Art Walk

One of the coolest things to do in B'ham is go to Art Walk.  Each year the city hosts an art exhibit in an old part of town.  Artists set up their wares in several old stores and on the sidewalk and the public has a chance to just walk and browse and buy.  I love it!  We went today and, naturally, I took my camera.  There was so much to see so these are just  few images made with my little point-and-shoot camera and edited in Lightroom. 

I'm sharing my blog with my young assistant.

These photos were made by my six-year old granddaughter on one of our photo outings. Although I did the editing, I did it according to her specifications.
(See the earlier post:  Me and My Shadow)

Now for her commentary:

I took these photos by myself with no help. My name is Hallie and I love peace signs and stuff.  I also like taking pictures I love to help grandpa edit them. I also like color/black and white whichever, I don't care.

My favorite color is magenta I have a cousin named Sadie my other cousin’s name is Madelyn. Grandpa let’s me use one of his cameras to take pictures. I love to take photos with Sadie but I’ve never done it before that’s why I’m waiting for that day to come. My favorite animal is a horse well I have more favorite animals then that. There’s this painting thing on the computer I love but I wish I could do.  I like this close up thing on the camera that when you’re far away from something and you want to get a picture of it you can zoom in. Oh my grandpa’s a photographer. I live in North Carolina

The end.   

Small Boats

I love to make photos.  Especially if the subject is interesting.  So, this morning Joy and went over to Aldridge Gardens to see a local rc boat club sail their small boats.  I was most intrigued with the sail boats.  These are just a few of my favorites from this morning.

We've had a request so click here to see a gallery of all the photos.

Mixing fun with business

Stacy and Blake's wedding at Hilton Head, SC, was fun all by itself, but it also gave us the chance to spend a little time in Savannah.  After meeting them on the beach for a "morning-after" session on Saturday, we drove down to Savannah and spent the night before coming back home on Saturday.  Although we spent only a little time there, I was able to make few photos that were keepers.

Train up a child...

I know it's a bit of a stretch, but Proverbs 22:6 says, "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it."   I hope this applies to training photographers as well as spiritual matters.

Hallie, one of my granddaughters, and I went out this morning for a short photo excursion.  She's only six, but already shows some signs of becoming an artist and photographer.  Naturally, I am encouraging this every step of the way.

 These are a few of my photos from this morning.  You can see Hallie's in another posting.

Hallie's photo excursion with Grandpa

My granddaughters are now six years old.  Old enough to begin making photo excursions with grandpa.  Hallie and I went out this morning, I with my Canon 5D Mark II and she with my Canon G11.  When we got home we immediately sat down to edit our photos.  From her photos these are Hallie's choices for the blog, edited to her specifications.  I wanted to make a few in black and white, but she has strong opinions about her art and only wanted color.

Snow Day

I was born and spent most of my growing up years in south Alabama along the gulf coast.  Then my family moved to Atlanta during my teenage and early adult years.  Needless to say, snow is not something I grew up with.  However, in my adult life I've lived in Texas, New Jersey and Germany.  So I've seen my share of it in my life.

But, we've been back in Alabama for about five years and snow has been a rare experience for me.  They tell me that we receive a pretty good snow last year, but I was in Belize on a mission trip when that happened.

It snowed today.  Not much by the world's standard, but a near blizzard by Alabama measurements.  We closed the studio and went out and made a few photos.

Click here to see the gallery

 

 

How long have you been a photographer?

That's the question lots of people ask me.  My answers range from, "forever," to "over forty years,"

to "depends on what you mean."  I usually tell people that Joy, my lovely wife, bought me my first 35 mm SLR for our first wedding anniversary in 1971 and it's been a love affair with the camera since then.  It became an obsessive hobby and I began photographing weddings and portraits for money in the mid 1970s to help support my hobby.  As you know, photography can get expensive.

But, the story really goes back even farther than that.  I don't really remember the first time I got to use the family camera, but I do remember what camera it was -- a Brownie Hawkeye, built in the early '60s.  My mom liked to take family photos of my dad and family of four boys and this was the camera that she used to make many of those photos.  Lately I've been on a project to scan all of our old family images and store them digitally.  I love the way we were usually posed in front of the family car.  My dad worked for the Studebaker and one is often prominent in our family photos. 

Another common theme is the Christmas morning photo of our living room showing us marveling at all the good things that Santa had left the night before.  It's usually a photo of me and my brothers standing around in our under pants.  I guess we never wore pajamas.

All this to say, the Brownie Hawkeye had a great influence on the path I would eventually take.  Below is a photo I made of my maternal grandparents on Dauphin Island in the mid 1960s with that camera.  Then there are the close ups showing the camera today.  When I was a cub scout, my mom finally gave me that camera.  You can see where she wrote my name and troop number on it with India Ink.  We didn't have Sharpies in those days.  You can see by the electrical tape repair that I made many years ago that the camera was well used.

I still have it.  It sits on a shelf in our studio.  I'm not even sure if you can buy film for it any more, but it still means a lot to me.

 

Sophie, The Wonder Dog

Just messing around with a photo I made of Sopnie a few weeks ago. She's my jogging/hiking buddy and just loves the park we go to in the mornings. I thought she looked like "Wonder Dog" sitting at the crest of this little hill. In spirit of full-disclosure, I added the clouds from a photo I had on file. The sun beam is a swipe of the stylus across my Wacom tablet over an opaque layer.

Took the day off and went out and made some pictures

Fellow photographer, Jim Little, and I took the day off and went out to see what we could make pictures of. Not sure what Jim came home with but these are a few of the ones I got. Most were made in Old Alabama Town in Montogomery.

Click to see the gallery