Kathy & I have caught up from being at the beach last week and having the boys over for dinner yesterday. I didn’t take any photos – the camera stayed in the closed. I couldn’t think of anything useful to say today, so I decided just share a quiet photo from the beach.
The photo in my previous post was processed using the “Vintage 01” profile in Lightroom. My default setting is usually an Import Preset I’ve developed using the “Camera Velvia” profile, with some of my own secret sauce. The Velvia version with that subject came out way too saturated, so I started messing around with a few other treatments. I created new Virtual Copies, changed to a new profile then made a few additional tweaks based on what I thought each version needed.
No verdicts or preferences at this point, but it was interesting to see what the different options can do.
I have always loved the look of a wide angle lens but feel like I struggle to come up with wide-angle photos that I love. I forced myself to carry my 10-24 with me yesterday afternoon, expecting to find some long shadows in the afternoon. I was not disappointed! It’s especially hard (in my opinion) to use a super wide focal length without a tripod, because it is virtually impossible to get the framing I intended. Some of these came out OK!
So far, so good with our little “experiment” of being away from home. We visited our favorite Hilton Head restaurant yesterday evening, and it marked the return of their Wednesday night live jazz, which is main reason we like to go there on Wednesdays. It’s “the beach,” so everyone is fairly relaxed anyway, and things aren’t a lot different now. We’ve seen very few masks on the beach, but when we went to the grocery store about 75% or more of the people were in masks. We’ve only been to three restaurants. At two of the restaurants all of the servers had masks, while we haven’t seen a single guest wearing one.
We’ve overheard and had several conversations with people about where they are from and how those places have been coping, but very little “hand-wringing” or negative talk. It seems like most people are doing what makes them comfortable without a lot of judgement. Although sometimes you hear a comments about “anti-maskers” or some such nonsense.
I’ve taken the camera to the beach at some point just about each day, although I have not tried to make photography my main goal. I do think I’ve gotten some pretty nice shots, though. And I’m learning more and more about how to make this new camera do what I want it to do.
Kathy & I have tried to be very careful in our travels to not carry around too much – as we like to say it – ‘shit.’ To be polite I’ll call it ‘gear’ but the idea is the same. Whatever our “thing,” there is a certain amount of gear that we all have to have with us.
If you are a photographer, your travel packing list has to include a certain amount of camera equipment. If you are a cyclist, you need to have a bike or bikes, plus all the requisite tools, spare parts and clothes to suit your needs. If you are a kayaker, the same applies. Fishermen, metal detector-ers, sunbathers, surfers, the list goes on. RV-ers and boaters – my heart goes out to you. It ain’t for me, thanks. Nothing like loading our Subie up with two bins for clothes and food, a cooler and a camera bag and heading off for parts known or unknown.
What triggered this conversation was watching endless people either carrying or pushing carts loaded with chairs, umbrellas, coolers, boogie boards, toys and other gear to the beach. And it is even worse for those who come to the beach with kids! It’s no wonder people have huge cars with car top carriers and luggage racks hanging off the back. Too much gear!
When we packed to come to the beach, we were feeling like we had over packed, but quickly realized that the majority of the extra stuff we brought with us wouldn’t be going home with us. It was mostly water, food and adult beverages, to minimize trips to the grocery store. When we go to the beach in the morning we take a small cooler with breakfast, water, iced coffee & tea and a beach bag with towels and reading materials. And usually my camera. That’s it! We rent chairs from the life guard service, but it is our choice to pay a few dollars instead of carting chairs and umbrellas (not to mention buying them in the first place) from home and then to the beach and back every day. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. It’s just our choice to pay for the convenience.
Years ago we started to have a bug about living on a sail boat, but eventually realized that it wasn’t the sail boat the appealed to us but the idea of a life without all the extra gear. We’re not completely down to the bare bones level, but we do tend to travel that way. And we like that!
Oops. I spent all morning and most of the afternoon doing stuff and forgot to finish my homework! Here it is, a little late, and without any witticisms to accompany it. I doubt anyone will be disappointed. 😉
We took our first foray into the restaurant world last evening to celebrate Kathy’s birthday. It was a nice experience, not a lot different from what we’ve come to expect from our favorite restaurants, except the tables were farther apart, no one hugged and all the servers wore masks. It was our first restaurant meal since March 16, and between our travels and the Coronacrisis, it was our first time at this restaurant since Christmas Eve. We’re still not in a hurry to resume our normal visitation, but it was nice to see our friends.
This photo is one I took on our morning walk yesterday and it says several things to me. The new X-T4 handles dynamic range really well, and it has very little noise despite a lot of shadow and highlight adjustment. This was taken with the 23mm f1.4 prime lens. The in-body image stabilization seems to work really well with non-stabilized lenses – as advertised. In this photo, the lens exhibits very little flare and barely any chromatic aberration. The 23 has been my favorite prime, it works really well on the X-T4 and makes a nice walk-around lens.
One of my weekly routines is to go through the sale ad for our regular grocery store. It amuses me to look at some of the foods that are advertised and wonder who eats them. Today’s chuckle came from something called “Daily Crave Bourbon BBQ Quinoa Chips.” I mean, that doesn’t even sound good. I like bourbon, I like BBQ and I even like quinoa. But I don’t know about mixing them. ‘Quinoa chips’ must be another one of the ways that food companies destroy otherwise healthy food by adding stuff to make it taste good to people who don’t know what healthy food tastes like. I suppose you would wash those down with a Snapple. 😉
I haven’t paid a lot of attention to the protests that have been going on around our country. Not because I don’t care, I do. But while I agree that things need to change, I fear that until the people in charge are held accountable, these demonstrations will only provide entertainment for the masses and actually accomplish little. I always try to be an optimist but optimism can be tough to come by these days!
It’s hard to be anything but optimistic when our grandson Edison is around! One of the things he enjoys is using an old pair of my binoculars to watch the birds and the squirrels, and to make people seem “right next to me!” He has a very curious mind and loves looking at interesting things and taking “nature walks” behind our house.
I’m still working with the settings on this new camera and processing of the files. Our grandson visited yesterday so I got some photos of him. Shooting pictures of a moving 4 year old was a good test of focus tracking, and also of the user’s ability to use the camera!
No, these are not his toys. 😉 I may have a photo or two to share soon.