RSS feedRebel T3i
Still burning in the afterglow….
By Silver Blue
There exists a photographic phenomenon call various things: “False Sunset”, “Lingering Sunset” or simply “Afterglow.”
What is it? Well, as it was described to me: you have your typical sunset. For 90 minutes, or so, after the sunset the energy of the sun still is in the sky — though you’re eyes can’t perceive it, your digital camera is able to.
Point your digital camera in the direction of the night sky where the sunset happened (and you see a black sky, or perhaps starlit), and take a photo. You’d expect to get a nice, star studded sky, yes? Well….not quite. You get:
Notice I picked up the green of a mercury vapor light, and the yellow of a sodium vapor light, but…what’s up with that “black” sky? It doesn’t look so “black” anymore.
In fact, it looks to be sunset. But … it’s not. Sunset happened at 7:39pm. This photo was taken at 8:19pm. A full 40 minutes after the sun slipped under the horizon.
Now, the neat thing about a False Sunset, Lingering Sunset, or Afterglow is that if you rotate yourself a full 180 degrees and shoot in the OPPOSITE direction from the sunset, you get the black sky you’re expecting.
(Just for giggles and grins, I photographed the same scene at 4:35 in the morning when I had to let the dogs out. Behold. Black sky.)
Mind you, I could have messed with the contrast and made the sky a complete pitch black, but that’s not what I was going for. I live in the city, we have light pollution. Ergo, the sky will actually appear as a medium to dark grey, unlike if you’re in the countryside, away from cities and towns, and can get the true black sky captured. (Plus, I don’t have my tripod over here, so it makes it a bit harder to steady the camera, and that’s why the top photo is somewhat out of focus.
I look forward to playing with this phenomenon more in the future.
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/tt-a7.mp3]Silver Blue, who sings along, “If you could see me now, just living my life in limbo…still burning in the afterglow…”
Pieces of my past
By Silver Blue
There are certain things that will always remind me of my youth, and I’ve had the opportunity to capture a few of these in picture this evening.
This was from my Grandma on my mom’s side. He sat on a shelf in her kitchen for years. I mean… for YEARS.
Dad brought back, from Japan, a pair of Kimono’d figurines.
When I was in High School, I ended up having to drop out of AP Algebra and take Algebra III at a local college. I helped a Chinese lady with her English, and she presented me with this watercolour. This would have been either fall 1984 or spring 1985, but she painted it in June 1983. I still remember the other option was a clown on a unicycle with balloons, but this more captured the Lucy I knew. 🙂
My room is pretty much as it was when I lived at my parents house, with a few minor changes. I was big into unicorns and suncatchers in high school:
Finally, remember my logo? This one?
It’s still there. It’s just hidden now behind my mother’s collection of Furby’s (she has them all, except for the gem encrusted $100,000.00 FAO Swartz edition):
Years can’t take away these memories. 🙂
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/ssy.mp3]Silver Blue… over and out.
Look behind the facade….
By Silver Blue
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/jh-f.mp3]A series of shots of harlequin masks shot over the past 5 years.
Masquerade noun \ˌmas-kə-ˈrād\: a social gathering of persons wearing masks and often fantastic costumes (Merriam-Webster Definition)
Facade noun \fə-ˈsäd\: a false, superficial, or artificial appearance or effect (Merriam-Webster definition)
Harlequin noun \ˈhär-li-k(w)ən\: a character in comedy and pantomime with a shaved head, masked face, variegated tights, and wooden sword (Merriam-Webster Definition)
These “masks”, designed for decorative purposes only, run from $19.99 for the very small, basically unadorned, to well over $250 for the feathered and hand painted/glittered. While I don’t own any of these (I much prefer the one here from my great friend $ally and James, which adorns my mantle), I am taken in with their beauty when I visit.
Silver Blue… who has far too many “Masquerade” songs in his archives for his own good. 🙂
A Study in Colour (Part 5)
By Silver Blue
This brings me to the conclusion of the photos that I took this past weekend at Busch Gardens. Oh, I took far more than the 27 shots you’ve seen… but these were the ones I shot with an eye toward form and colour.
Much like the snapdragons that were in front of the “window” in “Germany”, here are another set.
Near the Roman Rapids ride in the Festa Italia section of the park is a waterfall, and shooting station where you can pay an quarter to shoot a stream of water on the passing by riders.
Daisies, Tulips and Dusty Miller come together to … I can’t explain it other than to say it makes me happy.
Using Bokeh (or depth of field to throw the background out of focus is something I enjoy experimenting with. Here, the red tulip and pink snapdragon are the same distance from the lens.
I wonder what happens once everything blooms out. Do they take the plants back to the greenhouse? Do they collect seeds? Or … are they merely turned into mulch?
A straight down shot. Almost looks like a space pod opening up!
What you first see upon entering, and what you last see when exiting the park. The change from the fountain is donated to charity.
Of course, when the heat of summer hits, these delicate pansies will be history. I’d not seen the dusty rose/lavender before, at least not this season.
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/cu-ta.mp3]Silver Blue… who will look for colour to study!
A Study in Colour (Part 4)
By Silver Blue
More photos from the trip to Busch Gardens:
Something to be said about varying bushes with flowers. The pom-pom effect is nice, though I don’t know what kind of plant it is.
More “bedrock” sprouting with a variety of flowers in copious colours.
From almost opposing colours comes a soothing flow of shape and form.
Nature has its own way of cranking up the saturation. 🙂
Even the repeating pattern of colourful umbrellas can be interesting, even when blocked by a tree that has yet to sprout.
The richness of a metallic purple carousel horse beckons one to mount and ride… one more ride on the merry-go-round.
Only I would look up and see…. Silver and Blue. LOL.
It may look like wood, or marble, but this is pollen, resting on the surface of the “Rhine” river flowing through Busch Gardens.
Finally….
I call this “The Lady Of The Lake/The Rhine Maiden” (A hat tip to the legend of King Arthur and to Richard Wagner’s “Der Ring des Nibelungen”.) Can you see her face?
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/omrotmgr.mp3]Silver Blue, who… is at a loss for words this evening.
A Study in Colour (Part 3)
By Silver Blue
A trip to Busch Gardens on the second official day they were open. (The season opener was yesterday, but with rain in the forecast, decided to delay it a day.)
Not every study in colours is bright and cheerful. Some are more muted, such as this flowing water.
Still, there were enough colours out and basking in the open air that it made it look, at likes, like Walt Disney had vomited.
Little things, like the water reflecting in the indentation of the rock, however, gave an interesting compliment to the colours of nature.
As you can imagine, the pollen counts were off the charts today, even with the rain of yesterday and the on again/off again misty rain we had today.
Down by the Loch Ness Monster coaster, comes a lesson in repeating patterns.
Wisteria, in the lane, with nary a desperate housewife in sight.
Remember the post I made about “Never be afraid to stand out in a crowd”? Notice that the red tulips don’t seem so special now that everyone is trying to be like them. LOL.
I just think that nature can give us a rainbow of choices to view, and fortunately, Busch Gardens groundskeepers feel the same way!
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/esp-e.mp3]There’s two more sections in our study in colour, but those will have to wait for another day. I decided to hold off and do 9 photos at a time.
Silver Blue, who now is off to dye his hair and get this pollen off me!
Sing with me!
By Silver Blue
Enter to learn, leave to serve.
This is the motto by which we shall live.
Maroon and gold, our banner high we raise…
Wythe School, Our School, we proudly sing your praise.
Yes, I still remember the school song from my final elementary school, Wythe Elementary, where I attended from 1980-1981.
The school, built in an Art Deco Style, opened in 1936 as the George Wythe Junior High School. In 1950, the new George Wythe Junior High opened on Gloucester Street, and the old building became the Wythe Elementary School. (The original Wythe Elementary School had been built in 1909 and was demolished; the site was repurposed by the Wythe Recreation Association as the Wythe Neighbourhood Membership Swimming Pool.)
Wythe Elementary closed in 2010, and for the first time in over a century, the City of Hampton was left without a school named after Founding Father, George Wythe.
The building went through numerous renovations over the years; on the second floor is an auditorium that used to have a balcony you could sit in (and access) from the 3rd floor. Due to structural damage, however, the balcony was removed prior to 1980. On the first floor was the cafeteria, and entrance to the fallout shelter (yes, there were fallout shelter signs on the building when I went there. I didn’t poke around the property (besides, my allergies were getting the best of me.)
There exists a photo of the school (when it was built as a Junior High) with it’s original windows…:
(Courtesy of the Library of Virginia). (The old elementary school can be seen at the left of the photograph)
The school was about 4 blocks from where we lived, so I could walk, or ride my bike to school.
Pardon the distortion from the stitching of the panoramic shot — this is actually 7 photos stitched into one photograph, as I could not get back far enough to photograph the entire building (due to houses being behind me.)
We were known as the “Wythe Owls”, after the large owls that are over each entrance. (This is the left owl.)
Our school song came from the granite engravings over each door.
Here’s the right owl. I hope that whatever becomes of the building, that they put the owls in a museum, along with at least one of the “Enter To Learn/Leave To Serve” granite signs.
There is talk of making the former school into an adult education center. But as you can see, time is beginning to cause deterioration. Hopefully the city will be able to restore the schools exterior/facade into what we students had been proud of for years.
In 2002 (22 years after I attended the school), the students commemorated 9/11 with the planting of a tree. The granite block (engraved with an owl) says “Growing out of our hopes and wishes for America. The children of Wythe Elementary School, September 11, 2002.”
This is the tree that was planted, a decade ago, and the stone marker.
Coming home, I found St. Francis of Assisi hiding in the azaleas.
(Okay, so the song is more fitting for High School, but hey… how many times is there something actually from Grease 2 that is fitting??)
Silver Blue, who now is off to scrub the pollen from my eyes!
A Study in Colour (Part 2)
By Silver Blue | 1 comment
1Not much to say this evening. I’m in a rather introspective mood, but I wanted to share some more photos from the trip to Busch Gardens:
The colour, the water droplets, even the mulch come together to act as one.
A wheelbarrow of spring. Overflowing in its greenery, simplistic in its colouration.
Un petit oiseau, jaune.
Tis the season for tulips and pansies.
As well as tulips and dusty miller.
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/tf-epce.mp3]Silver Blue, who wonders how different the world would be if people took time to not only stop and experience the world around them, but if they were for accepting of those who are different. What if… everything were possible?
A Study in Colour (Part 1)
By Silver Blue | 1 comment
1
A trip to Busch Gardens, Williamsburg, has put me on a study of colour, from the garish tones in the above photo, which to me still work as the flowers and greenery spill forth from this window box planter to the simplistic….
…single red tulip blooming in a field of purple pansies. I call this “Never be afraid to stand out in a crowd.”
Learning to use depth of field (known in the photographic world as “Bokeh”) to throw the background out of focus so that you don’t have sensory overload from EVERYTHING being sharp and your brain going “what do I focus on? This? That? This?” is something I’m really beginning to have fun with.
Of course, I realize that most of the flowers at BGW have been “forced” into bloom in greenhouses, the weather has been so peculiar this year that it really wouldn’t surprise me to see petunias, pansies and snapdragons all in perfect harmony. (In fact, this morning while cutting the manor grounds here at the Shenandoah Forester, I noted that the wild violets are already in bloom — something that normally doesn’t happen until late April/early May.)
One of the things I appreciate most about the groundskeepers at BGW is that they aren’t afraid to juxtapose opposites on the colour wheel for dramatic effect.
[audio:https://www.eyesofsilverblue.com/aob-liaf.mp3]Silver Blue, who loves this time of year, even though I suffer from bad seasonal allergies.
Night I left the city…I dreamt of a wolf…
By Silver Blue
Went to Passport Preview day at Busch Gardens, Williamsburg today. Weather was perfect and it was worth putting up with the pollen.
I’ve never heard the grey wolves howl in the park…. until today.
In fact, over in Germany, at the Curse of Dar Kastle ride, a large wolf statue says…. CHEESE!
The thing that I really appreciate about BGW however, is how well they tend to their grounds (a veritable wheelbarrow of Spring):
Plus, the fact they act as caretakers this year to four Bald Eagles who have been injured in the wild and cannot fly or hunt, so are protected and fed here:
and…
This one, if I recall correctly, injured his wing by flying into a power line and almost lost the wing to injury and infection (hence the reason it wasn’t able to be “re-set” so he can fly).
All in all a great day… even if time passed too quickly.
Silver Blue, who is thankful Mother Nature held off on her rain and storms and let me have MY day, making the most of the shots…
(*title from “Cry Wolf” by a-ha)
RSS