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Monday, April 12th, 2010
The National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. (HDR from a single RAW)
Admittedly, the food court makes for an awkward backdrop. The abundant glass windows at this end of the building allow a lot of natural light to hit the exhibit. This enabled me to get a nice indoor single RAW HDR without a tripod.
Excerpt from the museum’s website:
This is an actual lunar module, one of 12 built for Project Apollo. It was meant to be used in low Earth orbit to test the techniques of separation, rendezvous, and docking with the command and service module. The second of two such test vehicles, its mission was canceled because of the complete success of the first flight.
Posted in District of Columbia, buildings, historical, travel, uncategorized | No Responses »
Tags: apollo, astronaut, authentic, exhibit, food court, hdr, high dynamic range, historical, indoor, lunar module, museum, nasa, nasm, National Mall, natural light, project apollo, satellite, Smithsonian, space exploration, spring, the District, travel, Washington
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
Great Falls Park in Northern Virginia (HDR from 5 bracketed exposures)
According to a nearby sign, you are looking at the ruins of “the first of 5 locks on the Great Falls portion of the Patowmack Canal. Used from 1802 to 1828, they lifted or lowered riverboats the 75 feet that the river drops in going over the falls.”
I recently stayed with family in Great Falls to attend the USCAP 2010 Annual Meeting. During a break from conference activities, I found myself exploring the Great Falls Park. Walking beside the Potomac River and the falls was a nice, relaxing break from everyday life. For instance, today I spent the late morning doing an autopsy on someone with blunt force injuries of the head and multiple gunshot wounds. Immediately upon completion of that autopsy, I walked a short distance to the scene of a suicide. It was just another day at the office.
I have been unable to work on my photography very much lately. I have a lot of things going on. I’m winding down my forensic pathology fellowship, I’ve got a clinical faculty position in GI pathology and cytopathology coming up very soon, my house is currently on the market, and I’m in the process of building a new home. Things are crazy, as they often seem to be. And, when things get crazy, my photography suffers.
Posted in Virginia, historical, parks, travel | No Responses »
Tags: canal, colorful, exploration, Great Falls Park, hdr, high dynamic range, hike, locks, national park, Northern Virginia, park, Potomac River, ruins, spring, stones, trail, USCAP, vanishing point, Virginia
Monday, April 5th, 2010
The Washington Monument and Washington Monument Lodge in Washington, D.C. (HDR from a single RAW)
I was recently in the District for a work related conference. The weather for most of the week was downright dreadful. But, I made the most of it. In this photo, the Washington Monument in the background towers above the Washington Monument Lodge.
The girls were able to come up and spend a couple of days with me. It was their first time in D.C. We visited a couple of museums and did a lot of walking on the National Mall. We miscalculated the weather and decided it would be safe to walk all the way to the Lincoln Memorial, which put us about 1.2 miles from the Smithsonian Metro station. Just as we started to walk back, we got hit with a deluge. The kind that renders umbrellas useless. The wetness, combined with being pummeled by stuff getting knocked out of trees, made for a pretty rotten commute back to where we were staying.
Posted in District of Columbia, buildings, historical, life's unexpected challenges, parks, travel | No Responses »
Tags: city park, cloudy, D.C., deluge, downpour, hdr, high dynamic range, historical, Lincoln Memorial, Metro, monument, museum, National Mall, park, rain, rainy, sky, Smithsonian, spring, the District, Washington, Washington Monument
Thursday, February 25th, 2010
The Rotunda on The Lawn at UVA (Charlottesville, VA)
This photo was taken back in September of 2008. We took a day trip up to Charlottesville to show Kate where she was born and where she spent the first year of her life. She didn’t remember any of it, but she had a good time.
We caught a lucky break with the weather. After it rained nearly the entire drive up to Charlottesville, the weather improved when we arrived. In fact, we were greeted by some really nice clouds.
Charlottesville is a neat town. Graduating from medical school on The Lawn is something I will always remember.
Posted in historical, parenting | No Responses »
Tags: Academical Village, autumn, campus, Central Grounds, Charlottesville, cloudy, college, fall, hdr, historical, rainy, sky, The Grounds, The Lawn, The Rotunda, university, University of Virginia, UVA, Virginia
Sunday, January 3rd, 2010
The North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh, NC
I took the girls to the Natural Sciences Museum in Raleigh today. We’ve been there several times before, but I got a couple of new and interesting shots today. This is shot from the second floor, overlooking the Coastal North Carolina Exhibit. The giant whale skeletons are pretty amazing. I’ve never had much luck shooting up at these from the first floor.
I’m working on integrating my Facebook, Flickr, Digital Photo Project, and Imagekind websites. What a pain in the ass! I need more time to devote to this stuff. I’d better cut back from 5 hours of sleep a night to 4.
Posted in historical, nature | No Responses »
Tags: fossil, hdr, indoor, museum, Natural Sciences Museum, North Carolina, Raleigh, whale
Saturday, May 23rd, 2009
The E.B. Bain Water Treatment Plant in Raleigh, NC
Natalie, my soon to be 3-year-old, fell down about 13 stairs tonight. She seems to be okay. Actually, I think she walked away from it without a scratch. I know that kids are resilient, but I’m very surprised (and so relieved) that she’s not hurt.
I was downstairs and everyone else was upstairs. Natalie broke away from the herd to come downstairs, presumably to get her sippy cup full of water. It sounds like she made it successfully down no more than one or two stairs before she fell. All I heard was a series of thuds that just kept going. It was a sickening sound and I honestly can’t get it out of my head. There were no screams or anything like that, just thuds. I started running to the stairs as the sound stopped. There was silence for about a second, then terrible screaming. The kind of screaming that scares you to death as a parent. I expected to find Kate (my older girl) when I rounded the corner. I was shouting, "Kate, Kate" as I was running to the stairs. Kate has fallen down 2 or 3 stairs before, but certainly nothing like this, not from the top. When I saw Natalie’s little hair covered face on the ground, it felt even scarier.
She was crying, which was a good thing. That ruled out a couple of really bad things right away. I got her to hold pretty still and to quit crying enough to be able to talk to me. She said the only thing that hurt was her head, she pointed right to the top of it. She seemed to be limping a little at first, but after a couple of minutes, she was walking just fine.
Even though she seemed unhurt, because she said her head hurt we decided to take her to the pediatric ED to get her checked out. I knew they probably wouldn’t do any diagnostic tests, but it was okay, I felt better getting her seen anyway.
Posted in historical, parenting | No Responses »
Tags: accident, art deco, emergency department, hdr, indoor, Natalie, North Carolina, Raleigh, The Bain Project, urban decay
Wednesday, May 20th, 2009
The E.B. Bain Water Treatment Plant in Raleigh, NC
The title of this photo explains the feeling that I had while exploring the Bain Project. I really have no idea what most of the equipment was used for. And, that doesn’t even matter. I’m glad that there were no maps, no guides to tell me what I was looking at. I like that I was allowed to use my imagination to try to figure it out myself. And, if I couldn’t figure it out, I could just stand there and appreciate the colors and complexity and decay.
Posted in historical | 1 Response »
Tags: art deco, hdr, indoor, North Carolina, Raleigh, The Bain Project, urban decay
Sunday, May 17th, 2009
The E.B. Bain Water Treatment Plant in Raleigh, NC
The Bain Project
www.bainproject.com/
Wandering through the Bain Water Treatment Plant experiencing the Bain Project was exceptionally cool. I lived on the edge and went hand held, opting to leave the tripod in the trunk. It turned out to be a good move since the lighting was pretty good (in most areas of the plant) and I was able to maneuver better and cover more ground without it. I was able to get away with an ISO setting of 200 at f/4.0 and a shutter speed ranging from 1/4 to 1/20 of a second. Fortunately, there were no shortage of things to brace myself against when I took my photos, so they turned out to be damn near tripod quality (patting myself on the back for getting quality RAWs indoors and hand held using a long shutter speed).
I have no idea what kind of equipment I’ve captured in this one. If anyone out there is familiar with it, I’d love to know what you think. There’s nothing exceptional about the composition here. It’s the colors and contrast that make me love how this one turned out.
Posted in historical | 1 Response »
Tags: art deco, hdr, historical, indoor, North Carolina, Raleigh, The Bain Project, urban decay
Sunday, May 17th, 2009
West Point on the Eno in Durham, NC
I made my second trip out to West Point on the Eno yesterday. I shot this one after chatting with a couple of the folks who work and volunteer at the park on the weekends. They were very hospitable and I walked away knowing the story behind the West Point Mill and also having a better understanding of grist mills in general.
I was surprised at just how much the whole building vibrated when the mill’s machinery was operational. My D200 and tripod were visible moving when I was capturing my bracketed exposures, but fortunately the photo turned out nice and clean.
Posted in historical, parks | No Responses »
Tags: Durham, Eno, grist mill, hdr, historical, indoor, North Carolina, shop, West Point on the Eno
Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009
West Point on the Eno in Durham, NC
I’m not much of a history buff. It’s not that I don’t care about historical things, it’s just hard to find the time to learn about them. This old tobacco barn at West Point on the Eno made for a really nice subject and the redbuds framed the barn nicely.
Posted in Durham, North Carolina, buildings, historical, parks | No Responses »
Tags: barn, beauty, city park, colorful, country, Durham, Eno Indians, Eno River, farmers, hdr, hike, historical, history, nature, North Carolina, park, redbuds, river valley, rural, rustic, secluded, settlers, Shocco Indians, spring, tobacco, tobacco barn, trail, wagon, West Point on the Eno, woods
