Category: Light

Heron, Hawk & Cranes

Timothy Price6 Comments

I went out about 30 minutes before sunset to photograph the Sandias when they turned pink, and ended up getting bird photos along the way. The Sandhill Cranes and Snow Geese where still hanging out in the apple orchard with light streaking across them from the low sun. When I got out to the river, a Great Blue Heron was wading around feeding, until it noticed me and flew off. I figured I wouldn’t see it again, but when I focused on the large bird coming toward me (figuring it would be a Sandhill Crane) it turned out to be the heron. The Heron noticed me about the time I got it in focus and it banked left and started hightailing it south, offering me a shot of it in profile, then it turned eastward to circle back out of range of my lens.

A group of ducks where floating down the Rio Grande, diving under the water and popping their heads up several yards down current from where they dived. When they came up from their third dive, they saw me on the bank and took off, leaving little splashes behind them. Just before the sun went down, a hawk flew over at high speed, but I managed to get a fairly clear shot of it. I got my photos of the dark pink Sandias, and as I was walking back to the house, a large group of geese took flight from the apple orchard, heading to the river — they reminded of bats flying out of a cave at sunset.

Ring Around the Moon

Timothy Price2 Comments

RingAroundMoon

The moon had a really nice ring around it when we got home last night. The fast moving, thin cloud cover formed ripples and streaks under the influence of my 1/3 second exposure and 17mm lens at ƒ/4. You can still see a few stars twinkling behind the clouds and Jupiter next to the moon at about 1 o’clock.

The Light

Timothy Price3 Comments

TheLight

I helped out in three of the five services at Central United Methodist Church yesterday: I played accompaniment for Silent Night at the 1:00 pm service and discovered the fuses were missing from the spotlights when they wouldn’t come on for Jerri before the service. One of the maintenance men called around and found fuses, and ran out and purchased them, so the spotlights were working for the evening services. I ran one of the spotlights and took photos for the 8:00 pm service, and then ended up running both spotlights at the 11:00 pm service.  Jerri got the idea to add guitar and castanets for a Spanish song the men’s ensemble performed at the 11:00 pm service, so I also played guitar and Laurie played castanets with the piano on “From a Distant Home”.

A different couple played Mary and Joseph for each service, and Jerri or someone else who knew how to dress the couple got them in costume for the first 4 services. I was in the chancel area when Ronzel, the sound tech, came up to me looking quite desperate and asked if I had photographed Mary and Joseph in costume in an earlier service, because he was trying to get the couple playing Joseph and Mary for the 11:00 pm service dressed and he didn’t remember what all they had on.  Fortunately, I had photographed one of the couples in costume, so I ran back to the dressing room with Ronzel, and we were quite a pair looking at the screen on my camera, finding all the pieces of the costumes and getting the couple properly costumed.

We got them ready  about 4 minutes before the start of the service, then the couple asked me when they were supposed to start walking up the aisle with the elements for communion — since I didn’t know (all the services were different) I ran up and asked the pastor, ran back told the couple, then dashed up the stairs to the balcony to run the spotlights for the candlelight portion of the service. After the lights came back on, I walked around to the front of the church and slipped in with the choir, and acted like I was singing on a couple of the hymns before playing on “From a Distant Home”.  Then I slipped back out, helped Mary and Joseph out of their costumes, and then hung up the costumes and accessories. Laurie’s brother and parents commented after the service how they thought it was funny how I kept appearing and disappearing during the service.

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The End of the World and All That

Timothy Price1 Comment

ReflectionsEndOfWorld

Tristan and David had their annual Solstice party tonight where we all sat around waiting for the end of the world and then reflected on it — it didn’t happen — AGAIN!  The end of the world and all that is getting to be a bit of a bore — Firefox, Cat’s yellow kitty, was mad about it, Gia thought she saw it, but was mistaken, and Firefox gave me an appropriate “Blah!”  Cat celebrated, Gia consoled the kitty, then she peeked around the corner and gave me a nice smile. After having a lot of fun we all finally had to go on our merry ways until the end of the world comes again.

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On Spot

Timothy Price4 Comments

SpotLight

We were working out the lighting for the Christmas Eve services, and while I was practicing following people walking down the aisle, I photographed Jerri with camera in one hand while tracking her and manipulating the spotlight with the other hand.  I guess all those “drive-by-photos” have honed my skills at taking photos while doing other things.

On Christmas Eve there will be three services at Central United Methodist Church with music and drama in the 8:00pm and 11:00 pm services — I’ll be manning one of the spotlights at those two service. I’m playing guitar for the first service at 1:00 pm, and the fact that I only have two arms that are each a little less than a yard in length, playing guitar at one end of the sanctuary and operating a spotlight from the balcony at the opposite end of the sanctuary stretches way beyond my ability to multitask, so whoever shows up for the 1:00 pm service with only get the added drama of listening to me improvise while the congregation lights their candles, then I’ll play accompaniment for “Silent Night,” which, by the way, was written for guitar.

A clarinet and xylophone duet played for St. Martin’s Hospitality Center’s Holiday Breakfast as part of the NM Philharmonic Orchestra’s gift of music for the homeless and disadvantaged members of the community. I was invited to drop by photograph them playing for the breakfast. The music was excellent, and the place was packed and swarming with activity. I managed to put together a panorama of the activity, but it was one of the most difficult panoramas I photographed and successfully stitched together because of the constant activity, the room configurations, and the extreme differences in lighting from on side of the building to the other. But I think the resulting photo show the activity and how many people St Martin’s was feeding this morning.  St. Martin’s is just one of a handful of shelters and churches that feed and clothe the homeless and other people who need help in the Albuquerque area.

 

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No Molasses? Really?

Timothy Price3 Comments

NoMolasses

One my way home tonight, I noticed a car dealer had the emergency flashers blinking on alternating cars on the lot. I suppose it is was supposed to be festive looking, but I was just trying to get by it before it sent other drivers into epileptic seizures. The old uncovered, covered wagon with lights on it is much more creative and festive. The traffic was as thick as molasses tonight, unlike the  morning traffic which was surprisingly light when I photographed the hazy mountains. Speaking of molasses, Laurie said she couldn’t find any in Walmart, and when she went to ask the floor clerk, the clerk was deaf, and Laurie didn’t know how to “sign” molasses. I told her I thought that making a rodent face and pointing at her butt might have sufficed to get the idea, but alas, neither mole asses or molasses were to be had.  Stretch was in a state of disbelief when he heard they didn’t have mole asses as he thought they would go well in his idea for almond, watermelon cookies — Stretch is quite the gourmet for a cat.  While on the subject of cat food, I can understand that flavors like chicken and gourmet beef, seafood, etc. are cat foods that people can stomach buying; but I really think they should make cat food in rodent, bird and reptile flavors, flavors that cats would really go for. The cat food makers could get clever and give the cat food names that people could deal with more easily like Mole Ass Mole, Rotisserie Robin, Mouse Mousse, Rodent Ratatouille, Lizard Linguise and so on. Back to the molasses melodrama, Laurie found some organic molasses on the way home tonight that Stretch is happy with, and the almond, watermelon cookies look cute with the little tails sticking out.

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