"The secret to a happy life is never pass up the opportunity to eat, sleep, or gather possible blackmail material." -- Sam Starfall, in "Freefall" by Mark Stanley, 2008-06-18
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Daphne Eftychia Arthur, guitarist+. Jul. 21st, 2008.
"The secret to a happy life is never pass up the opportunity to eat, sleep, or gather possible blackmail material." -- Sam Starfall, in "Freefall" by Mark Stanley, 2008-06-18
"The secret to a happy life is never pass up the opportunity to eat, sleep, or gather possible blackmail material." -- Sam Starfall, in "Freefall" by Mark Stanley, 2008-06-18
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eftychia at 12:30pm on 2008-07-21
The last few thunderstorms had a) brushed past just far enough south to avoid showing lightning north of Lombard St., b) only had clout-to-cloud lightning, c) passed too quickly for more than one or two flashes, or d) gone by while I was asleep or in the wrong part of the house. But last night, I got my chance to use the downtown skyline in a lightning photo. I attached the camera to a cymbal stand and stuck the boom out the window, and had it click off frames as quickly as it could store them (which isn't really very fast for exposures longer than about half a second -- it has to think a lot longer after the shutter closes than it does after exposures of more ordinary length).
Sunrise the day before brought a very pink sky containing clouds of varying degrees of saturation, all red or pink.
In the heat we've been having lately, during much of the day my view of downtown is distorted by heat shimmer and/or haze (and yesterday afternoon I saw an advertising banner in the sky but found it difficuly to spot the aeroplane that was towing it -- the plane, when I finally found it, was painted a colour in between that of the clouds and the cast of the haze). For the most part, the hot-air ripples just make what I'm trying to photograph even more blurry than the borrowed department-store telescope and doubler ("Barlow lens") already make it (in effect, it's a 1400mm, f/22 lens with very little chromatic or spherical correction; multiple blurrinesses built in even before adding vibration, and I'm having plenty of trouble controlling vibration as well, but it's still fun) ... but a week ago I managed to catch the effect in a more contained way, in the hot exhaust of a Maryland State Police helicopter coming in for a landing at UMMC.
eftychia at 12:30pm on 2008-07-21The last few thunderstorms had a) brushed past just far enough south to avoid showing lightning north of Lombard St., b) only had cloud-to-cloud lightning, c) passed too quickly for more than one or two flashes, or d) gone by while I was asleep or in the wrong part of the house. But last night, I got my chance to use the downtown skyline in a lightning photo. I attached the camera to a cymbal stand and stuck the boom out the window, and had it click off frames as quickly as it could store them (which isn't really very fast for exposures longer than about half a second -- it has to think a lot longer after the shutter closes than it does after exposures of more ordinary length).
Sunrise the day before brought a very pink sky containing clouds of varying degrees of saturation, all red or pink.
In the heat we've been having lately, during much of the day my view of downtown is distorted by heat shimmer and/or haze (and yesterday afternoon I saw an advertising banner in the sky but found it difficuly to spot the aeroplane that was towing it -- the plane, when I finally found it, was painted a colour in between that of the clouds and the cast of the haze). For the most part, the hot-air ripples just make what I'm trying to photograph even more blurry than the borrowed department-store telescope and doubler ("Barlow lens") already make it (in effect, it's a 1400mm, f/22 lens with very little chromatic or spherical correction; multiple blurrinesses built in even before adding vibration, and I'm having plenty of trouble controlling vibration as well, but it's still fun) ... but a week ago I managed to catch the effect in a more contained way, in the hot exhaust of a Maryland State Police helicopter coming in for a landing at UMMC.
eftychia at 07:19pm on 2008-07-21Earlier today I saw the slowest-flying dragonfly I've ever seen here in Baltimore, moseying across Pulaski about two storeys up (come to think of it, I've seen slower-moving dragonflies at Pennsic), ... right up until a swift overtook it from behind and swooped in to snatch it up. At that point the dragonfly started moving at a speed more like what I associate with dragonflies, zipped eight inches down and to the right, and the swift swept by. Then the dragonfly resumed its lazy meander.
I'd wondered about the dragonfly (at least I think it's the same one) that I see crossing Lombard in the mornings and returning in the evenings -- I thought it odd that it had a set route right through an area so heavily populated by birds that hunt on the wing. I guess dragonflies are just really, really good at dodge-bird?
I giggle a little each time I see a swift tip over and dive in a way that looks like a cartoon fighter aircraft being shot down. I don't know how often they catch what they're diving for, but the effort entertains me.
OTOH, if I'm watching through a long lens instead of bare-eyed, those sudden direction changes are what make swifts so bloody difficult to photograph. *Poof!* Right out of the frame so quickly that I'm not even sure which direction they went.
Oddly, just after I saw the slow-moving dragonfly, I noticed two helicopters hovering over south Baltimore, a few blocks apart. (They must have been television choppers, 'cause I almost never see a police bird hover. But they were too far away to see the paint jobs or logos, and I didn't have a long enough lens with me to make up for the distance.)
eftychia at 07:19pm on 2008-07-21Earlier today I saw the slowest-flying dragonfly I've ever seen here in Baltimore, moseying across Pulaski about two storeys up (come to think of it, I've seen slower-moving dragonflies at Pennsic), ... right up until a swift overtook it from behind and swooped in to snatch it up. At that point the dragonfly started moving at a speed more like what I associate with dragonflies, zipped eight inches down and to the right, and the swift swept by. Then the dragonfly resumed its lazy meander.
I'd wondered about the dragonfly (at least I think it's the same one) that I see crossing Lombard in the mornings and returning in the evenings -- I thought it odd that it had a set route right through an area so heavily populated by birds that hunt on the wing. I guess dragonflies are just really, really good at dodge-bird?
I giggle a little each time I see a swift tip over and dive in a way that looks like a cartoon fighter aircraft being shot down. I don't know how often they catch what they're diving for, but the effort entertains me.
OTOH, if I'm watching through a long lens instead of bare-eyed, those sudden direction changes are what make swifts so bloody difficult to photograph. *Poof!* Right out of the frame so quickly that I'm not even sure which direction they went.
Oddly, just after I saw the slow-moving dragonfly, I noticed two helicopters hovering over south Baltimore, a few blocks apart. (They must have been television choppers, 'cause I almost never see a police bird hover. But they were too far away to see the paint jobs or logos, and I didn't have a long enough lens with me to make up for the distance.)