Six

Blogger's license taken with this theme...six six

Metallic

Old car in the Painted Desert near Route 66 in Arizona. 3-shot HDR that I'm pretty happy with, but would welcome feedback.

Liquid

I'd say so.....

Gooseberry Falls, MN

Unforgettable

If you saw this driving down the road, or parked behind you at work, would you forget it?

I think it's a delivery car for a chicken place. Note the door... "soon to be famous".  Ha!

Blurred

Yesterday's brave little fawn finally spooked at something, and my last image of him was a blurred motion shot as he bolted into the forest.

PS: Everyone who is concerned that Bambi here will be soon munching on my petunias will be happy to know he was spotted well into a wildlife preserve, where he belongs, so I assume your flowers are all safe tonight. :-)

Bold

Driving back from our Minnesota trip, we stopped at the Necedah Wildlife Refuge so Jon could do a little birding. On the drive up to the visitor's center, we spotted (ha ha) a doe and her fawn. I have seen lots of deer in my life, but never a fawn. I was so excited! He was fairly bold, standing his ground asI took several photos of him out the car window. How cute is he??

Negative space

Here's my interpretation....the foreground and lower half of the image are busy with color, while this sky presents a negative space.

Freeze frame

Thanks, CCC boys!

If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you know that Jon and I are huge National Park Service fans.Those parks, and many others across our country, have trail systems and shelters that date back to the Great Depression in the 1930s, when young men of the Civilian Conservation Corps undertook trail development and maintenance across the country. This statue, in Gooseberry Falls State Park in Minnesota, pays tribute to these good, hard workers.

Lightness

Theme stretch. During our visit to the northern shore of Lake Superior in Minnesota, we stopped to visit two lighthouses. The interiors from the last two days were posted from the Split Rock lighthouse, which is shown below. Classic setting, beautiful day.

Earlier that same day, we stopped by the Two Harbors lighthouse. We didn't go in this one, but enjoyed exploring the rocky shore upon which it was perched.

In the darkness, these lighthouses provided lightness for passing ships.

Glass

At the top of the lighthouse is the Fresnel lens, made up of many glass panes. Above the interior deck where I stood was the lens, and I could aim up and shoot through the rotating hole as the panes passed by.

Don't peak...tomorrow you get to see the outside of this beautiful building.

Spiral

Spiral staircase inside Split Rock Lighthouse in northern Minnesota. More from the lighthouse tomorrow.

Crooked

A lot has been written about crooked politicians in Illinois. This rock, spotted on the way up to the summit of Eagle Mountain in Minnesota, looked like a broken, crooked Illinois to me. (Or, an arrow pointing back down...)

Extra credit for anyone who can tell us the significance of Eagle Mountain. :-)

Mood

I love the mood set by this image. Same rocky beach as yesterday's post, only facing the other direction. You can just make out the gentle mist between the surface of the water and the sky. Another attempt at a 3-shot HDR.

Misty

The second week of August, we took a few days and headed up to the north shore of Lake Superior, in northern Minnesota. One morning found us on the rocky beach, enjoying the mist bumping against the shore. I'm still figuring out Photomatix, but I am kind of happy with this 3-shot result.

Sweet face

This pup let us take his photo at the car show. Woof.

Smooth..... ??

These two clowns hanging around in Mary Lou's downtown were tossing "smooth" lines at us as we walked by with our cameras. For fun, I snapped their picture. I think they think they were going to show up in the local paper. Smooth....

Cupcakes

While strolling through Mary Lou's town, we came upon this adorable, little pink bakery. Unfortunately, it was closed for the day, but I still enjoyed photographing (through the window) its mosaic-tile cupcake floor and the sign out front. A calorie-free way to satisfy this theme, if not my sweet tooth.

Storefronts

Mary Lou's downtown has several blocks of cute storefronts.

M is for . . .

Fun! Jon let me use his 500mm Sigma lens with a 1.4 extender, for a zoom capacity of 700mm. Yowser! Even on a tripod, I could see the image wavering just slightly in live view. I could only achieve f/9, so I bumped the ISO to 200. Shutter speed at 125. Hit the self timer so I wouldn't jiggle the camera. Cropped only a little.

Powerful car, powerful message

Take a good look at this car. Really look at it. Do you notice anything odd about it?

I hope you noticed that the front is upside down, while the back is right side up. This was a teaching car. The officer demonstrated; she activated a switch, and the front of the car began to rotate, like meat on a spit. She cranked it up to simulate a rollover accident at 30 mph. In the front seat, a crash dummy (baby) remained safely buckled in. Her adult counterpart was not so lucky, having been flung, unbelted, from the open window in an earlier demonstration. Flung hard enough to knock out some of his stuffing. A powerful message about seatbelt usage to young bystanders (and me, too!)

DARE to flaunt a stuffed animal at the car show

Shiny shiny

Fellow blogger and Village member Mary Lou and I had a chance to meet up recently, and our first stop was a car show (yes...there was much talk of BillZ's car-photography prowess). We each had a chance to snap a photo of this shiny hubcap, with its neighboring Model T...and us...reflected. You might have caught Mary Lou's version of this at the Village - where she was holding the camera.

B is for . . .

....brave

Primary colors

One of three primary colors is red, which was the dominant color in the Painted Desert.

Humor

Surfaces

This suspension bridge has all kinds of interesting surfaces, strung as it is over the surface of the water. Came upon this in the Sequoyah National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oklahoma.

Floating Garden

These lily pads and flowers were on display in one of the many gardens in Balboa Park.

Q is for . . .

Summer fun

I asked Steven (Red Sky) if he thought trolley cars were as enjoyable as trains. He replied, "Some are fun..."  (hahahahaha...say it fast.......get it??)

PS: This conversation with Steven was imaginary.

(I may have been at this blogging thing too long.....)

Center of Interest

Not much on Interstate Highway 40 between New Mexico and Amarillo, Texas, but one center of interest was Cadillac Ranch.