SOTW – Dutch goes the Photo!

Shot of the Week – vol 13

We’re all quackers!

A bit of a late post this week, as the day was absolutely gorgeous and the shot is from today…

2016-04-17 17.06.02 HDR-3 — *Working with Quackers!*

Yes, folks, these are ducks that I photographed, as our youngest dog, Dora, was herding them! Our youngest Cardigan Welsh Corgi, Dorothea Lange, enjoys herding, and, in addition to herding sheep, she also herds ducks. In this photo, these are big ducks, which tend to keep their distance from Dora, and, therefore, are harder to herd than the smaller ducks, which are also called Call Ducks.

Dora has a lot of fun doing her herding, as she finds it a welcome break from agility, which is fun too, but none of the obstacles move on her 🙂

Technical Details

This image was captured with my iPhone 6S using the standard camera app.

Shot of the Week – vol 12

Nubble at night

This week’s shot of the week is a throw-back, as weather and time were not exceedingly cooperative this week.

Nubble-Night-2_57A0318-8x10 — *Nubble at Night*

It’s not a frequent occurrence for me to do night photography, even though it is something that I enjoy, as it’s a thinking photographer’s game. This shot is from December 2014, when Nubble Light on Cape Neddick, ME, was decorated with lights for the holiday season.

From a position, low on the rocks, I noticed that I could get a nice long reflection of the light on the island, including some on the rocks that were moist from the surf. In case you wonder, the ocean was flat, as this is a side effect of very long exposures.

Hope you enjoy!

Technical Details

This image was captured with my Canon EOS 5D Mk III using an EF 17-40mm f/4L lens. Exposure settings were at f/18, 100 ISO and 2.5 minutes of open shutter (yes, a full 130 seconds).

Shot of the Week – vol 11

Bucolic moment

After a short hiatus, it’s back: the shot of the week!! Well, almost, as you’ll see.

2014-04-03 07.10.22 HDR-1 — *Farm equipment*

While this is not quite a shot of the week, as I captured this 104 weeks ago, which makes it a shot of this week.

I’m always attracted to farming, probably because, when I was young, we lived near some farms for a number of years, and I wound up spending itme on them helping out. I always enjoyed the sense of being in touch with the land and nature, something that appears to have gotten lost quite a bit in today’s society.

Little farm scenes, such as this one, always catch my eye, particularly on a morning with light as beautiful as it is in this image.

Hope you enjoy!

Technical Details

This image was captured with my iPhone 5S using the standard camera app and some imnor adjustments in instagram.

Shot of the Week – vol 10

Ready for Spring!

How long do you think I would go without posting something about my Lady of the Fields? I agree with you that it’s been too long!

2016-03-11 07.36.14 HDR-1 — *Spring is in the air!*

The first hint of Spring was showing this past week, as the temperatures have been unseasonably warm and all of Nature got a bounce back in its step! The Yoga Tree was no exception, as she is showing the first growth of the season at the tips of her branches.

She stands tall and proud, overseeing the activities in the field, as all prepare for Spring!

Technical Details

Shot with my iPhone 6S using the standard camera app and smidgen of Instagram treatment.

Shot of the Week – vol 9

Simple tulips for today

2016-03-02 15.54.23 HDR-1 — *Think Spring!*

Some weeks high-technology work can be soul-devouring to the point of leaving precious little time for any other creative expression. Given that I barely got time to escape the office this past week, I present to you an image of tulips to help us employees lift our spirits.

Please accept this with a promise that soon, not nearly soon enough, I will get additional time available to get some real photography in… Stay tuned for the announcement!

The image is not re-cropped, as I shoot mostly square with my iPhone 6S; it’s an aspect ratio that forces my eye to observe things just a little different.

What do you do when you can’t get away from it all?

Shot of the Week – vol 8

Bricks with a bit of sky

2016-02-25 12.22.54 HDR-1 — *Looking up*

This week’s shot was taken, as I just stepped out from work for a quick jaunt to Starbucks to feed my addiction.

It was a beautiful day with unseasonably warm temperatures about 60F (16C), which is a regular heat wave in New England in February. Walking down the uneven sidewalk, my eye caught the reflection of the Sun in the puddle of water. A little bit of adjustment in position, added some of the tree branch and resulted in what you see here.

The image is not re-cropped, as I shoot mostly square with my iPhone 6S; it’s an aspect ratio that forces my eye to observe things just a little different.

How often do you find yourself capturing serendipitous little scenes?

Shot of the Week – vol 7

Books have the answers

Searching-for-Answers-140427 — *Searching for Answers*

As the best shot of this week was Doane’s Falls featured frozen in the Winter in New England post, I thought that it might be interesting to take something from the archives.

Today’s image is ‘Searching for Answers’, which was created in 2014 during a workshop held by Brooke Shaden in Yonkers, NY. As I mentioned in an earlier post, taking a workshop with Brooke is truly inspirational and truly energizing! Please check out Brooke’s blog Promoting Passion, where she shares a lot of detail about her process and approach to creating her stunning images.

About The Image

We were shooting in a wonderful, old mansion that is undergoing a slow, thoughtful renovation. When I walked into the library and saw the curtains and beautiful woodwork, I immediately had the idea of an ethereal being coming from the past to look for understanding of what happened during her life, which is the source for the title.

As luck would have it, we did have access to a wonderful red dress that looked great on Steph, the model in this shot. Next steps were to make her float in the right location in front of the bookshelves and to ensure that the rest of the room played along just right.

The planning made the post-processing a breeze; only about 4 hours’ work to get that done.

Hope you like this image, and, if there’s interest, I would be happy to do a post that talks in more detail about the entire process.

Shot of the Week – vol 6

Embrace the Sun

2016-02-11 07.36.34 HDR — *Embrace the Sun*

Yes, she’s back! Here we find the Yoga Tree gently embracing the Sun, as it rises up into the Winter sky. A heavily overcast day with a glimpse of better light to come along the horizon.

Simple beauty is something we can often find during this season, as form and shape stand out more than color at this time of year.

Hope you enjoy this one and have a wonderful day!

Shot of the Week – vol 5

Chef Wilson Wang at his best!

20160131-WBC_57A4398 — *You’ll love it!*

Something a little different for this edition of the Shot of the Week. It probably won’t happen too often that some of my event photography work merits being Shot of the Week.

When looking back to this past week of photography, there were some good candidates, one of which will make the line-up for tomorrow, but this one stood out in the way it captured a moment in time.

I took this photo during my coverage of the Worcester’s Best Chef Competition, which was a lot of fun. What I captured was the ebullience of Chef Wilson Wang of Baba Sushi in Worcester, MA, as he is feeding one of the attendees! Some of the chefs are a bit more reserved, as they are hard at work preparing their dishes, but Chef Wilson’s attitude typifies the mood of the event: great food and lots of fun!

Hope you enjoy this look into the event.

Shot of the Week – vol 4

Getting down with the noble grasses…

2016-01-28 07.42.33 HDR-1 — *Morning Frost*

The shot of the week came about on Thursday morning during my commute; yes, there may be a pattern here, as you may have noticed that I’m often inspired during morning travel.

The quality of the light was that beautiful warm tone, that occurs on chilly days when the air is nice and clear. As I traversed into Westborough, Massachusetts, I decided to stop near a pond that I had frequented before and check out what caught my attention.

In all honesty, I had first thought to do something with the way the sun’s light was playing across the trees, but the sun was still too low in the sky for the desired effect. As I walked along a path, my eye caught the tall grasses with still quite a bit of frost on them; I thought they looked pretty interesting in this color light.

Now, all I had to solve was how to make it pop in the image with just my iPhone as a tool. You can see what I did: put the sun behind a fence post, get low enough and ensure that the focus is on the front grasses to create some extra depth in the image.

Hope you like the result!

	Stephen Greaves on Tuesday Photo Challenge…
	pensitivity101 on iPhone Friday
	jansenphoto on iPhone Friday
	pensitivity101 on iPhone Friday
	jansenphoto on iPhone Friday