Spring Flowers

March 23, 2009

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I just love the first flowers of spring.  My garden has lovely spring bulbs that are blooming, and with the help of my little 3-year-old assistant, I was able to grab a few fun macro shots.  These flowers just have the most amazing details.  For my fellow photographers–these are all in full sun, shot using a golden reflector and my little assistant serving as a gobo to block direct sunlight.  That setup allowed me to grab better detail with my 100mm macro lens.

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Posted 15 years ago at 10:32 am.

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Snowy Macros

March 2, 2009



Today’s snow inspired me to pull out my macro lens (which allows me to take extreme closeups/magnified images). Snow seems to make anything, even a dead leaf, look fresh and clean.


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Posted 15 years ago at 10:44 pm.

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India, Part 4: The Culture and History

January 25, 2009

After spending time in the big city of Mumbai (India’s New York), and then at the beach in Goa, we took a tour of the state of Karnataka aboard the new Golden Chariot luxury train. The historic stone cities were simply stunning, and the culture that we encountered along the way was always intriguing. Above you see the work animals painted and decorated in honor of the pongol festival. The day we arrived in Mysore, we were surprised to find pink and yellow cows all over the city.

The ruins of the city of Hampi were definitely one of the highlights of the tour. It is no wonder that it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site. Not only the intracately carved temples and buildings, but the actual landscape it was built on make for a breathtaking view.

The sculpture carved into the granite in the cave temples has withstood hundred of years of weather and war.

Fishing boats–I loved the colors.


The temple complex in Hampi lit up just for our group. For my fellow Nikonians, this was ISO 3200 on the D300, handheld.

The government of Karnataka has a policy of getting schoolchildren out to visit their historic sites. We encountered many of them along our tour. These are at in Pattadakal.

This was one of the “menace monkeys” we encountered on the way to the cave temples. They will steal even your water bottles are you walk by.

The stone temple complexes not only served as cultural centers, but also stored literature in carvings on the exterior walls.

And finally, one of the few Asian elephants we encountered on our trip. This one was at the Bandipur National Park. We spent an evening at a safari resort there, and got to go on a short safari tour. We saw some elephants, peacocks, two different types of deer, an eagle and many kingfishers, monkeys, and warthogs. We looked hard for a tiger, but no luck.

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Posted 15 years, 2 months ago at 3:46 pm.

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India, Part 3: The Beaches

January 23, 2009

We had the opportunity to spend a few days at the beach in the former Portuguese colony of Goa. The beach in Calangute was a lot of fun, with “shack” restaurants lining sand, and free, comfortable sunbeds that came with chair-side service. The water was just the perfect temperature for swimming and wasn’t plagued with Jellyfish like the East Coast beaches can be.



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Posted 15 years, 2 months ago at 1:20 pm.

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