Theme 338 – Triangle

Philadelphia Afternoon

 A few weeks ago I headed into Philadelphia with a friend to do some street photography.  I don’t know the city very well and have even less experience with street photography, so I was thrilled to get a guided tour of a historic part of Philly.  We spent most of the day walking and talking and getting to know each other and the city.  While we were taking a break in the shade near a national historic area, I noticed the scene above with a family sitting on a bench and the sunlight shining through at an interesting angle.

Mount Washington Observatory Photo Journal

Mount Washington

Several years ago my wife and I had the great pleasure of vacationing near New Hampshire’s Mount Washington.  We drove the Mount Washington Auto Route on a fine windy autumn day and took a few videos and photos along the way, one of which appears at the top of this post.  As many of you know, Mount Washington lays claim to the “world’s worst weather” which, coincidentally, makes for great photography opportunities.  Check out the Mount Washington Observatory Photo Journal and other related photo pages for some amazing alpine photography.

Theme 161 – It’s Saturday Morning

Saturday Morning

I was in Boston a couple weekends ago with my wife and son.  Saturday morning we decided to take a walk along the Freedom Trail and enjoy Boston by foot.  As we entered Paul Revere park, I noticed this fellow feeding the pigeons.  He’d tear a piece of bread from the loaf, and then slowly, deliberately tear it into smaller pieces and toss it to the birds.  I watched him for a while and took several photos.  He glance up at me once or twice and didn’t seem to mind that I was there, as long as I didn’t disturb his small charges.  So I kept a respectful distance and smiled, and he fed the pigeons.

No Themes Today – But a Great Photo Website

Wow…where or where did my summer go?  Well, between multiple computer crashes, new operating systems (that won’t download photos from my camera), learning new photo software, and importing thousands of photos and snapshots onto my new back-up external drive, I sort of got lost in the mechanics of it all.  That’s not to say that I haven’t done any photography.  But I haven’t spent much time processing my new photos or (obviously) posting on my blog.   I’m still reading though, and there’s a great new nature photography slide show on the Nature Conservancy’s website.    And “thank you” for everyone that still checks my blog from time to time.  More stuff is on the way, I promise!!

Theme 326 – Things with Wings

Red-Tailed Hawk

My copy of Lightroom 2 has arrived and I got it loaded onto my computer over the weekend.  I’m reading my way through the 420+ pages of a training guide I picked up and hope to be working with some real photos soon.  In the meantime, I thought I would post a photo of a red-tailed hawk I photographed during a spring birding/photography outing.  This fellow flew into a nearby tree and was thoughtful enough to pose for quite some time.

It’s good to be back and I hope to have some new photos to post soon! 

Greg

My Photos Saved – USB 2.0 to IDE or Serial ATA Drive Adapter – Cables To Go

I was pretty upset when my computer failed, taking a couple months worth of photos with it.   Fortunately, my brother (a self described computer geek) told me about a cable adapter that would allow me to read information from the old hard drive, if it was still functional.  I bought the cable, hooked the old hard drive to my new computer, crossed my fingers, and hoped.  Within a couple minutes, my computer was downloading all my old files!!  I don’t normally advertise for vendors, but this cable is worth knowing about.

USB 2.0 to IDE or Serial ATA Drive Adapter – Cables To Go

Cheers!

Greg

Software Search Concludes!!

Took long enough – but after reading the specs on several software packages and, finally, a phone call to my friends at B&H Photo (I really love those guys) I have found photo software that supports Vista 64-bit processing – Photoshop Lightroom 2.  I am awaiting delivery now!  Thanks everyone for the comments and, SteveM, I am barely able to use my PC – you want me learn how to use a MAC!!

Theme 37 – Building

New Jersey Farm

Hello!  I’m still working out my computer issues.  I have a new laptop, but the operating system won’t allow me to use my older version of Photoshop Elements.  So this photo has had zero processing – straight out of the camera.

I took this photo from one of my grassland bird survey points, a large privately-owned farm in northwestern New Jersey.   The survey protocols require a short wait period before beginning the bird count.  The wait period allows the birds some time to adjust to the presence of a human in their habitat, and hopefully return to their normal behavior.  It was about 6:30 AM when I snapped this photo, and the morning mist was just beginning to rise out of the fields.

Hopefully I’ll be able to devote a bit more time to photography now that the surveys are winding down.  I do need to locate photo software that will operate under Microsoft Vista 64-bit, and all suggestions are appreciated!!  Thanks for looking.

If a hard drive crashes….does the computer owner make a sound?

Hello folks,

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer (well, the first full day of summer, anyway).  The last few weeks have been busy..my birding surveys have taken several weekend days to complete and weeknights for paperwork.   Softball and soccer seasons consumed nights and weekends too! 

My wife and I became grand-parents for the third time!  Our new grand-daughter (Ryleigh Madison) arrived safe and sound (mostly) a couple weeks ago.  The “mostly” sound was due to a fractured shoulder apparently suffered during delivery.  She’s spent the first couple weeks of her life with her shirt sleeve pinned down.  The docs didn’t want her to raise her arm over her head, but that restriction should be lifted today!

A bit of bad news though and a cautionary tale for everyone.  My computer’s hard drive crashed late last week and while I am usually very good about backing up important documents and photos on CD, I really didn’t get around to it for the last month.  Only by special request had I made a CD of the birth photos of my grand-daughter, and had made no copies at all of my last several photo sessions (some of which would have eventually ended up here).  After several phone calls I’ve learned that it is very, very expensive to attempt data recovery from a crashed hard drive.  So, while I am out shopping for a replacement, I’ll also be shopping for one of those external hard drives with software that automatically backs-up your files.  In my defense (and a feable one at that), this is the the first time EVER that I have gone through a hard drive failure.   My brother the self-described computer geek had warned me several times that back up systems are a must.  As of this morning, I couldn’t agree more!

Snooze Patrol

Hey Folks…yep, my blog has been on snooze patrol the last several days, and probably will remain so for the next couple weeks.  My weekends (and most weeknights) are totally booked right now with birding surveys, soccer, and softball.  I’ll try to post from time to time and visit your blogs too, but probably won’t make any real headway for several days.

I hope you’re all enjoying the early Spring weather as much as I am!! 

Cheers!