Childhood

Well, this is at least one shot for the childhood challenge. This is little Dominik, he is our friends youngest son. Dom was born last May (2006) and I came *this* close to having to deliver him in the car, but that's another story! So now, here he is, dressed in Dad's BDU cap.

I was crawling around on the floor chasing him and his brother trying to take photos of them, but wasn't having much luck. They are quick little guys and they were a bit hyperactive. It's been raining for what seems like forever!

I tried a new way of post-processing... not sure if I like it, but it was fun! This photo reminded me of when I was young, I used to wear my moms shoes around the house, or my dads baseball glove which was half the size of my body. I still have a few pics from today to go through, hopefully I'll find a couple more worth posting! This is it for now though!

More Macros Today!

We had a bit of sun so I went out looking for more bugs! I found quite a few, so here's what I've got!
Not sure what this is, some type of leaf hopper I believe:
Fly:

Small Caterpillar:




Hover Fly:
Hover Fly in Flight:



I still need to work on this weeks theme for the SB.com blog challenge: Childhood, that's going to be a tough one for me!

Altered Canvas

I made this canvas yesterday, it's my first one! It actually took two tries, the first time I mod podged it and then used the mod podge to past the photos on, and they turned pink!!! Yuck! So I tore them off and then had to print them out almost EXACTLY the same size and try again, without mod podge and try and cover up where I tore it off. Overall, I like the way it came out. The only thing I would change is the rub-on that goes through our foreheads and my chin, I would have just done the Life is good part, not the border, but oh well! It's not that bad unless you are looking for things wrong.

DOF and Bokeh

Lots of pics today!

The cool thing about Macro is the very shallow depth of field. All it takes is a slight sway for things to be out of focus. The Macro photos were all taken between about F/9 and F/11. So you can see how small the area is to work with! Also the bokeh on the 100mm macro is nice and creamy (like buttah!)

This red mite spider was teeny tiny!! Probably only a few millimeters at best. You can clearly see the limited DOF here. Here also, I just had this guy in the right spot. If you look past him the brick wall is unrecognizable as brick, and just appears as shades of color.
The area of bokeh is small here, but I cropped it wide so you can still see the out of focus leaf in the background.
This photo, while it looks mainly black, is actually a bunch of leaves from a tree behind this leaf! They were just so far back, most of the light didn't hit them, and they barely showed up as bokeh. You can see a small bit towards the bottom that appears dark green in the shadows.

The following two photos were taken with the 50mm f/1.8. If you look at the highlights in the bokeh, you can see that they have a shape (looks 5 sided). This is from the blades that form the aperture (like Danielle was saying). They don't show up as much when there isn't a lot of contrast in the OOF area, but here it's quite obvious.

Here's another one, in the highlights in the bushes, you can see the shape from the blades.

This isn't a great example of bokeh, but I liked this picture and thought I would share it anyway. Cossie got a new backpack to carry his treats, toys, water and sometimes help me with the fruits and veggies I get at the market when my hands are full. DH and I took him for a walk with it on him today to get him used to it. They were suppose to send me black though and I ended up with green! :) Taken with the 70-200 f/4L

Textures, and some color.

Two of these I took today, and the last one I took a few months ago, but thought it fit in well here. The first two were taken with the macro lens again at f/9 with flash. The last one was with flash at f/6.3.

This is a seashell from a little house decoration we have.



This is part of a picture frame that we got in Barcelona Spain. The are really big on mosaics there!
This is a feather from a feather duster :) I tried to clone out most of the dust spots, but you can still see some!

It's HERE!

My 30D came in the mail today, and I'm so stoked! I bought it used, though practically new as it had under 1000 shots taken with it and is only 3 months old. Since I already have most of the lenses I want (for now that is) I just bought the camera body, but here is my new love with my 17-40L on it. It's so much BEEFIER than my XT, it's great! I love the huge screen, and the solid feel. So from now on, all my pics will be taken with the 30D as my XT is going to a new home tomorrow!

The Dog

I forgot I took this photo yesterday as well of Cosworth (our Great Dane). It reminded me so much of one of those "The Dog" images that I had to share it. Now if only I had a little bit wider of a lens! He wasn't too sure about what to think of this big thing in his face, but he was a good sport.

Insects, Larvae, Arachnids.. and a river!

It was a gorgeous day today, we actually had SUN! I even got myself a small tan line going on. So I sat outside much of the day staring into plants looking for bugs. I was quite successful, though some of the pics didn't come out as well as I would have liked. The identifications of these might not be 100% accurate, but should be close. All of these were taken with the Canon 100mm f/2.8 Macro, with the exception of the last one, which was taken with the Canon 17-40 f/4L.

Two caterpillars. The one on the right is possibly a Vapourer Moth Larvae.


This little guy is a Wooly Aphid. Can't say I've ever seen one of these before!
Ladybug LarvaeTetragnatha Extansa or Long-Jawed Orb Weaver. I moved a branch and she came running out and scared me, looks like I scared her too! When frightened, they stretch out along branches to disguise themselves.

Perhaps some type of wasp, standing on an aphid! Amazing what you find after you take a photo.
Beetle PartyDuring the summer, all the boats start coming out and cruising down the river that runs through our area. There are some that are stationary (further into town) that you can have dinner on, and some take you on tours. These are just local owners, and a beautiful day!

A rose is a rose...

It was raining today, but as I got home, it had all but stopped (temporarily of course). Walking into the house I noticed our roses are blooming in the front garden, so I grabbed my camera to get some photos before it started raining again. I wish I could capture the smell on camera, but it smelled gorgeous as well!

Smoke Art

I posted some smoke shots a while back (incense smoke against a black background). I read of a new technique using photoshop. Take the image and duplicate the layer. Flip the layer horizontally and then move it until it makes a shape that you like. Here are some of my attempts at this!