San Diego –Well last week was an interesting week… Little of this… Little of that…
It started with going to the Tryyn Gallery in Gautay, CA situated between Descanso and Pine Valley, to show a portfolio to the owner and chat about showing work in the gallery. That part went extremely well and he would like me to bring some work to show plus I am going to do his portrait next week.
On the way back on old Highway 80, just before Descanso Junction, across the now dry stream and up on a hill, stood the skeletal framework of an old barn. With the context of the hibernating trees it seemed well worth a shot. Before long it may disappear entirely into the undergrowth.
Old Barn on the road from Pine Valley to Descanso, CA. Canon 5D MkII w/ Canon 85mm f1.8
The CD Project is nearly ready to promote. I finished the editing and made the master CD. The final tally comes to 570 pages of illustrated tips, techniques, and thoughts on photographic topics, especially digital photo. From “pre-flight” issues through shooting to editing and finally to display, there are 697.3 megabytes of data that will barely fit on a 700 Mb CD.
My friend Linda at Tree Frog Design took my photo of lenses and designed covers and labels for the various parts. And I ordered in some new print heads so I can start the time-intensive tasks of duplicating CDs and then making/applying labels to the disks and cases. My goal was to have them ready for the start of the Spring Semester and it looks like, to my own surprise, I will actually make that goal. Last week at this time I would not have bet a penny on it.
For a complete change of pace, I ended the workweek with a small photo project. The same Linda also rents out part of her house to vacationers and visitors. She needed new shots for her own promotional efforts so I shot those on Friday. If you were planning on coming to San Diego for a few days or few weeks this would be an especially nice place to stay. Here is one of the shots: this one of the bedroom. The door on the far right of the shot (behind the red drapes) leads to a garden and barbeque area for outdoor dining.
Bedroom shot of the vacation rentals of a friend. Canon 5D MkII w/ Canon 17-40mm f4L
I had not done any architectural interior stuff for a long time so it was fun to give it a shot (so to speak) again even if it was a simple room. But it was also a SMALL room so that added some sport to it…
So Sunday morning I got those shots delivered so she could upload them to her website and then spent much of Sunday afternoon working on the flyer and web page for the CD project, and killing time before dinner. On my way downtown I saw the sun setting over the bay and raced for the harbor. I was a minute or two too late to actually catch the sun setting over Point Loma but was able to catch the last light reflecting in the bay. Looking for a parking spot I had wanted to do a long exposure to smooth out the water but by the time I found one and raced for the waterfront there was not even time for a tripod for the single “normal” shot.
Sunset over San Diego Bay. Shot from the waterfront near the Maritime Museum. Canon 5D MkII w/ 17-40mm f4L @ about 30mm.
On the left are some of the tall ships belonging to the San Diego Maritime Museum and across the bay, anchored at the North Island Naval Base is an aircraft carrier. If you enlarge this by clicking on it you can see its numbers ablaze on its “island.” Over a hundred years of shipbuilding evolution all in the same frame.
It will be interesting to see if next week offers a similar range of shots…
Travels with Rocinante 