So Much DependsOn the Camera Lens

Blog Moved

2010-05-20T09:30:00.000-07:00

Hello all, I've moved all new photography posts to thegreatgildersleeve.tumblr.com. There's some new stuff there, so anyone following this blog should now follow that one.

Liberty Park Ferris Wheel

2010-05-04T17:08:00.001-07:00

Testing out Diana Lens with DSLR Adapter

2010-05-01T15:17:00.000-07:00

Some test shots using a Diana 28mm lens with a DSLR adapter. Generally, it's a spoiled white hipster thing to do, slapping on a $40 plastic lens on an otherwise expensive camera. Results are OK, but I think I would rather take a decent photo and mess with it in photoshop rather than start out with this lens on. The first shot is straight out of the camera, the second is cleaned up a little, with a bit of a Polaroid color shift.

Black and White Studies

2010-04-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

Vanitas #1

2010-04-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

Waterfall Abstract

2010-01-17T16:18:00.000-08:00

The Evergreen Lake waterfall, sudsy and cold.

White House Ruins, Canyon de Chelly

2009-11-30T20:01:00.000-08:00

White House Ruins, named for the white plastered room in the upper structure, is a ruin in Canyon de Chelly dating from the 11th century Anasazi culture. Plastered walls were common, but few have remained intact. This ruin originally reached to the ground, and stretched along the cliff wall, where up to 100 individuals might have lived, and the complex had room for 4-5 times that during ceremonial periods. The upper ruin would have been reached via the roofs of lower buildings and wooden ladders. Also of note is the large rock art figure below the upper ruins. It is not improbable that this pictograph would have originally been inside a room. Although this ruin can be reached from a canyon rim trail, everywhere else in Canyon de Chelly is closed to outsiders except Navajo and those being guided by Navajo.

Roadside Memorial #1

2009-11-29T12:54:00.000-08:00

Part of an upcoming series of spontaneous memorials and roadside memorials. We'll see how many of these I pull together. The plan is to spin these off into their own website. Details to follow.

Cat on the Street, Brantome, France

2009-11-20T14:29:00.000-08:00

Homebrew Still Life

2009-11-18T20:29:00.000-08:00

It's been quite a while since I have last posted some photography, but here goes another attempt at making this a regular thing. I'm working on developing a still life, but I need to progress my lighting and composition skills before I get to the actual project. Here is a study using some homebrew supplies: grains, hops, a wort chiller, beer bottles, and the final product (a HB51 recipe at that). More to come (hopefully).

Approaching Great Basin National Park (or the Great Rift Valley)

2009-06-12T12:08:00.000-07:00

A very isolated place.

Nevada Jackrabbit in Great Basin

2009-06-08T14:58:00.000-07:00

Spring Photo Roundup

2009-05-05T11:38:00.001-07:00

Some photos from around Salt Lake City and City Creek Canyon, during a wet spring.

Spring Fire Tulips

2009-04-23T10:14:00.000-07:00

A particularly colorful set of tulips. The pointed petals fan open to reveal a star blossom during the heat of the day, more like a lily than a tulip. In the background, purple tulips look on jealously.

Bumble Bee in Tulip

2009-04-18T16:10:00.000-07:00

A bumblebee hatching from a tulip in the spring. Where did you think bumblebees come from?

Still Life with Artichokes

2009-04-17T07:06:00.001-07:00

Zion Canyon, across from Angels Landing

2009-03-27T14:26:00.000-07:00

Ann's Birthday Portrait

2009-03-22T15:39:00.001-07:00

Looking into the Narrows (Zion Canyon)

2009-03-20T12:20:00.000-07:00

Morning Breaking over Zion Canyon

2009-03-18T10:55:00.000-07:00

Morning breaks over Zion National Park, looking north into Zion Canyon.It's been a while since I have posted any new images; February in Salt Lake City tends to be dreary and unbecoming for taking photos. We did get the chance to take a long weekend trip to Zion National Park, still a little early in the year for anything to be blooming, but a very pleasant trip nonetheless.

Foothill Cultural District website

2009-03-03T14:06:00.000-08:00

A new website for Foothill Cultural District. It seems that building websites takes up most of my time, leaving little for photography or anything else. Oh well.

Late Winter Hyacinth

2009-02-18T20:24:00.000-08:00

A late winter / early spring Hyacinth, given as part of a Christmas present.

Utah Trails Website

2009-02-16T15:15:00.001-08:00

A new website for the Garfield County, Utah tourism bureau, featuring trails in the region around Bryce Canyon National Park, Escalante, Grand Staircase, and more. View the live site at www.utah-trails.com

Steam Train in 3D, composite

2009-01-27T09:21:00.001-08:00

A steam train engine, modeled and rendered in Maya. Original render composited in Photoshop.

Compare this image to the real thing from the Teton Valley, in Idaho.

Northeastern Utah Website

2009-01-23T13:10:00.000-08:00

A new website for the Northeastern Utah Travel Region, designed by myself at The Go Travel Sites. To see the full site, visit www.dinoland.com.

Tombstone Website

2009-01-13T10:54:00.001-08:00

The final design and code for the Tombstone Chamber of Commerce. The site can be viewed in action at www.tombstonechamber.com

Wallester T. Dog

2008-12-30T10:41:00.000-08:00

Wally deciding what piece of great literature to tackle next: the abridged Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, or perhaps The Winter of Our Discontent.

Study in Black and White, Somewhere in Idaho

2008-12-19T12:38:00.000-08:00

A well photographed building in northeast Idaho. At one time probably a school house, now just a temptation for folks intent on disregarding the posted No Trespassing sign. Also, it is probably haunted.

Audi R8 Commercial

2008-12-14T15:11:00.001-08:00

Below is the completed spec commercial for the Audi R8, more an opportunity to practice animation and rendering in Maya than anything else. The car is modeled in Maya 2008, using primarily NURBS surfaces, with the occasional polygon thrown in for good measure. Most of the textures are procedural textures that do not require a detailed texture map. The car itself was typically rendered in three passes in Maya:

Color / Beauty pass - mental ray with Final Gathering, etc. turned on.
Occlusion pass - mental ray default rendering layer.
Depth pass - different techniques depending on the shot.

Further animation was done in the Maya software renderer. All elements were then imported into After Effects, where some fine tuning took place, lens flares, etc. Final layback and export with audio was via Final Cut Pro.

Below is the 'HD' embedding, and below that, the normal embedding for slower connections.

Deviating From The Script

2008-12-14T10:12:00.001-08:00

It was a silent night, at least initially - calm - but bright. Much brighter, in fact, than the average night. The local radio had mentioned that the full moon would appear larger and brighter - something about the rotation of the earth. The radio also mentioned the influx of visitors from afar, drawn by the glowing sky, however the radio failed to mention the exact rhyme and reason for at least one of the visitors. Peace, or conquest, it motives were up in the air, crackling with static electricity.

Little Girl With Bunny

2008-12-07T18:24:00.001-08:00

From a collection of old photographs in and around the Teton Valley in Idaho, taken sometime in the early 20th century, probably between 1905-1915. This photo in particular is a portrait of a little girl in a pioneer dress, holding a bunny. The chair looks a little more modern than the above time bracket, but not by much.

Fractured Head

2008-12-05T13:35:00.001-08:00

One from the archives. To see more photos from Florence, Italy, visit this photo gallery.

Explorers on Horses near Geyser

2008-11-24T06:19:00.000-08:00

Three men and their horses, checking out a geyser in Yellowstone, circa 1915. No idea which geyser it is.

More Tilt-Shift Photography

2008-11-18T09:06:00.000-08:00

Here are some more tilt-shift style photos. It is interesting to play around with this technique, as I am currently developing a working method of introducing depth of field into the Audi R8 render, which uses the same post-processing tools.

The University of Utah, looking at the Psychology building and towards the football stadium.

Suburban Salt Lake City. How more ticky tacky / cookie cutter / etc. can you get?

On the left, a more-recently abandoned mine in Utah, in the mountains above Park City. On the right, below, a farmhouse near Park City, Utah.

Detail of the farmhouse.

Walking in the fall.

Below, a small herd of cows gathered at a watering hole.

A suspension bridge near Lava Hot Springs, over the Pourtneuf River, as a trail sails by.

Tilt-Shift Park City Downtown Panorama

2008-11-17T10:22:00.001-08:00

A detail from a massive tilt-shift panorama of downtown Park City. The photo was taken in 2007 as part of a collection of aerial photography over Salt Lake City, the Wasatch mountains, and Park City. It works well for tilt-shift photography (created in Photoshop, as I have no tilt-shift lens). In tilt-shift photography, depth of field is kept in a very shallow slice through the scene. Additionally, the lens (and plane of focus) can be tilted away from parallel with the film plane. This effectively creates the illusion of miniature photography, as your brain has no real-life correlation with such distortion of depth of field over a large expanse (such as a city) but accepts it fully at the smaller scale. Real (non-photoshop) tilt-shift images also have additional shifts in perspective from tilting the lens away from the film plane, and is often used to shoot tall parallel things, like buildings, from the ground and still maintain the sense of the parallel. Below is the full image, zoom in and explore. Or download the image as jpeg here (2.85 MB).

Audi R8 Test Animation

2008-11-15T08:18:00.000-08:00

More to come. For now, the Audi R8 model is rigged and ready for animation. Here is a test render with some simple animation. The headlights still need some work for this particular shot.

Oyster Mushrooms on Tree

2008-11-12T17:16:00.001-08:00

A beautiful set of oyster mushrooms growing out of an old stump, somewhere in a forgotten section of Salt Lake City. Oyster mushrooms are edible, and considered tasty, although I will not personally be eating these. I liked these images quite well; below I have included a slideshow of more photos of the oyster mushrooms. Also, there are some slime-capped brown mushrooms that were sharing the space, although I have not identified them yet. Any help would be appreciated.

Audi R8 Exterior Render

2008-11-09T18:48:00.000-08:00

A final render comp of the Audi R8, modeled and textured in Maya using primarily NURBS for the model, and mostly procedural textures. The exterior of the car is modeled to the detail necessary for a thirty second spec ad I am working on. The above image gives a sense of the style. Still to come: rigging and car lights, and maybe a simple interior if necessary.

Below are two straightforward images of the front and rear of the R8.

And one more of the Audi R8 model, rendered in Maya using Mental Ray.

Day of the Dead Altar and Montage

2008-11-07T08:08:00.000-08:00

University Guesthouse website (WIP)

2008-11-05T15:02:00.000-08:00

Recently completed, the new website for the University Guesthouse and Conference Center at the University of Utah. As with most these sites, I was responsible for all design and layout, media manipulation as necessary, and some of the underlying code (ColdFusion, javascript, etc.)

Liberty Park, the last day of fall colors

2008-11-02T09:58:00.001-08:00

The pond at Liberty Park, looking northeast. The last day of pure fall colors, after which trees started to loose their saturation. As a bonus images:

Halloween 2008

2008-10-30T15:21:00.001-07:00

It's pumpkin time! My pumpkin does not wear a mask, although he should. Not that he is terribly disfigured, or burned by acid or something like that. It's just they're terribly comfortable. My pumpkin thinks everyone will be wearing them in the future.

Audi R8 Front View Render

2008-10-26T11:13:00.000-07:00

The 2007 Audi R8, a work in progress presented as a NURBS model in Maya. The main body is modeled and textured. Still to come: side view mirrors, wheels and tires, real spoiler, non-functional interior. I intend to rig the car for animation and create a :30 second spot highlighting the car. Details to come.

Soda Springs, Idaho

2008-10-24T13:16:00.000-07:00

Soda Springs, Idaho has made a name for itself by turning a small natural hot spring in the area into a full fledged, albeit man made, geyser. Some inspired entrepreneurs tried to market soda water (under the brand name Idan-ha) by drilling for carbon dioxide from a spring near town, kegging the gas, and carbonating local water in the bottle. This turned out to be a bad idea, as the gas was impregnated with a sulfur smell, which made any water all but unbearable.

Said entrepreneurs then decided to make the best of a bad situation, and to turn their fledgling seltzer company into a hot springs bath house. Expanding their drill hole, they hit hot water which shot out of the bore a la There Will Be Blood. Once they contained their gusher, the town now had a fully functional geyser that they could throw on at the turn of a valve. The joke in Yellowstone is that tourists ask where the pump house is for Old Faithful. Here, it is located several feet from the pipe that emits the geyser water every hour, on the hour.

High Fashion

2008-10-22T15:14:00.001-07:00

Fall Panorama Roundup

2008-10-21T13:25:00.000-07:00

Fall is panorama time - ok, well, everyday is panorama day - so here are a couple recent big images. The top two are from a recent venture into the McCain/Palin stronghold of southeastern Idaho (on the opening day of deer hunting season, no less). Pictured is Bear Lake, complete with its abnormally blue-green waters, and a (190 megapixel) early morning outside the forest service cabin in Idaho where we stayed.

And just for old time sakes, a panorama at sunset overlooking Flaming Gorge in Utah, taken almost exactly one year ago at th

Heber Valley Website (WIP)

2008-10-20T15:08:00.000-07:00

Here is a screenshot from the near completed website for Heber Valley, Utah. I handled the design elements, all the html / css work, and some of the underlying ColdFusion code. The full site, for what's it worth, can be seen at www.gohebervalley.com.

Moon and Other Spheres

2008-10-19T14:05:00.000-07:00

Something like a Christo installation.

First Day Of Snow

2008-10-12T14:28:00.000-07:00

To celebrate the first snow in town (Salt Lake City, 2008) here is an old photo from the Teton Valley area depicting two men in a horse drawn sleigh. The sleigh is a low slung type typically used for hauling freight or timber, as opposed to a passenger sleigh for jaunting across the Russian countryside.

Ann in the Kitchen (Early Morning)

2008-10-11T10:13:00.000-07:00

The Night The Plants Attacked!

2008-10-09T15:13:00.000-07:00

So I was just minding my own business, and the papas grass in the front yard attacked me. Luckily, it turns out not to be a green hand grenade, but this katydid. In many ways-even considering my sedentary lifestyle-the katydid does a better job of imitating a plant than I could.

Cowboys on the Plains

2008-10-02T12:43:00.000-07:00

A dozen cowboys out on the plains. See below for a detail.

The State of Utah Wine Affairs Bureau, 2008

2008-09-28T16:59:00.000-07:00

We are happy to present the state of the Lamberti Bocca Noir grape harvest for the 2008 growing season. One of the most successful harvests in recent times, we pulled in a hair under 150 pounds of grapes, de-stemmed and crushed for 16.6 gallons of must for the initial fermentations.

This is up from 70 pounds in 2006 (a late season hail storm damaged about a quarter of that crop) and 48 pounds in 2007 (birds, heat, and ???). This year the protective nets got on early, and the vines were well maintained. For the record, Growing Degree Days (10 C base, March 1) was 3165 at time of harvest (Sept 28, 2008). Heating Degree Days (SLC station since July 1) cumulative was 27 at time of harvest compared with 7 last year. For what it's worth. More stats to come.

Likewise, a good turnout of wine grape pickers, destemmers, and stompers. More photos of the 2008 Wine Stomp can be seen below:

The Passion of the McCain

2008-09-25T12:19:00.000-07:00

To celebrate my short film "The Passion of the McCain" breaking 60,000 combined views across YouTube and Machinima.com, this post will mirror some of the design decisions and content for the film. The recent increase in views is largely due to the inclusion of the film in the 2008 Cambridge Film Festival, where "Passion" was invited to be screened as part of a special program on machinima styles and techniques. Reviews so far have been mostly positive.

It is interesting to read the comments on YouTube, et al where available. Those who approach the film from a typical machinima's viewer's perspective (i.e. a typical gamer) tend to not like it, because it hides the underlying video game characters and style. they tend to prefer films made wholly within a particular game's reality, which is nonsense, as most games tend to have a fairly boring and conformist world-view. Shoot this, dodge that, escape[ist] here. I, on the other hand, believe that because it hides the underlying game, it is inherently better than stock characters in stock situations. Halo's Master Chief doesn't event have a visible face, so how can he act?

Regardless, the film was fun to put together. Take a look for yourself here, here, here, or below:

Men Sawing Lumber

2008-09-24T20:23:00.000-07:00

Abstract Photo #5

2008-09-21T18:32:00.000-07:00

One in a series that I put together a long time ago, when I did more film and darklab work. Anymore, such an image would be produced entirely in Photoshop. Even design work that ought be created at least from "real" elements are more quickly and efficiently made from scratch. Is this a good thing? Probably. I'm no purist. Here the trick is figuring out how I accomplished the image entirely analogue.

Late Summer Dragonfly

2008-09-20T12:50:00.000-07:00

The Odonata order comprises dragonflies and damselflies. Dragonflies are well-regarded in Japanese culture - on par with Japan's and other cultures attitude towards butterflies. In western cultures and in early United States, the dragonfly was understood to either sew your eyelids shut during sleep, or simply pluck your eyes out entirely. There are no documented reports of anyone ever waking up to his or her eyelids sewn shut, but one must be ever vigilant. These creatures of the "night" are only waiting for their chance, and then it's off with our eyeballs.

Full Harvest Moon

2008-09-15T20:37:00.000-07:00

Also called the Wine Moon, the Harvest Moon heralds the coming harvest and the autumnal equinox in one weeks time. The hops are growing heavy, the grapes will be crushed in two weeks, and grappa and apples in the time afterwards.

Comb Ridge Panorama - Southern Utah

2008-09-14T10:08:00.000-07:00

From National Geographic:

Geologically speaking, the Comb is a monocline—a single fold in the Earth's crust created by a cataclysmic slippage of deeply buried tectonic plates some 65 million years ago. That upheaval has left a scar slashing across the desert landscape of the Southwest: a sharp ridge of sandstone that stretches almost 120 miles (193 kilometers) unbroken from just east of Kayenta, Arizona, to some ten miles (sixteen kilometers) west of Blanding, Utah.

The scale of the Comb is not colossal: Its ridgeline looms only from 300 to 900 feet (91 to 274 meters) above the plains, and shallow washes surround it on either side. But what the crest lacks in height, it makes up in ruggedness. No smooth arête, the ridge swoops to sharp summits and dips to V-notch cols with relentless regularity. To hike the Comb is to run a gauntlet of up-and-down severities, always at an ankle-wrenching, sideways pitch. There is not a single mile of established trail in the Comb's reach, which is one reason why no humans, to our knowledge, have ever traversed its length. We thought we should be the first.

Native American Woman on Horse with Travois and Child

2008-09-13T12:45:00.000-07:00

This is an incredible image, that shows a Native American woman on a horse, pulling a travois and child. There are not many other details in the image to suggest a time and place, other than the (relatively) modern building and corral in the background. I image 1900's-1910's given the timeframe of other photos in this batch, but other than that it is anyone's guess.

At The Sideshow (Utah State Fair)

2008-09-07T09:44:00.001-07:00

Not featured in the sideshow, but present nonetheless: fanatic evangelic scrapbookers, a AK-47 carved out of wood, $16 lemonades with nary a lemon to be found, 9-5 pencil mouse pushers from Midvale thinking they have better lives than carnies, funnel cake, bulging dairy cow mammary veins, someone singing a capella at the Crest Toothpaste booth, all the booths by the main sponsor - an LDS apocalyptic (i.e. The Second Coming) preparedness organization - featuring food storage buckets, generators, and emergency scrapbook supplies to document it all.

If you survive it all (the fair, or the apocalypse), this is your reward:

Montana Panorama

2008-09-03T10:01:00.000-07:00

I have a feeling Springhill Ranch leaves their sprinklers on all day for dramatic effect. Not really needed, but a nice touch nonetheless. Overlooking Bozeman, Montana, the foothill of the Bridger Mountains can be seen to the left, with the Hyalite Mountains in the center, and the Spanish Peaks range in the distance on the right.

Hop Plant and Ripening Flowers

2008-08-26T11:03:00.000-07:00

The hop vine, I have found, is fairly difficult to get established and sprout. When it does (as seen here in attempt number 4) it grows quickly during the heat of summer. Currently, the main shoot of the vine is roughly 18 feet tall, with a second main branch another 6 feet - amazing considering the hop dies back to nothing every winter. The cone shaped flowers grow on the top third of the vine, and will be used to flavor barley soup (aka beer).

Completion of the Teton Valley Railroad - 1913

2008-08-26T07:28:00.000-07:00

By 1913, the Union Pacific railroad had completed a line from Aston, Idaho to Victor, five years after offering the first "Yellowstone Special" on June 11. 1908. The rail dead-ended in Victor, and steam trains were turned around there on a wye (a triangle shaped junction that allowed a trail to back up and turn around.) Passengers heading to Jackson, Wyoming then took a carriage, or later, a bus, over the Teton pass, which by then was still a difficult, though not impossible, journey. The photo above shows the inaugural train - UP #684 - with a second engine and at least 6 passenger cars, probably somewhere between Driggs and Victor. The photo below, given the position of the boxcar with people standing on it in both photos, is probably taken on the top of a car on the track, either before or after the first train rolled through. The population shown in the photo below most likely represents the sum total of residents in the Driggs/Victor corridor.
More information about the UP Victor line (circa 1965) here.

Attempt at Something Hip (part x of np)

2008-08-19T14:22:00.000-07:00

Where np is the set of all problems (complex or otherwise), here defined as the solution to a two dimensional vector, for which the solution can be verified in polynomial time (i.e. it is possible to determine the solution in the time given to us).

A Man Standing Near Lake Yellowstone

2008-08-13T16:07:00.000-07:00

This picture was taken near Fishing Cone, in the West Thumb Geyser Basin near Yellowstone Lake in Yellowstone National Park. Approximately here:

This area is unique in that geysers and hotspots are on and in the lake. A story from the 1870 Washburn Expedition tells of a man trout fishing near one particular cone in the water, and the fish got off the line, flipped into the thermal vent, and boiled itself. No work on how sulfur infused lake trout tastes.

This photo was probably taken in the mid to late 1910's to early 1920's. During that time, the West Thumb area was a popular tourist destination in the Yellowstone area. Arriving on stagecoach from the Old Faithful Lodge (still a great building), travelers could depart nearby on a steamboat that would take them to the northern end of the lake.

Also, Lake Yellowstone looks like a hunched-over backpacker. West Thumb should be called Hiker's Head.

For Ann, Who Pointed Out The Scene

2008-08-12T13:17:00.000-07:00

A Canadian Goose in Washington's Court, or Mr. Canada Goose [sic] to Washington
We've got the guns but they've got the numbers.

p.s. In late December, 1775, George Washington sent Major General Benedict Arnold (who would famously switch sides to the British - Traitor!) and Brigadier Richard Montgomery (who has just switched sides to the colonists - Hero!) to invade Quebec. This proved largely unsuccessful, although not for being a bad idea. The United States maintained at least through the 1960's detailed plans "just in case" we had to invade Canada. Upon declaration of peace after a successful U.S. rout of the mounties, the U.S. would annex Canada and territories and maintain the land and resources a la Puerto Rico. This was the plan for almost 200 years, and even then it was generally decided against.

Modeling and Texturing Pixar's Wall-E in Maya

2008-07-30T14:04:00.000-07:00

A freelance animation project I am working on calls for a cameo from Pixar's Wall-E robot from the 2008 Pixar film. Here is the basic model, textured and rendered. Please read more about this project, including modeling, texturing, and rendering Wall-E in Maya.

If You Gotta Go, Go With A Smile

2008-07-29T16:26:00.000-07:00

A Message From The Forest

2008-07-28T08:41:00.000-07:00

Along the Rocky Mountains, from Canada into Colorado, lodgepole trees are dying by the thousands. Entire forests are being attacked by beetles and the trees, in a weakened state by a decades long drought, are unable to defend themselves by natural methods. More dead trees produce more beetle larvae, and warmer, drier winters don't produce cold snaps sufficient to kill off the beetles. It takes two to three summers for the tree to die, after which the forest is simply biding time until a fire destroys historical structures, cabins and homes, and trees alike. This, unfortunately, is Your Fault.

Somehow, You thought that it would be a good idea to invest in ATVs and snowmobiles, and You taught your children how to start a two stroke engine before they could walk. By insisting that the only means to explore the world is via a powered, personal vehicle, You have created a misinterpretation of outdoor recreation: motor boat bait fishing rather than backwater fly fishing, unlicensed offroading rather than hiking and exploring, and Your original sin, parking Your motor home and associated motor scooters, generators, and trucks in a once empty meadow campground like so many beetle grubs in the forest. You have warmed, and consumed, Your planet.

This particular species of beetle (Mountain Pine Beetle) only attacks lodgepole pines, and their deaths make other trees in the forest nervous - like shopping in a marketplace in Sadr City. Here, then, is a worried message from a couple Aspen trees. Try and expand upon their message, and consider that there are other ways of igniting and burning a forest than by simply lighting a match.

Snow Canyon Petro-Dune

2008-07-19T16:03:00.000-07:00

A petrified sand dune sounds and smells almost nothing like being near the ocean. Sure, tens of millions of years ago, this area was prime seaside real estate, but now the area is just Prime Real Estate (tm). People die in Snow Canyon State Park all the time--not from exposure and dehydration, but from being too fat. It is a very beautiful area though, as long as you are in good shape.

Mountain Meadow Meanderings

2008-07-18T11:09:00.000-07:00

I have not yet decided if the redness of the dress makes this more a massacre than a meander.

Ann (1920's Edition)

2008-07-17T20:28:00.000-07:00

A good method of wasting time is retouching photos. You can accomplish something, and yet when you are done, you really haven't "done" anything. In fact, you have taken something real and made it less real. This is not fighting entropy, my friends (spoken a la John McCain). Here, then, is Ann. She does fight entropy, even if her photo does not. She is seen here wearing a paper hat, which does not provide much protection against rain.

Ain't she a looker?

Young Hunter with Dogs and Coyote

2008-07-16T20:30:00.001-07:00

Hopefully more photos like this will follow. I inherited/took over management of 2500-3000 negative, prints, and positives depicting life in the Teton Valley of Idaho. Most of the photos focus on Driggs and Victor, Idaho during the turn of the 20th century through the 1950's, although some of the photos are taken from around Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and up towards the Yellowstone National Park area. Some are identified, many are routine family portraits, but most show a lifestyle (hunting, trains, Native Americans, farming, cowboys) that is quickly disappearing.

This photo shows a young man, in pseudo-Boy Scout garb, just back from hunting with his hounds and one lucky sheep dog. He has bagged a coyote or a wolf, and the boy strikes a majestic pose, assured in the knowledge that he has help reduce the Teton Valley's biodiversity.