360 Bar light adjustment

iPhone 7, cropped and altered

For my 365th day in a row, I went in search of a scene with “365” in it. And I ended up settling for 360.

Cropped and straightened, this wasn’t a bad shot. Except for one thing: to get the light levels adjusted properly for the shot as a whole, I had to make the interesting part (the folks behind the counter) too dark.

Enter Photoshop. I masked off the stand’s window (easy enough, as it was close to a simple rectangle). Then I could adjust the light levels separately.

For my blog, this wasn’t a problem at all. But if I took this picture for a newspaper, odds are this kind of alteration would be considered an ethics violation. Even though the result produced a photo that accurately reproduced what I saw when I took it, masking is considered a slippery slope for folks whose reputations depend on publication of unaltered images.

Here’s the photo as shot:

iPhone 7

Best of the 365 Blog - April 2017

April was a quiet month, mostly spent at work or at home.

A cat toy abandoned on a heating grate made an interesting study in patterns and lines.

iPhone 7

This is a close up of gel pens in a rack. I used an off-camera flash to get the odd side lighting.

Nikon D7000, 80mm (35-80), 1/125, f/32, ISO 200

When I moved the bird seed boxes off their shelf to refill them, I found an interesting example of texture and rule of thirds.

iPhone 7

I got a mini fridge for my office, just big enough for six cans of DMD.

iPhone 7

April 15 found us back at the ballpark for another season in the sun. This is the well-worn number on the back of my seat.

iPhone 7

Easter eggs, naturally.

Nikon D7000, 45mm (35-80), 1/1250, f/4.2, ISO 200

Here’s something I’d never seen before: two pennies in a Ziploc bag of water, hanging above the drive-thru window at China Feast. We looked it up later and found that it was there for good luck and good fortune.

iPhone 7

It seemed like this might be useful photo clip art for future projects.

iPhone 7

Easter eggs

Nikon D7000, 45mm (35-80), 1/1000, f/4.2, ISO 200

Happy Easter!

A carton of Easter eggs gave me an opportunity to do a little selective focus. With the aperture open that wide, the depth of field is fairly narrow. It’s a nice effect, particularly with the spring green in the background.

Pens and bottles (flash and transparency)

Nikon D7000, 42mm (35-80), 1/125, f/25, ISO 200

This week I decided to play around a little with off-camera flash. I also wanted to shoot some pictures of subjects with a mix of color and transparency.

The photo above is a close up of a rack of pens. I put the flash off to the right and triggered it using a remote.

The photo below is of colorful bottles on a glass shelf. The flash is below the shelf.

Nikon D7000, 42mm (35-80), 1/125, f/25, ISO 200

Best of the 365 Blog – March 2017

No dramatic spring break photos this year (we stayed put for the whole week). But a few good ones from our regular environs.

On the drive to work I noticed that someone placed a birdhouse in one of the trees between the highway and the river.

Nikon D7000, 28mm (28-200), 1/250, f/8, ISO 200

Sunbeam cat. A rare good shot from the iPad.

iPad Pro

Clipboard in a paper rack.

iPhone 7

The Kansas City Rowing Club’s dock, on the day we cleaned the boat yard. This was my first time out there in more than a year.

iPhone 7

Glass skull, close up.

iPhone 7

A lion from the Pompeii exhibit at Union Station.

iPhone 7

Toward the end of the month I did a whole week of cats. Usually cat pictures are a sure sign that I didn’t photograph anything out in the world and needed a photo op somewhere around the house. But for these seven days I concentrated specifically on our feline friends and family members. This is the Dutchess, an outdoor stray in the mood to pose for a picture.

Nikon D7000, 80mm (35-80), 1/200, f/5.6, ISO 400, cropped

 And at long last spring is officially upon us.

Nikon D7000, 300mm (75-300), 1/40, f/5.6, ISO 100

Theme Week: Cats

Nikon D7000, 80mm (35-80), 1/200, f/5.6, ISO 400, cropped

Here’s a couple of things you don’t see much from me. First, I typically take pictures of my cats only when they’re being especially cute or when I need a photo for the day. And second, I don’t generally do “theme weeks” on the 365 blog.

But this week was different. It started out with a particularly good photo of The Dutchess, one of the neighborhood strays we’ve been feeding. [subsequent note: the cat died a few days after this photo was taken] And in our own family, Anna Marie’s room got a new door, replacing the baby gate we’d been using.

iPhone 7

iPhone 7 (cropped)

iPhone 7

iPhone 7

iPhone 7

iPhone 7

Pompeii exhibit

Today Ken and I went to the Pompeii exhibit at Union Station. Fascinating stuff.

But after getting stuck lugging a useless camera around the non-phone-photography-forbidden Body Worlds exhibit, we opted to leave the serious equipment at home. Imagine my dismay when I saw at least one of our fellow patrons shooting merrily away with an SLR (though I don’t know if he was allowed to or if he was just doing it anyway).

To spare myself some captioning, all these photos were taken with an iPhone 7.