Ollie eats his peas...

...like a good boy should.

                                    Oops! One got away!

The Magic Hour

Or, the Magic Hour-and-a-half, depending on who you ask. Some claim it's the hour after sunrise and before sunset plus the half-hour before sunrise and after sunset. Others say its simply the first and last hours of daily sunlight. Either way, the Magic Hour (also known as the Golden Hour) is the time of day when the sun is low in the sky and offers a direct, warm, golden glow while also providing dramatic shadows and contrast. Some photographers only take out their cameras during that time.

 

Getting the exposure right can be surprisingly tricky during the magic hour, especially when photographing people (and definitely when the subject is running around and moving in and out of the light, as is our little friend in these examples). For landscapes, matrix-metering would give you generally good results, but in this situation I tend to use center-weighted, and occasionally even spot-meteing (usually to keep the highlights in Ollie's golden locks from blowing-out).

Back-lighting can be particularly effective during the magic hour, as in the final photo above, provided you nail the exposure. In this case I used center-weighted metering and didn't worry about the back-lit highlights in Oliver's hair blowing out, because that is the desired effect, after all. Fortunately, center-weighted metering gives a modicum of attention to the areas outside of the center of the scene, so there is still enough detail in the highlights to make this a well-balanced image.

Easter with Oliver

Oliver was quite surprised when we arrived at Katrinka's house on Easter Sunday. There waiting for him was Katrinka, her father, Dennis, and a whole bunch of eggs ready to be dyed!

Oliver was very helpful. He gently placed the eggs in the dye...

...and helped load them into the egg-carton to dry.

The real fun was yet to come, but first Ollie thought it would be nice to entertain Dennis with a makeshift drum in Katrinka's Backyard.

Finally, it was time for Oliver's first Easter egg hunt!

With a little help from Katrinka, Ollie quickly began finding Easter eggs that were hidden in the yard.

Ollie was very pleased with his excellent detective work and was delighted to show-off the eggs he found to Katrinka and Dennis.

 

 

He quickly became very adept at hunting for eggs, searching around the yard until he found his prize. (This went on for quite some time, as Katrinka was equally adept at recycling the eggs that Oliver found.)

He was filled with joy whenever he found an egg!

All in all, a wonderful Easter. Just one minor problem, however. Every time we go to Katrinka's house now, Ollie expects to go on an Easter egg hunt!

There are several more photos of Ollie on Easter Sunday in my galleries, starting here. As always, you can also click on any of the above images to view the larger versions in the gallery.

A Napa Landscape

By no stretch of the imagination do I fancy myself a landscape photographer, but every so often I manage to produce one that I can live with - even if it's only because the scene itself is compelling.

This photo is not a particularly special or unique composition. It's reasonably well executed in terms of technical aspects such as exposure and acuity, especially given the weather conditions, but ultimately what makes this image work for me is simply the grandeur of the subject itself. The scene transcends the photography, I think.

 

This is a classic "grab shot" in the sense that I really wasn't prepared for, or even thinking about, taking this photo. While heading back to the Bay Area from Calistoga along the Siverado Trail, I noticed this scene and pulled the car over to the side of the road and snapped away. This was at the tail end of a storm passing through the valley and it was still raining lightly when I took this photo. The view here is facing across the Napa Valley vineyards towards the mountains on the valley's Western flank that separate it from the Sonoma Valley. This is a couple of miles south of Calistoga.

The photo was taken handheld with the Nikon D700 and the new Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 AF-S, stopped-down to f/11. Shutter-speed was 1/250 of a second and  ISO was 280. Shot in RAW and converted in Adobe Lightroom v. 2.3. Click the image to view it in a larger size.

Oliver goes for a swim

Ever since the first time Oliver took a bath, it's been clear that he has an affinity for the water. His mom and I decided that it would be fun to finally get him into a swimming pool so we took a quick jaunt up to the Napa Valley town of Calistoga, which has several nice little places with pools fed by mineral water from local hot springs.

So, even on a cloudy and relatively cold early-April day, the water in the various pools is warm and inviting. Oliver took to the water like a fish, he even seemed to know intuitively how to move his arms and kick his legs as if to swim. No trepidation at all.

Move over, Michael Phelps!

 

A few more pics from this outing are in the galleries here and here.