Harold Davis's Blog, page 90

Window and Shadow

Wandering through an open house in the neighborhood, I came across this window and shadow, and photographed it with my iPhone, the fun camera I always (at least mostly always) have with me.

Window and Shadow © Harold Davis

Edward Weston’s Kitchen

In September 2013 I spent a night in the guest cottage of famed photographer Edward Weston’s house at Wildcat Hill along the Big Sur coast, following a workshop I gave in Carmel, California. The gracious hosts, Kim and Gina Weston, rent the cottage as an occasional retreat, and it was like spending the evening in a museum. In the morning, I roamed the grounds with my camera.

Edward Weston’s Kitchen © Harold Davis

As a photographic hero of mine, I perhaps should have tried to emulate Weston’s wonderful monochromatic imagery in his own house. Instead, this rather colorful image of the Weston kitchen is what I came up with!

You can read more about my stay at the Weston house in the original blog story that I wrote contemporaneously with my visit.

I Wasp Eye

Early this morning I came downstairs in my pajamas and found myself face-to-face with this wasp, somnolent before the heat of the day. I pulled some close-up gear together, and got down face-to-face and jowl-to-proboscis to eyeball her ladyship. Glad am I that our relative sizes are not reversed, as She is a formidable looking creature indeed!

I Wasp Eye © Harold Davis

In 2005, towards the beginning of my career in digital photography (for more about my roundabout route back into digital photography, check out Behind the Lens with Harold Davis on the Topaz Labs Blog), I climbed an unsteady stack of diaper cartons to photograph another sleepy wasp on our living room ceiling. (You can see the rinky-dink-and-possibly-dangerous setup in the linked story.)

The 2005 Wasp has been a surprise hit on the image licensing circuit. Special thanks to Pixsy for helping to protect this image from unauthorized use. Of course, my hope is that my more modern wasp will also be popular (for authorized use only)!

Color Field of Flowers

Thanks for participating in my previous request for comments on Decorative Grasses and Blades of Grass. Today’s Which variation do you prefer? And, why? involves six images. What these variations have in common is the subject matter: the same floral arrangement was photographed in each.

Four of the images involve different processing of the full composition, with a version on white, an inversion on black, a version with a virtual “frame,” and a woodcut-like black & white version. I have presented these images as verticals.

The other two images, shown as horizontals, involve closer-in captures, with a different (stronger) magnification.

Which do you like best, and why? I particularly appreciate comments entered directly on the blog story (the comment box is below, or follow this link!). Thanks.

Color Field of Flowers on White © Harold Davis

Color Field of Flowers on White with a Deckled Edge © Harold Davis

Inverted Color Field of Flowers © Harold Davis

Black and White Field of Flowers © Harold Davis

Flower Friends © Harold Davis

Papaver Nudicaule © Harold Davis

Decorative Grasses

Thanks for all the input on my Blades of Grass series. I appreciate the (varied) input. Here’s another sequence of Decorative Grasses. Which is your favorite variation, and why? I particularly appreciate comments entered directly on the blog story (the comment box is below, or follow this link!). Thanks.

Decorative Grasses Variation D © Harold Davis

Decorative Grasses Variation C © Harold Davis

Decorative Grasses Variation B © Harold Davis

Decorative Grasses Variation A © Harold Davis

Blades of Grass

Which version do you like better, and why?

Blades of Grass Variation A © Harold Davis

Blades of Grass Variation B © Harold Davis

Blades of Grass Variation C © Harold Davis

Egg

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Coming downstairs on a school-day morning, I found a boiled egg that Nicky spurned alone in a small white bowl. The bowl was lit by beautiful ambient (but strong) sunlight from the kitchen window.

Somewhat groggily (it was before my first dose of caffeine) I contemplated my technical options from iPhone to full-court drill with camera, tripod, and Zeiss Otus. I went for the middle ground: the DSLR (Nikon D850) with a macro lens (Zeiss 50mm f/2), handheld, bumping the ISO to compensate for the lack of a tripod (I wanted to get to the cup of coffee sometime in this life!).

My interest was to use the available light to make the ovoid shape of the egg stand out above the shadows, and it is always fun to create an abstraction (or a semi-abstraction) from the everyday things around one.

Egg © Harold Davis

Katie Rose and the Swallow

Alas, Katie has had a sinus infection, and antibiotics have been prescribed. She has graduated from solution to pills, but she does not like swallowing them, and makes a production out of it twice a day! Katie is the youngest in our family, and I am always amazed at how fast the years go, and how slow it sometimes seems (simultaneously!). I picture time as a river, with rapids and slow-moving water in stretches that occupy the same topography.

Katie Rose contemplating the swallow © Harold Davis

I am deleting my Facebook account in one week

I am deleting my Facebook account one week from today. The week’s delay is to give my real friends on Facebook, many of whom hail from other parts of the world, a chance to connect with me IRL or via other social media (my preference among photo-sharing and social media sites remains Flickr, call me an old stodgy).

Here’s what I wrote on Facebook: 

I am deleting my Facebook account one week from today. #deletefacebook I no longer want to be complicit with the egregious misuse of personal information at the behest of commercial profit.

I will miss many of my Facebook friends’ updates, and hope that you decide to keep in touch with me off Facebook. My website is https://www.digitalfieldguide.com – My contact info is publicly available on my website at https://www.digitalfieldguide.com/about/contact-harold-davis(including snail mail, phone, and email). I work hard to respond in reasonable real-time to personal emails at harold [at] digitalfieldguide [dot] com. You can subscribe to one of my email lists at https://www.digitalfieldguide.com/about/subscribe.

Finally, if you want to laugh (or cry) about all this, check out Alexandra Petri’s Deleting Facebook? Don’t Worry I’ll Replace It for You from the WaPo.

Bullseye on Black © Harold Davis

Slay a Bucket-List Dragon

Time to slay your bucket list and visit Malta with me (photographed on the streets of Valletta). Click here for a detailed itinerary (PDF) and here for the Reservation Form. Small group of photographers, November 2018.

St George Slays Dragon © Harold Davis