Santa's Catapult Launch

Santa launches off the deck of the USS Harry S. Truman at the Norfolk Botanical Garden's Garden of Lights display. Cindy and I took Robert through the garden's tonight after Thanksgiving dinner. The light display is special but even better when enjoyed with a six year old. Canon 7D, 1/50 sec @ f/2.8, ISO 800, 55mm focal length.

Fall Explosion

Time for a little explosion of fall color. Canon 7D, 1/5 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 200.

Costumed Apples

A couple of our apples dressed up as the Sorcerer's Apprentice and Minnie Mouse for Halloween. Canon 5D Mark II, 1/60 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 800, 100mm macro lens.

Weather Fit for Ducks

With Hurriance Sandy dropping 5 inches of rain on us today, I thought of the old saying "this weather is fit only for ducks." So I decided I post a picture of ducks I took last week in Orlando Florida. This mother mallard duck watches carefully over one of her new ducklings at the quiet pool at Disnet's Boardwalk Resort. Canon 7D, 1/160 sec @ f/18.0, ISO 400, 100mm macro lens.

Glow PEZ Skull

This is a glow in the dark PEZ Skull dispenser. It's a long exposure in a totally dark room. Michael saved the day with a last minute suggestion for this photo. Skull week continues. Canon 7D, 3.2 sec @ f/11.0, ISO 200, 100mm macro lens.

Orange Swirl

The results of yesterday's introduction to glass making and the hot shop at the Chrysler Museum of Art's Glass Studio. I made this glass paperweight using a combination of opaque orange and translucent amber colored glass chips and then twisted the hot glass to create the spiral effect. Couldn't have done it with the help of our great instructor Hannah Kirkpatrick. Canon 7D, 1 sec @ f/16.0, ISO 200, 100mm macro lens, LED flash light shining down the center of the glass to illuminate from the interior.

Swimming on Glass

The water in the Hague in Norfolk Virginia was smooth as glass until a small group of Canada geese swam by. Canon 7D, 1/160 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 200, 200mm focal length.

Patiently Waiting

This big lady is patiently waiting for her next victim. She built a large web just outside the window of my home office. I took this photo through the glass window, so I was able to get pretty close. Hope it doesn't creep you out too much. Canon 7D. 1/80 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 800, 100mm with one LED Litepanel for illumination.

Little Lilly

Canon 7D, 1/500 SEC @ F/13.0, ISO 200, 100mm macro.

Hanging On

This dragonfly is hanging on to save energy on a windy day. Canon 7D, 1/200 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 100, zoom at 400mm focal length.

Dwarf Fountain Grass

Pennisetum alopecuroides 'Hameln' - Dwarf Fountain Grass. Canon 7D, 1/125 sec @ f/13.0, ISO 200, 100mm macro.

Night Insulator

An electric power line insulator backlit by the full moon. Canon 7D, 1/640 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 400, 560mm focal length.

Blue Moon

According to the font of all knowledge, Wikipedia, a blue moon is the appearance of the third full moon in a season with four full moons. The term has also been used to refer to the second full moon in a month. Tonight's blue moon is the first since December 31, 2009 and the next one won't be until July 2015.

Today was Neil Armstrong's memorial service and his family said one way we could remember him was to "Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink." So step outside and behold the rare blue moon and give Neil a wink.

Canon 7D, 1/400 sec @ f8.0, ISO 400, 560mm focal length. Converted to black and white in Lightroom 4 using the Silver Efex Pro 2 plugin and added a little blue tint using Google's Picasa. The real blue moon is not actually blue at all.

Tipsy Repeat

For the next two weeks this picture entitled “Tipsy” will be on display at Richmond Camera's store on 21st Street in Norfolk Virginia. It was made on New Year’s Eve as the last photo for my first 365 project. Glass can be hard to photograph because of the reflections it picks up. I found a how to blog post on the digital-photography-school.com by Ronan Palliser using martini glasses and colored water.

As he said “The secret to lighting glass is to not light the glass.” This photo was setup on an ironing board in my kitchen. A single off-camera flash is placed below the setup and bounced off the background to light the subject indirectly. Two pieces of black cardboard were placed on either side of the glasses just out side of the frame. The black gets reflected by the edges of glasses giving them definition. Executing the tilted colored water gives the photo its “surprise” element. Canon 7D, 1/250 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 100, 50mm prime lens and one off-camera strobe.

Worker Bee

The bees were mighty busy at the Hampton Roads Agricultural Research and Extension Center off Diamond Springs Road in Virginia Beach. The demonstration garden here is one of Hampton Roads best kept secrets. Need some tine to think or unwind, stop by for a walk in the gardens. I guarantee you won't be disappointed. Canon 7D, 1/160 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 100, 100mm macro lens.

Parachute Ball

The dandelion in its parachute ball stage. Remember as a kid the pastime of blowing the parachutes off the stalk? Canon 7D, 1/20 sec @ f/10.0, ISO 400, 100mm macro.

The Back

This is the back of the Christie Microtile display wall featured in yesterday's blog post. Here you can clearly see the the 32 different display units that make up the wall. This was truly a "geek" moment for me. Canon 7D, 1/30 sec @ f/2.8, ISO 1600, converted to Black & White.

5120 by 1920

Talk about your big screen. This Christie Microtile wall is a prototype for the new Hunt Library under construction on the South Campus at NC State in Raleigh, North Carolina. The screen is ten and half feet wide and fout feet tall. It is made up of 32 individual DLP based microtile displays yielding an effective resolution of 5120 by 1920. The typical HD television is 1920 by 1080 with a little over a million pixels. This display has almost 10 million pixels. It was certainly the bigest and highest resolution screen I've ever seen up close. Tomorrow - the back. Canon 7D, 1/30 sec @ f/11.0, ISO 800.

The Moon Is Quite Nice Tonight

Thanks to seeing Courtney Boyd's Facebook post "The moon is quite nice tonight :)", I was able to capture a nice photo for the last day of July, day 212 of 366. Canon 7D, 1/400 sec @ f/8.0, ISO 400, zoom at 400mm with 1.4X teleconverter equaling a total focal length of 560mm. Converted to black in white using Lightroom 4 with the Silver Efex Pro 2 plug-in.

Sun Loving

Nothing says summer like bright and beautiful flowers. Canon 7D, 1/400 sec @ f/13.0, ISO 200, 100mm macro.