Pritchard House, Titusville, Ga.

This is the house and yard on the other side of the weedy fence in my previous post's black and white photo.

Just to show how completely ignorant I am of achitectural styles, I though this was a Victorian home.

Well, it ain't.  It's "an outstanding example of the Queen Anne architecture, a distinctly American form that was popular from approximately 1876-1910."

Whatever, it's still a beautiful place and seemed strange to see such a stately old home in Florida.  (i.e. it's not cinder block and it's not painted in Key West pastel blue, green, or yellow colors.)

Note the beautiful landscaping and compare to the other side of the surrounding fence from my previous post.

The Pritchard House was built in 1891.

added later, (Technical note:  I've been learning to correct distortion in photos, and adjusted this one to correct that building-leaning-backwards look from having used a wide angle lens pointed upward.  Now I need to learn to leave a little more space around my main subjects when photographing them to allow for the bit of cropping needed after a perspective correction like this.)

Original leaning-over-backwards look.

Black and White #38

This was taken at a beautiful old historic home in Titusville, Florida.

The yard on the other side of this fence was manicured and beautiful.

But on the street side of this obviously high-quality and expensive fence it was Weed City.  As someone who grew up cutting lawns for people, I can't imagine a worker with any self respect not taking ten extra minutes with a weed-eater to trim outside this fence. 

But I'm not them I guess.

I've been trying some different techniques in Photoshop Elements 9 to get nice, contrasty black and white images.

This is not a great photo, but I was able to get a range of tones here that I do like.

Crane Creek Promenade on a Saturday Morning

Not much to say here.

This walkway along Crane Creek in Melbourne, Florida, and the Melbourne Harbor Marina in the distance, is close to home and a great place to walk, photograph, and otherwise enjoy the beauty of Florida.

My second try at jumping on the HDR bandwagon.

Gone Fishin'

I was impressed that these teens were out net fishing just after dawn on a Saturday morning.

Sometimes when I'm out wandering and photographing things, I take a photo that doesn't impact me at the moment of pressing the shutter, but when I get home and see it on computer, I really, really like it.

This is one of those photos for me.

About three weeks ago, I had a sleepless night with my back and about dawn I decided to get my camera and go take some photos in the morning sun.

Lovely wife is an early riser and woke up before I left, so we went down to Melbourne Harbor Marina, one of my favorite local photographic haunts.

We parked in a park next to the marina, the Crane Creek Promenade, a nice walk along the banks of Crane Creek. (Which is a great local place to see and watch manatees. Sadly, no manatee sightings on this morning)

The marina is located at the mouth of Crane Creek where it meets the Indian River Lagoon.

I used to get up at the butt-crack-of-dawn when I was a teenager and go fishing for bass in the local bayous in Monroe, Louisiana with my friends way back when, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised to see these fellas doing it.

Sign, Sign, Everywhere a Sign

Taken at the Melbourne Harbor Marina in Melbourne, Florida.

If I'm stumped for somewhere to go with my camera, I can always head to this marina.  Boats change over time so there's usually something new to see and photograph.

And few things are as varied as a marina during different parts of the day. Morning is one kind of beautiful, and sunset is another kind of beautiful.

We (Lovely Wife was with me on this particular Saturday morning) usually park up the road at a local park called Crane Creek Promenade - Manatee Viewing Area and walk along the creek until we get to the marina.

Sadly, there were no manatees in view on this morning.  It has gotten warm enough that they move out to the Intracoastal Waterway, and the ocean.

This sign was put up since my last foray into the wilds of this fairly upper crust boating area.

I have no idea what most of the pointers are pointing to, must be to placed boaters care about that a land lubber like me would not understand.

P.S.  I have always HATED that friggin' Sign, Sign, Everywhere a Sign song by the 5 Man Electrical Band.  Even as a kid when it was originally out.  Don't get me started on Tesla's 1980's version.  But, as often happens, years of unintentional hearings of the song have left me with many of the lyrics memorized.  It popped into my head while uploading this photo.  Now I'll have to start iTunes and play some King's X to input some good rock 'n roll into my massive cranium.

My First Stab at an HDR (-like) Photo

I've never been much of a jumper-onner.  Bandwagons hold little appeal for me.

This psychological trait is probably a result of the overall mental state that also has me preferring the life of a loner.

So as the High Dynamic Range imaging made possible and popular by the attributes of digital cameras has been all the rage for several years now, I've never tried to get this look in my own photos.

Yes, I certainly have many photos that I thought could have benefited from this technology, but at the time of their "taking," I did not use a tripod or take a bracketed set of the images.

A couple of weeks ago, after a sleepless Friday night (back pain), I grabbed my camera and bag and got ready to go somewhere local and take some early Saturday morning photos.

My wife wakes early, and came with me, and we ended up on a walk around a local marina that I like to visit for its beauty.

I ended up trying my hand at HDR with this scene at Melbourne Harbor Marina in Melbourne, Florida.  It's located on the mainland where Crane Creek meets the Intracoastal Waterway.  (Our local section of the Intracoastal Waterway is officially the Indian River Lagoon.)

Anyway, it's certainly not a great photo, but I found that I tend to like my HDR photos a little less harsh than many others I have seen.  Many seem to have the "HDR look" screaming at me.  I also added a little softness to the photo to give a bit of the dreamy quality that helps the photo impart some of the emotional impact I felt walking around a beautiful area on a beautiful morning.