What a Christmas!

This year, Christmas was a bit hectic, but as always, and despite numerous hurdles, it was great. I was on call for work, my wife didn’t get to make the yearly Dallas trip with me and since the kids were already there visiting grandma and grandpa (Sarah’s parents), I had to make sure and get there for the opening of presents. So, I got up at 3:30am Saturday morning and left for Dallas right at 4am. I got there just in time! We all played and talked until about 11:30am, then I hit the road heading back to Austin so I could spend the rest of the day with Sarah. It was a LONG day, but in the end the timing was perfect and it all went off without a hitch (minus a few minutes spent with Highway Patrol between Temple and Austin on the way home. They are always SO nice!).

While in Dallas, I decided to pull out the camera for a little bit. These are ALL candid, and all shot w/ the 30D on manual and either an 18-55 + wide angle adapter, or a 50/1.8. Two things to say about my daughter’s pics. First, notice the left over waffles around her mouth? My bad. Sarah always teases me because when I take pics of Josie, it is often after she eats, and hindsight is when I finally realize she had food all over her mouth. Honestly though, this has happened so much, it’s kind of her style. The pics wouldn’t be the same without the leftovers. lol Secondly, her haircut. She did it herself! Well, started it anyway. That haircut was the only possible recovery, and even then it’s not quite right. Oh well, such are the antics of 3yo little girls… lol

Here are a few pics that I thought you all might like… Also, bonus kittens at the very bottom!

Bonus Kittens!!!

I haven’t posted in a while, so I thought I’d throw these up. They are from a few months ago, and while I didn’t plan on sharing them, here we are. I am not extremely happy with these, but they will do. I need to get out and shoot and get back in the grove, then I’ll have some decent shots to share with everyone. Anyway, on the the pics…

Yup.

I posted a while back about the Best Camera project and community that Chase Jarvis and crew have build, and I’d thought I’d share some of my pics related to that. It’s been a while since I have posted here, so this seems like a good reason. This whole ‘movement’ seems to be really taking off, which is pretty cool in my opinion, and it shows that there is merit to art made with a limited medium.

I have been participating in Best Camera with various phones and iPods since my last post on the subject, all of which can be seen HERE, and then last week I picked up a 4th Generation iPod Touch. The new Touch has both a front and rear facing camera built in, so finally I can participate from the iPod itself, no matter where I am (using my phone as a WiFi router).

Here are some of the pics I have taken w/ the new iPod Touch, hope you enjoy!

This first picture is easily one of my favorites with this new device, and maybe even of any device. It is absolutely my style; super contrasty, a bit cross colored, a very ‘me’ composition, etc. I just love the shot, which is why it’s first… lol

Just wanted to share a few more pics, all from last week. Again, no names or places, just pics. I do, however, want to give a shout out to a good friend of mine. He let me borrow a couple of lenses for this project, and it helped out a great deal. Please, when you have a few minutes, check out his site. He is VERY good, and he will shoot just about anything you might need him too. You can see his work, as well as contact him via his website.

On to the pics:

I just wanted to share a few of the pictures from last week. I took these out at the “Pole Farm”, and it was a lot of fun. We had to do this around 1pm, and the Texas sun was absolutely horrible. It is somewhat of a miracle that these came out at all with the abusive lighting, but in the end, I am actually pretty happy with them. They stay true to my style, being very contrasty and saturated, so the outcome is acceptable, in my opinion. Anyway, on to the pics…

Well, it’s been over a month since my last post, so I think it’s about time. I know, I know, FAIL. I’ll try a little harder in the future to bring posts more often… Anyway, here we go. I am working on a project, which I can’t really go into detail about right now, but it involves me taking pictures of people. No names, no places, just pics (for this post). I also can’t share a number of the shots because they contain sensitive information, but the ones I can share are below. I like these a lot, especially considering the cramped space and HORRIBLE lighting that I had to work with!

These were all taken with my 30D and a Canon 50/1.8. A couple are using an external flash bounced off the ceiling, and the others are natural/available light…   (100 points if you can tell me which ones are which lighting)

And here is my hilarious friend Jessica. She’s ‘ganagsta’…   hahaha

My wife and I both grew up in Dallas, then moved to Austin around 10 years ago. We are in agreement that the clouds we see around Austin, and near our house in Elgin, are different from those in Dallas. We have no explanation as to why, and we may be way off base, but they really do seem ‘different’. That is part of the reason why you see so many shots from me that include clouds. I am a big fan of them, especially here, and in photos…

I took these from my back porch. The clouds looked cool that night, and almost ominous, so it seemed like a good opportunity for a few shots. These were taken with the Canon 40D + 18-55 + wide angle adapter…

I just wanted to share these two shots from last night. I took these near Elgin, kind of in the middle of nowhere. Both were taken with the Canon 40D + 18-55 w/ wide angle lens adapter… I hope you enjoy them…

Just a sunrise from the other morning. It was nice a foggy, and I loved the way it looked in the distance, so I took advantage… Here ya go…

Early this month, my daughter turned 3 years old, and I can’t believe how fast the time went by! She is SO big, and I am so proud of her (and my son of course!). I just thought I’d share a few pictures from her birthday. I took a lot more, but these are my favorites…

Canon 40D + Canon 28/1.8