The Big Eclipse Of 2008

Well, here they are, the pictures you've all been waiting for. This is a composite image of the total lunar eclipse of February 20, 2008. You're looking at about an hour and a half span of time here, from the newly-risen full moon at upper left to the completely eclipsed version at lower right. I had been excited about the opportunity to shoot an eclipse again for almost a month before yesterday, and then the day turned out to be terribly overcast. I had pretty much written the occasion off when, right after sundown, the clouds began to part. At first it was only sporadic gaps, but as it got later and later, it started to be more clear than cloudy. Some of these images were shot through those gaps in the clouds, but after a while it was all clear sailing, at least up to near the moment of totality. Before the last little bit of direct sunlight could slip off the side of the moon, big clouds rolled in. But they rolled on past and I was able to get a shot of the surface of the moon illuminated by all the world's sunsets after all. I didn't stay up and shoot the second half of the cosmic ballet since it's pretty much the reverse of what I had just seen. Plus I had an hour drive home since I didn't actually shoot this from anywhere near my house. Oddly enough, everyone I spoke to about the eclipse near where I live said they missed it completely because of the overcast. So I think I got really, really lucky.

Imagine That

You may recall that I shot the lunar eclipse last night. I'm flipping through the pictures trying to find the best ones, which I'll get to you later, when I come across the shot above. This was early in the evening not long after moonrise and well before the eclipse began. I saw a dark spot on the shot that wasn't there in the shot before or after, and I wondered what I was looking at...

A little magnification reveals that for 1/100 of a second, there was a jetliner on the moon! And it was really, really big! Either that, or I just happened to catch a local jet as it passed in front of the moon. Either way, it's pretty cool. This isn't the first time I've inadvertantly caught something in the picture that I didn't know about until later, but this is the most impressive.

This Just In

I just got home from shooting the total lunar eclipse this evening. I've got lots and lots of pictures to go through, but I wanted to get one up and show you how incredible it looked. Hopefully it was clear wherever you are and you got to see it.

Gettin' Towards The End Of February

Your picture for the week? How about this pelican looming over you like some spectre of doom. Well, perhpas not doom, since it's just a pelican after all. I think I shot this guy up at The Pier in St. Pete. I can't be sure of that since I see pelicans pretty much everywhere I go that's near the water, but there's a walkway at The Pier that takes you down to a lower level, and these guys like to perch on the upper level and wait for scraps of fish to be thrown their way. So I'm pretty sure that's where I got this low-angle shot.

Purple Pollen

For some years now, I've been trying to capture something similar to what you see in this picture. When I was growing up, we had a row of pine trees out in front of the house. Every year, the trees would sprout these little structures that produce pollen, and they were the coolest shade of purple. Years later, when I became interested in photography, I wanted to try and catch that purple, but could never get the timing right on when the trees would be blooming. Well, I happened to be out and about today, and I found a pine tree that is almost at the end of the cycle. You can see some of the purple is still left in the picture above, but not too much. Maybe next year I'll remember to start looking earlier. Oh, the pollen that comes out of these is yellow, not purple. That post title is just a little bit of alliteration for you.

Ye Olde Cube

I happened to find some pictures from early 2006 recently that showed an earlier sculpture by Christine Desiree that was very similar to the more recent Pulse that I shared with you quite a few times here on the blog. I don't remember the name of this one, but I suppose I could look it up. (High Voltage, that's what it was called...) I'm not sure why I didn't post any pictures of this way back then. I guess the blog was still sort of new, and I didn't post all of the stuff that I could have. Anyhow, I think the similarities are pretty obvious, but the scale is somewhat different. This entire cube would slide right into the one that we built recently. It would be a tight fit, but it would fit.

Now what I didn't know about this sculpture at the time was that it lit up. I never got to see it at night during it's original installation, but they recently re-lit it at it's new home at the Ringling School of Art and Design on US 41 in Sarasota. And me being the photographer type, I had to stop and shoot some new pictures of it. It's neat to stand there in the glow of the light and watch the little red squares flutter in the breeze.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXXIII

Well, I never thought I'd get this far in my doodles. The first hundred was pretty easy, the second hundred took a while, but it wasn't too hard. The third hundred took even longer, and now I am one third of the way to my first thousand. It's an odd milestone to celebrate, but here I am anyway. And I found a handful of doodles by one of the great doodle artists, Mozelle Thompson. Still don't know much about him, but I know he's fairly prolific. I believe that prior to this doodle, all of his work has been for RCA, but with this one, he spreads out to MGM. These six doodles are actually from inside the gatefold cover of The Starlight Symphony Conducted By Cyril Ornadel-The Musical World Of Cole Porter (MGM E3843, 1960). I've got no idea why I picked this record up, but I did, then I opened it up, and there were these doodles. I think these doodles represent the 6 musicals named on the cover, those being Kiss Me Kate, Born To Dance, Leave It To Me, Can Can, Silk Stockings and Rosalie. I can't tell you which one is which but I'm sure many of you can figure them all out.

So, where else have you seen artwork here at the blog by Mozelle Thompson? Let me count the ways: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 And one maybe that I just noticed last night in an old post.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXXII

Here's another doodle that I recently found from another one of my favorite doodle artists. I had already made up my mind to buy this one before I spotted the little RR down by the bull's right front hoof. This sort of blocky style has shown up in several doodles signed RR, so perhaps that's what drew me to it before I knew those initials were there. This bull fight scene is from Federico Moreno Torroba Conducting The Pasodoble Band Of Madrid-Bull Ring Pasodobles (RCA Victor LPM-1581, 1958). If I counted correctly, this is the tenth doodle I've brough to you by the mysterious RR. Here are the links: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.

Oodles Of Doodles CCCXXXI

Imagine my surprise when I walked into the Goodwill store and right there on the top of the stack, with the back side facing forward, was this awesome doodle! And not just any plain old good doodle, this is a doodle with a pedigree. According to Mr. Chusid over at the Jim Flora website, this is a Jim Flora doodle! This is only the second one I've ever found, so I'm pretty excited about it. I would not have immediately attributed this one to Flora, but I can see where it has some bits of his signature style in it. But I have to defer to Irwin on this since he's the expert. This comes from the flipside of Billy Mure's Supersonic Guitars In Hi-Fi (RCA Victor LPM-1536, 1957). I brought you a Jim Flora doodle only once before, and I have also brought you another cool spaceship as well. (While you're looking at the unsigned doodle right above the spaceship link I just gave you, tell me if that doesn't look like a Mozelle Thompson doodle to you. Sure does to me...)

The Next Week Of February

You never know what you might see until you see it. I came across this log in Ohio one day, and right there in the center of it was this almost-perfect star shape. So naturally I had to get down on my knees and shoot it. Sometimes photographs sneak up on you from directions you can't imagine, so you always have to keep your eyes open. All of life is like that, I suppose.

Louis In A Box

I don't know why, but I just thought this was funny. It's Louis Armstrong in a box. Well, it's not really Louis Armstrong, but a sculpture by Niki de Saint Phalle, one of the artists participating in the Sarasota Season Of Sculpture. This is the only artwork not being displayed on the bayfront, but that's where I saw it first, still tucked away in it's shipping crate. They later carried it down the raod a bit to the Ringling Museum. They have him on display down there now, but he's out of the box.

Fish Story

I think I've mentioned that I was in Boca Grande this past Sunday to shoot some pictures. I wandered around a corner and happened upon the scene you see above. At first I thought there was a small wedding going on, but I couldn't figure out what the bride and groom were doing in the water. I snapped a couple of shots and started to amble in that general direction. Before I could get very close, I saw them push what I at first thought was a large rock back into the water, then everyone cheered. I had to look at the pictures I had snapped and zoom way in before I realized that someone had caught a giant grouper, and everyone was huddled around it taking pictures. You can see the size of this monster in the blurry enlargement below. I wish I could have gotten closer before they released it and gotten some nice pictures, but I was glad that they let it go. This fish probably weighed between two and three hundred pounds! And the guy caught it on that little fishing pole you see him holding up. Now that's fishing!

Sunset Yesterday

You gotta love living in a place where you can get sunsets like this pretty much any day of the week.

Bird In Distress

Not long after I spotted the ospreys I mentioned a few minutes ago, I came across this little tern. Stumbled across is more like it, because I almost stepped on him. He didn't fly away so I knelt down to take a few pictures. It worried me that he wasn't flying or walking away like these guys normally do, so when I was done shooting, I walked over to him. Something was wrong because I was able to pick him up. His wings and feet seemed to be in good shape, he just didn't seem to have any energy. I took him over to the lighthouse and found a park ranger, but we weren't able to get hold of anybody due to the Super Bowl starting in a few minutes. I put the guy back on the beach where I found him and checked on him a few times later. He seemed to be a little better, walking around instead of just laying there. The park ranger assured me that she would check on him in the morning. I feel bad that there wasn't anything more I could do for the guy. The two shots below aren't typical of the way he was behaving, so don't look at them and think he was broken. Those are after I set him back on the beach and before he got his bearings. But even in the picture above, you can look at his eye and tell something's not quite right...

Osprey Action

I found my first pair of mating ospreys this season down on Boca Grande this afternoon. The one above was skittish and flew off as soon as I walked up, but his (or her) mate just sat there and watched me until I got bored and wandered away.

More From February

The image for this week in February is a close-up of a cormorant. You've really got to get in there close before you realize that they have beautiful turquoise eyes. I'm not sure this picture even does their eyes any justice. They are amazing up close. Maybe the eye color helps them to see underwater better, I don't know.

The First Of February

Almost forgot that the month changed today, but I just remembered and here is your calendar picture. This was the sunrise one morning when I was working in Ohio a year or so ago. I remember that this was the only time I saw the sun all day. This is a shot that really benefits from a larger canvas, so be sure and click the picture to see a bigger version.

At The Beach

I went to the beach today, which you can do in Florida in the middle of January without too much difficulty. It was cold, and I had to wear a jacket, so it was a little odd, but not too bad. Not a whole lot of stuff to take pictures of, though, but I did get some nice shots of this shell. I found it on a stretch of beach along the southern edge of Ft. Desoto near St. Pete that was nearly deserted. That gave me time to get down on my hands and knees and line things up just so. The shot above is the position I found the shell in, but I moved it for the shot below. Not sure which pose I like more.

The Last Bit Of January

What is the calendar page this week? It's a cactus! Isn't that exciting? I'm not sure why I thought this was such a great picture. Maybe it's the composition. Maybe it looks cooler when it's printed out. It's not impressing me too much at the moment. I remember shooting this picture up in St. Pete in Pass-A-Grille Beach. I've always wondered how the little beach got that name, but I'm too lazy to look it up.

Ernie And The iPod

I finally decided to join the 21st century and get myself an iPod. I figured that if I'm going to listen to 50 year old vinyl records, I may as well listen to them on something modern. I've been looking for an iPod for a few months now, and have been checking out the pawn shops on a regular basis. I figured if I waited long enough, I'd find a bargain. Sure enough, I managed to find a 30G video model for about $150 this weekend, so I snagged it. Came complete with over 3000 songs from the previous owner, 2 or 3 of which were actually worth listening to. There was even a copy of Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back on there. I lost all that in the reformat though. But before I could reformat it, I had to get it home. And before I could get it home I had a couple of errands to finish. But I didn't want to wait, so I was playing with it in the car on the way to Wal-Mart after leaving the pawn shop. I had the earbuds in, driving down the road, and guess what? Yep, I got pulled over. And do you know what's illegal in the state of Florida? Driving with headphones on or in both ears. So my cheap iPod is now not nearly so cheap, since I have to pay a $76 fine in addition to the price of the used iPod. Some deal. I suppose that's better than having to pay the ticket for the real reason I got pulled over, which was for doing 71 in a 55. Not that I realized how fast I was going, I was paying too much attention to the iPod. Live and learn, I guess...