2 in 1 day! More flowers!

Ok... A day to get caught up :)
Just this past week, I made trip to the Oregon Gardens with a wonderful friend, Teresa. It had to be the nicest day so far this year. Well that had its benefits and challenges!

Still new to macro photography and plants, what felt like pleasant breeze equaled tornado like winds when you are trying to capture a macro shot. And of course my tripod is in need of repair. Hand holding my camera with 105mm lens steady was no easy task to do, so I could be ready for the brief second the wind would stop long enough to capture an image.

The sun that I have been so happy to see peaking out from behind the clouds every so often was out in full force! This meant not much was in the shade. At noon the light on the flowers was quite intense giving strong contrast.

But any day to get out and play with my camera is absolutely worth it and I couldn't have asked for better company! It was a wonderful day and I look forward to my next adventure!

Tulips... a little later than anticipated :)

This April I had taken a trip down to the Wooden Shoe Tulip Farm and it turned out to be one of the few beautiful spring days with almost no rain :)

The morning started just around 9am before the loads of people arrived. Only the those looking for the perfect picture were out there at this time in the morning. Moving from flower to flower, row to row, color to color, there were so many in bloom the choices were limitless!

After about 3 hours of shooting my family joined me and we spent the rest of the afternoon taking a few more pictures and checking out the other activities like bouncy houses, rock climbing, slides and of course an elephant ear to refuel!

In May the Portland Metropolitan Photographer's Association had their quarterly print competition. Since I really had not done much in the way of flower macro photography I entered 3 images to see what I could learn...

This one "Three of a Kind" did ok it scored a 79. Almost but not quite a merit print as the name implied all 3 flowers were the same, though the middle one is just a soft focus. A better name, maybe a better score ;)

These 2 did score an 80 earning a merit and tied for 3 place "Morning Dew" and "Peach Pit Tulip" During the process of putting the images together and entering them in competition, I learned quite a bit about presentation, impact and titles... just to name a few. There are some many things to consider when entering but I look forward to the next one! Always an excellent opporturnity to grow and learn!





Oregon Coast Exploring

It has been quite a wet spring season here in the Pacific Northwest. Though an once in a while the sun would poke out from behind the clouds and brighten up the skies.

As a family we took a trip to the Oregon Coast this past April for boy scout family camp out. The forecast was sunny and bright as we began our drive out to Beverly Beach and the view along the way was gorgeous. Green fields, vineyards, forests and mountains, who could ask for better scenery on a drive! We pulled into the camp site and the rain began to fall and the wind blew. Assuming this was to be the outlook for the weekend we were glad to have our heated yurt!

Saturday morning had a few weather breaks and so we made hike out onto the beach. Oh how I miss the beach! Growing up in southern California I was spoiled being able to enjoy the warm weather and going to the beach; definately took it for granted.

Here everyone was bundled up in their winter jackets and hats to spend an hour walking along the shoreline. There is always a calm and peacful feeling sitting watching the waves crash and wash up by your feet. The kids dug in the sand, checked out the seaweed, rocks and shells scattered about. Damon even climbed up the large sand wall and attempted to ride a piece of driftwood down; didn't quite work :) As we made our way back to camp, the rain returned so we decided it was time for lunch. Just enough time for it to pass.

Since the sun was back out and no rain clouds in site we wandered off to Yaquina Head to explore the light house and tide pools. What a great idea! The kids (and grown ups) had a blast checking out the light house and climbing the stairs to the top and looking out over the beach. We then drove over to the tide pools and were able to see the sealions sun bathing on the rocks and check out a few tidal pools.

After enjoying the experience at Yaquina we decided to drive a few miles and see Devil's Punch Bowl. We found a chained off trail and ducked under the trail out sign to a beautiful section of beach! A small waterfall to the right and the "punch bowl" to the left. The tide was on it's way out and the access to the punch bowl meant sliding off the shoes and rolling up the jeans. And yes the water is very cold but the loor of taking some fun pictures was more than enough to justify the cold! And of course Damon decided to just jump the water and head off in front of me. He was just as excite to explore inside the huge rock bowl as I was :)

As energy levels were running low and the kids had their fill of fresh air, it was time to head back to camp and join the company of friends. The scout trips have been definately worth while to get us out of the house and offer an opportunity to spend time with other families. We have a wonderful troop and look forward to other adventures with them!

Along with the few pictures above, below is a slide show of a few of the sites we saw on trip to the coast... Enjoy!

Stay tuned...

New posts coming this weekend from our weekend trip to the coast! :)