Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 200 , 1/1000s , ƒ/3.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 21 March, 2018
Guess what? 1/1000s is also a good shutter speed for photos of backyard birds in the snow. But I have no clue what sort of bird this is. Do you?
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 182mm , ISO 125 , 1/1000s , ƒ/2.8 by Khürt L. Williams on 21 March, 2018
I’ve been home since yesterday. I’ve felt under the weather. Nope, not this weather. Just a cold. But wait, this weather is cold and I’m making very bad puns.??
Anyway, I’m bored, having been stuck inside since yesterday and having already binge-watched everything of interest (Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Dare Devil) to see on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.??
I’m experimenting with the camera trying to find out which shutter-speed freezes (no pun) motion for falling snow. Of course, the snow was uncooperative and fell at various speeds but I kept trying.
I looked up some winter quotes and found this one:
“Snow provokes responses that reach right back to childhood.” — Andy Goldsworthy
Andy Goldsworthy obviously didn’t grow up in the West Indies, South America, Central American, or India, or the Middle East or … anywhere where snow would be a reason to think it’s the end of the world.
Wake me up when it’s summer.
Replied toMagnets by Colin Walker (colinwalker.blog)
The magnet in the Watch strap obviously lines up perfectly with the one in the MacBook which detects when the screen is closed.
NIKON D40 @ 35mm , ISO 200 , 1/250s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 3 February, 2013
Some DSLRs have a feature called live view. Live preview is a feature that allows a digital camera’s display screen to be used as a viewfinder. This allows the photographer to preview the framing and exposure before taking the photograph. It’s very useful for landscape photography.
A few years ago I bought Freehands Men’s Stretch Thinsulate Gloves. I spent a lot of time shooting outside during the winter. Regular winter gloves are bulky and it was difficult for me to operate the camera. But operating a metal camera in below freezing temperatures is not fun. The Thinsulate gloves are a good solution. The thumb and fore fingers tips open up so that photographer can operate the camera knobs and levers. They also have magnets to hold the tips in place.
Everytime I would use those gloves with live view mode the shutter would close as soon as I enabled live view. It turns out that electro-magnets in the Nikon keep the shutter open for the live view feature. Until I realized what was happening I panicked, believing my Nikon was damaged somehow and in need of repair.
When taking photos, my eyes are always scanning the horizon, framing and composing in my mind. If something clicks, I stop on the side of the road and often have a half dozen DIFFERENT photos within the space of a few minutes. Would my photos be any better if I took longer and deliberately thought out and planned purposefully what I was doing? I will probably never know because while planning for one shot another three pop into my head and just as quickly they disappear.
iPhone 6 @ 4.15mm , ISO 32 , 1/180s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 10 February, 2016
I get the attention deficit thing. I discovered that listening to music on my phone and wireless headphones can help focus my mind. But wearing headphones means being unaware of my surroundings in situations where sight and sound are important.
One thing that frustrates me about where I love is that I see these beautiful scenes on my way to and from the office or while driving around town but the narrow-one-lane-no-shoulder country roads don’t allow for stopping and we don’t have any sidewalks here either. It can be a strange site for other motorist watching a car slow-down and stop briefly while the driver rolls down the window and stick out a DSLR camera and lens. It works only when traffic is light.
Princeton Battlefield State Park, Princeton, New Jersey iPhone 6 @ 4.15mm , ISO 800 , 1/60s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 29 October, 2014
Sometimes I get lucky and the scene unfolds before me, traffic is light, and the road actually has a shoulder. But still, there is no time to pull out a DSLR, set up a tripod, compose the shot, set camera settings etc. Sometimes, there is just enough time for a grab shot shot on the iPhone. It’s the best I can do in that moment.
The Highline, New York City, New York iPhone 6 @ 4.15mm , ISO 32 , 1/10000s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 28 September, 2014
Being without my Nikon1 has forced me to use my iPhone 7. The camera on the iPhone 7 is much better than the camera on my previous iPhones. But I am less happy with recent images taken with the iPhone 7 and less willing to use it in general. But by using a DSLR for most of the images I captured over the last few years, I seem to have forgotten how to compose and think through capturing images with the iPhone. Looking back through my catalogue over the last few years, I have many old iPhone images of which I am proud.
Rodanthe Pier, Rodanthe, Outer Banks, North Carolina iPhone @ 4.15mm , ISO 32 , 60s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 3 September, 2015
Why am I so stuck now? Why am I not even trying? Why am I struggling to put my “best foot forward”? Have I become one of those people who think that a good photo can only be captured on expensive high-end equipment. I hope not!!
Self Portrait, Carnegie Lake, Princeton, New Jersey iPhone @ 4.15mm , ISO 32 , 60s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 5 November, 2015
For the last few weeks, while driving along Mapleton Road on the border between Plainsboro and Princeton Township, I have observed the beautiful morning sun that illuminates the expensive homes on the western side of Carnegie Lake. There is no place to stop and take a photo. But I am determined and perhaps tomorrow I will arise before dawn, drive to the southern end of Mapleton Road, park my car at the entrance to the Delaware and Raritan Canal Park Trail, and walk the trail, with the tripod and iPhone 7, north toward that area. I expect the walk will be quite cold.
Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve, Princeton, New Jersey iPhone @ 4.15mm , ISO 32 , 30s , ƒ/2.2 by Khürt L. Williams on 31 October, 2015
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 1000 , 1/1000s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 22 March, 2018
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 160 , 1/1000s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 22 March, 2018
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 1600 , 1/1000s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 22 March, 2018
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 1250 , 1/1000s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 22 March, 2018
Canon EOS 5D Mark III @ 200mm , ISO 250 , 1/1000s , ƒ/6.3 by Khürt L. Williams on 22 March, 2018 
Frank Jansen
