Fix Yo Self

Words to live by;-)

Store shelves, St. Augustine,

 Some people really know how to stock shelves. This is an art glass shop on St. George Street in St, Augustine. They have all manner of little collectibles. I love the chicken with an attitude and the zaftig swimmer.

Spider lily, St. Augustine

I always thought that these lilies were so named because of the flowers. They are usually planted in large groups. When I saw this freestanding one I realized that the whole plant resembles a spider.

Statue, St. Augustine

 I love to photograph statues. They sit still. They can hold a pose forever. They never complain. And they take the light beautifully. They are great practice for portraits. This little nymph was being hit by very soft light on the second floor of the Cafe Alcazar. The food was great too.

Electric cones, Nocatee

The state's smallest construction site, but it needed two cones.

Malden sidewalk, by my daughter Jenn

Look down two posts and ask if genes travel;-)

Over 150 Different Dog Breeds, St. Augustine

I just can't tell those breeds apart.

Cement dove, sidewalk, Nocatee

Palm frond, Beach Blvd. Bridge, Jax Beach

I have recently downloaded Tonality, a Photoshop filter from MacPhun software, and am starting to play with it. It converts color files to black and white and allows all of the darkroom techniques to be incorporated into that file. I converted this from color to Agfapan 100 and then applied a split-tone filter. It looks like split tones I used to do in the darkroom. It's a great filter..highly recommended.

Fence and church, Jax Beach

Wall, cement and rust, Jax Beach

Pole and fence, ballfields, Jax Beach

Rare soft light here in the south.

Old John Deere, Jax Beach

Batting cage, Jax Beach

Chairs, PVIC, Ponte Vedra Beach

Chair cover and clouds, PVIC

I have been playing with MacPhun's Tonality, which allows one to convert a color file to black & white in the style of a lot of the old b&w films. I converted to Ilford SFX 200 with a red filter. Sort of Ralph Gibsonish.

Choice, Jax Beach

Water service, Jax Beach

It's Breast Cancer Month here in the U.S. and pink is worn and painted everywhere. But when the stalking crab-like water services get into the act, it has gone too far;-)

Ballfields, Jax Beach

I went for my post-spinning walk in Jax Beach yesterday. I changed directions and went south and west from Bailey's. There were very high clouds, creating a lovely soft light, so I took a lot of pictures.

Two palms, Jax Beach

These are in the very peaceful black graveyard in Jax Beach. It is directly across Beach Blvd. from the white graveyard. Now, before people get their panties in a bunch, these are old designations. The races were buried as they lived, years ago. I am sure that there is now a mix of races, at least in the old white graveyard. The graves in the black graveyard seem to stop in the 1980s. when such separations ended officially. The black/African-American side is very peaceful and the graves are in a lovely grove of trees behind these palms.

Store window, St. John's Town Center

Is it just me, or are mannequins getting a little creepy?

Store window, St. John's Town Center

Dinner last week

Shrimp, red bell peppers and some Andouille sausage. Spicy and warming.

Red water service, St. John's Town Center

They aren't even hiding anymore.

Jenn's tofu

My daughter Jenn has been studying to be a health coach, a more and more important skill in these unhealthy times. Part of her studies, a large part, involve our relationship to food. She has started her own blog, called All Good Things, in which she finds or invents or adjusts recipes that are healthy and good for you. She has just started it and has a few followers, mostly family, so far. Food blogging is a hard place to get a toe in the water. As a proud dad, I read every post.

One of the recipes was for fried tofu. Now tofu is one of my favorite ingredients anyway. I love it's texture and it's ability to absorb almost any spice or flavor. So I made it and here is my result. It was crispy, crunchy and, when dipped in the sauce, lit my tastebuds up. A real winner.

Her blog is at www.jennweekes.blogspot.com  Try this recipe and let me know.

I am fully aware the a significant percentage of the population hears tofu and has a gag reflex. If you are one of those I do not recommend trying this.........well, you should......but you won't.

To Wes, Ponte Vedra Beach

Wes Disney was a photographer/artist/muralist in Burlington, VT when I lived there. I attended two of his workshops to my great benefit. His were unconventional workshops. I arrived at my first one, having been asked to bring recent work. At that point in time I printed every day in one of two darkrooms. So I brought the most recent 200 prints in two ratty old paper boxes. Everyone else brought carefully assembled portfolios. The first night we all ate copiously and drank beer and wine until the wee hours. We had a lot of laughs and, being a gregarious person, I was in the middle of  the give and take. We all stumbled up to bed and Wes stayed up and went through our pictures. When we came down he had everyone's portfolios assembled separately. There were some wonderful prints and good groups. Mine were nowhere in sight.....gulp. Wes critiqued everyone's work and then said that mine was a different problem, he couldn't choose.

The group of pictures I had brought were everything from work prints to finished work. I have never concentrated on one area of photography, probably to my detriment, but love trying every part of the discipline. Wes led us into the rec room, the workshop was in the early Spring at a summer camp, and, there on the ping pong table were all of my prints. Still he never critiqued them, just suggested people look at them.

That night we had an even better evening, good food, good laughs and great wine. Still no critique. Yikes. The next day was the last and we were all scheduled to leave by 2:00. At 1:00 Wes asked me to take a walk with him. We went around a corner and there was a barn in a field with a boat on a trailer around which the snow had blown. He asked if I saw anything and I said the the boat looked as if it was at full speed through the snow. He then said that he had looked for two days to find an example to show me and the boat was it. He said that I spotted it in a minute. Then he said that I should use my sense of humor in my photography and walked away. Done. Over. That was my critique. I spent a month trying to make funny pictures before it dawned on me that he meant use my quick wit and stop trying to be Edward Weston, or Irving Penn, two of my heroes, and take what I saw in a flash. It changed my personal work entirely.

Wes had a wonderful print in his studio of a lifeguard's chair, taken with his rickety old 8x10 camera. I loved it and never was smart enough to buy one. Wes got melanoma and died in 2000. I still miss him. This picture that I took last week is the latest and closest attempt to recreate that print. It doesn't come close but it keeps Wes in my mind.

Pete's Bar, Jax Beach

Pete's Bar is an institution in Jax Beach. It is an unpretentious little beer joint with some pool tables, I believe. I have only been in once, during the day, not it's best time. This little feller apparently was over served.

Odd assemblage, Jax Beach

A-pillar, Sonata,Solana Rd.,PVB

I would never have taken this until I got the RX100 III and have it with me at all times.

Chair and bag, Ponte Vedra Baech

Clever solution, Jax Beach

I have been watching these condos go up for a year. In the top picture they had finished the parking garage, which I thought looked like a monolith and not very attractive. I went away for long periods and took a walk and didn't really notice that I couldn't see the garage. I finally noticed that they had built condos right onto the front wall. Clever....but, the middle condos only have windows on the front and back up to a garage wall. The end caps will be a bit airier due to two sides of windows. They also are not very deep as you can see. I would love to see one when they are finished just to get a feel for being close to a major road, Beach Blvd., with a cement wall behind me.

Reed grass and dead palm, Roscoe extension.

I think that every photographer, and especially gear heads like me, have a place they go simply to test equipment. I come here to see how a new lens and/or camera do in separating detail. Reed grass grows all over itself and ranges from dark green to very light grey. It will reveal any loss of acuity in a lens. This was taken with my new Sony RX 100 III with a Zeiss lens. I was using a monopod on a grey day. At 100% on my big screen it held up wonderfully. amazing. It is a tiny camera that I can carry in a belt pouch, with a great lens.

Seed pods, Roscoe extension

They really are this color, but only for a few days, then they turn brown and become subjects for black and white photography.

Swimming island, Lagoon Course, PVIC

Somewhere near this is one of my golf balls.....rats.

Red fence and basket, Millbrae, CA

Cherub, Millbrae, CA

Two chairs, Millbrae, CA

I love nice places to sit. This looks a winner.

Japanese maple, Millbrae, CA

Sigh....I have a few Japanese maples here in Florida, but they struggle. In Millbrae they are almost an invasive species. Every yard has at least one.

PLAY calottery, Millbrae, CA

Tights 'R'  Us

Cash only, Millbrae, CA

Hydrant, Millbrae, CA

Ahhh the posh life.

Driveway, Millbrae, CA

A strange bleak area in a town full of plant life.

Fence and bench, Millbrae, CA

So many angles here in California. For a state so vast the houses are usually on small plots of land and close. Of course, a lot of the land in the state is, wonderfully, declared wild and preserved. An idea Florida could use.

Alley, Millbrae, CA

Millbrae, CA