WildOats

One of the great things about digital photography is the instant feedback you get. You shoot a pic and then immediately look at that little screen on the back of the camera. Back in the film days there was no way to do that. You shot the pic and had to wait about a week to see what you got. What a difference.

Now you can look at that tiny screen and see what’s going on. You can see if everyone’s head is really in the frame. You can see is your focus is right. You can see if your exposure is right. Lots of info instantly for you to see.

One of the things I’m starting to look into using on that screen is the histogram. It’s kind of a diagram thingy that shows up. It helps you determine if your exposure is good or if you need to tweak it a bit and shoot again. When you see this histogram you see little curves on the screen. If the curves are all bunched up and mostly to the left, you’re probably under exposing the shot. If they’re all bunched up and mostly to the right, you’re probably over exposing the shot.

It is more complicated than that, but that’s the basics of it. I’ve been trying to use this little tool to get my exposures more correct. It actually does work. You can tweak the settings shoot again, and see on your screen, what the tweaking actually did. You can see your shot either get lighter or darker. I got that idea down. Now I’m just fine tuning the practice of it, and refining my technique. More learning to be done.

No….. I’m not talking about the thing you put quarters into to park. No…. I’m not talking about the thing the guy reads before you get your water bill. I’m talking about that thing in your camera that determines what your exposure should be.

What’s exposure? Well exposure is the amount of light that gets into your camera and falls onto your sensory. If it’s too much light, your pic is over exposed. If not enough light gets in, your pic is under exposed. Gee wasn’t that simple huh?

The exposure depends on 3 things. Your Aperture (how wide open your lens is) and the Shutter Speed (how fast the lens opens and closes) and your ISO (how sensitive the sensor is to light). Balance those three things correctly, and your scene is exposed properly in your pic. It gets more complicated than that, but that’s the basics.

The camera also has 3 different ways of metering. Spot Metering is when only a very small spot out of the whole image is metered. The rest of the image is not metered. Then there’s Matrix Metering where the camera looks at the whole image and takes everything into consideration, the highlights, the shadows, what’s actually in the image. This is the method I’ve been using since I got this camera. The final way it meters is by Center Weighted Metering. Here the camera looks at the whole image but gives the most weight to the center.

I have to say, so far I haven’t really tried anything but the Matrix Metering. It’s the default when you get the camera, and I haven’t changed it. But as I was taking pics the other day it came to me. When I take the close up pics of flowers and stuff, why don’t I used the Center Weighted Metering? After all, the close ups fill the whole frame, and the center is usually the most important part.

So I changed my technique, and tired the Center Weighted thing out. I have to say, so far it’s kinda been a struggle. I’ve gotten some ok pics, but a lot were not right. I guess I’ll have to play with this and see if I get better at it. The theory makes sense and all, but the practice part isn’t there yet….lol. Also….sometimes it’s the operator and not the camera. Anyway, I’ll continue to give a go, and see what happens. Can’t learn unless you try.

Just some yucks for the day. Enjoy!!

We had to have the garage door repaired. The Sears repairman told us that one of our problems was that we did not have a “large” enough motor on the opener. I thought for a minute and said that we had the largest one Sears made at that time, a 1/2 horsepower. He shook his head and said, “Lady, you need a 1/4 horsepower.” I responded that 1/2 was larger than 1/4. He said, “NO, it’s not.” Four is larger than two..” We haven’t used Sears repair since.

IDIOT SIGHTING My daughter and I went through the McDonald’s take-out window, and I gave the clerk a $5 bill. Our total was $4.25, so I also handed her a quarter. She said, “You gave me too much money.” I said, “Yes, I know, but this way you can just give me a dollar bill back.” She sighed and went to get the manager who asked me to repeat my request. I did so, and he handed me back the quarter, and said, “We’re sorry, but we cannot do that kind of thing.” The clerk then proceeded to give me back $1 and 75 cents in change. Do not confuse the clerks at McD’s.

IDIOT SIGHTING: I live in a semi-rural area. We recently had a new neighbor call the local township administrative office to request the removal of the DEER CROSSING sign on our road. The reason: “Too many deer are being hit by cars out here! I don’t think this is a good place for them to be crossing any more.” From Kingman , KS

IDIOT SIGHTING IN FOOD SERVICE: My daughter went to a local Taco Bell and ordered a taco. She asked the person behind the counter for “minimal lettuce.” He said he was sorry, but they only had iceburg lettuce. From Kansas City

IDIOT SIGHTING: I was at the airport, checking in at the gate when an airport employee asked, “Has anyone put anything in your baggage without your knowledge?” To which I replied, “If it was without my knowledge, how would I know?” He smiled knowingly and nodded, “That’s why we ask.” Happened in Birmingham , AL

IDIOT SIGHTING : The stoplight on the corner buzzes when it’s safe to cross the street. I was crossing with an intellectually challenged coworker of mine. She asked if I knew what the buzzer was for. I explained that it signals blind people when the light is red. Appalled, she responded, “What on earth are blind people doing driving?!” She was a probation officer in Wichita , KS

IDIOT SIGHTING: At a good-bye luncheon for an old and dear coworker (She was leaving the company due to “downsizing”) our manager commented cheerfully, “This is fun. We should do this more often.” Not another word was spoken. We all just looked at each other with that deer-in-the-headlights stare. This was a lunch at Texas Instruments.

IDIOT SIGHTING: I work with an individual who plugged her power strip back into itself, and for the sake of her life couldn’t understand why her system would not turn on. A deputy with the Dallas County Sheriff’s office, no less.

IDIOT SIGHTING: When my husband and I arrived at an automobile dealership to pick up our car, we were told the keys had been locked in it. We went to the service department and found a mechanic working feverishly to unlock the driver’s side door. As I watched from the passenger side, I instinctively tried the door handle and discovered that it was unlocked. “Hey,” I announced to the technician, “it’s open!” His reply, “I know. I already got that side.” This was at the Ford dealership in Canton , MS

STAY ALERT! They walk among us… they REPRODUCE …and scariest of all, they VOTE

The digital age has ushered in a bunch of new things. At this point in time most things are now digital. Cell phones, land line phones are becoming digitized, cable tv, music, video you name it. Some of the stuff was an improvement over the old, some was not. Some of the things that were initially brought into the digital age were pretty crappy, but have gotten much better with time.A perfect example of that is digital cameras. I remember back in about 1996 or so I bought my first camera. It was an Olympus something or other. I forget the exact model. But anyway, I do remember that I paid about $900 for it. It wasn’t even 1 mega pixel. Lol….makes you laugh when you think about it now. It did take pics, but the quality of it wasn’t that great. Look how far digital cams have come. The improvement is huge.Digital cameras have a ton of advantages to them over the 35mm film camera. You can now do a lot of things that you couldn’t do with film cameras. But along with these perks come some annoyances as well. I just came across one of these little annoyances recently. Film cameras used film (hence the name). Digital cameras don’t use film, they have a sensor and memory cards, and a whole bunch of electronics.Due to the laws of physics, when you have electricity, you also have magnetism. Didn’t Einstein say something about electromagnetic forces? Anyway, with electricity you have magnetism. Big deal you say. Well it is, or at least it can be. Ever notice that in your computer room, or around your tv, you always have more dust then anywhere else? If you haven’t, check it out. You’ll see it. The magnetic fields of all those electronics attract tons of dust. And that is the exact same thing that happens in digital cameras. The electronics attract dust. Again you say big deal? Well it can be.The dust winds up eventually on your digital sensor. When that happens, you start to see dots or funny little spots on your pictures. The more dust bunnies that accumulate on your sensor, the more dots and specs you see on your pictures. That’s exactly what I saw just recently. I started to notice this one pretty big spot on all my pictures, in the same spot. It didn’t matter which lens I used, or what the pics were of. I always saw that one spot.So now what? Well you can either learn to live with it, or try to remove the spot. So I wanted to see what I could do to remove the dust bunny. Well it turns out there’s a few things you can try. I’ve never done anything with the inside of the camera, so I was a bit nervous. I didn’t want to ruin anything inside. It’s all delicate stuff.I read a bunch of stuff, and you are supposed to remove your lens, and then look inside. Inside the camera is a mirror, that reflects what comes in through the lens into the viewfinder. Behind that lens is where the film or sensor is. When you push the shutter, the mirror flips up, and the image is imprinted onto the sensor behind it. So you’re supposed to flip the mirror up, so I did, and right there was the sensor.The first step in removing the dust is to use a blower. It’s a bulb thing with a nozzle to aim the stream of air that comes out of it. You point the camera towards the floor so the dust can fall out of the camera if it dislodges, then give the sensor a good blow job with the air stream from the bulb blower.If that works and removes all the dust bunnies…..taa daa mission accomplished, you’re done. If not, then it gets much more complicated. You have to use liquids and solvents and wash the sensor. Scary stuff.So I did the blowing thing, and I lucked out. The dust is gone. I no longer get that spec on my pics. I was happy about that. I didn’t have to do the liquid washing of the sensor. I wasn’t sure I wanted to attempt it anyway. But for now I’m a happy camper.

Ever feel like things repeat over and over again? The same things happen day in and day out. Get up, go to work, come home, go to bed. Repeat. Kind of like that movie Ground Hog Day.

With that in mind, I decided to make that, the theme of my shooting today. Repeating patterns. As soon as I got outside, I did noticed another thing that has been repeating a lot lately. The wind. It’s been windy here for weeks. And as usual, while I’m out hoping to get some pictures.

I did find some repeating patterns, but nothing that I really liked. Nothing worth taking of picture of anyway. I noticed a pattern in the tiles on roofs, but nothing to take a pic of. I noticed the repeating pattern of lines on the sidewalk…..who wants to see that? Nope not much out there today.

Finding these repeating patterns to photograph was turning out to be harder than I thought it would be. After a while I did finally find something I could call a pattern, and was better than some of the other stuff I saw.

I liked the repeating curly part of the leaves. The other side, is more straight, but kinda put a medusa-esque feeling in my head. Either that, or the Indian god with all those arms.

Then the other pattern I noticed was in a fern. I’ve seen ferns before, but they are usually all green. This one today, was green, but it also had some interesting colors in it. I thought it looked pretty cool.

Kind of different for a fern. But I did like the repeating little leaves, and the pattern it created. Anyway….so much for repeating patterns for today.

Today I was transported back in time. Back to the early 1990’s. Back to 1992 to be exact. It was a time when music was still pretty good. It was a time before we were inundated with tons of talentless so called artists that we have today. I could name some of these talentless artists off, but the list would be too long, and I’m sure you already know who they are.

Back then, we had artists or groups that were actually musical. I know….I know….hard to believe. But get ready for this…..hope you’re sitting….. they could actually sing. Yup…..all on their own. No live tweaking by the sound guy. No lip syncing. Just plain old get up to mic and sing live. And to top it all off…..it would sound good….they could carry a tune. Staggering……I know. Oh…..and one more thing….they sang….they didn’t talk. There’s a whole genre of that crap right now……forget what they call it tho And if you haven’t fainted from all this over whelming news…. there was even a band in the background…..that actually played music. Yep…right there…..live. Nope….no scratching, no records, no nothing. Scary isn’t it?

Anyway, so what was it that got me to reminisce of days gone by? That’s a song you know. What made me think of yesteryear? Well today I grabed my camera and went out for my walk. I went to a nature preserve, because the temperature was perfect. Not too hot not too cold. A few minutes into the preserve, I saw this tiny little frog. That’s what made me think of Peter Gabriel’s song. Kiss the Frog. Anyone remember it? Here are the words.

[aah, yeah]

Jump in the water

Sweet little princess
Let me introduce his frogness
You alone can get him singing
Hes all puffed up, wanna be your king
Oh you can do it
Cmon [x6]
Lady kiss that frog

Splash, dash heard your call
Bring you back your golden ball
Hes gonna dive down in the deep end
Hes gonna be just like your best friend
So whats one little kiss
One tiny little touch
Aaah, hes wanting it so much
I swear that this is royal blood
Running through my skin
Oh can you see the state Im in
Kiss it better, kiss it better
[kiss that frog]

Get it into your royal head
Hes living with you, he sleeps in your bed
Cant you hear beyond the croaking
Dont you know that Im not joking
Aaah, you think you wont
I think you will
Dont you know that this tongue can kill
Cmon [x6]
Lady kiss that frog

Let him sit beside you
Eat right off your plate
You dont have to be afraid
Theres nothing here to hate
Ah, princess you might like it
If you lower your defence
Kiss that frog, and you will
Get your prince [x2]
[huh!]

Jump in the water, cmon baby jump in with me
Jump in the water, cmon baby get wet with me
Jump in the water, cmon baby jump in with me
Jump in the water, cmon baby get wet [get wet, get wet]

Kiss that frog, lady kiss that frog [x4]

Jump in the water, cmon baby jump in with me [x3]
Jump in the water, cmon baby get wet
[get wet, get wet] [x6]

Anyway…. here’s a picture of the tiny frog that I ran into today.

Cute isn’t he?

The brown truck pulled up and dropped off the monopod I was talking about earlier. It comes in a long box about 30 inches long or so, and only about an inch square. Kinda odd when you see it. So I took it out of the box, and it looks just like it did online. The head also came with it. It was easy to assemble. Just screw the head into the top bolt of the monopod.

The head also has a nifty little gadget called a quick release plate. Instead of having to screw and unscrew your camera onto the monopod each time, you can use this quick release plate. The plate screws into the bottom of your camera, and then you just slide the plate on and off the head of the monopod. That really is a nice feature. I use it a lot. It also comes in handy when you want to change the orientation of your camera from landscape to portrait. Or in other words shooting the camera in it’s normal position, or turning it on it’s side, going more up and down.

Anyway, I attached the quick release plate to my camera, put the camera into my camera bag, picked up the monopod, and left on my walk. I was eager to try out this monopod, but nothing really came along. Not much was going on, and I didn’t see anything I wanted to shoot.

I did walk by a canal, and did get to see a bird(heron I think). I shoot off a few pics, but it was too far away to even keep the shots. But it did let me see how the monopod felt. Actually it does help. It’s a lot easier to keep the camera steady. It’s no where near as steady as a tripod, but it does help. It allowed me to be able to slow my shutter speed down from the 1/300th sec from before to about 1/125th or even 1/60th sec. Which might not sound like a big deal, but it really is. So overall I’m happy with the purchase.

I did manage to come home with one shot I liked. It was of an orchid. The monopod allowed me to able able to get the shot. It was in the shade, which means the shutter has to be open longer. But it let me keep the camera steady enough to capture the image.

So that’s my experience with the monopod. I think I’ll continue to use it. Hopefully it’ll improve my shots.

Ok so you know I’ve been complaining about holding my camera steady enough to take sharp pictures. The problem of camera shake becomes noticeable when your shutter speed is too slow. But that speed of the shutter also depends on what lens you are using. For example if you are using a pretty wide angle lens like say a 50mm, then as long as your shutter speed is 1/50th of a sec you’ll been fine. That’s a pretty long time that the shutter will be open, and the lens won’t magnify the motion. But now put on a bigger lens, like my 300mm, and the amount of time you can keep the shutter open and have a sharp picture is a lot less. In this case you have to have a shutter speed of at least 1/300th sec. Or the shutter has to open and close 6 times faster for you to have a sharp picture.So I decided to get a monopod to see if that would help me out. What’s a monpod you’re asking. No it doesn’t have anything to do with an iPod. And no it’s not that round piece of glass on a chain that guys used to put in front of their eye generations ago. That’s a monocle. So what the hell is a monpod?Well I’m sure you know what a tripod is. That stand you put your camera on so you don’t have to hold it, and the camera stays steady. Well a tripod has 3 legs. A monopod is like that, but it only has one leg. That makes it lighter and so much easier to bring with you. It doesn’t take up much room, and I thought it might be good for my walks.I went online and had a look at all the different monopods. There’s all different types and makes. They make taller ones, shorter ones. They make monopods that only support a few pounds to ones that support about 30 pounds. But basically it’s a stick with a bolt at the top for you to screw your camera to.I decided to get one that has 2 levers on it to extend it to almost 6 ft tall. This one supports about 26 pounds, and is black, so it blends in well with my black camera. I also bought a head for it. The head mounts to the top of the monopod where the bolt is. Then you mount your camera to that head. The head allows you to be able to tilt the camera up and down. Some heads also allow you to be able to pan the camera left and right too.

This a picture of how the monopod looks. The bolt up top is where the camera screws into. The levers on the bottom, extend the monopod to about 6 feet tall. The monopod then keeps the camera steadier, and hopefully your pictures come out looking much sharper.So when the monopod shows up, delivered by that guy in the brown truck, I’ll take it out for a trial run. I’ll report the findings then. We’ll see how it goes.

Came across these little bits of info. Hope you find them useful.

1. Do not sign the back of your credit cards. Instead, put ‘PHOTO ID REQUIRED.’

2. When writing a check to pay on your credit card account, DO NOT put the complete account number on the ‘For’ line. Instead, just put the last four numbers. The credit card company knows the rest of the number, and anyone who might be handling your check as itpasses through all the check processing channels won’t have access to it.

3. Put your work phone # on your checks instead of your home phone. If you have a PO Box, use that instead of your home address. If you do not have a PO Box, use your work address. Never have your SS# printed on your checks. (DUH!) You can add it if it is necessary. But if you have it printed, anyone can get it.

4. Place the contents of your wallet on a photocopy machine. Do both sides of each license, credit card, etc. You will know what you had in your wallet and all of the account numbers and phone numbers to call and cancel. Keep the photocopy in a safe place. I alscarry a photocopy of my passport when I travel either here or abroad. We’ve all heard horror stories about fraud that’s committed on us in stealing a Name, address, Social Security number, credit cards.Unfortunately, I, an attorney, have firsthand knowledge because my wallet was stolen last month.Within a week, the thieve(S) ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a VISA credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN number from DMV to change my driving record information online, and more. But here’s some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know:

5. We have been told we should cancel our credit cards immediately. But the key is having the toll free numbers and your card numbers handy so you know whom to call. Keep those where you can find them.

6. File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where your credit cards, etc., were stolen.

This proves to credit providers you were diligent, and this is a first step toward an investigation (if there ever is one).But here’s what is perhaps most important of all: (I never even thought to do this.)

7. Call the 3 national credit reportingorganizations immediately to place a fraud alert on your name and also call the

Social Security fraud line number. I had never heard of doing that until advised by a bank that called to tell me an application for credit was made over the Internet in my name. The alert means any company that checks your credit knows your information was stolen, and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit.By the time I was advised to do this, almost two weeks after the theft, all the damage had been done. There are records of all the credit checks initiated by the thieves’ purchases, none of which I knew about before placing the alert. Since then, no additional damagehas been done, and the thieves threw my wallet away this weekend (someone turned it in). It seems to have stopped them dead in their tracks.Now, here are the numbers you always need to contact about your wallet, if it has been stolen:1.) Equifax: 800-525-62852.) Experian (formerly TRW): 888-397-37423.) Trans Union : 800-680 72894.) Social Security Administration (fraud&nbs p;line):800-269-0271We pass along jokes on the Internet; we pass along just about everything.If you are willing to pass this information along, it could really help someone that you care about.MAKE A COPY OF THIS INFORMATION AND KEEP IT IN A SAFE PLACE !!

This lady has changed her habit of how she lists her names on her mobile phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which contained her cell phone, creditcard, wallet… etc… was stolen.20 minutes later when she called her hubby, from a pay phone telling him what had happened, hubby says “I received your text asking about our Pin number and I’ve replied a little while ago.”When they rushed down to the bank, the bank staff told them all the money was already withdrawn. The thief had actually used the stolen cell phone to text “hubby” in the contact list and got hold of the pin number. Within 20 minutes he had withdrawn all the money from their bank account.Moral of the lesson: Do not disclose the relationship between you and the people in your contact list. Avoid using names like Home, Honey, Hubby, Sweetheart, Dad, Mom, etc…. And very importantly, when sensitive info is being asked through texts, CONFIRM by calling back. Also, when you’re being text by friends or family to meet them somewhere, be sure to call back to confirm that the message came from them. If you don’t reach them, be very careful about going places to meet “family and friends” who text you.

So it’s almost half way through March already. Time is moving on. Last weekend we went back to day light savings time which I’m glad about. I wish we would just leave it here. You cares about the extra sun light in the morning? You’re only going to work. Let it be dark. You cares? Wouldn’t you rather have it light when you get home? So maybe you could do doing something.Anyway, since it’s half way through March it got me thinking. Spring must be coming to the rest of the country. And along with it better weather and all that fun stuff. I’ve also noticed that we are getting some new flowers coming in, here as well.On my walk I saw this odd kind of plant. Not really sure what it is. At first it looked like corn growing on a stick. But upon closer examination….it wasn’t. It was pretty though in a weird sort of way. So that was the focus of my photo excursion.

I liked the yellow color and the also the orange-ish glow in the center. Don’t think I’ve seen this plant before. After taking this shot, I decided to make it a whole bouquet. And came up with this arrangement.

Color en masse. Available at the local florist. So that’s it for my rather short trip today.