Winter photos

How many decent pictures can you take while your hands are shaking from cold? For me the answer is: very few. The lens optical stabilizer was given a run for its money as I took some more photos at sunset today. With the ISO at 400, I still couldn't use a fast enough shutter speed to offset the shakes in most of the shots, so I think the lesson here is to bump it up to 800 and risk introducing more pixel noise in favor of better clarity. That's something to try the next time I'm an idiot out wandering the frozen tundra with a camera.

Here are the few that turned out:

Out in the cold

On New Year's Day I went out in the freezing cold to take pictures downtown. Cold weather makes me feel like death – really, I hate the cold – but my enthusiasm for photography outweighed the painfulness of the cold. Or at least it did until I went outside. It was 17 degrees out and even though I wore layers, I froze within minutes of getting out of my car downtown.

The first pictures I took by the City Hall, but the wind blowing along the river made my fingers go numb in minutes, so I didn't hang around long.

I edited the colors in the photo of City Hall for effect, but the rest I left alone. The natural contrast between the frozen, blue river and the sun hitting the side of the building inspired me to mess with the photo a little bit.

Next, I went over to the parking ramp next to the U.S. Cellular Center. Ten stories up, this is the view I took in:

It was so much colder on the top of that ramp and the wind was a lot stronger, so after taking a handful of photos I went back to the elevator to head back to my car. When I stepped inside the building, the sun was shining against the dirty window at the end of the room, which made a great shot. I posted that photo in the previous blog post.

Despite the cold and the fact that my fingers had lost all feeling, it was worth the trouble and the photos turned out OK. Photography never gets old, it's always worth the effort to go snap a few photos, even when the weather isn't the best. The more I take pictures, the more I want to make time to take even more.

OK, that's all.

Looking forward

Looking back on 2012, it was a year full of variety on Rekelekt. Photos, poetry, renting a studio, playing guitar, trying to stop bullets with a laptop, planning for the end of the world, and of course more wacky dreams than anyone wants to hear about. I'm still getting the hang of blogging and I imagine there will still be gaps here and there in 2013, but I plan to post more.

I'm really looking forward to 2013 and I hope to accomplish a lot this year. My resolutions for this year include building my photography business, writing more, and procrastinating less. That last one I keep putting off each year, so we'll see how it works out this time!

2013

Have a happy New Year's!

Rise Above

Another track

Still playing around with GarageBand. It's really rough, but I've got two tracks in there...

Wasteland Survival Guide

Like everyone else, I have been stocking up on canned goods, twinkies (because they can stay fresh for centuries), and firearms as I prepare for the coming apocalypse. When civilization comes crashing down and the world as we know it turns inside out on 12/21/12, I want to be ready. It would be foolish to stand by and do nothing to prepare for the worst, especially since an ancient tribe of people from nearly two-thousand years ago ran out of steam when putting together calendars for the future and called the project quits when they reached 12/21/12. Of course this is an accurate prediction of the end of the world, a person would have to be nuts to think otherwise. To ignore this obvious warning sign would be crazy. CRAZY, I TELL YOU!

In preparation for that Friday morning, I have put together a list of things that I will do to ensure the survival of my family (and anyone who stumbles into one of our hidden pitfalls that we've set up around our yard... er, I've already said too much). On that fateful day when the internet becomes nothing more than folklore and everyone is left staring at their iPhones in disbelief, I will be busy ransacking Cedar Rapids. Here is my plan:

1. My first stop will be at HyVee. No more helpful smiles in the aisles on this day! I will load up on all the food I can fit into my HEMTT A3, a handy-dandy rig that will be easy to pick up from the local National Guard base amidst all the confusion. I will also acquire a substantial supply of Dr. Pepper from HyVee. Why? Just because.
2. After I have left HyVee in smoldering ruins, I will proceed north to Guitar Center. Once I have completed a few laps around the parking lot crushing parked cars (there's no way you could drive one of those things around and not crush stuff), I will stop in and gather up a few guitars and amps to keep up our spirits during the long days to come without Facebook or Netflix. The rig should easily accommodate 20 or 30 guitars with room to spare, so I will strap them down carefully before moving on.
3. Where can you find all of your apocalypse survival needs? At the Home Depot of course, and on this particular Friday they will be running the sale to beat all sales: a first-come, first-serve, five-finger discount sale! I'll make my way across the parking lot from Guitar Center, leaving a trail of crushed Fords and Chevys in my wake. This is where I will acquire a couple generators to power the guitar amps... and our household appliances, too.
4. Next up, I will swing through Lowe's to pick up several chest freezers and their largest charcoal grill along with a smoker. We'll be grilling out for a year after cleaning out HyVee's meat department.

I'll head back home and – as long as Cedar Rapids doesn't burn up or get destroyed by a meteorite – spend the following months sitting out in the yard taking it easy, grilling and shooting stray cats. This end-of-the-world situation doesn't seem so bad after all. I'm looking forward to it!