Happy New Year - Welcoming 2014

"Hanging Out"

Happy New Year to all of my photographer friends.  It has been a great year with many interesting adventures.  I was fortunate to be able to photograph Tahiti, snorkeled and shot photos underwater for the first time.  The Great Sand Dunes National Park in southern Colorado  always intrigued me, particularly after visiting the tallest sand dunes in the World in 2011 in Soussesvlei Namibia.  The remoteness of these 750 foot high US dunes was as interesting to me as the massive sand fields.  I got to photograph lifelong friends at two 50 year high school reunions.  I attended Marathon High School in the Florida Keys.  I left Huntington, Indiana just before the 8th grade, but my childhood friends invited me back for the last 3 Huntington High School Class of 1963 reunions as their friend and photographer.  Also, I was invited to photograph and MC a benefit that raised thousands of dollars for a young lady that was seriously injured in a head-on car accident in upstate New York.  And Lynn and I also gave back by helping to landscape a new house for Habitat for Humanity.  I took some pictures there as well.

 Then of course there were the family events...my daughter Holly's beautiful wedding on Clearwater Beach, the many trips to Colorado to visit and photograph our daughter, Heather and granddaughter, Savannah.  Savannah turned 5 in November.  What a momentous event that was.  

So, my wish is for the best for all of my friends in 2014...but most of all for your good health, great relationships and super photographic opportunities.

Birds at Venice Rookery

On Thursday I ventured to the Venice Rookery with a friend to get a first look at the bird photography opportunities.   Surprisingly some chicks had already hatched.  In addition to the babies I particularly enjoyed taking this photo of an anhinga with a catfish.

Great blue heron with chicks.  Unfortunately there are a lot of dead branches on the island at the Venice Rookery (Florida) that make getting a clean shot really difficult.  My friend and I think that the Audobon Society needs to do a bit of pruning. 

This is my first time shooting at the Rookery in the afternoon.  There still were plenty of photographers there. All of these images were shot with my Nikon D300, the Nikon 200-400mm f4.0 lens and a 1.7X teleconverter.

British Style

1954 Jaguar Mark IX Salon

I recently spent a couple of hours at one of my favorite car shows, the annual Safety Harbor British Car Show.  The British have always been known for their unique auto designs and this show always features the best of the best.

1951 Bentley

Approximately 100 Jaguars, MGs, Bentleys,  Sunbeams, Rolls Royce and other exotic British offerings are featured on Main Street in quaint Safety Harbor.

1990 Morgan

These are a few of my favorite cars from the show..  All were photographed with my Olympus OMD-EM5 camera, 12-50mm Olympus lens at ISO 200 and f8.0 aperture.  I added the Gaussian blur in Photoshop CC.

Giving Back - Habitat for Humanity

On Friday Lynn and I volunteered our time to Habitat for Humanity with 5 other members of our Mercedes Benz Club.  We spent 4 1/2 hours sodding the lot  for this new home built with volunteer labor by Habitat for Humanity. I set up this group pose using the Posing App that I have on my iPhone.  Rick, the organization's construction superintendent took the photo with my Panasonic Lumix DMC-LF1 camera.  All three photos were adjusted in Photoshop CC.