Yellow Tulip Field – Mount Vernon

11. May 2012 · Comments Off on Yellow Tulip Field – Mount Vernon · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

Yeah yeah I know I said no more tulip pictures, but I like this one so suck it.  This picture was taken in Mount Vernon at the tulip festival (now that’s a surprise).  Can you see all the people walking in the field?  No?  Well that’s the magic of Photoshop!

I liked this one as the tulips looked beautiful and the leading line of the row on the right going off to the distance draws your eye to the trees, hills and mountains behind the flowers.  That white peak “poking” over the hill top to the right of the barn is Mount Baker.  I also liked the barn behind the tulips.  It kind of provides a feature of interest between the flowers and the sky.

When I took this picture I actually took several versions all with varying depth of field, some had everything in focus, others (like this one) had the flowers at the front in focus and the focus dropped off into the distance.  I liked this look most of all so I picked it for today’s picture.

Obviously this wasn’t taken at work as that would be quite naughty, but the guys found a bottle of scotch somewhere!  (My Dad will like this one).

Pike Place Market – Seattle

10. May 2012 · Comments Off on Pike Place Market – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

You really can’t post a series of pictures of Pike Place Market without posting one of the actual market.  So that’s tonight’s image.  This was taken from the north entrance and as you can see it’s super busy.  Actually it’s not because this was early on a week day, if you go to the market at the weekend you can see about 4 floor tiles in and then it’s just a mass of people.

As you can see on the left of the market you find all the fresh flowers and fruit, and on the right the preservatives and crafts.  As you walk through the market the people behind the counters offer you samples so you can walk your way through and get a pretty decent meal – for free.

The market has a load of neon signs and lights and looks great and this came across a little in the picture.   You’ll be pleased to hear that I only have one more Pike Place image to post, so I had better get out of the house over the weekend to take some more pictures.  I can hear the farmer’s markets calling me – they all start this weekend.  (I wonder if I could do a year of market pictures?)

Carter and Master Chief decided to draw on my whiteboard today, and who am I to say no!

Lake Union – Seattle

09. May 2012 · Comments Off on Lake Union – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

Lake Union is a fresh water lake that sits between Lake Washington and Puget Sound.  On the north shore of Lake Union is Gasworks Park which provides a fantastic view of downtown Seattle which is directly opposite on the other side of the lake.

I guess the thing that Lake Union is most famous for, is that this is where Sleepless in Seattle was filmed.  In fact the house boat that the male lead Sam Baldwin (Tom Hanks) lived in was on Lake Washington.

When you visit Seattle you can go on the “Duck Tours” which are amphibious World War II vehicles that take you round Seattle showing you all the local sites and end up going into Lake Union.  They actually take you past the house boats and tell you that after the film these homes became supper popular.  One reason being they don’t pay property tax (as they are classed as boats).  Apparently the city of Seattle was concerned they were losing money so now there is a limit on the number of house boats on the lake.

Today’s picture was taken from Gasworks Park right by the waters edge.  There was this small wall that had graffiti on it – something you don’t see much around Seattle.  Anyway I thought it looked cool with the painted wall in the bottom of the picture, the choppy water in the center and the Seattle skyline at the top.

Today Carter was caught enjoying his secret passion – reading “Reality Weekly”.

Mount Si – North Bend

08. May 2012 · Comments Off on Mount Si – North Bend · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

Over the weekend I visited North Bend, again just looking for things to photograph and found myself driving towards Mount Si.  Now I could have just photographed the mountain (in fact I did a couple of times) and, well, it didn’t look that impressive.  To get the whole mountain into the frame I had to use a wide angle lens and when you do that you get a lot in but distant objects look smaller.  I did want all the mountain in the picture so I needed something in the foreground to make the image interesting.  Then I found this small lake.

I really liked the way the trees reflected in the water and the sky had a great red, warm glow, so while the picture was originally about Mount Si, it kind-a took a back seat in the finished composition.

So what can I tell you about Mount Si?  Well it’s part of the Cascade Range, it was named after some homesteader called Josiah “Uncle Si” Merritt, it has a 4 mile trail going up 3,500 feet and the best bit, if you are old like me, you will have seen it in Twin Peaks!  Yes, Twin Peaks was filmed in North Bend with Mount Si in the background and this is where Agent Cooper had his excellent Cherry Pie.  How educational is my site – Fantastic!

Carter and Master Chief were shocked to find some Halo figurines at work today, I guess it was inevitable that they would find these at Microsoft, but Carter was definitely surprised.

Pike Place Lanterns – Seattle

07. May 2012 · Comments Off on Pike Place Lanterns – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

Those of you who have visited Pike Place Market, know about the stores downstairs.  I’ve mentioned this in previous posts, but basically it’s an eclectic collection of stores that pretty much sell everything from clothes, to old records, to rock & roll memorabilia.

One store that caught my eye when I was there last, was this cool lantern shop.  They had a number of lights hanging from the ceiling that were all shapes, colors and sizes.  I don’t like just walking into a store and taking pictures (I might ask for permission but if the store has people in it I’m not going to bother), but outside is kind-a fair game.  Just outside this store was a number of hanging lanterns, so I grabbed a shot.

Rather than shoot the store as it looks I turned the camera a little to emphasis the lights and force the eye to work out what’s going on, hopefully creating a more interesting composition. Also I selected a big aperture that gave me a shallow depth of field so the first lantern is sharp in focus and the focus falls off as you look down the line of lights, again helping the look of the shot.

Cool shop, great lights and hopefully a nice image.

I like Sudoku (what can I say I’m getting old), so Lisa got me this daily Sudoku desk calendar for Christmas.  Well today Carter found it and starting solving puzzles.

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