of killed.) 

Long story from early summer.  There was a mishap.  I thought the lens was okay and promptly forgot about said incident.  Only recently have I been questioning why so many photographs were blurry.  After several days of DPChallenge folks giving me suggestions on how to diagnose my issue - I seriously thought it was either my camera or my skills - it was fairly conclusive that there was something wrong with the lens.  (And then LIGHTBULB - the memory of dropping the lens came back.)  Warning.  Don't drop your cheap kit lens, it will not recover.  Although I am told that I should try turning it upside down and whacking it a bunch of times with a mallet.  That may re-settle a dislodged/moved part. Huh.  I would have thought the lens was quite delicate.

I figure my mechanical engineer husband will have fun with me on that experiment. 

Plus my 85 mm macro lens arrived.  I was desperate to try them out.  Luckily my mom has a neat Halloween Village so I was able to play indoors with my camera after the kids were all gone.

This first guy might end up as part of a photo challenge - a tribute to Lou Reed - this would be in tribute of his "Strawman" song.  (It was the best I could come up with in two days.  I real scarecrow would be better I know.)

 

Nothing fabulous, but I had a bit of fun with my camera.  Today I was able to get back out to the McCrory Gardens for one last photoshot of fall foliage.  I'll post a few of those tomorrow.

 

See on,

Julee