Lots of photos

Two opportunities to see what's been going on here in the office and why things are so quiet. You can either view my flickr pages to see loads of images in easy-to-navigate folders...

OR you can scroll down a little and and watch my embedded shows of select images from the latest additions to the catalog and available for license or print purchase. Either way, I hope you enjoy.

Early morning sight

I was able to squeeze in a little "work" today and head up into the mountains above Anchorage to one of my favorite stomping grounds of old; the Glen Alps trailhead. With a commanding view over Anchorage it is my favorite place to await the first rays of the morning sun as they creep in between Wolverine Peak and Flattop Mountain. Today didn't disappoint and there was the added bonus of an arriving jet into the airport, what a glorious sight it must have been from that aircraft.

Enjoy.

View across the Inlet

A quick trip up to visit the property brought back to my memory a view I had seen many years ago and, surprise surprise, it was just as stunning today as I remembered. The Anchorage skyline as seen from Port McKenzie across Cook Inlet on a crisp fall afternoon.

On holiday

Lovely to be home. Jill and I are back home in Alaska for a couple of weeks. Today we went to do an oxymoronic task called "absetee in-person" voting for the upcoming Federal election. On the way to City Hall we were treated to one of Alaska's normal traffic hazards: momma' moose and her baby crossing Tudor Road. And then it snowed this afternoon.

Yes, it is good to be home. Here's an image I captured while doing a little aerial vehicle spotting near the Anchorage airport. Enjoy and look for more images in the next few days.

The Holiday Season Approaches

Yes, it's hard to believe but it is getting close to the time of the year for re-connecting with that long list of friends hidden away in your Holiday Greetings address book. Millions upon millions of pieces of mail will literally travel to and from the four corners of the globe in order to give yearly updates on what we do, the growth of our kids and the current state of our pets.

Not one to be content with the current offerings at the corner store, I decided this year to produce a line of holiday greeting cards with my own little style added to them. The first batch is out featureing a poor little eagle in a Santa hat waiting for the first glimps of morning in Alaska, scrumptious cookies, brilliant poinsettia (growing outdoors in the Azores of all places) and a couple of others.

My favorite is probably the single aurora image. When we were in Alaska the wife of our pastor saw this photo and called it the "baby Jesus" photo as once could imagine the sky looking like that on that very special knight. So Dar, THANK YOU!

When I was a young man...

I was digging through a box of old photos the other day and ran across a little snapshot of me taken when Jill and I were dating and we had nothing better to do than go around the mid-west with a band I worked with and do what young couples do: listen to loud music and drink a beer or two. I may have had a couple more, but that's not really the point now is it? I had just turned 20 and am in full metal rock god gear onstage at Wishbone's in Columbus, Nebraska while working for the Street Legal band out of Beemer, Nebraska. Sometimes for the last couple of songs I would come up and play, a fun 10 minutes in my life.

Yes, that is my hair. Yes, that is a white leather fringy jacket ala' John Bon Jovi (whom I was once mistaken for in the Sioux Falls, ND airport for by a 10-year old kind once). Yes, I cry when I think about that guitar I sold (a 1964 Gibson Les Paul Custom "Fretless Wonder") for a pittance. Yes, my lovely wife Jill (then my lovely girlfriend Jill) took the photo and I remember it was with a red plastic Vivitar 35mm point-and-shoot.

Amazing Macro Photos

Many of you know I have had a hand in running the Online Visual Artists Forum for awhile. One of the things we're doing over there is running bi-monthly themed contests with an open entry for members (yet another free service we provide you). You can see the last competition's winners on the front page and I'm amazed at what people can do with pencils and paint.

Now since I'm one of the "powers that be" I don't enter the competitions, but you have got to check out this current round of entries into the MACRO contest. Last count there were over 80 fantastic entries and my guess is that it will top 100 by the deadline of 31JULY.

So jump on over and take a look and feel free to cast your vote!

A Great Northern Lights Article

I have made some fantastic friends in my years on the Internet. One of those is my buddy Ken who lives up in Canada in the Sarnia/Port Huron area. I met Ken back when we were trying to figure out if you could do such a daft thing as create digital slideshows with music (and back then rudimentary was pretty much the best you could wish for) over at the Pics2Exe forum hosted by WnSoft.

Well, out of the blue, Ken sends me a link to one excellent article in the Globe and Mail explaining what causes the aurora borealis to erupt in the winter skies over the poles (actually, they always happen but you can't see them in the summer). Oddly enough I just posted an entire gallery up of my aurora photographs for everyone to look at, there's also a pretty cool slideshow feature to use as well.

So enjoy the article, get a little ed-ju-ma-ka-shun while you're there then pop on over to the gallery and "oohhh" and "aahhh" at what happens in Alaska's night skies.

Weeting Steam Rally- Day 2

If you have heard me wax lyrically about my first day at the Weeting Steam Festival, well... let's just say the second day didn't disappoint. With the arrival of a few more engines I heard someone mention the figure of over 50 for the attendees. There was more smoke, more noise, more people, more fun. My newfound friend in the traction engine community, Rob Shorland-Ball, was again most gracious to me in sharing his knowledge and love of traction engines and endured yet another string of questions about this and that. I would also like to thank for fine folks who were kind to me at the threshing display, the mill yard, and the water pumper section for educating me into this world I have grown greatly fascinated with.

If you want to see even more, consider a quick hop over to my gallery at Zenfolio. So, without further adeu, my second day at the Weeting Steam Rally:

Lensbaby and the Weeting Steam Rally

Living here in England offers some of the most unique opportunities one could ever imagine. Case in point: the Weeting Steam Rally and Country Fair. Held just outside the small village of Weeting, Norfolk (pop. 1750) it is celebrating 40 years of shows in which steam powered vehicles (called traction engines) gather to show their stuff. Today I took my 4 children and my Lensbaby 3G mounted on a Canon 40D to Weeting to look around and I have to say, it was really an incredible time.

We parked in a huge field and as we approaced the main event area you could see plumes of grey sooty smoke rising from numerous locations, the smell of sulfurous-coal thick in the air. As we rounded a huge white tent we saw example on example of huge, lumbering machines. What a fantastic sight, some of these monstorous vehicles were 100 years old but looked as if they rolled out of the shop only last week. You have never seen or smelled so much Brass-o in your life!

At one engine we stopped to talk to a very nice gentleman named Rob who kindly took the time to explain what a traction engine was, what they were made for, and how they worked. The children were even asked to step up onto the platform and shown the controls. What a fantastic learning experience. He would explain how the coal fire heated water in the boiler and as he did, a lumbering 8-10 ton machine would go by, gigantic masses of cast iron spinning and stroking about with a speed that nearly defied belief. The ground shook, flecks of coal soot invaded every inch of body. It was grand.

I'm going back tomorrow with my serious gear to get even more images. Enjoy Weeting as seen through the Lensbaby, you can view more and larger images at my print order website.