Carillon Point – Kirkland

25. December 2012 · Comments Off on Carillon Point – Kirkland · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

Well folks, here we are on Christmas day and I’m very close to the end of the year and the end of this new years resolution.  I really can’t believe I’ve successfully posted every day, and after December 31st, I’ll never do this again.  That said I will still post next year, just not as often.  I’m going to write quite a long posting on January 1st about this experience and explain why you should NEVER try and do it!  Still I still have a week to go so had better post a picture for today.

Tonight’s image takes us back to Carillon Point in Kirkland.  This little harbor has a great marina and very posh hotel and shops and is a gerat place to take some shots.  This image was taken just after the sun went down and the sky looked great.  I got really close to the harbor’s edge with a nice wide lens and made sure I had a really small aperture.  This gave me a really deep depth of field (so lots of the image was in focus) and I was able to ge the light in focus as well as the boats far away.

I loved the orange color cast thrown on the wood by the small light and the deep blue sky, I think it made a really nice image.  Light reflections in water also always look great so the small lights going round the harbor added to the image too.

Tonight the guys sat down and enjoyed a mince pie.  This is a very British thing (I think), not sure they are popular over here in the US. Basically they are dried fruit filled pies. Taste great!

Bell Square Mall – Bellevue

20. December 2012 · Comments Off on Bell Square Mall – Bellevue · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

Here we are with 5 days to go to Christmas and tonight I decided to do a nutty thing, I drove to Bellevue after work to do a little Christmas shopping.  I needed to pop into Bell Square Mall to get something for Lisa (can’t say what, as she reads this) and it was totally manic.  The traffic was really bad and parking (as you would imagine) was also terrible, but I got in pretty quickly by taking some back streets.  It was totally chaos in the Mall – far too many people.  I managed to get one thing I wanted but the other was sold out so I’m going out again tomorrow (very sad about that).

It was actually a nice evening tonight, a little cold but we had a clear sky and it was dry, so I thought I should grab a picture for the day.  In Bellevue at 7pm every night they do this sort of street show called “Snow Flake Lane” where all these actors come out in costume – loads of them are dressed as toy drummer soliders – and they dance around and play instruments entertaining the shoppers.  I totally hate this, it’s a complete nightmare and not entertaining at all!  So I needed to grab a picture quickly and get out of Dodge.

There are loads of really pretty street lights around the city center, Bellevue do a good job of adding loads of Holiday lights, but at street level it’s pretty hard to compose an image that really shows the lights at their best.  So I decided to get some height and shoot down.  Tonight’s image captures the traffic and lights in the city.  I love the blue lights all over the buildings and the holiday lights on the street lamps look cool too.  But my favorite part is the blurred motion of the vehicles as they enter the city.

Tonight the guys played hide and seek.  Excellent hiding I thought.

Christmas Space Needle – Seattle

18. December 2012 · Comments Off on Christmas Space Needle – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

You can’t really go to the Seattle Center with a camera and not take a picture of the Space Needle, that would be just silly! – there’s probably a law somewhere that prohibits that!  So I figured I should take a picture while there on Saturday.  The rain was coming down pretty hard and I was soaked.  But being the “professional” I am, I still got out the tripod and set it up in front of the needle.

At this time of year it’s all lit up and they even have a Christmas Tree in the fountain at the front.  Being Seattle it’s not a traditional tree obviously, it’s made up of a collection of balls that are covered in lights.  But it still looks pretty cool.

When I took this picture it was pretty dark.  But as I put the camera on a tripod and took the picture with a long exposure, the sky looked quite light and you can easily see the blue color.  Having said that of course the needle is nicely lit and the water on the road gives some really nice light reflections.  I used a really wide lens on this picture, it was the only way I could get the needle in the picture.  But lenses this wide introduce some distortion.  You can remove this but you lose some of the picture.  In this image the tree in the fountain appears to be leaning over to the left, but really it was standing straight up but as I wanted to keep all the details in the image I decided not to correct it.

Today Master Chief showed Carter his new Santa Hat – really nice!

Arboretum Bridge – Seattle

08. December 2012 · Comments Off on Arboretum Bridge – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

You aren’t going to believe this but today I actually went out with the camera and took some pictures.  It was pretty cold out but dry so I hit the road and headed for Seattle.  I had this great plan to go to the Seattle Center (home of the Space Needle) and take some nice pics as they now have loads of Christmas lights up.  But when I got there I spent 45 minutes driving round the area trying to find somewhere to park!  It was impossible and I eventually gave up and headed home.  Luckily though I did go to some other locations so I got a good weeks worth of new pictures.

Tonight’s image was taken in the Seattle Washington Arboretum Park.  This is a really pretty park right by Lake Washington and is full of walking paths that at this time of year are full of runners (it’s too cold I guess to go for a walk).  I found this park by mistake one day.  I was driving down Lake Washington Boulevard looking for somewhere to photograph and drove under this great bridge.  It was made of stone and had these lights on top.  I had Abi with me at the time and told her I’d go back one day and shoot the bridge.

Well today I found the bridge and captured this shot.  Now, those of you who read this blog know I like Photoshop but this image is pretty much right out of the camera.  I did fix one thing though.  One of the lights wasn’t on so I copied a light from somewhere else and fixed the broken one.  Question is, can you tell which one?  Bet you can’t.

But other than that, I didn’t change a thing and I think it came out really well.  It was getting dark when I got there so I had to take this with a long exposure and I needed to take a few shots as runners kept coming over the bridge.  But after five minutes I had the shot and headed home.  More new stuff tomorrow.

I don’t know about you but you cant beat tined Unicorn Meat – yummy.  Tonight the guys enjoyed a delicious dinner.

Town Lights – Redmond

07. December 2012 · Comments Off on Town Lights – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

So tonight has been a funny evening – and it’s not over yet!  I got home and Lisa phoned me as I walked in the door telling me that she was dropping Abi off at “Paint Away” where (as she puts it) you paint things and then Lisa’s plan was to go on for a foot rub with her friend Kathryn.  My instruction was to meet her at 7:30 in Redmond for dinner and then go on for a party at someone’s house.

Now, I don’t really do parties.  It’s not that I’m antisocial, well maybe it is, but when I get home I just want to watch TV, and play on my mac.  I’m too tired to be “entertaining” and listen with interest to other people.  My family will confirm all this if you ask them.  Anyway, Lisa also told me that I needed to get some food for James before I come to Redmond to meet her.  Oh and I was to pick up Cameron (Kathryn’s husband) when I met her for dinner.

So being a good boy I did exactly what I was told.  James wanted a “Baconator” from Wendy’s so I went and got that for him and while I was in Redmond I grabbed this shot of the high street which is currently covered in lights.

I then drove home, dropped off the food for James, picked up Cameron and went back to Redmond for dinner. (How complicated is this?  Are you keeping up?).  So Cameron and I got to the Pub/Restaurant before the girls and started drinking.  Needless to say I’m now home typing this posting after too many beers (we got a couple of pitchers between us), and I’m feeling very happy.

Lisa is rather uncomfortable as apparently I’m a little embarrassing when I’ve had a few drinks, but right now I’m too “Happy” to care.

Needless to say I managed to post a picture tonight (here it is), I’m a little “tipsy” and now off to a party.  I’m pretty sure I’ll say something “bad” and get in trouble but what the heck, my blog, my picture etc. etc.

I’ll let you know how it goes tomorrow.

I’m sure you have often wondered what happens if Carter and Master Chief get in front of a canvas with paints.  Well they fight over the brush as you can see in this image!

« Older articles
Newer articles »