Cloud and trees, Roscoe

A whimsical cloud.

Drain mouth, Jax Beach

Look like teeth to me. I didn't put my foot in to see.

Weed, Jax Beach

This is a hole in a well-travelled sidewalk that got some dirt in it. It is about the size of a quarter (euro). This little sedum was as happy as could be.

Inadvertant mosaic, Jax Beach

We had 10 inches (.3 meters) of rain here in a three day period and this advertising flyer got pretty well rearranged. Looks like stained glass.

Datura flower, Garden, Roscoe

A bumper crop this Spring.

Blue water, dock, Roscoe

After last week's 10 inches of rain in three days it was nice to see blue sky and puffy, dry clouds.

Dock piling, Roscoe

Dune walkover, Jax Beach

Ever since the beach communities have put these in and banned walking on the dunes the dune grasses have built themselves up and don't erode nearly as quickly during storms.

Palm fronds, Jax Beach

Salmon on a minted pea puree.

Since my daughter gave me an industrial strength stick blender for Christmas, I have been able to make true purees. This was wonderful.

Pasta salad, Roscoe

Made a nice dinner. Onion, melon,chicken, spinach and a red wine vinaigrette. (You could leave the chicken out Martina, and it would still be good!)

Sonata hood, Roscoe

My new car, a Hyundai Sonata, has a very sculptured body. I keep seeing details that I need to photograph. This is the hood.

Rain!

 We have just ended three days of almost solid rain. We almost had water in our living room due to flooding. We had 7 inches of rain in those three days, the result of very humid air caught between two fronts butting isobars. I snuck out during a lull and shot these of rain dripping off of our Live oak into the Intracoastal Waterway. Of course today it cleared in an hour and temperatures got balmy and our sandy soil drained quickly.

Grilled peppers, Roscoe

 Grilling makes peppers so sweet that they're almost dessert.

Photo mistake #346

Here is a case of not doing the basics. I have a little 40mm pancake lens from Canon that I put on my 5D Mk II to make it lighter and because it's the same focal length on a full frame as the lovely little 20mm Panasonic is on my Micro 4/3 cameras. The lenses even look identical if scale is taken into account. I have had great problems with flare with this lens when there is a light source in the frame. It's sharp with the light behind me but flares like crazy, as in this picture. I always put a filter on my lenses, usually one from B+W because they are so optically neutral. Well, I cleaned the front of the filter and the back element of the lens, all very clear to the naked eye. Went out and took more pictures, same flare problem. I was about to write the lens off when I decided to try one last cleaning. I took the filter off and it looked clean. I held it up to a light source and it flared like crazy. There was a clear, but guaze-like film on the filter. I couldn't see it when it was on the lens. So I cleaned it and put it back on the lens and voila! no more flare. I went through all of my 4/3 lenses and all of the B+W filters had the film. They must be shipped with it on as a protectant with the assumption that any thinking photographer would check and clean a new filter before installing it.

If you get lazy, you pay.