2014 -- A Look Ahead

2013 was a mixed bag. I was busy, spent the year recovering from Achilles tendon surgery, and in general experienced a photographic slump. My top five photos were, I think, excellent. But where my ceiling remained consistent from 2012, my floor definitely dropped.

In 2014 I'll be re-focusing my efforts to become a better photographer. In lieu of posting nothing but my own work, I'm going to spend a bit less time shooting but instead shoot for the best results I can. However, I want to keep bringing consistent content to the blog.

To that end, I had one regular feature in 2013 -- Found Photos Friday (FPF). In that feature I shared old photos I found at estate sales, as undeveloped film in eBay auctions, and so forth. That feature will continue and I have enough material to last, probably, though 2015. I've already written the FPF posts for January and February and have enough for part of March. In April, I'll begin sharing a literal lifetime of photos I was loaned for the purpose of digitizing and sharing. They span at least 50 years with the oldest I've found being marked 1916 and the youngest 1966. The collection includes dozens of boxes, some with more than 150 negatives or slides.

In addition, I'll be dding another regular feature -- Top Ten Tuesday (T3). Each Tuesday I'll have a top ten list. I have all 52 planned and all the entries through February written, so this should be a manageable feature. My hope is that the lists will contain links, tips, and knowledge that will help improve other photographers skills. Some of the upcoming T3 posts are Ten Great Google+ Photo Communities and Ten Easy Photoshop Techniques.

2014 looks like it will be an exciting year and I've set high goals for myself again. In 2013 I failed to meet, well, all of my goals. 2014 will be better.

A Year in Photos -- Week Forty-seven

This week on A Year in Photos, we venture into the realm of psychadelia,


ask if those are hills or boobs,


go negative like a good political campaign,


do whatever the heck this is,


and again bask in the greatness of this guy's shirts (I'm not being sarcastic when I say that.)

A Year In Photos: Week Forty-six

This week in a Year in Photos, I get my lens mashed,


get too close to the edge,


go all low-fi with a Recesky TLR,


and get in front of the camera.


And for Found Photos Friday, some railroad tracks.

A Year in Photos: Week Forty-one

This week on A Year in Photos, I'm going to break format a bit and spend the whole week on a single day's worth of photos. On September 8th the Morgan Fire started near my home. It lasted six days and burned more than 3,000 acres.  To recognize how quickly the firemen contained and eliminated the fire, this week's photos will all be from my first hike into the area last weekend. I wanted to see the damage's extent and find out if life was returning. So this week we'll:

Look up at some burned trees (with some general shots of the burn scar),


get uncomfortably close to some smoldered moss (and other macro-type shots),


see the burn damage in infrared (with a visible-light cut filter),


check out some birds (and other signs of life),


turn some people to stone in part 2 (of 12!) of the 1960s Americana Found Photos Friday series.

A Year in Photos: Week Forty

The blog is back! This fall I'm taking a photo class to refresh some of my skills, but I'm still a ways away from getting to those photos. So this week I'll

order octopus from a street vendor in Tokyoi (it was amazing),



find serenity in Yokohama,



shoot a Caddy,



howl like a wolf,



and wear what is perhaps the coolest hat ever worn.

A Year in Photos: Week Thirty-three

This week I'll share photos from the Hawaii leg of my Japan trip. If you like shots of buildings, you'll be pretty happy this week. I'll start in Wakiki, have some from Honolulu, and finish up at Byodo-In Temple.

This week we'll try and figure out what all those different color settings on our monitors do...


...put some giant spotlights on some buildings at dusk...


...walk aimlessly around Honolulu...


...make an anole really mad...


...and partake in a tea ceremony.

A Year in Photos: Week Thirty-two

I'm back from my Japan trip and have been processing those images like mad for about ten days. Next week I'll start sharing my Hawaii photos and, I hope, there will be enough material for a good number of good blogs.

As for this week, though, we'll try and figure out how to use a camera...


... take a silly bokeh shot of some flowers...


...wear cool sunglasses...


... and celebrate Christmas at two houses.

A Year in Photos: Week Twenty-seven

This week will be a bit light as I prepare for my Japan trip. I'll have posts on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. Here's a glimpse of what we'll see.

A Year in Photos: Week Twenty-six

I head to Japan in a week or so for a three-week business trip, so my blog may (or may not) be inactive for July. That said, this week will be full of new photos. Well, except Friday when we'll visit Ireland and France to check out some castles from the 1950s.

Also, not to get your hopes up, but I have some AWFUL photos to share on Wednesday. Wow. I should have learned how to use that camera before testing it.

Anyway, this week on A Year in Photos I'll get sucked into a jet turbine,


see an angel,


devastate all the photographic street cred I've built in the last 20 years,


take a picture of my imaginary friend Farspanargyle,


and take us back to Ireland and Carcasonne, France, in the mid 1950s.

A Year in Photos: Week Twenty-five

This week on A Year in Photos we eat grass,


take my Nissan GTR for a spin,


troll on a boat,


Polaroid a sunset,


and visit New York. Oh, sorry; That's Las Vegas. Wait, no; that's Paris in 1956.

A Year in Photos: Week Twenty-four

More photos this week! It's been a long time since I blogged two weeks in a row, so let's bask in this blog greatness of amazing activity.



That done, let's take a look at what we'll see this week.


I take my Calumet CC-401 large-format camera out and get some actual photos with it this time!


I make my dogs looks taxidermied as they pose in an uncharacteristic display of affection for each other. This is actually part one of a series taken with my Rolleiflex Old Standard. I shot some photos about a month after these and will be printing them as opalotypes this month. So stay tuned for the subsequent blog posts, too.


I make one of my friends cry.


I visit the top of the Lime Ridge Open Space


And we go back to 1952 (I think) and visit the grand canyon. Is that a factory next to the canyon?

A Year in Photos: Week Twenty-three

After a few hectic weeks, I've managed to build up a number of photos to share. I also built a film developing tank out of plumbing supplies, which took a couple of nights. When we get to the Found Film Friday installment where I used the new tank (a while from now), I'll share the video I filmed making it. Found Film Friday is going to be a fairly regular part of the blog. I have about 700 found photos that I've digitized in the last month. Most of those I won't share, but some are pretty interesting.

For now, though, let's take a look at what we can expect this week.