Tom & Small Cube

My friend Tom Noddy displays one of his more renowned bubble creations. The cube is constructed by blowing a bubble and catching it so it is hanging from his bubble wand. A second bubble of equal size is blown beneath, so it is attached and suspended below the top bubble. It looks like an hourglass, with a flat membrane between the two bubbles. Next four more equal sized bubbles are blown around the “waist” of the hourglass, so they connect. And finally a smoke-filled bubble is blown into the middle of it all.

This was shot with several flash units scattered around the room, and black velvet draped behind to isolate Tom and the Bubble.

Tom Noddy displays a bubble cube

Tom Noddy displays a bubble cube

Sunset Log, Big Bear Lake, CA

Running out of daylight, but time for one more shot so I grabbed this sunset with the near silhouette of the log along the frozen shoreline of Big Bear Lake in February of 2022. You can see across the big part of the lake in this view and most of the lake is not frozen, just the end where we were. It was a satisfying journey to get out of the cabin and run along the nature trail and get back before the temperatures dropped to single digits. The next day would be great skiing.

Kids at Frozen Shore, Big Bear Lake, CA


Lucky for me, I was able to encourage and coach my kids into being avid runners. We suited up and ran out to this frozen shoreline of Big Bear Lake before sunset and they were happy to take a break and pose for this cha-cha shot with my Fuji GA645w. I was fortunate the winds had died down and the lake water was still, allowing me to capture this moment from our 4 mile run.

Bubble Star

Bubble master Tom Noddy displays the extremely complex Bubble Star

Bubble master Tom Noddy displays the extremely complex Bubble Star

My friend Tom Noddy came over to my house so I could capture some of his amazing creations in 3D. The back wall is draped with black velvet. DOF is pretty narrow. Shot with TL-120, Provia 400x, and flash units aplenty.

The Bubble Star is a very complex bubble and takes some time to build, So by the time it’s finished it will not last long. Something is going to pop.

Tom was presenting once in Israel (he does a lot of science museums) and you can imagine the reaction he got when he presented this.

Red Rock Canyon – Waterton Lakes

A29 - Red Rock Canyon - Waterton LakesThe red rocks provide an unusual background to this otherwise typical scene of people relaxing while enjoying an idyllic scene. The alluvial rocks in the stream bed are not red like the canyon, and have been carried down to the canyon from up the mountain.  We fell in love with Waterton Lakes National Park in south-western Alberta during this our first visit. Original slide taken June 7, 2015 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed at 1/160 at f16. This was my last roll of Provia 400X; it is sorely missed.

Ghost Trees, Upper Geyser Basin – Yellowstone

A29 - Ghost Trees, Upper Geyser Basin - YellowstoneThese white dead trees create an otherworldly scene around many of the geysers at Yellowstone. I am not sure why living trees are growing amongst them: are the dead trees silicified and preserved, to be joined by the living trees when they succumb to the harsh environment; or perhaps the conditions have changed allowing a new generation of trees to survive; or perhaps the dead trees were burned in one of the many forest fires that occurred at Yellowstone before being covered in the minerals expelled by the geysers. Original slide taken June 1, 2015 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed at an estimated  1/250 at f25.

Belgian Pool – Yellowstone

A29 - Belgian Pool - YellowstoneThe Belgian Pool was named for a tourist from Belgium who was killed in 1929 after falling into the pool. Enthralled by an eruption of Grand Geyser, the unfortunate man apparently wasn’t watching where he was stepping. The range of colors is caused by the variation in the composition of the microbial mats caused by the change in temperature at different parts of the pool. (The colors would have been more intense with polarizing filters but I don’t have two polarizing filters. This more intimate scene is more effective with the regular lense separation of the Heidoscop than the shots I did of Old Faithful and other majestic scenes in Yellowstone and the Grant Tetons, most of which would have benefited from hyper stereo.) Original slide taken June 1, 2015 wit ha tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed at 1/200 at f22.

Three Lonely Crosses

A29 - God Bless AmeDo these three crosses stand in memory of three people that lost their lives at this lonely crossroads? If yes, what complex lives are reduced to these simple white crosses? What happened? This shot was taken at intersection of US 287 and MT 200, north of Wolf Creek, Montana. The crosses are not present in Google streetview from June 2009. Original slide shot June 6, 2015 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed at 1/160 at f25. (I was going to call the image “God Bless Ame”, after the billboard, but changed my mind as I felt it was going to change my intent.)

Carousel Follow Pan

WSF_Carousel_2_225x190This was another experiment to do something a little different with a stereo image. I tried following the ride as it was moving to get a crisp subject with a streaked background. Can’t claim success, but I’m encouraged to keep a’tryin’. One of the challenges was the lighting, which was a combination of fluorescent and tungsten. The original film I got back was awful to look at — super saturated ugly yellow-orange where you should see white. With some experimentation I settled on two filters stacked — one fluorescent and one blue. I think it was an FL-B and an 80A. If I remember right, the ideal exposure would have been 1/15th of a second but I couldn’t get there with my filters, even with pushing the film. I think these were shot at 1/8 second. I could probably get there with a flash that’s gelled for tungsten and fluorescent. Maybe next year! I’m not sure if this is the exact same image that’s in the folio (I sent some images in by mail and didn’t note exactly which scans they matched!). TL-120 with Provia 400X pushed to the limit.

Xmas 2014

xmas2014_MFT-folio28A“Candid” tripod shot on Christmas eve, when (according to German tradition) the tree is lit for the first time.  Boris and Michele on the left, then Jet, and Sarah, his godmother.  Probably shot on Kodak E200, 1 second exposure, f8?  Focus variable throughout – not the best situation for the Spud’s optics.  Lighting is tungsten and a bit of window light. Jet’s godfather, Travis, released the shutter.

 

2 Close 4 Comfort

Just a few houses down from us is an intersection that I’ve always judged to be hazardous. Melbourne Avenue intersects with Kenwood Lane in a “T” in such a way as to invite sleepy or otherwise impaired motorists onto your property. Melbourne goes over a little rise right before meeting Kenwood on a little steep downhill. The rise prevents a motorist from seeing the stop sign until about the last hundred feet before the intersection. If you don’t know the roads, and you’re going too fast, chances are you’d not be able to stop – especially because coming over the rise your car would be “lifting,” and your traction would be reduced.

To make matters worse, DIRECTLY in the path of Melbourne, i.e. exactly opposite Melbourne, is a house, 1321. When I first saw this arrangement, I immediately thought: I would not want to live in that house; but if I was forced into it, I’d always park some kind of large, heavy, junk car in front of the house. Well, of course the current owners never do that (and amazingly, STILL don’t do it).

So, coming home at night last winter, we noticed a lot of flashing lights just down the road from us. Jet is totally into emergency vehicles, so we went to have a look. I had a peculiar suspicion. Sure enough, an automobile was lodged in the living room of the house opposite Melbourne Ave. Upon coming closer, though, I noticed that it was not 1321 – the house right opposite the intersection – but 1323, the house next to it. The car had come over the rise much too fast and could not stop. The driver had tried to make a left turn, but came nowhere near completing the turn. They jumped the curb, plowed through some bushes, and ended up as you see in the picture, entering the house at a diagonal angle.

2-close-4-comfort_MFT-folio28ATo their great fortune, the family was not at home. I ran back to our house and grabbed the Spud and a tripod. With a policeman’s permission I set up at the corner of the property. I shot a roll exposing between 15 and 30 seconds onto RXP (fuji 400ASA). Local TV and newspaper reporters were there too. In the aftermath the story circulated: this driver had been running from the police, all the way from interstate, outside the city. They had come into town at high speed, taking random turns, ending up at this very unsuitable intersection.

The house has just been repaired, some nine months later. I guess it took a while to get the insurance money straightened out. I’ve not yet talked to the homeowners about the event – I might give them a stereoview sometime as a conversation starter. But I have talked to the neighbors at 1321, where I always thought such a mishap would be the most likely: they were surprised by the event, but remain otherwise not much more concerned than before, still not parking their car in front of their house.

Noodle Delirium

Noodle Delirium“Noodle Delirium” was an “ephermeral installation” that was created by the “Collectif ARG – Les Astronautes” and included in the “Unusual Passages” show in Quebec City the summer of 2014. It transformed a discreet anonymous passage into something special that people loved to walk through brushing against the noodles with their hands.

Original slide on Provia 400X taken with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop at 1/8 second at f25 on August 14, 2014.

Tourney Fountain, Quebec City

Tourney Fountain, Quebec CityTourney Foundation full viewI tried several classically centred shots of the fountain, as with the photo on the right, but I was not satisfied. I then decided to emphasize the overlapping jets of water coming from the frogs’ mouths, which I hoped might be more interesting in stereo than the fountain itself. I waited some time to view the scene with tourists in the background and without, and decided to take the shot with tourists to give more “as it is” context. The Tourney Fountain was a gift of the Simons Family to commemorate Quebec City’s 400th anniversary in 2008, and has become a popular landmark in front of the parliament. The fountain is the creation of French sculptor Mathurin Moreau and was  originally installed in Bordeaux, France in 1857.

Original slide on Provia 400X taken with tripod-mounted Heidoscop at 1/80 second at f25 on August 12, 2014.