Logging on to my iGoogle page today, I see this:

Everything looks fine, right? But wait. Zoom in on the weather.

I didn’t notice it was 89 degrees below freezing here! My goodness, my digits should be falling off. And in Central Florida, in the middle of summer. Very bizarre. Must be the effects of global warming.

This iGoogle “gadget” comes right from the horse’s mouth, and claims to have 12,203,943 users. I wonder for how many of them, the temperature drops 145 degrees at once. But for now, I’m back to sunny Florida’s 88°F.

The stars and stripes fly low on a windless day. There was a nice background of clouds, so I shot this of the flag from the ground. I placed the pole off-center a bit, as that’s more appealing to the eye.

I added some contrast and color through curves.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/800, F7.1, 50mm, ISO100, 2008-06-12T11:14:07-04, 20080612-151407rxt

Download the high-res JPEG or download the source image (Canon Rebel XTi RAW file).

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

I was contemplating how to get the word out about the resource I’m developing here at Brilliant Photography. I decided to send an email to everyone know a.k.a. mass spamming. But it’s not spamming, because it’s relevant. I don’t know where the idea comes that messages that aren’t personalized are spam; do we expect the same from the newspaper, television, or even blog articles? Certainly not. Here’s the message, anyway. It outlines what I’m doing here quite well.

Hello everyone!

This is one of those super automated emails to everyone I’ve known over the past four years. I wanted to let you know the great progress I’ve been making at my website, Brilliant Photography by Richard X. Thripp, at http://richardxthripp.thripp.com/ . I’ve been working hard on my writing and photography, completing a portfolio of my 30 best images: clichés like roses, sunsets, raindrops, bugs, and still life. Mine are different because I always try to be sharp and innovative. I have a nice gallery section showing every photo I’ve ever posted, and I’m writing more informative articles on photography; stuff like How to Always Get the Perfect Shot, How to Use Zooming for Explosive Photos, How to Brand Your Prints, and my 4500-word novel, How to give file names to your photos, which arcs across photography, library science, cataloging theory, and the evils of Daylight Saving Time.

Two days ago, I was thinking "how could I make my website an even more useful resource?" It didn’t take long to think of it; I’ve done the unthinkable by releasing my entire portfolio (my life’s work, if you will) as a free stock resource. If you are a digital artist of any sort, or want a nice photo for a

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There’s one technique that I’ve found useful, when you’re waiting for the perfect photography moment, to never miss it.

Snap so many shots, you can’t miss.

You’re bound to get a good shot of those falling raindrops if you take 50 photos instead of one. Now, there are a few pre-requisites. First, you have to have the shot well composed. The shutter speed must be adequate, and the exposure dead center. If you mess up this, you’ll just end up with 50 bad shots instead of one. Focus can be a problem, because the camera may change itself automatically between shots. Switch to manual focus once you’re locked in if possible, or keep your eyes peeled for blurriness through the viewfinder or on the LCD screen.

If you’re working with a digital compact, switch to burst or continuous shooting mode first. With a DSLR, you can just click away. Here’s an example of what I shot yesterday of raindrops on my front porch:

Click to enlarge, and you can see I took no fewer than 35 distinct photos. All in a period of two minutes. But for something as chaotic as falling water, you need to do this to get the perfect moment. The masters in film photography did it despite the terrible expense, but the cost is nothing besides wear and tear on your camera in the digital age. You can delete all but the best afterward, but you won’t even get the best unless you shoot ten times more than what a normal person would.

As you can see above, my favorite was the second one. So why didn’t I just stop then? Because I had no idea what would come afterward. I just parked myself in the same space, and kept clicking away, because who knows what …

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