Category Archive: Macro Photography

Thai Basil and “K” stories voting reminder

Current voting for the “K” stories is . . . baffling? I didn’t think it would lean the way it’s leaning. But that’s the thing with readers; they can surprise you. If that sounds intriguing, give the stories a read and vote for the “Alphabet Challenge K-Stories” HERE.<<<This Is A Link

Clicking on the above link will take you to the post with the poll where you can cast your vote. The post also contains links to the individual stories. After voting, readers can — if so moved — spread the news about the story to friends and family. Or, not. But, we hope for yes.

So . . . Thai basil

I didn’t know what these were. All I knew is that Melisa clipped them and once close, I thought the flowers were pretty neat. .

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“Here’s what’s that?” and “K” stories voting reminder

Voting on the “K” stories is still abysmally slow . . . probably because I let the other two writers down in the last few rounds. Still, if you want to support the other writers, give them a read (there’s at least one good one, I’d wager), and if you’ve read them, you can vote for the “Alphabet Challenge K-Stories” HERE.<<<This Is A Link

Clicking on the above link will take you to the post with the poll where you can cast your vote. The post also contains links to the individual stories. After voting, readers can — if so moved — spread the news about the story to friends and family. Or, not. But, we hope for yes.

So . . . here’s the answer to “what’s that?” from the last post . . .

“What’s that?” — No. 1 — the remnants of a clematis flower.

After a rainstorm, of course.

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“What’s that?” and “K” stories voting reminder

Voting on the “K” stories is progressing slowly . . . probably a reflection of all the other stuff that’s going on in the world. Still, if you want a break, give them a read (there’s at least one good one, I’d wager), and if you’ve read them, you can vote for the “Alphabet Challenge K-Stories” HERE.<<<This Is A Link

Clicking on the above link will take you to the post with the poll where you can cast your vote. The post also contains links to the individual stories. After voting, readers can — if so moved — spread the news about the story to friends and family. Or, not. But, we hope for yes.

So . . . “what’s that?”

“What’s that?” — No. 1

Well, give it a guess in the comments if you think you know.

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To bee, wasp, or not bumblebee — “H” stories voting reminder

On my previous bug post HERE <<<this is a link I mentioned I used to photograph bugs . . . and if one wants a bit of proof, I have a SmugMug Folder <<<this is a link dedicated just to bugs.

Side note: some might wonder why I started adding “<<<this is a link” after links. Well, it turns out that if you read these posts on a phone — and depending on the browser — you might not see the underline signifying a link. Of course, the capitalized word should be a big hint, but some links are tied words in a sentence. I figure pointing to the link will increase the chance that someone who might be interested will recognize it as such.

Anyway, while not bad, I wasn’t super-thrilled with those photos. That’s why I went out a week later and snapped additional shots with more care and purpose.

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Topaz Plugins itsy bitsy spider and a “H” stories voting reminder

Here’s a quick reminder to please — if so inclined — read the “H” Alphabet Challenge Stories. After, if receptive to the idea, the writers hope you’ll make the effort and vote for your favorite HERE.<<<this is a link

Clicking on the link will magically transport you to a post. There, you ‘ll find the poll where you can vote for your favorite of the three stories. Unless you want to deprive your friends of the experience, you can share that link and help expand the readership. if we say so ourselves — and we have to — most of the stories aren’t that bad.

If you’ve already voted, thank you. If you’ve already asked friends and family to read and vote, thank you again.

So, itsy bitsy spider . . . Two days ago, I told the tale (<<<this is a link) of me hurting a spider, likely breaking one of its legs. As I said, I rarely (intentionally) hurt spiders. But, I do intentionally post-process their photos with effects I find interesting. Today, I’m using a few Topaz Labs Plugins and Standalone Apps.

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Monochrome itsy bitsy spider and a “H” stories voting reminder

Here’s a quick reminder to please — if so inclined — read the “H” Alphabet Challenge Stories. After, if receptive to the idea, the writers hope you’ll make the effort and vote for your favorite HERE.<<<this is a link

That post links to the individual stories and it’s where you ‘ll find the poll where readers can click a box and vote for their favorite. If you have friends (I mean, even I have a few, so I imagine most readers have many, many friends), you can share that link and help expand the readership. I mean, we’re not professional writers, but there’s usually at least one decent story in the bunch.

If you’ve already voted, thank you. If you’ve asked friends and family to read and vote, you’re an angel, or maybe a saint, or just a swell person, and we thank you.

Anyway, monochrome itsy bitsy spider . . . Yesterday, I told the tale (<<<this is a link) of me hurting a spider, likely breaking one of its legs. I don’t know much about a spider’s healing abilities, but I hope they heal and that Lefty healed quickly.

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Itsy bitsy spider, feeling terrible, and a “H” stories voting reminder

Here’s a quick reminder to — if so inclined — please read the “H” Alphabet Challenge Stories. After, if receptive to the idea, the writers hope you’ll make the effort and vote for your favorite HERE.<<<this is a link

That post has links to the individual stories and the poll where readers can click a box to indicate their appreciation for their favorite. If you have friends (I mean, even I have a few, so I imagine most readers have many, many friends), you can share that link and help expand the readership. I mean, we’re not professional writers, but there’s usually at least one decent story in the bunch.

If you’ve already voted, thank you.

Oh, yeah . . . the writers encourage you to, you know, like, share these stories with friends and families. I mean, only if you agree any of the stories are worth reading, of course. That would be swell, we think.

Anyway, itsy bitsy spider . . . and why I feel terrible . . .

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More Old Favorites and Another Reminder to Vote

If you haven’t yet done so — and if so inclined — please take a few minutes (about 15-20 minutes) and read the three stories in THIS post and then, if feeling charitable, please cast your vote for one of them (the survey is after the stories).

Also, if you are associated with the publishing industry (editor, published author, agent, etc.) and would like to volunteer as a judge to help us confer our Professional Recognition Award, please drop me a line or leave a comment. Thank you.

And that’s enough of that . . .

The following photos are the rest of the photos I had processed a few days ago. I posted the first set yesterday. Some of these photos show different poses of the same subjects . . .

And some are new subjects . . .

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Old Favorites and a Reminder to Vote

If you haven’t yet done so — and if so inclined — please take a few minutes (about 15-20 minutes) and read the three stories in THIS post and then, if feeling charitable, please cast your vote for one of them (the survey is after the stories).

Also, if you are professionally associated with the publishing industry (editor, published author, agent, etc.) and would like to volunteer as a judge for our Professional Recognition Award, please drop me a line or leave a comment. Thank you.

And that’s enough of that . . .

I’ve got this itch, you see . . . no, nothing medical. I have lots of pretty good photos (my opinion and not necessarily shared by the public) going back to 2002, when I purchased my first digital camera, the Nikon D100.

I’ve recently mentioned processing tools have exponentially improved since then and that has me looking back at photos I like but were marred by bad lighting, limited equipment, user error, and limited operator skills. Many of these I’ve already published here or on Smugmug, but always with the disclaimer and apology for the poor quality.

Well, I’m going back and revisiting some of these and processing them in Topaz Sharpen AI, Topaz Adjust AI, Skylum Luminar 4, and Skylum Aurora HDR.

For instance, this cardinal was photographed through a double-pane plate window at my Franklin (Michigan) home . . .

Prior versions have always been “soft” and somewhat unsatisfactory to my critical eye.

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Old Hawk and Reminder to Vote

Twenty-three visitors viewed the 1500 words challenge post but only two voted. I mean, I get it; it was a holiday. An eating holiday, at that. In retrospect, that wasn’t what one might call good timing. Same for today; people immersed in a spending frenzy aren’t likely to spend their break reading stories and pondering on the relative merits of the narratives before casting a vote.

Still, them Readers Awards won’t mean much if there are no actual readers voting. So, if you can muster the physical and mental energy for it, please read the short stories and cast your vote before noon, December 4th. 

At 1,500 words, reading each story should take no more than seven minutes to read and I realize that’s a huge time commitment in these days of near-instant gratification.

And that’s enough of that . . .

Today’s post is about an old hawk. Not age-wise old; photo old, as in 2012. This was a rare capture for me; a hawk who dropped from above onto a random spot in the snow. I missed the actual moment, but I have the aftermath . . .

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The Seed and I

I might have mentioned (once or twice) I like sitting out back, under the covered porch, camera in hand, coffee by my side.

A few days ago, I was joined by a seed. A Milkweed seed, as best as I can tell. Side note: Milkweed plants are essential for the Monarch Butterfly (HERE, HERE, HERE). Well, this gave me the perfect opportunity to try out a piece of wood I’ve been preparing for use in macro photography.

That’s a curved decorative piece of wood (about 8″ x 8″) I bought at a garage sale for about $1 (or maybe less)

It was in poor shape before I repaired a few scratches, removed a few stains, sanded it as smooth as I could, and sprayed with six coats of matte black paint. The idea was (is) to provide a curved surface for photography so as to minimize reflections, seams, and other background distractions when shooting macros.

Unfortunately, when it comes to paint, matte is not the same as flat so there’s still more sheen than what I want. Also, despite the visual inspection, photographically the surface is neither as smooth or unblemished as it looks, as we shall see.

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Blackberries Moment

For them not interested in reading, you can go directly to the SmugMug Gallery HERE.  

For a SmugMug slideshow click HERE. When you click the link, it will open in a new window and you have two options:
1) Manually scroll through the photos by clicking the “<” and “>” symbols to the left or right of the photos.
2) There’s a PLAY/PAUSE button at the bottom-left of the screen with the transition set at about 5 seconds. Note: clicking the PLAY arrow will run a full-screen slideshow. You can then still use the”<” and “>” symbols to the left or right of the photos as this will pause the slideshow.

If you want the full experience, keep reading. You can click on individuals photos to open a larger version in a separate tab or window.

~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~

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Haines – Alaska Cruise 2017 – Part 3

Note: this is a long post. I mean it; long, long, long post. If you just want the photos, go to the bottom and check out the gallery sans the witty, incisive, profound, and irreverent banter.

This is the third and final post documenting our September 12, 2017, visit to Haines, Alaska, a long-delayed continuation of my documentation of our 2017 Alaska Cruise. Previous posts relating to this cruise is HERE. The following introduction is the same as that of previous posts so that’s something else you can skip.

There’s a gallery at the end of each post and a SmugMug gallery HERE. Photos in SmugMug can be viewed full-size. Note that the SmugMug gallery will contain all the photos from Haines; those from this post (Part 3) and those of the previous two posts.

You can click on the photos in the body of this post to see a larger-but-less-than-full-size-version. If there’s a panorama, I’ll link the full-size files but be warned . . . they’re typically huge. Huger than people have ever seen before. Don’t click on those links unless you’re enjoying a biggly Interweb connection. Also, if you have biggly Interweb but you’re reading this on a phone — which is sad; VERY SAD — I wouldn’t bother with the full-size photos because they are HUGE; huger than anyone else’s huge photos. 

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Haines – Alaska Cruise 2017 – Part 2

Note: this is a long post. If you just want the photos, go to the bottom and check out the gallery sans the witty, incisive, profound, and irreverent banter.

This is the second post documenting our September 12, 2017, visit to Haines, Alaska, a long-delayed continuation of my documentation of our 2017 Alaska Cruise. Previous posts relating to this cruise can be found HERE. The following introduction is the same as that post so that’s something else you can skip.

There’s a gallery at the end of this first post and a SmugMug gallery HERE. Photos in SmugMug can be viewed full-size. Note that the SmugMug gallery will contain all the photos from Haines; those from this post (Part 2) will be in there when the post goes live and those of the next post(s) (Part(s) 3(4,5,n+1)) I’ll add as those posts go live.

You can click on the photos in the body of the post to see a larger-but-less-than-full-size-version. If there’s a panorama, I’ll link the full-size files but be warned . . . they’re typically huge. Huger than people have ever seen before. Don’t click on those links unless you’re enjoying a biggly Interweb connection. Also, if you have biggly Interweb but you’re reading this on a phone — which is sad; VERY SAD — I wouldn’t bother with the full-size photos because they are HUGE; huger than anyone else’s huge photos. 

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Haines – Alaska Cruise 2017 – Part 1

Note: this is a long post. If you just want the photos, go to the bottom and check out the gallery sans the witty, incisive, profound, and irreverent banter.

This is the first post documenting our September 12, 2017, visit to Haines, Alaska, a long-delayed continuation of my documentation of our 2017 Alaska Cruise. Previous posts relating to this  cruise can be found HERE.

There’s a gallery at the end of this first post and a SmugMug gallery HERE. Photos in SmugMug can be viewed full-size. Note that the SmugMug gallery will contain all the photos from Haines; those from this post (Part 1) will be in there when the post goes live and those of the next post(s) (Part(s) 2(3,4,n+1)) I’ll add as those posts go live.

You can click on the photos in the body of the post to see a larger-but-less-than-full-size-version. If there’s a panorama, I’ll link the full-size files but be warned . . . they’re typically huge. Huger than people have ever seen before. Don’t click on those links unless you’re enjoying a biggly Interweb connection. Also, if you have biggly Interweb but you’re reading this on a phone — which is sad; VERY SAD — I wouldn’t bother with the full-size photos because they are HUGE; huger than anyone else’s huge photos. 

Continue reading →