Nature's folds

27 June 2015:

From today's macro and still life photography workshop.

Canon 5D

Manhattan Beach Grand Prix 2015

7 June 2015:

The annual bike race in Manhattan Beach was held today. I took a few pictures between helping with course setup and teardown. I experimented with a camera mode that I do not use very often because most of my normal subjects are not moving at me at 25 miles per hour. I got better at it as the day went along. Once in the correct mode, the camera picks its sensitivity (ISO setting) and aperture (usually wide open for the zoom lens at maximum focal length) and focus (top two images). This would be a bit tough using the Hasselblad...

Top image: Womens Category 3, 4

Middle and lower image: Men's Category 4

Canon 5D

Walk #20: Sunset Junction Loop

31 May 2015:

Today found us back in Silver Lake for walk number 20. We started with a relatively short but steep climb up the hill behind the junction of Sunset, Santa Monica and Sanborn avenues. At the top of the climb we found the Canfield-Moreno estate. You cannot see much from the road. As we peered in through the big front gates, two of the caretakers wandered by and invited us in for a brief look at the pool area. What a treat! The estate was built in 1923 by silent film star Antonio Moreno and his oil-heiress wife Daisy Canfield Danzinger. The pool area reminded me of the kind of opulence found at the Hearst Mansion up on the central coast. You can see Bacchus surveying the pool scene in the top photo, and the Spanish-Revival villa behind. Then, on our descent off of the hilltop, we came upon one of the oldest residences in Silver Lake, the August House, a 1913 Craftsman-style home that was in good condition and quite nice. Then on the final walk back to the car I passed this simple scene of a flower pot sitting beside the house numbers. I couldn't resist.

Canon 5D

Roses

26 May 2015:

A portion of Lily's flower arrangement for this week, with the 100 mm macro lens.

Canon 5D

Walk # 37, Hollywood Bowl and High Tower Loop

9 May 2015:

From the walk two weeks ago just west of the Hollywood Bowl. These particular stairs are unique in that they intersect another walk street that is signed. You can see the sign for the walk street half way up the stairs, just behind Lily. This was a great walk, as I described earlier. This was also the first time that I used the Hasselblad instead of the digital SLR.

Hasselblad 500 C/M, Ilford delta 100 black and white film

Tomatoes

I just got a new macro lens. Need I say more?

I like the faint scratches on the tomato skin just to the left of image center.

Canon 5D

Lily's Roses

15 May 2015:

Lily created this flower arrangement this past Tuesday in her flower-arranging class. The instructor wanted her to gather the roses all together in the middle of the arrangement, but Lily protested that roses were not to be treated this way and rebelled, leaving them as you see here. And I agree.

Canon 5D, light painting