View 48: Do the Dew!

Mountain Dew bottles moving down a conveyor to be shipped out to stores.

I work for a soda (or pop or soda pop or just coke depending on where you live) bottler near Syracuse, New York. The other day I went out and took some pictures around the plant. I enjoy capturing motion in my photography and the Mountain Dew bottles were flying down the conveyor belts which made for some great shots. If you have never tried panning to show motion, it is a fun and valuable technique to learn. Click here for a short article I wrote on panning.

View 47: Silk & Satin Jazz

Silk & Satin Jazz group performing at C. W. Baker High School, Baldwinsville, New York.

The C. W. Baker High School’s awarding winning Silk & Satin Jazz Ensemble is the source of much pride in the Music department. I was fortune enough to be at their recent craft show when they gave one of their performances. During one of the songs, they brought out the Bass player and I caught this great shot of everyone following their Director, Colin Keating.

In photographs of people, the eyes really do tell the tale, don’t they?

Photographing Christmas Lights

Yeah, I know. It’s not even Thanksgiving and here I am talking about Christmas. Unless you live far away from any town, village or city, at least, in the United States, you’ve seen Christmas stuff in the stores since mid-September so I feel I can start a little early, too.

As some of you may know, I contribute to a Disney blog about photography. It’s called Picture This! and is hosted by Deb Wills’ AllEars.net website. (If any of you are thinking or planning a trip to Walt Disney World, Deb’s site is the place to start. If you go there, feel free to tell Deb I sent you!) Back to business…

This week I posted a blog entry on Picture This! about taking pictures of Christmas Lights at Disney (click the link to read it). However, the links, tips and examples I give can be used for any outdoor light display so I thought I’d share the article here.

Do you have any tips, links, resources or examples which we can all learn from for capturing the upcoming holidays?  If you do, share them with us by leaving a comment here.

View 46: Locked Memories

We all have them. Locked memories we don’t want to remember but somehow come out when we least expect them to. I recently visited my high school during a craft show and wandered off down one of the hallways I used to walk some 30 years ago. Brought back good times and bad times. Teenage years have many of both kinds of memories. Having the 50mm f/1.8 on my camera, I leaned down a bit and shot this extreme selective focus shot which captured where I want to keep those locked memories…

Lockers in C. W. Baker High School, Baldwinsville, New York.

October Photographic

Wrapping up the photographic month of October 2008 with some additional photographs from upstate New York, more information and links. If you like this one, check out my other Photo Essays here.

View 45: November Sunset

Sunset over Onondaga Lake from Onondaga Lake Park on November 2, 2008.

The color of October has gone to be replaced by the stark beauty of November trees prepared for the long winter months ahead. I took a sunrise of Onondaga Lake in the Spring when the light was much different.