[SI] "Interesting" comments

Arrrggh!! Posted this to the wrong newsgroup earlier. The two newsgroups are
adjacent in my reader and look too much alike. :^|
..................................................

Maybe I've gone soft, but this strikes me as one of the best SI collections
we've seen in a while. Aside from two or three macro shots that might have
benefitted from a bit more DOF, there are no obvious technical deficiencies.
And the subject matter is almost uniformly ... well, ... interesting. A good
job!

That said, I'll revert to my usual opinionated self and try to find specific
points to praise and nits to pick.

Bob


Eric Stevens 2 & 4
Eric's numbering system is odd, but these pictures are as straightforward as a
brochure from the museum that contains their subject. They do a nice job of
introducing us to an interesting piece of equipment that most of us will never
get to see.

Eric Stevens 0(?)
If you don't have an excellent optometrist, this picture's thumbnail appears
as a plain blue rectangle: only opening it reveals the kite. What's
interesting is that you can see the string all the way out to the kite.
Usually the string is hard to see and even harder to photograph. Martha and I
spent most of last week at the New Jersey shore, and she took several photos
of people flying kites on the beach. In none of her pictures can you see the
string.

Tony Cooper (AR)
I surmise from the caption that this is a wax dummy, but indeed she does look
almost real. Not sure who or where she is, though.

Bob Sosenko
What I found interesting here is how much the interior of the race car
actually looks like its street-ready cousins. Did this one begin life as a
regular production vehicle?

Bob Flint 1, 2, 3
It's interesting that it's so hard to figure out just what these guys are
doing. Some infrastructure improvement, obviously. Possibly a water or sewer
line? If it's in the U.S., is it a "shovel-ready" Stimulus project?

Savage Duck 1
Do the seven barrels fire all at once or in rotation? Back when I could
actually tell one fighter plane from another, their machine guns had to be
carefully timed so that they didn't shoot off their own propellers. At least
modern planes should never have that constraint.

Savage Duck 2 & 3
I'd be tempted to guess that the Duck paid a visit to the Air Force museum in
Dayton, Ohio. But I see what could be a jetway at a commercial airport, so I'm
not sure. I'm not into old planes, even though I used to work for the company
that made the engine of one of these. Well executed pictures, though,
especially the one of the Trojan.

Tim Conway 1
What is it about old airplane engines that captures the attention of people in
this group? This one appears to be mounted on a test stand, so maybe it's in
the shop for a rebuild.

Tim Conway 2
I guess the challenge here is to figure out where this is. I don't have much
of a clue. Without much conviction, I'd guess Italy, or possibly Spain or
Portugal. Just to keep from being so relentlessly saccharine, I'll observe
that I think I'd like this picture better if it showed more of the building.

Tim Conway 3
This is one of the most intriguing pictures in the collection. Martha and I
agreed that it looks most like an internally illuminated dandelion. It's gotta
be some sort of plant life, either real or imitation.

Calvin Sambrook
A church library? Several books on religion are identifiable. But that
customer had better be careful, or she's going to dump that chair over and
land on the floor with a couple of rows of books. This picture isn't helped by
the overly flat lighting, but I guess it's one of those cases where you have
to play the cards you're dealt.

Solomon Peachy 1
Another picture that belies its thumbnail, which disguises the chain as an
array of blue beads. Beyond that, I'm not sure what the point of interest is,
but the blue light does contribute to an attractive picture.

Solomon Peachy 2
Either she forgot to pick up her cigarette or she's about to light a gas
grill. So I guess the point is that teenagers shouldn't smoke or you shouldn't
stand too close to a gas grill when you're lighting it. Obviously I don't get
it, but it stands as a well executed photograph. Even the B&W works well. Is
the model Solomon's daughter?

Bowser 1
Nice doggy theme. Where are those bony ferrocanines, and who put them there?
Looks like a town green, or maybe a college or prep school campus. Hmmm... I
think Bowser lives in Andover or a nearby town. Phillips Academy, perhaps?

Bowser 2
Until I read the caption, I had guessed that it was Bowser's wife and dog on
that motorscooter. Anyway, it's arguably the most amusing picture in the
bunch, and I agree that the dog's matching sweater is what makes it work.
(Also those goggles.) And what could be more timely than a picture taken
today?

Bowser 3
I'd never have guessed what this was or where it was taken without reading the
caption. It does make an interesting picture, but I would be interested in
hearing why it works better in B&W.

Simon 1 & 2
Bug pictures are always interesting, because we usually don't see them up so
close. But I think these lose something to the exceptionally small depth of
field. I realize that macro photography is tricky and difficult, but there
must be a way to gain a bit more DOF in cases like this.

Frank S 1
I think this picture works really well. The thumbnail advertises it as a
checkerboard-like pattern with objects placed in the squares; only on
expansion do the fence and flower patch become clear. Simple but nice.

Frank S 2
For all their destructiveness, Japanese beetles are rather beautiful insects.
And this is an effective and imaginative picture. But I'm afraid I'd have
stuck the pin through him, rather than letting him climb it. Sorry.

Frank S 3
I'm not sure I altogether get this one. For all I know, it could be a display
of stuff you're planning to unload on E-Bay. Possibly it's intended to
represent an artist's studio or something similar, but the presentation comes
across to me as too cute and too staged to be very interesting. But I freely
admit that I'm probably missing something, possibly something obvious.

Tony Cooper (CD)
Just as I'm about to ask whether this device controls a player piano or a
Jacquard loom, I think I finally get it. You're portraying this disk as the
precursor of the CD, right? I guess that makes sense, and it does make an
attractive picture. Sorry to be so dense.

Tony Cooper 2
Yeah, this is interesting, since it doesn't look at all like what you'd see in
any flea market in Florida (or Massachusetts). I'm guessing it's in Africa,
although I couldn't tell you what part.

Lunabella
Now this *does* remind me of Florida, since I take those to be snoozing
flamingos. (Without their pink feathers I'd have identified them as turkeys
ready for the roaster.) Certainly interesting for the novelty of the pose.

Helen Silverberg
Wow, I wouldn't want to meet this one in a lonely alley on a dark night. I
take it the Minox was to keep her from noticing you were taking the picture? I
know you like to work in B&W, and I'm not sure it always helps your pictures.
But it seems very appropriate here.

Alan Browne 1, 2, 3
Very nice! That may be the only library reading room I've seen that's as
attractive as the recently renovated one in our town.

Did you know that they now make us carry passports if we want to get back into
the U.S. from Canada? Another boneheaded legacy of the moron Bush.


Finally, a few words about the pix my wife and I submitted:

Bob Coe 1
These are the electrodes of what is said to be the world's largest and most
powerful air-insulated van de Graaff generator. It's located in the Boston
Museum of Science and is used for lectures and demonstrations.

Bob Coe 2
A few weeks ago Martha and I photographed several covered bridges in
southwestern Vermont. One of my less successful pictures showed the very dark
inside of one of the bridges, with the outdoors at the other end grossly
overexposed. So I cranked up the brightness until I could see all the inside
woodwork, which made the overexposed end go almost pure white. Then I turned
it on its side to make it look like an eerily lit passegeway of some sort.

Bob Coe 3
This was a failed sunset picture from a photo shoot on Cape Cod a few years
ago. I had accidentally used a slow shutter speed, and I must have moved the
camera as well. Just when I was about to hit the "delete" button, it dawned on
me that if I cropped the picture round, it would look a bit like the surface
of Jupiter or Saturn. The birds probably wouldn't have been there on those
planets; but I had no way to get rid of them, so they stayed. I liked the
effect, so here it is.

Martha Coe 1
On the same trip that we photographed the bridges, Martha and I went to a
photography exhibit at Williams College. She liked the way the rounded roof of
this building, on the Williams campus next to the art gallery, complemented
the ridge line of the Berkshire Hills in the background.

Martha Coe 2
It turned out that Martha got some very nice pictures of the covered bridges
(better than mine, for the most part). This is the Silk Road Bridge over the
Wallomsac River in the town of Bennington.

Martha Coe 3
Martha's an avid photographer of flowers with her 60mm macro lens. This
picture shows several stages in the blooming of a daisy.

On 2009-09-07 19:41:28 -0700, Robert Coe said:

Arrrggh!! Posted this to the wrong newsgroup earlier. The two newsgroups are
adjacent in my reader and look too much alike. :^|

That's OK, I responded to that as well.

.................................................

Maybe I've gone soft, but this strikes me as one of the best SI collections
we've seen in a while. Aside from two or three macro shots that might have
benefitted from a bit more DOF, there are no obvious technical deficiencies.
And the subject matter is almost uniformly ... well, ... interesting. A good
job!

That said, I'll revert to my usual opinionated self and try to find specific
points to praise and nits to pick.

Bob
--------------------



Savage Duck 1
Do the seven barrels fire all at once or in rotation?
The 30mm GAU-8/A Avenger Gatling gun on the A-10 fires one barrel at a
time, but due to the high rotation speed it has an effective firing
rate of 3900/min, or 65-70/sec.

Back when I could actually tell one fighter plane from another, their
machine guns had to be
carefully timed so that they didn't shoot off their own propellers. At least
modern planes should never have that constraint.

I didn't know you were WWI vintage!
Guns firing through propellers in WWI and a few used in WWII used an
interrupter gear to only allow firing of the gun when the propellor
blade was clear of the muzzle. However most of the Allied fighters in
WWII had wing mounted guns, or in the case of the P-38 nose mounted and
therefore no props to shoot through

Savage Duck 2 & 3
I'd be tempted to guess that the Duck paid a visit to the Air Force museum in
Dayton, Ohio. But I see what could be a jetway at a commercial airport, so I'm
not sure. I'm not into old planes, even though I used to work for the company
that made the engine of one of these. Well executed pictures, though,
especially the one of the Trojan.

The shots were taken at the California International Air Show in
Salinas California. If you check the Trojan pic you will see a link to
the GPS location at the Salinas Municipal Airport.



Tim Conway 1
What is it about old airplane engines that captures the attention of people in
this group?

They are interesting.
--------------

--
Regards,

Savageduck

On Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:41:28 -0400, Robert Coe wrote:

Tony Cooper (AR)
I surmise from the caption that this is a wax dummy, but indeed she does look
almost real. Not sure who or where she is, though.

All three of my shots were taken the same day, August 12, at a flea
market in Volusia County, Florida. This particular photograph is a
store window manikin used to display vintage clothes and jewelry by
the stall's owner. I crouched down and shot upwards in order not to
have a busy background.

Tony Cooper (CD)
Just as I'm about to ask whether this device controls a player piano or a
Jacquard loom, I think I finally get it. You're portraying this disk as the
precursor of the CD, right? I guess that makes sense, and it does make an
attractive picture. Sorry to be so dense.

It's an antique music box disk. The mechanism is wound-up (crank on
the right), the disk turns, and metal prongs are sounded by the holes
in the disk. Some music boxes have pins on a drum, but this style has
holes in a disk. Drum music boxes play just one tune, but this type
can accommodate different tunes on different disks. A mechanical CD
player, if you will.

Here's the whole thing:
http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f2...13/cdmusic.jpg Most
flea market vendors don't appreciate you moving things about on their
table to get good photographs, so I shot straight down.

Tony Cooper 2
Yeah, this is interesting, since it doesn't look at all like what you'd see in
any flea market in Florida (or Massachusetts). I'm guessing it's in Africa,
although I couldn't tell you what part.

Yep, it's a Florida flea market. The interesting aspect was that the
merchandise offered wasn't typical of what the other vendors were
offering.

I can't comment on the other photographs. Pbase seems to be down.
Bret's got his lower lip stuck out in a pout over not liking the
mandate, so maybe he drooled on Pbase and shorted something out.




--
Tony Cooper - Orlando, Florida

"Robert Coe" wrote in message
...
Arrrggh!! Posted this to the wrong newsgroup earlier. The two newsgroups
are
adjacent in my reader and look too much alike. :^|
.................................................

Maybe I've gone soft, but this strikes me as one of the best SI
collections
we've seen in a while. Aside from two or three macro shots that might have
benefitted from a bit more DOF, there are no obvious technical
deficiencies.
And the subject matter is almost uniformly ... well, ... interesting. A
good
job!

That said, I'll revert to my usual opinionated self and try to find
specific
points to praise and nits to pick.


Tim Conway 2
I guess the challenge here is to figure out where this is. I don't have
much
of a clue. Without much conviction, I'd guess Italy, or possibly Spain or
Portugal. Just to keep from being so relentlessly saccharine, I'll observe
that I think I'd like this picture better if it showed more of the
building.

Thanks for your comments. It's the courthouse in York, PA from the top of
the
parking garage across the street. It's also an HDR because of the bad
lighting at the
time. (Photomatix with 3 exposures and PS)
Tim Conway 3
This is one of the most intriguing pictures in the collection. Martha and
I
agreed that it looks most like an internally illuminated dandelion. It's
gotta
be some sort of plant life, either real or imitation.

It's a macro of a dandelion against a setting sun with fill flash. I was
lying along
the road getting verbally abused by cars driving by. "don't f*** up!" It
was
worth it though. I like it. I think the lens was a Tamron 90 2.5 and a 2x
converter.
Thanks again....
..

"Robert Coe" wrote in message
...
Arrrggh!! Posted this to the wrong newsgroup earlier. The two newsgroups
are
adjacent in my reader and look too much alike. :^|
.................................................

Maybe I've gone soft, but this strikes me as one of the best SI
collections
we've seen in a while. Aside from two or three macro shots that might have
benefitted from a bit more DOF, there are no obvious technical
deficiencies.
And the subject matter is almost uniformly ... well, ... interesting. A
good
job!

That said, I'll revert to my usual opinionated self and try to find
specific
points to praise and nits to pick.


Bowser 1
Nice doggy theme. Where are those bony ferrocanines, and who put them
there?
Looks like a town green, or maybe a college or prep school campus. Hmmm...
I
think Bowser lives in Andover or a nearby town. Phillips Academy, perhaps?

Nah, just a town green in Bradford, MA, near an old church. The Big Dog Show
moves around, so you can visit the web site for the current location.
They're big. They're dogs. I get it.

I live in a town adjacent to Bradford. Not much in my town, though.


Bowser 2
Until I read the caption, I had guessed that it was Bowser's wife and dog
on
that motorscooter. Anyway, it's arguably the most amusing picture in the
bunch, and I agree that the dog's matching sweater is what makes it work.
(Also those goggles.) And what could be more timely than a picture taken
today?

Plus, I got some really good seafood for lunch.


Bowser 3
I'd never have guessed what this was or where it was taken without reading
the
caption. It does make an interesting picture, but I would be interested in
hearing why it works better in B&W.

I'll post the color version, and you tell me which one you like better. I
liked the geometry, repeating shapes, etc. I just didn't like the color
version.

Robert Coe wrote:
though I couldn't tell you what part.

Lunabella
Now this *does* remind me of Florida, since I take those to be snoozing
flamingos. (Without their pink feathers I'd have identified them as turkeys
ready for the roaster.) Certainly interesting for the novelty of the pose.

A little bit of Florida, in the middle of San Francisco!

Bowser wrote:
Robert Coe wrote:

Bowser 3
I'd never have guessed what this was or where it was taken without
reading the caption. It does make an interesting picture, but I
would be interested in hearing why it works better in B&W.

I'll post the color version, and you tell me which one you like better.
I liked the geometry, repeating shapes, etc. I just didn't like the
color version.

The overexposed bridge interior would probably benefit from B&W.

Thanks for commenting, Bob. I like the bird/sunset/circle shot.

Nice big interesting set of submissions, in particular I enjoyed Tim
Conway's sunset-back-lit dandelion, Bowser's moto-dog & b&w spiral
stairway and Frank's odd portrait collection. Lots of good shots, I'll
try to put together more comments.


--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

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