Another Day Older

  
Sometimes, you look at your photos and say, "Nah, I've got nuthin'."  You think, damn, this doesn't work.  Then, a few weeks later, you think, "Ya know, maybe I should revisit those photos and see if there's something I can do for them."  And sure enough, you can.  Take the photo above.  It's a photo of a temple in Beijing.  We were driving past it at a pretty good clip.  Our driver seemed intent on establishing some sort of record for "nearly hitting" pedestrians, so he needed to keep his speed up.  This was the second photo of three I took.  It had the right pieces, one had a tree IN the temple, and the other had a light pole right next to it.  It didn't work well in color, but take away those colors and WOW!  Not too shabby!

The picture below is the "Longest Corridor in China," of which our guide was extolling virtues.  I thought, Jeez, I should take a good picture of this, but the greens and the reds seemed to cause the picture to lose something.  I tried black and white, and wow, it pops.

I used to follow the views of a former photography teacher of mine:  Digital will never survive.  I realized I was wrong several years ago, when I noticed just how many pictures you could take with very little cost.  Also, the fact that retouching these photos on computer took just minutes when in the dark room, it took many hours of trial and error...mostly error, though, I seemed blessed with a decent sense of time.  I mean, while my cohorts took numerous test strips, narrowing down the amount of time for an exposure, I managed to luck into the perfect exposure for my paper within a surprisingly short amount of time...my cohorts could be seen to hurriedly run back into the darkroom after gazing upon their newly developed images...maybe they were more picky, or maybe I was lucky.  I don't know.  I always got A's.  

So, I am in love with digital photography and my Nikon.  I am, however, realizing some short comings of my computer...very small hard drive.  Glad we have portables!!

So, below is Little Miss in my favorite hat that she owns...err...does that make sense?  It is as though she is talking into her radio about the oncoming enemy!  "Roger that, Red Taco, the slide is under siege!  I repeat, the slide is under siege!  We need reinforcements!!!"

Chloe has been very awesome lately.  Only tonight, she stood up, unaided, by herself for the first time!  She followed THAT trick up with a series of 4 or 5 steps, which puts her walking by week's end!  I tell you, the kid is a genius!!