29. July 2012 · Comments Off on Birds – Bainbridge Island · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

While on Bainbridge Island Chris and I headed over to Fort Ward State Park to see if we could get any cool pictures.  When you get there you find this long very stoney beach that’s pretty much covered with old tree trunks and drift wood.  There’s a boat ramp that leads you down to the beach so Chris and I grabbed our gear and walked down the ramp.

Along the beach we saw this wooden frame with loads of birds on the top, we thought it might make a nice picture and it didn’t seem that far away, so off we went.  There wasn’t a path to follow you just had to walk over all the stones and carrying all my camera gear I nearly went over a couple of times.  Also while at first it didn’t seem that far, it took us ages to get there (these things always seem closer than they are).

When we arrived at the wooden poles we set up the tripods and took some pictures.  I thought it might look cool if all the birds took off so I picked up a stone and threw it towards the structure to try and startle the birds into flight.  I was totally pathetic!  My stone didn’t even make it half way and the birds didn’t move at all.  I’m clearly getting very old, either that or I have totally unrealistic expectations over my athletic ability (probably both).

While I was attempting this I didn’t notice that the tide had started to come in and was already over the base of my tripod.  So we moved back a few feet, took some more pictures and headed back.  The water was really coming in fast and we only just made it back to the boat ramp before the beach was cut off.  I’m so pleased we made it, but I guess it would have been a more interesting story here if we had got wet, luckily though that didn’t happen.

I actually think the picture below came out OK, the water was pretty still but you still get the wobbly pole reflections in the water.  It was so peaceful there, really quite beautiful.  I left the beach quite jealous of all the homes with a beach view.

Lisa made some Potato Salad today and when she wasn’t looking Carter and Master Chief pinched some!

07. February 2012 · Comments Off on Ducks – Kirkland · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

OK I admit it this is an odd posting.  The reality is that we (the family) liked both pictures and couldn’t agree on which “Duck” picture to post.

I was driving from Kirkland to Redmond and saw a small park by the water.  I pulled over, parked up, grabbed my camera gear and went to check out the area.  In truth there wasn’t much to see, but there were a load of ducks in the water.

Now I know what your thinking… Ducks!!! I’ve finally gone nuts.  Well yeah maybe I have, but what caught my attention was when the ducks started to stick their heads under water and their “tails” in the air, I guess they were looking for fish.  But there were around 5 ducks and it was almost synchronized!  It looked really funny.  So I started taking pictures and as per usual, all 5 didn’t go again at the same time.

So, I ended up with two pictures.  One of duck heads, and one of duck tails.  When I got home there was a big discussion over which picture to post.  Abi and I liked the tail one, but Lisa preferred the head.  To save any arguments I’ve included them both here, so you can decide yourself and pick a favorite.

Tonights Halo picture shows our two heroes playing “Tavel Shut the Box”.  I have no idea why!

29. January 2012 · Comments Off on Seagull – Alki Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

I went out with the camera today to see what I could capture but it was a bit miserable again.  Rain with grey skies.  Anyway I went over to west Seattle to Alki Beach and found this pier with some boats propped up on the railings.  Sitting on the top of one of the boats was this seagull.

I walked up to it and the bird blazingly sat there looking at me, I could see the bird thinking “what the hell do you want?”

Anyway I decided to set up the camera and take this shot as behind the bird was the Seattle skyline and the sun was just going down, so building lights were coming on.

I took several shots and the bird kept moving and the light was low so I needed a long shutter.  When I got home I checked out the pictures and found one with the bird staying reasonably still.  But when I examined the image I saw the boat was covered in bird crap!  I suggested to Lisa that I should throw the image away but she liked it and thought it was funny, so here it is.

These Halo guys have no fear, they just throw a rope to the top of one of Lisa’s glass ornaments and started to climb!

Climbing