architects of air MIRAZOZO Luminarium
we'd read about this, became curious and decided to give it a view. it wasn't that easy. we first tried to go on MLK day, only to find it was sold out. sold out at $8 per person for a 20 minute viewing... so we thought some more and doubled our effort. I went early one morning and bought tickets. the ticket lady advised me to show op before 3PM to avoid a long line, kids won't be all be out of school till 4PM, the last admission is 5PM... this was getting complicated. kat left work early to meet us, I went to p/u the daughter from school, but she forgot and got on the bus anyhow.
the boys and I drove back home and waited the 30 minutes for the bus. kat went ahead and got in line back at the long center. we arrived at 4:45! I paid $7 for parking, this was now nearly a $50 20 minute event. but we got in.
I've noticed a lot of people got new DSLR cameras for christmas. good for them. unfortunately many of these people have NO idea what they have. they find the auto modes, point, and click. that works MOST of the time. I've grown impatient with these dslr slingers who are ignorant of basic light knowledge. like when we were at the dallas aquarium and people were trying to use the flash, in a dark space, up against a giant wall of glass, that reflects the flash back at the camera. or at live shows when I see people using the flash for a subject that is WELL BEYOND the reach of their flash. they preview the result on the back of the camera, lift it up and try again, and again. we saw this once at the one world theatre. the girl was blasting us all with her flash and not getting the band on stage at all. she finally told us "it's not my camera, somebody gave it to me and asked me to take pictures"
anyhow, there are really only about 4 adjustments you should learn about your dslr:
shutter speed: length of time the sensor is exposed to light, faster to stop fast moving objects and slower to allow more light in
f-stop: size of the hole through the lens that adjusts depth of field (focus from shallow to infinite) and also how much light comes through (shutter speed and f-stop are the two main adjustments to set the pic)
digital cameras have brought two new manual in camera adjustments not present on film cameras
ISO: this is the sensitivity of your sensor to light. lower numbers offer less noise and more detail, but need more light. newer cameras have a huge iso range and if the pics are going to be sized down for web posting, high iso settings can still yield plenty of clarity and work in low light settings.
WB (white balance): this is an adjustment for light source. this is usually left to auto, but there are times when you need to change it to record the light as you see it. super saturated color situations can really throw the AWB into messing up the color
for the pics above, I first bumped up the ISO to 1600, slowed my shutter down to 1/25 of a second and an F-stop of 7.1. the blue color was WAY off in my test shots so I turned the white balance to Daylight. a wide angle lens at 10mm was used to get the most of the small-ish spaces. regular focal length lens would have captured bits and pieces.
I try to avoid using a flash unless for fill-flash, as seen below. yes, you can shoot directly into the sun and use fill flash to light your subject if you don't want them to appear as silhouettes.
if you can't wrap your head around all that, just use your iphone. it's pretty damn good for a point and shoot with enough light.
on the way to the mirazozo luminarium, I saw a guy riding a bike that was about 12 ft tall. he was at a red light, working hard not to tip over and land on the roof of the car next to him. he managed to keep it up and slowly advanced when the light turned green. at the next red light I saw a guy riding his bike, shirtless, with his cat on his shoulders... it's good to live in austin.
the chocolate fountain is the stuff dreams are made of.
I have spent SO MUCH TIME working on removing body damage and repainting the wife's "72 bmw 2002. it used to be mine, but she started driving it regularly and fell in love with it so... the paint and bodywork are not perfect, but I've reached the point of "it's good enough" and I'm putting it back together. bit by bit and piece by piece, another vehicular puzzle.
temps have been in the mid to high 70's! went for a neighborhood walk, this is the downtown view from our street.
I've told kat that all decisions about fixing up her barn/cabin on the blanco river near wimberley were up to her. there are a few things that have to be done FIRST. I've learned when she starts off with "I had an idea" I should not respond with "another one?". she has ideas for shelves and flooring and walls... I am more about what needs to be done first and I'm trying to not help (lead) any decisions. I did offer that "a window that swings out from one side" is called a casement window. they are not that common, and certainly not cheap. she found some on craigslist, but they are MUCH too big for her cabin. but after she saw how much they cost new, I was dispatched to go get them anyhow. so now I have to build a home around two jeld wen 2'x7' casement windows. we gotta start somewhere. at $130 each, it was a bargain. but now we have more stuff to store and the garage is about to burst.
