Project 52 by Letrow

[Geoff F]

Difficult to tell with this cheap monitor, Peter, but the exposure looks perfect on the dark dog. The white one seems a bit bright in places though. But that could be just my monitor.

[Letrow]

Ok, ok, I'll try another one...



less highlights



and more eye contact

[FrankMi]

These are much better Peter. Did you intend for them to be rotated clockwise for effect?

[Letrow]

These are much better Peter. Did you intend for them to be rotated clockwise for effect?

Now that you mention it...but no, I only noticed now. This reminds me of my old boss who saw a photo of my two kids, each holding a dog. I have a blond and a brown haired son and they were holding these dogs, colour matched. He wondered whether we had chosen the dogs based on that.

[Letrow]

Not totally happy with my photo this week, but this is all I could shoot given the time I had.



In front of the Brussel stock exchange. this girl in a bubble.

[Letrow]

I got in a puzzle order from Vinco this weekend. Vinco is a puzzle designer and woodworker and makes some beautiful wooden constructions from beautiful pieces of wood.
The cube I photographed is called a flattrick and is made from plum. It is a coordinated movement puzzle, which means that putting it together requires you to slide in all pieces at the same time. You really need one or two extra hands to do this.



The cube is now slightly opened and you can see the inner construction a bit.
I tried to convey an image of instability by putting the cube on one corner.

[wlou]

Hello Peter, first let me say that I am a dog person and a lover of Cairn Terrier. I had a dark one that was possibly the best of all and miss her so. Seing your pictures bring found memories.

Your picture of the face/sculpture is well done. I would crop it to show just the face, possibly with some foreground. It would have a lot of punch,IMO.

[Geoff F]

Nice wood texture and colour there, Peter.

With the previous bubble shot, I wonder if it might help to selectively brighten the surroundings slightly, but not the bubble.

I'm sure there is a really interesting scene there; it just needs a slightly different edit.

[FrankMi]

This is a very interesting puzzle Peter. It looks like without an instruction manual that you might never be able to get it back together!

I love the detail in the wood grain and the intricate interlocking of the pieces. An excellent use of angles, colours, and compositional cropping.

[Letrow]

Hello Peter, first let me say that I am a dog person and a lover of Cairn Terrier. I had a dark one that was possibly the best of all and miss her so. Seing your pictures bring found memories.

Your picture of the face/sculpture is well done. I would crop it to show just the face, possibly with some foreground. It would have a lot of punch,IMO.

Thanks Louise. Re-reading your post I just noticed you mentioning you had a Cairn Terrier (I was a bit busy last week, so had just scanned the answers). They are great, aren't they? We have two brothers, now 12 and 10 years old. I would probably go for another one if the time ever comes that they are gone (and it will of course eventually).
I always joke that dogs (mine at least) are not really smart, but they do make the perfect companions for almost every mood.
Here in this thread are a few more photos of them.

[Letrow]

A toad this week, a toad that nearly got stepped upon
Bufo bufo, as the official name goes and this one found in a small nature reserve near me called Bokkedoorns.

We were walking with the dogs and I had brought the camera for macro photos of flowers and/or insects. I suddenly noticed these tiny dark patches hopping over the footpath. Not many, but here and there you noticed one or two if you paid attention.
Tiny, between 0.5 and 1cm in size I guess.
There weren't many people around at that time, so I hope most of these toads made it to wherever they went without being crushed or being easy prey for birds.



Maybe I should have used flash, but with the macro lens only off camera flash would have worked and I didn't bring that particular flash along. The weather was overcast, so that didn't help either.
And of course their colour is some sort of camouflage anyway.

Well, anyway, here it is.

[johnbharle]

...Maybe I should have used flash, but with the macro lens only off camera flash would have worked and I didn't bring that particular flash along. The weather was overcast, so that didn't help either.
And of course their colour is some sort of camouflage anyway...

I don't think flash would have helped much. He's a neat little guy. Lucky you stepped over him.

[Geoff F]

The danger with using flash on a scene like that, Peter, is that it would probably have caused some hot spot problems with those pale stones.

[Letrow]

Yes, I think you are both right, but I would have liked a bit more colour I think.
By the way, I will be off to Canada for a few weeks, so my project 52 will be slightly delayed I think till I return.

[wlou]

Thanks for the pictures Peter. These dogs love having their photo taken I am sure!

[Letrow]

It is tough coming back from a holiday! I really have to set myself to looking at this thread and think about a suitable photo. It is so easy to just laps into the macro stuff once more (which I will do anyway)

So, for starters the bear who spotted me



We were just putting the luggage in the car one fine morning when my son said: 'I think I see something in the bushes over there on the other side of the road.' Soon enough this young bear emerged.
Me being the typical tourist I grabbed my small Panasonic first and made a few shots. Then I went back to the car for the Nikon with 18-200mm attached. The perfect photo opportunity, as long as we kept our distance.
But soon enough the bear spotted us (smell or sight, I don't know) and wandered over. Time to retreat for us.

When he was in the driveway one of us (in a car) drove up slowly and honked to frighten him off. The bear though went up a tree in seconds (destroying any illusions I had about escaping a bear by climbing up a tree)


Still, a good memory (bear in mind (sorry) that no one got mauled or worse) and for me a nice start of the project 52 after holidays.

[Donald]

What a wonderful grabbed opportunity.

I admire your presence of mind to get this image and not be so overwhelmed by the moment to either forget to take a photo or to make a mess of doing so. Having the bear staring straight at the lens in that first one, is magnificent.

[Letrow]

Thank you Donald. I am not sure whether it was wise of me to think about photos instead of saving my skin.

But honestly, the Canadian hosts at the B&B where we stayed when this happened were much more careful and urged us away. I was more like the typical (dumb) tourist.

Here is another photo of the bear (with the Panasonic, can you spot the difference?)



and finally another one of the bear up in the tree



I am not happy with the lighting on this one, but this is when I wasn't thinking too much about the settings and just clicked away at the bear


Now, two more bear stories:
1.) we went out in a boat before this happened, to watch bears from a safe distance. The captain told me that his boss was on a similar tour a while ago with a television crew from Vancouver. They saw a mother bear with cubs and while they watched they saw the mother lift a stone to find food. One of the cubs crawled into the hole and when the mother dropped the stone it got stuck.
Mother bear and cub panicked.
The captain steered his boat into the wall immediately when he saw this, asked if anyone on board knew how to handle a boat and jumped out and walked towards the bears. He proceeded to tell the mother bear that he was going to get the cub out from under the stone and apparently his tone of voice reassured her enough and she backed off a bit.
Well, he lifted the stone, the cub got out, went to his mom and they immediately disappeared.

Funny thing: the television crew members were so astonished at what happened that they didn't record any of what had happened. It was on the evening news though.

You have to think about these boat crews as very involved with the bears, it is their livelihood. Talking to the bear doesn't help of course, as the bear doesn't understand, but a calm voice is said to help. I haven't checked this.

2.) I met a retired, 67 year old Canadian farmer, who told me that in his youth they used to feed the bears by hand. His father gave him some vegetables and he gave it to the bear. The bears were used to people and vice versa.
He was amazed at it himself to be honest and wouldn't recommend it to anyone nowadays.

And a sad fact about bears: if they go to easy food (read: human garbage) too often, they might get shot eventually for safety reasons. As they say up there: A bear fed is a bear dead.

[Geoff F]

Some interesting shots there, Peter. Black bears in the shadows are always going to be difficult to photograph. All you can do is to expose for the bear and let the highlights over expose.

[Letrow]

Some interesting shots there, Peter. Black bears in the shadows are always going to be difficult to photograph. All you can do is to expose for the bear and let the highlights over expose.

Yes. Thinking back, I should have used the spotmeter perhaps. But TBH, with this kind of action photography you don't really stop to think. Getting closer to the bear was not an option either (at least that is what my wife kept telling me during the photo shoot).