Happy 4th of July!

Canon 7D, Raw, EF75-300mm lens, 205mm, f/9, 1/400, ISO 200

This is my nephew Caleb’s first 4th of July Party. As you can tell, he loves the water! He is 8 months old now. Here is a photo I took of him at 2 weeks old. He has the most gorgeous blue eyes and blond hair now. He looked like he was going to be a redhead! Anyway, I took a lot of photos and this was one of my favorites. I just did a little fill light in Camera Raw then a levels adjustment in Photoshop. Since I used my telephoto lens, I was able to take a lot of good candid shots. 

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Blowing in the Summer Breeze

Canon 20D, Raw, f4.0, 1/400, ISO 100 55 mm, Nik Film Effect Velvia 100 Filter

Willie and I were outside with the dogs this afternoon in the backyard. I looked over at this large “bush” of basil growing next to a pot of geraniums. The sun was shining from the back and the breeze was blowing the flowers. It reminded me of wheat in a field blowing in a field. I hope you can get an idea of what I saw from this image. I took several and this was the one that was the closest to what I saw.

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Game of Cricket in Long Beach?

I was in Long Beach this afternoon at Marina Pacific Park to take photographs at a baby shower. Next to us, at the other end of the park, was a cricket game going on. I have never seen this before except on TV. I was not expecting it today. I did not know cricket was played at this park. It was a good day and we (Willie and I) took a lot of photographs.

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A Huntington Beach Sunset

We went down to the beach at the end of Warner Ave. There are not a lot of people there so it was very nice and cool. I took my camera, of course, and got this great sunset shot. I hope you like it. There were some waves and it had something to do with a “high” coming and  settleing on the coast. I don’t really understand all of that stuff. I just like the results! Good use of rule of thirds horizontally, but not so much vertically!

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Donnan and Kyla, Shampooed and Beautiful

It was so very hard getting this photo of Kyla and Donnan today. We took them out to the front yard and there are just too many distractions out there! I waited until late in the day because I believe it must have been the hottest day of the year here. They were washed and fluff dried two days ago so I guess I should have taken the photo then (or at least brushed them first)! Oh well – I tried. It is hard to get them looking in the same direction let alone directly at me at the same time!

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Dana Point Harbor

Here is another view of Dana Point Harbor taken at a later time in the evening than the one from a week ago. You can really see a difference in the sky as the sun is at a very low angle. I realize it is somewhat blown out but I really wanted to get a photo from this angle. The Charthouse Restaurant where we ate dinner that night is up on the hill. What an evening we had!

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Sweet and Juicy Purple Grapes

I bought a lot of fruit at the grocery store today. I thought these beautiful grapes that I rinsed off for Willie to enjoy, would look very nice held up with some sun shining through. I think it worked out alright, what do you think? To me they look very tempting and oh so good! I purchased many other fresh fruits and vegetables today. We will enjoy them all!

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Does This Look Like Fun?

Isn’t this a great looking fountain? What is odd about it is it’s location. It is in the middle of the food court at Irvine Spectrum. In itself, that is not so odd. But the fact that children are allowed to put on swimming suits or run through naked is the really odd part of it. There are a lot of tables there for people to sit, have a bite to eat, and ignore their unruly children running and playing in the water. There are a few kids in this photo, although I don’t think you can see them!

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An Evening in Dana Point

Had a great evening with friends at the Charthouse down in Dana Point. Our friend Merle wanted to go there so we could see the sunset over the ocean. Not quite a sunset, but a great view! This photo depicts the view we saw! It was beautiful! Larry and Shelley were going to go also, but he called me today and said that Shelley is not feeling well. We will see both of them (I hope) at lunch tomorrow for Willie’s dads’ birthday, his 87th. Not quite sure where we are going yet! 

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Downtown Laguna Beach

This is a nice shot of downtown Laguna Beach at the intersection of Ocean and PCH (Pacific Coast Hwy). It is late in the day as you can tell by the long shadows. I love all the colors here, from the houses on the hills to the businesses on the streets, not to mention the people from all over the world. You hear many languages spoken as you walk around. It is a fun place to be and there is so much to see. The ocean, of course, is at my back!

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My HDR Orchid

 Not that long ago we thought the orchid was dying. I asked Willie to cut it down because it was getting so tall. He put off doing it and then, surprise, surprise, a bud appeared on the top! I thought it might be fun to try another HDR image. I got the tripod out and put a white board behind it. Willie held a piece of cardboard to try to block the breeze. It worked at the top but there is some movement at the bottom. I used five images in this process. That gives me more info to work with than just using three images.

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Laguna Beach Sunset

Isn’t this a beautiful sunset? The silhouette turned out great after a few Photoshop adjustments. Is that cheating? I don’t think so. All of us photographers use Photoshop! I just made it more of a silhouette so no one would be recognized. I confess, I took it at the PhotoWalk last month. It is on my gallery pages in its original form. You can check it out there. The individual PhotoWalk winners are out now and the overall winner will be announced soon.

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210 Freeway and the Gold Line

When I walked up to take a look at the station from above the underpass, it was very noisy and a little scary! It is pretty narrow up there, and the freeway is so close!  I was looking down the tracks to see if a train was coming and I couldn’t see one. As I was half way down the stairs, I heard the train. I don’t know if I should have been happy or mad! That probably would have been more scary!

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Lensbaby Macro Shot

I am so proud of this photograph! I thought I would try my +10 macro filter on my Lensbaby 2.0. I had only used the +4 macro filter before. Now the +10 is  my favorite. I was finally able to get a good focal point and so lucky I was able to get this bee. Isn’t it great? When I went outside, there were a few bees buzzing around my basil plant that is very large and has a lot of flowers on it. I will work on getting closer to the bee next time, but they really like to buzz around a lot!

This is a great Lensbaby macro photo…

We had some of the fresh basil from that plant on the spaghetti I made earlier in the week. It was great! The day started out very overcast and even a little chilly. I have been waking up early, so when I went out to get the newspaper at 5:30, it was pretty cool outside, and oh so nice and quiet! Willie took the dogs for a good walk today at Central Park. He said Donnan was really good until they went into the dog park. Why can’t he learn from Kyla? Willie said Kyla kept an eye on Donnan and didn’t go very far away from him. The Dodger’s are playing the Cardinals – has not been a good series for them! We’ll see how it goes!

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A Bright Summer Sunflower

This is a big sunflower growing in Larry and Shelley’s backyard. Shelley said they are very easy to grow and that they grow very fast.  They have quite a few that they have planted and also some that have been started by birds dropping seeds. The colors are so pretty and bright. Aren’t they a beautiful  part of summer? This coming Saturday they are having a family barbecue and I am looking forward to seeing everyone I haven’t seen since the wedding in May!

A beautiful sign of summer…

Yellow was always a favorite color of my mother’s. She would have really enjoyed these flowers. I took some time today to look at some of the other PhotoWalk photos from around the world. There are some beautiful images and I am very honored to be a part of such a wonderful thing. I spent some time on my gallery today and added some images. They were galleries I had on my website but I am putting everything  on the new site. They do a nice job of presenting the slide shows. I have a little more work to do and soon I will launch the new look of my website!

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My Very Last PhotoWalk Image (I Promise!)

Today was the last day to download our photos to the PhotoWalk site. I had some work to do and decisions to make as to what two photos I chose. This was not one of them. I also selected 16 or 17 images from the PhotoWalk and put them on my gallery site. Please have a look. I have shown you a few of them here, but the majority of them you have not seen. I decided to put together this panorama today. I am happy with the result.

Laguna Beach twilight panorama…

There were a lot of families at the beach having a real good time. As you can see, this is a South facing beach. The sun is setting straight ahead in the West. As I said before, I spent the majority of the day sitting in front of the computer. I was able to make some spaghetti sauce for dinner. It was very good with angel hair pasta and a little garlic toast. I am a good cook – have I ever told you that? I learned a lot from my mother and I enjoy watching the Food Network and the cooking shows on PBS. Have a good Sunday!

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