[Barracuda]

Thanks, at first I was kinda mad that they were coming up between a stand of trees, but ended up making for some fairly interesting foreground. Addison’s big show was last night, but after work yesterday I was in no mood to sit out in the heat then sit in traffic till 11pm to get home to see the show in person. Most of the local tv stations had it on though.

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Found this shot while going through my Lightroom albums this morning. Taken on my old Canon P&S not long after we moved into this house (geez, has it been 4 years already?). Early summer storm clouds at sunset made for a rather dramatic sky.

[Barracuda]

No ping-pong suits, but what I guess was a set of either LED or other sort of point capturing electronic dot was wired up on each side from hand to shoulder, down the torso, leg and two points on the foot. The knee feels much better already, and the lack of any sort of discomfort during the last capture was a huge relief. Other parts of my body are screaming this morning, but that could also be from the yard work of lugging rocks and bags of mulch around the yard that I did the last two days. Only a few real rides over the next few weeks will really tell what problems this fit has resolved. I do know I have to work on my flexibility which is holding me back as well.

One thing that can help is have someone take a side profile shot of you on the bike, either use a trainer if you can get your hands on one (remember to level the front wheel with the rear) or just leaning against a wall will usually help. A few photos with the cranks both horizontal and at maximum extension. A few minutes in Paint with the line tool and you can probably see where your knees are in relation to the spindle (google on where the “should” be to compare). That’s a good starting point. I was also too stretched out in front, which was causing a lot of neck and shoulder stiffness.

[Barracuda]

If they were not ready to be released, then why were they? Yeah, with a lot of Photoshop work, some of them could be improved, but the one shot of the track & field athlete with a half rolled out back drop behind him with black on both sides? Really?

[Barracuda]

Ahhh, Grant Petersen, if you want to start a flame war on a cycling board, second to “Shimano or Campagnolo” is probably dropping his name. He makes a few good points, but him and his “followers” sometimes take it a bit too far. Worth a read, but take his common sense with a grain or two of salt.

In other news, spent probably the best $250 on my cycling hobby I have in good long while and actually went and had a top of the line computerized motion capture fitting done today. A lot of minor tweaks to the bike, some of which I really wish I’d had done BEFORE I had the custom bike fitted. Not sure if Dave Kirk would have altered the dimensions of the bike all that much, but now I have to wonder. In any case, the bike will still work great for me, and it’s not like there’s 1cm of seat post sticking out or anything drastic like that. After tweaking my knee on my trip last month it’s been a slow recovery, hampered partially due to what I now know was a rather ill fit on the bike. Hopefully now my knee will be happy and I can get back to riding (you know, now that it’s 95-110 degrees for the next two months).

// NOT saying that all cyclists need to drop that sort of coin on a fitting, but finding a trusted fitter in your area that’ll do a basic fit for $50-$80 is probably worth it.

[Barracuda]

My Green Heron shot was taken with a Canon 55-250 f4-5.6, but I stalked him around the pond for about 5 mins to get one or two decent shots (bout 7 total taken). And I cropped in on that shot some as well, still think 2400px is less than 100%, but not by too much. I did take the 300mm f4.5 Nikon and doubler out with my XSi as well back to the same pond, of course I’m now looking at a stop less with the doubler, and manual zoom on vintage glass, but that does really bring you in close.

Example of the 300 + doubler:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-s-Wa5ChZzjo/T-dX4RIe5eI/AAAAAAAAHvo/AXJ8WWoI8Mo/s1600/IMG_5049.jpg
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-VNiUJWwF7zE/T-dhklXFFJI/AAAAAAAAHus/uT3a2eDJLFY/s1600/IMG_5085.jpg

250mm, minimal to no crop:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-E2svIf2TVZs/T-c10FmYgOI/AAAAAAAAHso/mCb1AX-I0LI/s1600/IMG_5031.jpg

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Ah, the Volare, I know the model. I’m a regular over in the Classic & Vintage section of BikeForums.net (cuda2k, admin), as well as the owner/developer of VeloBase.com. I’ve had a couple of vintage Schwinns in the last few years, but none quite that old.

// first contest that’s on the outside of the vote avg curve I’ve seen since I started participating!

[Barracuda]

Wait. You can leave the house without so much as a cheap point n shoot? How do you do that?.

I know, I know, I should have known better. 😉

beakgeek, lots of fantastic shots on your website, guess I should swing back through the Fark.com thread and see how many new entries I need to vote for now. 🙂 Can’t quite make out the Schwinn head badge in your avatar. Looks to be one of the standard Schwinn Chicago badges, Radiant Coppertone paint?

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hunches, my first thought for your unidentified was a juvi mockingbird, but the wing coloring is all wrong, however the shape is about spot on, so guessing something in the same family of birds, likely a juvenile.

[Barracuda]

fluffybunny, love the wings and tail open shot. Really shows off the coloring very nicely. Was out walking my dog over the weekend and there was a scissor tail sitting in a tree in one of the park areas we were walking by, he seemed perfectly content to let me walk really quite close, but alas I didn’t even have my phone on me.

And yes, this IS going to be an epic thread.

edit, U-Man, love the part-gray mallard head, you’re right, that’s awesomely sharp. //envy.

[Barracuda]

Some B’s:

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-RQbxvf-xaiw/T-ueymasxOI/AAAAAAAAHxU/cJfo4Al6Yr4/s1024/IMG_4994.jpg
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-4XIG–ANNOk/T9PLoaDdeiI/AAAAAAAAHhQ/7FXBGP4vtsk/s640/IMG_0578.jpg
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-E5y4H8jLUmk/T9PFosBg8qI/AAAAAAAAHgI/sXZJDYAqCPg/s1024/IMG_2648.jpg
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-JAm3EZ2bkEE/T9PE4_cdGjI/AAAAAAAAHf8/hP0yzS5dEp8/s640/IMG_0411crop.jpg – should have probably used that one.

And my wildlife album where I’ve got a dozen or so more various birds and other wild such things: https://picasaweb.google.com/102637182371352471338/ParksNatureWildlife

Decided against one of my several Great Blue Heron shots as there already seemed to be several very good examples already posted. Went with the more elusive Green Heron just for Rav instead. 😉

[Barracuda]

Flash = okay. // learning something new today. 🙂

[Barracuda]

YUM.

[Barracuda]

So “thanks” to a comment Rav made over on G+ and a slight bit of boredom at home this afternoon while the wife is out and about, I decided to drive back over to the local park in hopes of getting a few ultra-closeups of the waterfowl and other birds for next week’s contest. The Nikon 300mm with doubler attached got latched onto my XSi. The sun was at high noon, and pretty much every living thing aside myself thought it wise to be in the shade, but I did manage to get a few good shots. White balance was a struggle, probably partially the lens, but also the shade/sun difference between subjects and background. Most of these have had some mild crop, but not much.

This one I like solely for the expression.

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As long as the subject is frozen in action, I’m cool with it. This example is a bit over processed for Farktography, but here’s one of my possibles:

1/1000 shutter

I have a lot of other ideas that I need to get about the business of getting shot.

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