If Every Autumn Were Like This...

Autumn has never been my favorite season. September always feels like Sunday afternoon before going back to school for the week. The urgency to complete tasks before the ground is covered with inhospitable snow always felt like the hurry to complete homework before the new school week began. A number of good things have happened in various Septembers of my life but so have a number of terrible things and, as much as I'm pretty good at forgetting the bad, some of these have not been erased with time's selective eraser.

This September, and even this October, has flown by because of our preoccupation and enthrallment with our daughter. However, we are very happy that it has been such a nice few months, most evenings being more comfortable temperature and insect-wise outside than they were in June or July, so that we could spend as much time outside with our little family than we expected based on previous year's autumns.

Most years our late-to-bud and late-to-shed linden tree freezes then drops its leaves. This year it has been nice enough for them to go through their entire change and fall naturally. I really enjoyed watching that process in addition to the nice weather. When it does have this opportunity to go through its cycle naturally it made for quite a lovely, steady, observation. Mixed with the other colors in the backyard neighborhood the pallet is quite gentle and pleasing.

I decided it needed to be photographed in some simple shots just to be recorded and shared. The last one was made on a slightly chilly evening by the light of our patio lights and rope lights. I observed the nice falloff of light while escorting our skitter-ish little dog for her evening outing. Those rustling leaves sure are a distraction and a little bit scary to her. You can't see me rolling my eyes, but they are.

No, I'm not looking forward to winter as the first flakes fall outside today, but you deal with it as we tough/stubborn Saskatchewanians do. Hopefully the winter tires on the van this year will make a difference, now if I could just get winter tires and a power drive on my chair we'd be getting somewhere. Or, better yet, people abiding by the bylaws and shoveling their sidewalks.

Doesn't matter, I've got a head full of ideas and things I want to do this winter that should keep me going until the first signs of melting.

Perfect Poser

 

  Yellow Dragonfly by Jay Scott on 500px

I'm quite happy to see the number of dragonflies that have been in our backyard for over a month, now. Combined with the hotter, drier weather, they have done a fine job keeping the mosquitoes at bay. I haven't seen any specifically eating wasps, but the nest under our deck that I will get dad to take care of when they come up (as of the writing of this our baby has yet to arrive so I'm assuming they are not here), probably has had its population reduced thanks to the dragonflies.

I always find it intriguing to see how they go through cycles. Early in the season you will see the lovely light-blue colored damselflies which often move to the deeper orange and fuzzier looking dragonflies before some of the turquoise and huge black ones emerge. I don't recall seeing this many of the yellow ones pictured above as I have this year. Maybe the food supply is better or maybe the weather is just right for them. Either way, they are a beautiful and harmless insect that takes care of all the other pests. I think the only reason to not wish the extinction of mosquitoes and wasps is that they are food for dragonflies.

Maybe we should put some money into researching other food supplies for dragonflies and technology for the near extinction of mosquitoes and wasps, at least in the city where they are of little help in pollinating crops.

Here's hoping the next photos I have to share our of our baby.

Kub Kar - Year 1

 

  Kub Kar Year 1

  by

  Jay Scott

Unlike the Kub Truck my dad built for fun, this was the Kub Car that I built in my first year of Cubs. That was a long time ago. I'm happy to say that it won first place in the regionals for design. It didn't track very straight and its top speed was not up to the competition, but it certainly did outshine the other entries that year in Swift Current.

A few of the decals are hidden by the camera angle, but it looked pretty good in my opinion. I remember that as much as the cub leaders and parents were certainly allowed to their help their boys in the construction, I remember that my dad did not take over. He left much of the design up to me, but helped me to take care of the dangerous work when it came to refining the curves on the bandsaw. But when it came to the filing and sanding it was up to me.

The paint color was obvious, the difficult to obtain Department of Highways yellow; the same color you see painted on the highways. It wasn't that difficult to get a hold of when your dad works for that organization, but it made my car stand out from the others. I chose the decals from some Lego and Playmobile sets and rounded out the look with some 80s GM pin striping. It was definitely a great first year for building a Kub Kar. The speed and tracking came in later years when I won trophies for those cars, as well. Photos of those will be coming in the near future.

The Technicals

The background was provided by the one of the galaxy slides included in one of the creative kits available to accessorize a Light Blaster. From about 5 feet away, focused to 4.5 feet (to increase the perceived bokeh) zoomed into approximately 45 mm, by one SB 28 set to 1/4 power, with the consumer lens' aperture opened to f/4.5, the image was projected onto my white fleece blanket hanging in the background.

The camera settings are 50mm, f/7.1, 1/200", ISO 200. I list these because I know there would be photographers who would ask, but really, when you are combining five light sources with different types, power settings, gels, modifiers, distances and triggers, those first four basic camera settings are little more than a baseline. They were adjusted around my flash power limitations. That limitation being the minimum output possible. The fog, created by my new Dragon Puffer kit from Zero Toys, was illuminated by one SB-28 @ 1/64 power with 1 2/3 cut of red gel. The galaxy projection was tweaked with a one third cut of CTB, the snooted flash on the camera left side of the car had a 1/4 cut of CTO, while the camera right side gridded flash had a 1/2 cut of CTO. 

The final gridded light source was projected from quite high and just camera left onto the reflective sticker on the front of the car to emulate a bright headlight. It was altered with a 3/4 cut of CTO and two thirds cut of lavender gel, chosen to emulate the color of today's higher and car headlights. Because of the sticker's reflectiveness it needed to be just bright enough to create that purple-blue reflection. The tarmac was made of black neoprene rubber while the dirt colored ditch was simply the brown packing paper that came with the Dragon Puffer.

I had tried numerous times to use the twenty second timer on my camera to time it while timing the puff of smoke but it takes a few seconds for that Puffer to warm up then belch the fog. Timing that with the countdown that only lets me know 3 seconds before the shutter will trip, was very difficult. So, I had Angie create smoke and I just sat at the shutter release to get the timing just correct.

I look forward to seeing what my friend Stacey's pack comes up with for cars this year.

Giant Pinapple

Just a huge pineapple we bought that begged to be shot before being cut up for grilling with our mahi-mahi tomorrow evening.

Giant Cuban Pinapple by Jay Scott

It's amazing how large of a backdrop you need to shoot something small at an ultra-wide, low, angle like this.

Child's Imagination

Angie made pies for her dad's birthday last week. Sorry, no photos of that. They were so good they got devoured before I could get at them with my camera.

However, when she got home one of our nephews' toys, a racebike with a magnetic rear wheel, was stuck to one of the pie pans.

Trying to break out the imagination kids might have while playing, I made a photo of the bike for fun. Hopefully our nephews will like it.

Mag Bike by Jay Scott

My recent arrival of neoprene, to use as DIY Lens Coats, was the perfect asphalt substitute before it gets cut to shape for the protective covers.