Keeping Your Eye On The Ball

Keep your eye on the ball, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Thanks to a friend, I recently had the opportunity to take in a Utah Jazz basketball game. Here's a capture of the action taken from the upper deck with a 300mm lens. I like how most everyone's eyes in this shot are fixed on the basketball - yet they all have very different expressions on their faces.

Liftoff

Geese in Flight, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

On my way home from church today I came across a cornfield full of geese. They were feeding on the remnants of last season's harvest. I stopped the car and decided to see if I could get close enough to make some interesting captures.

As I edged closer and closer to the flock, they became increasingly nervous of my being there. Moments before this capture, they decided as a group that it was a good time to leave. It is quite amazing to be in a field with 100+ geese as they take flight simultaneously.

Notice that the fellow on the right has a band on his leg. I imagine that this is a tracking tool put on by the game management people. This makes me wonder how many miles a typical wild goose logs each year.

As I last saw the flock, they were falling into formation and heading north.

What We Take For Granted

Orange Eye, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

I recently had a few minutes to kill while enjoying a typical American fast food lunch. Looking for a quiet place to eat, I stopped at a local park hoping to capture a few images of the ducks and geese that live nearby. As I was standing next to a fence photographing the waterfowl, I noticed a few pigeons perched nearby. I turned the lens to the fellow featured here and fired off a couple of shots. I then focused my attention back on the swimming geese.

Later that evening, while reviewing the captures on my computer, I was amazed to see the color and beauty of the pigeon. I never realized the brilliant color that adorns the eye of the common pigeon, not to mention the green sheen from the feathers. Of all the photos taken, the pigeon proved to be the most interesting subject.

The lesson hit home to me. I have always considered this breed of bird to be rather mundane. Many consider it a nuisance and a pest. Now that I have seen the beauty and poise they possess, I will never look at them the same way again.

The Pratt Children

Pratts, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Shown here is a digital capture I made of a photograph that is highly treasured in my family. Featured in the photograph are (left to right) my Aunt, my Mother and my Uncle. This was taken in the 1940's.

With a small amount of attention given to reflections and composition, you can easily preserve the memory of your old family photographs and heirlooms with a digital capture.

The Bookstore

Death & Dying, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

While waiting for my daughters at a local bookstore, I noticed these signs and thought it wood be interesting to photograph the Photography sign in this fashion. After a bit of looking I realized that there was no photography section in this area of the store - but the Death & Dying sign really stood out.

Much to my surprise, this capture has been very popular on Flickr.

iStockPhoto and Me

School days, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

I was recently accepted as a contributing photographer on iStockPhoto.com, a web based stock photography supplier. It was a fairly involved process to get accepted including the submission of several images to be evaluated by their reviewers. Once accepted as a photographer, I submitted numerous photos for consideration and so far have had 25 added to the iStockPhoto inventory.

The first from my gallery to sell through iStockPhoto was very surpising to me - the capture featured here of an old school bus. It was taken outside a small junkyard in Murray, Utah. I found the subject school bus intriguing with the broken windows and the barbed wire.

To visit my iStockPhoto gallery, click here.

It's a Small World After All

Golden Globe, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

I was discussing LeggNet's Digital Capture with fellow blogger Catherman (http://catherman.blogspot.com) recently and the subject of where this blog's readers come from became a topic. Since I didn't have an answer, Catherman suggested that I add a tracking tool to the site to find out. So I did.

After adding that tracking tool on December 30th, I have been really surprised to see where the daily visitors to the blog come from. Here is a list of countries that have visited in the past 3 weeks (in order of frequency):

United States, Korea, United Kingdom, China, France, Canada, Italy, Germany, Russian Federation, Sweden, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Spain, Netherlands, Mexico, Brazil, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Australia, Romania, Venezuela, Hungary, Norway, Turkey, Switzerland, Ireland, India, Iceland, Trinidad & Tobago, Israel, Colombia, Poland, Jamaica, Iran and Argentina.

Wow, 37 countries! I do believe that since the blog features photographs, that this increases the international appeal. Photos have no language barrier. I can't wait to see how this traffic continues in the future.

Marshmallow Snow

Marshmallow Snow, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Salt Lake City sits at the base of several canyons. I recently had the opportunity to travel up one of these canyons. This capture was made on that trip up Big Cottonwood Canyon. Upon seeing the field of snow captured here, I couldn't help but think of melted marshmallows.

Spontaneous Portrait

Snow Day (Revised), originally uploaded by LeggNet.

This past Monday was a holiday in the U.S. and locally Salt Lake City had been hit with recent snowfall. The kids and I took advantage of these two combined events to take in a bit of sledding on a nearby golf course.

Featured here is a spontaneous capture of Sarah as she looked up from her sled. The natural lighting made for a rather pleasing portrait, especially when presented in black & white.

To further accentuate her face and draw the viewers focus to her eye, I darkened her jacket and added subtle blurring to her cap in post-production.

Riding the Rails

Riding the Rails, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

A week ago I took my youngest daughter Sarah out with me to do some exploring and photographing. We ended up on an abandoned rail line and did a series of captures of her walking the rails. Click HERE to see one of the shots.

This past weekend, my oldest daughter Elisabeth wanted to do some of the same type of photos featuring herself walking the rails. Displayed here is one of the captures. I played around with the color and the contrast on this one and I am really pleased with the resulting image. By bumping the contrast and saturation up beyond normal acceptable limits, a rather unique and artistic image is created.

Thanksgiving Tilt

Thanksgivin' Tilt, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

I love this neon sign at a local movie theatre and on a recent visit I took several normal captures of it along with a few that were not as conventional.

This capture jumped out at me because of the boldness of the sign against the black sky and the slanted angle running from the lower left corner to the top right. It breaks a few rules of photographic composition, but I think it still works. What do you think?

My Life in a Bubble

My Life in a Bubble, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

This convex security mirror in the corner with the green walls made an irresistible target for a self-portait. I love how the capture gives the viewer the illusion of a floating bubble.

In the Shadow of the Wasatch Mountains

Salt Lake City, Utah, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Today was one of those special days in Utah where the mountains Jump Out at you. It snowed last night, but quickly cleared creating marvelous mountain views from all ends of the Salt Lake valley. As I drove back from a bit of work further North this afternoon I took a second to capture this view of downtown Salt Lake City.

Elk in Suburbia

Elk Meadow, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Nestled within a residentual community in South Jordan (Utah) is a farmer who has raised domestic elk for many years. I drove by the herd today in my daily travels and decided to take a moment and capture a few shots. It seemed so strange to be within one block of many newer homes and to be looking into the face of this fellow. The size of the herd varies, but today it seemed to be around 50 or so.

In addition to the elk, the same farmer has a herd of buffalo. I'll have to capture some photos of them the next time I'm in their neighborhood.

Dream Big

Dream Big, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

My 10 year old daughter loves this photo of a duck among some flamingos. In fact, she even has a framed copy of it hanging in her bedroom. She has told me on many occasions that she feels that it should be a motivational poster.

Well, earlier this week I came across a website that has free tools for making things out of your pictures. One of the the things you can make is a motivational poster.

Featured here is my version of a poster using the Dream Big capture. In addition to the motivational posters, you can also make magazine covers, I.D. badges, movies posters, billboards and much more. If you've got some time to kill, try it out. It's quite fun!

The website: www.flagrantdisregard.com/flickr

Fred's Drum Shop

Djembe Shop, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

A djembe (pronounced "ZHEM-bay") is a goat skin covered drum shaped like a large goblet and meant to be played with bare hands.

I had the opportunity to go to Fred Simpson's shop today. Fred is a master drum instructor that specializes in repairing and maintaining African drums called djembes. He was finishing up repair work on a drum for our church band. As I waited for him to put the finishing touches on our drum, I explored the shop. It was very intriguing to hear him tell of the history of the different drums and how he can tell where the drum was made by the style and the type of wood used (ours is from the Ivory Coast).

This capture is of several drums of various origin waiting to be skinned or tuned. The low light caused a bit of a challenge in photographing. This shot was shot at a shutter speed of 1/13” with the lens set at it’s maximum aperture of f/4.

Thanks Fred, it was very enjoyable learning about the history of the djembe.

Walking the Rails

Walking the Rails, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

With the unseasonably mild weather in Northern Utah, Saturday was a day to explore an abandoned railroad line. This capture was made with a 300mm lens and a very shallow depth of field to draw your focus to the shoes.

Rural Decay

Red Barn Skewed Angle, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

There they sit, waiting to be demolished. An old building can be a very interesting subject when taking pictures. The textures, colors and lines of the structure provide a great chance to be creative in your photography.

This old barn in South Jordan (Utah) is literally days away from being demolished to make way for a freeway off-ramp. In capturing the images of it I found that I was constantly shooting upward to avoid the signs and fencing put in place by the Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT), the owner of the property. I really like the saturated color of the building set against the bright blue sky. Click on the capture to see a larger version, or to see others in the series.

Give a Kid a Camera....

My Daughters' Self Portrait, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Here is what happens when your two daughters take an older digital camera into their room to play.

They set the camera on a chair, and played around pressing the capture button and jumping into the shot before it fired (while the red-eye reduction light flashed). Someday, I'll teach them about the self-timer setting - but the shots won't be nearly as fun.

Of course, I've not edited the file (other than correcting wb) as to preserve the integrity of their art... :)

Evening Sun

Old Gate at Sunset, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

I love photographing in the late afternoon and early evening. In addition to the dramatic shadows caused by the sun being low in the sky, the color of the lighting provided by the sun becomes noticeably softer.

In this capture, I stopped to take a couple of photos of an abandoned house when I saw this old gate. I really like the detail in the wood and how the sun accents it. To view this in a larger size, click here.

Playground Before the Storm

Playground Before the Storm, originally uploaded by LeggNet.

Captured this shot at the Riverton City Hall on the day after Christmas as a rain/snow storm was blowing in. Though the playground is a bit dark, I think it adds to the dramatic feeling of the capture.