At Night

Wisconsin State Capitol, as seen from Monona Terrace, Madison.

This shot was meant to be a night version of this original, taken in the daytime. I can't decide which one I like better. The reflection of the Capitol looks so ghostly.

There are certain photographic themes I'm a huge sucker for, cool reflections being one of them. I love photos of the blue sky reflected in a glass building, just about anything reflected in a puddle, and even those stereotypical lake photos. You just can't go wrong with a good reflection.

Why We're Not Putting Up a Christmas Tree

Oscar el Gato "helps" with my Christmas card photo shoot.

Is it bad that I allowed my cat to chew on live Christmas lights for the sake of a shot? Oh well. Another gorgeous but completely by accident photo.

Carolers

Carolers, from my Christmas card photo shoot this last weekend.

As I said in my last post, the miniatures were by far the hardest things to shoot. But the more I go over the final product, the more and more I like them. I think out of all the photos I took, the miniature ones were my favorite.


More on my Flickr. I also shot ornaments, lights, and Oscar "helping."  :)

Christmas Photo Shoot

Packages, from my Christmas Card Photo Shoot.

I probably took around 400 pictures over the course of two shoots for this project, using my Christmas tree and various props - ornaments, townspeople, etc. Oscar even jumped in to "help."

Shooting the townspeople was difficult because they don't have much detail to their faces, and it was hard to get the light on them just right. I sort of had Sarah Vowell's book covers in mind when I was styling it. I think the photos didn't come out too bad. More on my Flickr, and more to come.

Exactly.

Taken at the Rally to Restore Sanity/Keep Fear Alive in Washington D.C. on October 30, 2010.

Lucky Shot.

   A very lucky shot from the window of the airplane. My phone was off and camera buried in my carry-on because I had no idea we were going to get such a good view on take off. I scrambled to wrench the camera from my bag and took this pic without looking through the camera.
   The Washington Monument is the most obvious in this photo... if you follow the lawn back and to the right, that's the US Capitol building. If you follow the lawn back and to the left, that's the White House.

   The photo above is zoomed and cropped from the original. You can click on the photo above for a bigger view. Hit the jump for the original version.

Aggressive Cranes

Taken at the National Zoo in Washington DC, October 2010.

... because the passive-aggressive cranes in the adjacent enclosure just weren't as interesting.

I thought this sign was funny, I'm not really sure why. I tried to capture the bird and the sign in a sinister, kind of film noir way.

Detriot at Night

Sort of. Taken from a plane on October 31, 2010.

I was trying to get a good night, aerial shot of Detriot, obviously, but I think the camera initially was set to an automatic setting, causing the very slow shutter speed. Regardless, I like the result. Night shots from a plane are never interesting anyway, and they all look pretty much the same to me. But I'm always compelled to take one even though I know I can hardly replicate what I'm seeing out the window.