Blog

Note –  Bob Hazlett added photos to “What are we doing” but read on before going there.

My answer is: “Art and photography are essential to the human spirit for many reasons – Here are 3 reasons:

Photos makes you look: It’s hard to walk by a photo and not look at it. And then it makes you really look at it and wonder…everything from “what were they thinking?” to “who were they?” and “what are they doing?” them maybe wonder,  “why did they do that?” Look at Susan’s snapshots of a family event.

They give you a connection with the photographer and the subjects – what was their feeling at that moment – joy, laughter, empathy, desire,  wonderment……..

 Photos take you places: Look at the colors in Davids Wood Ducks, the eyes staring at you, the droplets of water from the beak. You can almost taste cool moist air from the lake, sense the stillness, and the see the emerging spring.  So, again, photos give you a connection with the photographer.  You will almost be there and sense the feeling of the photographer at that moment – joy, peace,  wonderment…….

Photos help you learn:  Observational learning is the process of learning through watching others and then being influenced by the behavior’s that were observed.   By looking at the photos of others we obverse all kinds of things – From learning what mastering the skills of photography can produce – like a perfect image, to learning how others have better enjoyed social interactions with family by sharing snapshots  with each other and friends – like Club members.

The TGO Photo Club, in the winter in Florida, helps us better enjoy this human-spirit essential. But we have at least 6 months without meetings.   So, I said I would help members continue to share during the summer through my blog.

Here is my new format to this blog:

1. “What are we doing” – Many of these photos will be shot with little set-up time.  It is an unplanned happening that tells the story. Here, even the cell phone camera is a wonderful tool to help you socialize with friends and neighbors by showing them “what they were doing”.  Through the web, Club members should be encouraged to share stories about what they are doing – Including photos taken with cell phone cameras and pocket-size cameras at any summer activity.  Sort of a Wheel of Fortune “What are we doing”?  Skills of art like composition, tone, texture, etc. are always important but what I want to encourage here is to tell a story of your activity when it happens.
2.  “Photo shoot images” – Some photos I deemed to have been shot while waiting for it to happen – maybe sitting in a  blind, maybe with tripods, and  complex equipment.  The camera is a wonderful tool to help you socialize with friends and neighbors by sharing “what they saw”.   Through the web members should be encouraged to development and improve their skills with “planned” photo shoots –  produce beautiful photographs of natural and man-made objects.  A planned photo shoot where you have time to practice skills of art like patients, composition, tone, texture, etc.
3.  “Digital photo art”   Some examples of photos that succumbed to the extremes of post processing!  Since I enjoy learning to create my own mental (maybe demented) version of digital art using photographs and PhotoShop – I can not help but try to make this website encourage Club members to develop better skills in digital post processing.

Therefore, send me images to share:  Send them to jimbrubaker@earthlink.net  If you can resize them to be 600 pixels high, it will make my job easier.  And send 6 or less per e-mail.  If re-sizing is not easy at your end – send them anyway – I am sure I can deal with it.    THANKS – Lets see where all this will take the Club this summer.

 

 

 

As TGO Photo Club members migrate to their spring/summer/fall activities I am going to attempt to offer a forum for members to share the joy of their activities with other club members. I want to help them tell their story through photos – stories snapped with their cell phones – or stories snapped on the spur of the moment using their cameras that just happened to be with them.

I will try to have two Club pages on this website throughout the summer – 1. The TGO Photo Page that you can click on in the left hand column and 2. The TGO Story Page that for right now will be this page that you are reading.

First click on the TGO Photo Page to see Dave Cesari’s NY spring snow and birds enjoying the snow at his feeders.  Dave wrote: “Hi Jim, A lovely spring day here in upstate NY. The plus side is it makes birds come to the feeders. A Cardinal, Fox Sparrows & a Morning Dove.  Dave”

Then scroll down – In the future, I hope to get photos from Club members so that I never have to use my own photos again.  I want to provide this space for club members to tell their story with each other.

To get started,  I will post a few cell phone photos that tell you my story of last week -seeing things in the great outdoors right here around the Great Outdoors – all taken within the last week or so with my cell phone while I spend most of my spare time enjoying The Great Outdoors’ great outdoors.

 

 

Over the next 6 months, I am hoping to post slide shows, once every two weeks,  with photos from TGO Photo Club members as they enjoy their summers.  Being that you all are residents of The Great Outdoors (TGO) – an RV, Golf, & Nature Resort – The TGO Photo Club is betting, during the summer, your travels and experiences offer some great photos to share.  The Club wants to provide you a new on-line way to do that sharing.

As a test of one approach, I created a 1 minute 30 second slide show using my own photos from summers on Drummond Island.  Tell me if you can view it on your computer, phone, and iPad,   (jimbrubaker@earthlink.net).  If this approach works, you could send me photos, and like “Show and Tell” at our winter meetings, we could continue to “Show and Tell” during the summer.

First check out Dave Cesari’s Nuthatches and Woodpeckers – click TGO Photo Club link in left hand column.

Then com back here and see a “Show and Tell” of a  DRUMMOND SUMMER:

I have again accepted a leadership position in the TGO Photo Club, after a 2 year rest.  But, it is so much fun to help the wonderful members of that organization practice their sport – photography.

Technically we are in such a wonderful time. Look at Donald Wyllie’s photos of the local airshow. (Click on the TGO Photo Club link in the left hand column).  His skill and the equipment he uses show us views of the planes in action that our naked eyes and our floating minds could not see. I love the action he captured.

Not quite like Donalds equipment he used to get the great shots of the planes in action, but, today we can do so much with the cell phone camera. 

One of my thrust in the Photo Club will be to get everyone who has a cell phone to become photographers – to share their daily experiences and inspirations with their friends – pull that cell phone out of your pocket and snap life – share your thoughts and emotions with friends.  In our mobile lives we need to stay connected somehow and the cell phone helps us do that – You know it does because you see that device next to the ears of people everywhere – But, do not forget the camera adds an other dimension to the connectivity that talking can not brings to our lives – That aspect is “showing and seeing”.

I have 10,603 cell phone photos stored on my icloud – somewhere up in the sky.  I enjoy the outdoors a lot. Did you realize that half of what you see when you are outdoors is sky.  I scanned a few of my recent cellphone photos – made me smile and I wanted to share them with someone –  I choose you, my blog readers, to see a few of the clouds my phone stored in the iCloud  –  just a snap of my life as I look to the sky each day – enjoy:

 

 

A friend of mine sent me two photos of “white stuff” and an “owl” from Drummond Island, Michigan.  They were taken by Terri Dudun Hartman – on the farm where my horse Perla lived.

I do not have a Florida owl photo to show you right now but I do have some Florida “white stuff” to show you.

But first, click on the TGO Photo Club page to see Bill White’s animals in Wisconsin’s white stuff and Dave Cesari’s Florida Screech Owls – Wonderful photos!

 

 

Linda Somers is featured on the TGO Photo Club Page – but first read, below, what I have to say about the club. Yes, my intent is to brag about our Club.

The Club invites you to join them and enjoy a wonderful group of people.  We meet at the Nature Center on the first and third Friday at 1:00 pm.  Ed Swan (321-269-3682) leads the meetings and organizes the agenda to accommodate a wide variety of interests in photography.

Read on – I’ll tell you of some of those interests:

You all know one of my hobbies is to take a photograph and use PhotoShop to change that photograph.

Lets look at more interests of TGO Photo Club members:

Photographer Dave Cesari, whom I really like and respect, says “If you do it right the first time you do not need to change it!” – Dave does get it right each time and post often on the clubs website – I love his works and his comment.

But say I, “By playing around with photoShop and attending club meetings, my mind is better trained on how to get the shot I want – It trains my mind to take a better photo in the first place.”

Another photographer, Nancy Presant, says, “I really enjoy our club.”  Why?  Because she gets to take club members on field trips to enjoy shooting photos in zoos, wildlife sanctuaries, on boat trips, and many others locations – I think she and some members enjoy the social aspects of photography.

Some of our members enjoy taking photos of wildlife.  Every day you can find them photographing TGO wildlife at the nature trail bridge.  Then, on a daily basis, they post their photos on the Nature Center’s Facebook page.

Some members want to learn to better use their cell phone camera to snap photos of their Florida home and send photos back to their family up north – maybe to rub in our warm weather a little:

We, also, take great pride in hanging photos on the walls of TGO.

Check out the walls of our library – It is a one member show, by Jim Dick.

How about the back-porch of the Manor.  Almost 50 brand new photographs by many members.  Susan Hubbard, also, maintains a motion triggered video panel on one of the walls with dozens of member’s photos.

Do you know that the CSA office wall holds 10 photos by the club members:

The Manor Lobby is decorated with 3 large photos by member,  Doug Jensen.

Hope I was able to show you what a great club the TGO Photo Club is and why I am so proud to be a member of it.

Join us in the Nature Center at our Friday meetings. Bring your ideas and your photos to share – anything from simple iPhone photos to precision photos from professional cameras – all are welcome.

If you would like to show us your photo techniques – Ed will find a spot in our Friday meetings for you to give us your insight. That is how it is – we learn from each other.

Note:  the website in the Happenings is incorrect.  The correct address is jimsdaily.wordpress.com  Linda Somers is the featured photographer there today.

See you at our Manor Porch reception on March 2. Come meet the photographers.

 

 

 

Oh my, I know it is a phone – it used to have a crank on it and it hung on the wall.

Oh my again – I just realized it is not a phone – it is a camera! and it is with me almost all the time. You would have to be a real photo enthusiast to carry a 200-500 mm lens with you all the time.

I want you to use you phone camera a lot – send me photos to share on these web sites as Dave Cesari does (He does not use the iPhone for the ones I post) but you sure can.

Click on the TGO Photo Club Photos to see 5 of his wonderful Spoonbills photos then come back here.

MY iPHONE MAGIC:

I’ll show you an Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake I saw on the Nature Trail, and antique car I saw on Drummond Island, and a freighter heading north to the Soo Locks to enter Lake Superior, and dancer in the streets of Havana, Cuba – all taken with my phone camera because I had it with me.

Now I’ll show you some Monochrome with the iPhone – Monochrome is always harder to isolate your subject but I think the iPhone allowed me to do OK?

 

 

Go look at Dave’s photos of the Snail Kite – The best after years of photographing them, says he – Click TGO Photo Club pages to the left.

_______________HERE IS MY SUCCESS and HAPPINESS THOUGHTS_________________

I was not sure of the relationship of happiness and success. So, I went to the internet to find out!

The internet was not a lot of help – but after pondering the question a bit I know that I see happiness in the face of those that succeed – but maybe if we ponder we will discover there is more to it than  that – so let’s start pondering by looking at yesterday.

Yesterday, 110 people attended Gloria’s reception in our community’s restaurant, the Blue Heron. 110 is twice the number she expected. She is still floating on cloud nine after that much success.  Gloria organized and promoted the reception to honor the 20 artists that created 50 pieces of art for her gallery that decorate the walls of the Blue Heron restaurant. 

The reception was two hours long. The air was electric – every artist felt the sparks that success puts into the air.  I know they were thinking: “WOW, all of these people paid to come and visit with me and see my art – WOW!”

Yesterday,  Dave Cesari – a dedicated experienced photographer of birds – wrote this to me – “I’ve shot (photographed) Snail Kites on and off for years but I think these are the best I’ve ever shot.”   Does that sound like success? WOW

I know Dave enjoys his passion for bird photography – and his success at it makes him smile.

I know Gloria enjoys her passion for art and her passion to help others find joy in her interests – and her success makes her smile.

So, say I, maybe I really do know the answer to this question – “Happiness is a result of success?”

But, I did say there may be more too it. You see, after I pondered it, I think I got it backward – I now think  “Success is the result of happiness” – If you are happy doing what you do, you will succeed.

Gloria pursues your passion – the thing she loves to do – That is why she is successful.

Dave pursues the Snail Kites for years – a thing he loves to do, and that is success. 

So I went to the internet again and looked for quotes about happiness and success and I found these three:

“Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.” by  Pele

Happiness lies in the thrill of creative effort and doing what you love to do. by Franklin D. Roosevelt

The real secret of success is enthusiasm – doing what you love to do.  by Walter Chrysler.

So, do your own pondering, make your own quote, and tune what you do accordingly.

Oh my,  I love playing with PhotoShop & I love putting the result here for you to see – so I guess I am successful:

 

Before you read my “Fake News” story, look at Dave’s owl photos on the TGO Photo Club page.  He wrote to tell me how pleased he was with the photos.

____________HERE IS MY STORY – HONEST____________________

What is truth?  I do not know, do you know what is true?  I saw 128 actors advertising stuff on TV this morning.  Did actor number 37 really feel the pain I saw on his face. Was what I saw the truth?

One advertisement said something to the effect that “These are real people, not actors”   I guess actors are just fake people? Is that the truth?

My mom was a real christian lady. I remember she, had pictures of Jesus on the wall, maybe even one on black velvet, also one as a book mark, and one as the second page of her Bible. Jesus looked a little different in each image. Was only one image true?

I found, in my research, that the oldest known portrait of Jesus, was dated about 235: “It shows him as a beardless young man of authoritative and dignified bearing. He is depicted as being dressed in the style of a young philosopher, with close-cropped hair and wearing a tunic and pallium – signs of good breeding in Greco-Roman society.”  Of course no photographs of Jesus were ever taken. We have to accept the artist’s rendering because the first photographs were made in the 1800’s.  Too bad, ’cause you can always believe the camera – right?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Which image is true? Do you get a different emotion from each?

In my research I found this: “Happening-truth is an objective factual account of events as recorded in the mind of a human at the time of the event with biases and a reason to influence the reader.  Story-truth is a subjective reflection of a person’s thoughts and feelings about the same event when retelling that story.  Since both are told by humans with biases, thoughts, and feelings, I see no difference between happening-truth and story-truth except the timing.  Are they both true or are they each shaded by the teller’s biases, thoughts, and feelings and, thus, not quite true?

So, that is why I conclude all stories of news are somewhat fake.  So study carefully  each story you read, hear, tell or snap a photo of.  Identify what you think is true and ponder what might not be quite true.

Oh my, would you please study the photos below and tell me if it is true that I enjoy playing around with PhotoShop: