Tonight Holly had her friend Kathy come over to help sew things for the wedding. Thus, I boogied outside and shot some more photos. Let’s just say the other day got me all excited to get out as much as I can nowadays, especially with the killer sunsets we’ve been having.
Here’s how I killed a few hours tonight down at the Sunset Transit Station where the Max Rail drives by:
I think it’s funny to look back at the “Edits” folder of my computer. That’s where I keep any photo I shot that I took a few extra minutes to make sure it looked good enough to share. Since it’s organized by date, it’s very easy to notice the trends I’ve gone through in just the past year.
You can tell just by stepping back and looking at the bunch as a whole where I first learned about Vibrance/Saturation in Photoshop CS4, as well as when I took the saturations to extremes. Then there was the heavy editing thanks to automated actions you could download from all over the web, followed by the heavy vignettes. There’s lots of panoramics and night shots, as well. Eventually came the HDRs followed by the use of Topaz Adjust to bring out single images into HDR-like fashions; not to mention long exposures, fast exposures and time-lapses.
Now, I’m into letterbox-style black borders. Why? I have no idea, aside from the fact that I’ve seen a few photographers (see here, here and here). Maybe it’s how they turn into a square. Perhaps it’s the contrast. Like I said before, I have no idea – I just like it.
…at least for now. We’ll see what happens next month.
Anyway, I’ve been busy playing with some older photos and taking some new ones this week and last. Here’s what I’ve been up to:
This little dandy was hiding deep in one of my Coeur d’Alene folders. Shots like this make me miss my drive to work in Idaho, all along Coeur d’Alene Lake Drive.
This was at sunset tonight. Holy friggin’ moly it was insane! I didn’t think I’d get it to look nice at all, and especially since I didn’t have my tripod handy. But I guess I was wrong…
I have wanted to shoot this photo since first moving to Portland, especially after seeing some awesome images of this same vantage all over flickr. Tonight was my night! This is actually an HDR of three separate 15-second exposures (+1, 0, –1).
From the same spot as above, overlooking downtown Portland from the top of OHSU. I had never been up here before until tonight, and I can’t wait to go back again! (Looks WAY better large!)
New edit of an old shot: This was from back when John came to visit. A little too dark for my taste, but I think that’s probably why I kind of like it, it’s not my normal edit.
And lastly, one of my favorite shots ever with an updated edit. This is probably my best “journalistic” shot, as I was on a police ride-a-long for a page design I thought might look nice. I borrowed a Canon from school and rode with a cop (who I actually went to middle school with, oddly enough).
Anymore it is far too easy to get my mind off track. I’m supposed to be working on a project I have due tomorrow, and it will likely take most of the day. So it makes total sense that I would get up in the middle of it all just to go outside and take a photo, for no other reason than to alleviate an urge that suddenly overwhelmed me.
And it wasn’t anything special, either. Just a panoramic down the road:
Click to view larger.
So far this Little League baseball season I’ve been stoked with the potential my team keeps flashing. While moments of incredible brilliance often times rear their gorgeous heads when I least expect it, more often than not we screw something up. 
But since we’re just two games into the regular season (five if you count the pre-season pitching machine tournament – I don’t), that is to be expected.
Nevertheless, since we’re just a AAA team of 9- and 10-year-olds in a league not too obsessed with winning, I’m happy with our progress. We know what we need to work on now and what we’re pretty good at. We lost on Friday due to simple mistakes made by our own team, so our win yesterday was even greater when the players realized why they won – preventing those same mistakes.
But the greatest achievement so far this season has come in the form of one new player. At his first practice, having never thrown a baseball in his life, he only talked about his undying love for basketball and why baseball “sucked.”
Then a funny thing happened: He got better each practice, proceeded to take a greater interest in baseball, and now leads the team in hits, stolen bases and batting average!
In the middle of a recent game, after ripping a line drive into the outfield and then stealing third base on the subsequent play, he came bounding into third base with a beaming grin.
“Coach Jake!” he bellowed as he reached the base. “I LOVE baseball! I think I love it more than basketball! No, I love it the same. Ummm, no, never mind. I love baseball more!”
I’m chalking that one up as my greatest coaching success And like I said, we’re only two games into the season.
I love this sport.
A few weeks back I met my good friend Heidi downtown for pizza and beer at Rocco’s (more about that place in a bit). Nevertheless, since I had the afternoon off work and didn’t want to wait indoors for our meetup, I headed downtown an hour early with camera in tow.
Now, I’ve seen this elephant before, lastly when my buddy John visited over Thanksgiving, and we simply took a few shots with our Smart Phones. But this time I had my Canon S5, so I grabbed an HDR:
I’m fairly certain that this might be my greatest HDR capture yet. Especially with the blue skies and white clouds behind, thanks to Photomatix for helping me pop the colors and contrast (Of course, I cannot wait for Photoshop CS5, check out the new HDR file handling it boasts. Can I get a Boom Shakka Lakka?).
Here are the rest of the shots I captured while waiting. All in all I’d say arriving early was worth the wait!
Tonight, my bride-to-be was out at Cirque du Soleil, so once again, I had the apartment to myself.
This is never a good thing.
With an empty home I quickly remembered this photo on Flickr and how much I wanted to try it myself. It was this photo that made me realize I could only try it when she was out – imagine the mess I would create.
So, here’s my version. I couldn’t get the timing down exactly. And it took 62 tries to get a few I liked, but this was the best:
I went to the Pittock Mansion this afternoon for one specific idea: A time lapse video of the clouds moving over downtown Portland. I took one photo every 15 seconds for 35 minutes.
Low and behold, it didn’t turn out so bad.
Holly got a plant from her mother the other day. Seeing as how I've been into time-lapse photography lately, I thought I'd see how it would bloom if I set up my camera.
So, after six and half hours of shooting (1 photo every 3 minutes), I came up with this little ditty. Unfortunately it doesn't look as cool as I thought it would, but I didn't feel like leaving the camera and laptop going all day. Maybe next time. I want to buy the AC adaptor for my camera, that way I can leave it plugged in and take photos for 3 days straight!
Anyway, here’s my 6-hour attempt:
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