April 24 -- Saturday errands

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This post is another tribute to Panasonic technology. The nest, shot from the ground with zoom, was pretty much a silhouette, but more detail was captured than was visible, and a bit of enhance/lighting/shadows-highlights in Photoshop Elements lightening made it visible.

It was a windy day. I wasn't sure that any of my flower pics would come out at all. There's no way I could have focused on the moving petals quickly enough, had I been in charge of focusing........

The camera (this is my carry-every-day small one) did a stellar job. Thank you, Panasonic!



Nest in small tree in library branch parking lot. It looks to be in good shape; I hope it will be productively used this year.





I was so intent on the flowers that I didn't look at the bark to see if this was a cherry. I bet it was. Near Busch's on Main Street.

I vote this variety should be named Princess Dreams......













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Buzzupdate

I am knocking on wood loudly enough that I bet you can hear me...............

We are one year past Buzz's diagnosis with (probably) chronic leukemia (or maybe lymphoma).

He feels great. I think the enalapril is really helping him feel 100%.

He acts just as I would expect him to act at 10.5 years old. He never had as much energy as my two girls had, so I don't expect him to be as energetic at 10.5 as they were. But for him, at this age, he's about exactly as I would expect (with no disease).

He had his vincristine (iv chemo) on the 13th, and for the first time, he had no apparent reaction. I did give him metoclopramide, as always, but he didn't go off his feed *at all*, which is a first in all these months (and months) of treatment.

I'll take it. (massive understatement)

Here he is, this morning, in the back yard, watching me take pics of our maple bud.





Isn't he cute?

Oh bother -- what is that black thing on his schnoz? Get it off so I don't have to 'shop it out ... oh yuck, it's a mosquito!!!!!





And now for a completely different topic -- All Those Pixels Really Do Matter.

Whoa.

I've been using the little camera pretty much exclusively, because it's ... little. This is the camera I bought before the Alaska trip. Not *that* much bigger, but with twice the zoom and a lot more pixels.

Self portrait, in my dog's eye............

Cropped out of the above. Still with this level of quality. !!!!

more macro focus

I had hoped to show you a pic of the purple crocus in my back yard, with their bright orange stamens, but alas, all the pics were borrrrrrrrrrrrrring.

As a perhaps interesting side note, some of those [yawn] pics I took yesterday involved the new camera's macro setting. The macro pics had a really shallow depth of field. As the purple crocus has vivid white and green striped leaves, the camera chose to focus on the leaves, so the flowers were not in focus. I also took a couple of pics standing up, zoomed toward the flowers. Those pics had a deeper depth of field; both leaves and flowers were in focus.

Here is something a bit less topical, but at least bright and (mostly) sharp (you can see the shallow depth of field, here -- the reddest bract is not sharp).

macro

Amongst my new little camera's capacities is its macro focus.

Wow, eh?



















I always use the viewfinder (rather than the viewscreen) on my big camera. Little cameras don't have viewfinders. I wondered how much I would mind......

As it turns out, I haven't been missing it. I can't see the screen well enough to tell if an image is in focus, but I can't do anything about focus on this camera, anyway, as it's all automatic.

I can see well enough to see if things are framed more or less as I want them.

I am verrrrry happy with this camera!

my new pencil

Twyla Tharp, in her book The Creative Habit, recounts a story of a kid, a baseball idol, and an autograph lost. The kid asks for an autograph, and the idol says "Sure, kid, got a pencil?" The kid, unfortunately, doesn't have a pencil, and so doesn't get the autograph.

That kid, and the man he grew into, never ever went out without a pencil again.

Twyla expands this to include any/all tools any person may need to do what is important to them.

I've been thinking about this, and I decided that if I'm serious about taking pictures, I need a pencil.

I love my "real camera." It's not too big, it's not too heavy. I can carry it all day without my shoulders or back hurting. But it's big enough that it is obtrusive to carry alllllll the time.

Hence:



















This is not a very little camera, as little cameras go. Nor is it a very capable camera, as big capable cameras go. I'm hoping that it is little enough, and capable enough, to serve as my carry-it-everywhere pencil.

Isn't it cute? And 6x optical zoom...........

I miss a viewfinder. (Little cameras only have viewscreens.)

And I'm annoyed that even though both my cameras are Panasonics, I can't use the same plug-into-the-wall power source, nor the same connect-the-camera-to-the-computer cable. Maybe the new generation of the big camera uses the same connections as the new camera?

Ha ha, yeah right.

Luckily, because it is *not* all that little, it is a lot less expensive than the really little ones. It's more capable than the really little ones, too.....

It does a good job, don't you think?

I love my camera!

There are so many things we buy without a clue if we will actually like them. Stoves, for example. How on earth can you know if you will like a stove, when you've never had the opportunity to see how the burners adjust? You just can't tell until you *use* it for a while -- and, of course, you can't *use* it before you *buy* it.

Cameras are another example. I did go to a local store and hold cameras in my hands (a good thing, too -- another model I was considering was so big that I couldn't hold it securely and push the shutter button at the same time!). I did read reviews. But none of that predicts whether I will like the one I choose, over time.....

All the time, we must fork over hundreds (or thousands) of dollars for something, hoping that we shall like it, once we are able to try it out...............

So I'm sure that one reason I love my camera is that ... I love my camera. I am sure I love it more because of the unexpected pleasure of loving it.

My kid was on the swim team in high school. I wanted a camera that would take decent pictures of our high school's large pool area. So the 12x optical zoom and good lens on this camera were selling points. I read in a review that it was good at close up things, too. But it blows me away that it can take closeups of small objects like those marbles from a couple of days ago, and can also do this:



I took this pic from the bleachers, which are *not* kissed right up to the end of the 14-lane pool. This is the 12x optical plus the 3x digital zoom, and it's grainy, but don't you think it's amazing that the same lens that took those marble pics could also take this pic of something (my golfer DH estimates as) 40 yards away?


Here's a not-fully-zoomed pic, also taken from the bleachers. See how far away that wall is? And we can read those tiles................













Equally amazing to me is this:

This was taken from the middle of a dark auditorium, of a actor on stage. Without flash. As you can see from his blurry "hand", it only works if the subject of the picture is very still. But isn't this amazing?

This is my first digital camera; I don't know if "they can all do this." The technology is cool, and this expression of it -- exceedingly cool. I'm sure this camera would not work for everyone (it's not very good at stopping motion unless the light is very good indeed), but ... it works for me, and I love it.

(Don't you think Panasonic should be paying me? I wish!)

cleaning is dangerous

I derive no more satisfaction from housecleaning than I do from yardwork. It looks better for about five minutes, and then you can't tell you did it, and have to start over. Feh.

Nevertheless, I carefully dusted off the top of this printer's drawer before photographing it for you. And got a splinter. (I did mention that I hate cleaning, didn't I? Even when I don't get splinters............)











After I dug the splinter out of my finger, I needed a bandaid. (Have you ever noticed how hard it is to take a photo of your right hand? With the shutter button on the right, and all?)


I LOVE these bandaids. (Well, ok, they are not Bandaids(tm), but you know what I mean.) In addition to coming in excellent colors, they are soft and stretchy, unlike regular plastic ones. They are comfy, and they Stay On. Even through the shower, usually. I gain nothing if you try these, but trust me, they are head and shoulders above any other bandaid-type product, except those with Shrek on them, which are so cool that we love them in spite of being the regular plastic kind.