Our Lady Of The Lake University

Click on photos to enlarge
Three views of the Church at OLLU.

Unfortunately it was locked, because I've been told it is the most ornate church in the city.

I think a return visit is needed for the inside, and earlier in the day for better light on the outside.

Band Photos

Getting decent photos in a dark nightclub is a royal pain in the butt.
Despite how bright the stage lights may look, they really aren't.
They're just bright compared to the darkness in the rest of the place.
And when you move from a singer under yellow to a drummer under blue, expect to lose 3 stops of light.
Camera response is dead slow due to autofocus trying to get a lock in the dimness.
Then add the many musicians who don't like them shining in their eyes and you have a recipe for disaster.
High iso is the rule, and you better have a fast lens.
I'm usually at iso400 (iso800 is worthless on my camera) and F2-F2.8 and 1/30th of a second or even longer--great training for steadier handheld work.

This past Thursday we were at a club with plenty of bright lights, but unfortunately they were flashing and changing colors at an extremely high rate, so getting a good photo was as much luck as skill.
I shot more photos in a single session than ever before in my life. Good thing I bought a much bigger memory stick recently!

My tripod came in handy, too.
A club employee was also shooting, using an inexpensive (short) tripod, and I imagine his photos have more double-chin action than mine, since many of the photos I shot were done with me standing on a chair and the camera held high over my head.

The shot above is of Manny, our lead singer. (He's awesome)
This post is mainly about publicizing my photoblog about the band String Theory.
You can see the rest of Thursday's photos here, and to keep up to date you can always click on the "My Band Photos" link below and to the right.

(Why don't I use flash if I need more light? Believe me, flash photos of a band onstage are less than worthless unless the strobe is far off-camera and gelled for color or snooted, and I'm not quite equipped for that yet, but thanks for asking)

The Birds

As always, click on the thumbnail to see the full-size image
Another in my series of photos of the strange overpopulation of birds in the Medical Center area.

The Helotes Mulch Pile

In a little town just NW of San Antonio called Helotes (corn) some guy with a business involving compost and mulch and dirt (sorry, I don't know the specifics or really care) accumulated a giganting pile of the stuff.
Really huge.
Pictures can't convey how big this pile is without something to provide scale.
Not a mountain, but certainly bigger than a foothill.
At first, the town and state were worried about the safety of the thing, but an "expert" they hired said that because it's 80% dirt, it was impossible for it to burn.
Right.
It's been burning since mid-December.

At first, the owner and other interested parties argued about who was going to put the fire out, if it was even possible, who would pay for it, how it could be done, etc.
After the smoke aggravated everyone nearby, including a school, the Texas Commission On Environmental Quality took over, and hired contractors to put out the fire under their direction.


First they built a berm around the pile, seen above at the bottom, to catch and re-use the water sprayed on the fire. Then they started pulling the pile apart and hosing it down.
After over three million gallons of water, it was discovered that wells half a mile away were becoming contaminated by the dirty sooty water.
This means the nastiness can make it into our aquifer, the sole supply of clean water for 1.5 million people.

So now everything is on hold while a new plan is formulated.
Good luck, dummies.
I recommend getting Christo to cover it with an giant red tarp.

Ice Storm

(Click on the photos to enlarge)
It's all over, but what a fun ride it was while it lasted!
The "Arctic Blast 2007" as our TV stations and newspaper called it was just a taste of what the rest of the country (and world) deal with every winter.
For San Antonians who usually only see such sights for a single night every fourth winter, this 3-day festival of freezing temps and precipitation ranged from magical to nightmare, depending on whether or not they had electricity and/or managed to avoid skidding their car into a wall.

The last time we had snow or ice, the photos I saw online were 90% snapshots of people's cars covered with the stuff.
Not very imaginative, but then again I went the same route because my car was one of the first things to grow icicles.
These first two were of little 'cicles hanging between my rear spoiler and trunk lid.
For the 2nd one I got in close for some mood lighting.

Being a night-photo freak, I nearly froze my fingertips off getting this shot. Balancing flash with ambient light while waiting for the perfect drip takes time, and I wear those gloves with exposed digits so I can push camera buttons.

After deciding I wanted to see more of what's inside an icicle, it wasn't hard to decide to break one off and bring it inside.
Upside-down in a tall shotglass with some creative lighting solutions, I got what I wanted before too much meltage.

The snow we were promised never made it to our sheltered suburban valley, but everything was covered in pretty ice for a few days.
I think my baby trees lived through it, and no large sections of our old trees fell, so it was a fun little winter adventure without any permanent damage.
Good Times.

More Leftovers

This is Sterling, who belongs to my dear old friends Mike and Amie.
He's a remarkable calm cat, which makes him a good model.
Repeated flashes as I tried to balance the exposure between indoor and outdoor light levels didn't faze him a bit.
The shade of his fur also allows for a perfect exposure that shows fine detail well.


San Fernando Cathedral.
For some reason, I only get crazy-looking lens flare at night when shooting churches, and it always follows the same pattern, as also seen here.
Coincidence?
A message?