Father's Day

My father was an Air Force pilot in the VietNam war. He was shot down over Laos in 1966 a few months before my 4th birthday, and Missing In Action until 1995. Only have a few clear memories of the man, but by all accounts he was a great guy. 
Growing up, I never had a good male role model in my life. Mom's boyfriends were douchbags, cheaters, drunks, and abusers. My uncle Jim was all I had, taking me fishing and hunting for a few weeks here and there. Still miss them both more than I can put into words. 
The result was that when my mother died of cancer (I was 24) there was zero knowledge of how to be a man. Some lost years ensued (decades?) but luckily nothing happened that I truly regret. 
To my great fortune I met Sylvia not long after the dawn of this century, and she helped me start healing. 
On this Father's Day 2015 I want to thanks her dad Jesus Cantu for welcoming me into his family with open arms and teaching me the lessons I sorely needed to learn. How to love and forgive, how to keep priorities straight, to have fun without getting into too much trouble, to teach by example, to accept faults in others and ourselves--there's SO much I've learned from my new DAD. Happy Father's Day, sir.

 

And what are the odds that he's retired Air Force, served in VietNam, and plays guitar, too? 

Christmas Card Photo 2014

This was our card:

The new Blanco County Courthouse, in Johnson City Texas.


I say new because this is the old one, in Blanco Texas:

At some point in the distant past, the county seat was moved to the larger city, and the larger courthouse was built.

Looks are deceiving, because we went with a side-view.
Here's a 3/4:

And the long side:

I've been trying to schedule a shot like these for many years, and it finally came together a few weeks ago.
Managed to confuse some people into thinking it's our house, but they really should know better.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to my remaining 3 readers.
Much love.

What I Got For Christmas

(Besides tragedy, the resulting outpouring of love and hugs, and tons of distasteful tasks to accomplish, of course.)


I got gift cards, which are awesome for people like me.
What I thought I wanted was a scope for my Mauser project and a harddrive to fix my PC, but I realized that those items can wait compared to more pressing concerns.

While I don't make New Year's Resolutions, I've been planning on giving up smoking for awhile. Not only has it gotten extremely inconvenient, expensive, and just plain gross, I also decided after my brother's recent health problems that getting very old is a worthy goal. Especially when you're the last of your family.

So on January first I bought a pair of vaporizers, with one shown on the left:

I'm sure to go into depth on this later, but the main point is to stop inhaling proven evil ASAP and worry about quitting nicotine at a later date. So far, so good.


On the right is the little camera that arrived today in a BIG box.
While surfing WalMart's website I stumbled upon this tiny Vivitar 787HD.

While on our trip to Lake Tahoe last March, I found myself wishing I owned or had borrowed a GoPro Hero, especially when we went snowmobiling. GoPro pretty much owns the HD Action Camcorder category, and deservedly so. But they are expensive, especially for someone like me who isn't sporty very often.
The Vivitar usually comes with the waterproof housing and a wireless remote plus a couple of basic mounting options, but WalMart had it in a bundle with every mounting option possible for a ridiculously low price. It shoots full 1080p HD video at 30fps and 12mp stills.
It's never going to compete with GoPro for hard serious usage, but if it lasts through our next trip I'll consider it a success.

There's no way I was going to risk my phone or the F828 to shoot video while riding a jetski or zipline, but this little thing can do the job and the whole bundle was about 1/8th what a GoPro costs before you start adding mounting hardware.

And it's always fun to play with a new camera, and update media player codecs while you're at it.

Craving Christmas

Our annual tradition is to cruise around San Antonio looking for an amazing and iconic photo for our Christmas cards.
I had a good run for like 6 years, but as we get busier in our advancing years the number of nights available for photo expeditions has been cut severely and we've been lucky to have a bunch of good shots in the archives.

Too many parties.

And 2013 had a damned late Thanksgiving, which cut at least a week off the normal "Holiday Season" when we achieve some kind of focus on the many demands.


This year I decided to use a very nice photo from 2006-7 that has long been a top favorite, and the cards went to the Post Office a few hours ago.
Not what I wanted as far as advancing my skills and staying current and modern, but time was running out.


At least we got 1 shot at something new.

For example, local universities with amateur decorators:
St. Mary's:

Scenes around Our Lady Of The Lake:

Merry Christmas

I really wanted to have a religious photo for our Christmas cards this year, but with my work and band schedules gone all crazy we just didn't have the time to go 'in search of' besides the one trip downtown mentioned in the previous post.
So I rooted around in my big external drive for stuff from years past, knowing that there are more than a few really good ones that have never been shown to anyone.

Lo and behold, the shot I intended to make this year was already in the bag--I had forgotten it. There are two versions from right after Christmas Eve Mass 2011--the other one had the forcus point shifted to the giant crucifix at St. Vincent DePaul Catholic Church, with the tree being blurry. I let Sylvia pick which to use and am very happy with the result.


It's been an amazing year for me.
Never in a million years would I have thought that I would be in a position to gift a 47" Vizio TV. (We had decided on 42" but they were all gone, and the bigger one was only $30 more...)
OMG it's HUGE and the most amazing picture anyone has ever seen!
All our friends and family went HD years ago, but since this TV is new and has all the best specs (like 120hz refresh rate) it's picture quality is insane.

When I enable 1080HD on the cable box, we were both stunned. "Look at the blades of grass! Look at the beads of sweat! It's so pretty!"

Sylvia loves it and was completely surprised (she said "What the crap?") but make no mistake--in this house the living room TV is ALL hers until late at night. I didn't buy it for me at all.
Sadly, it's so big that the giant lazy susan I built for our last set doesn't work cuz it can only be rotated a little before hitting a wall, meaning I can't turn it towards the kitchen during dinner or when I'm camped out at the counter fixing stuff or stringing a bass or tuning a trigger.
Looks like I need a smaller flat screen in the dinette running off the splitter I put in the cable (after our DVR so there's no time delay in the sound).
Oh darn! I think a 26" ought to be about right.


This Holiday Season has been such a joy, not stressing about money for gifts and supplies. Despite my hectic schedule I was (mostly) calm and relaxed.
The best part was all the pleasure I got from giving to charity and helping folks spontaneously.

I hope y'all have had a joyous holiday season, too.

My "Snow Day"

After a wonderful burger (+ tater tots and the namesake "eggs") at Armadillo's on Mc Cullough, we hit the Museum Reach part of the Riverwalk tonight.
Started at the Brooklyn Street locks that raise our barges to the upstream water level, which were all decked out:

There are a pair of convenient restrooms located here plus free parking, so it's a great place to start and end a river visit.


Heading north a little, I found a spot that appealed to me and shot a few more:

A well-lit bike left trails in this long exposure leading to the young lovers.

On this one, a tourist barge left another set of light trails:

I started to wait for a break in the traffic but got frustrated and bailed, which I now regret because this was a good spot and an uncluttered picture would have been nice.
While there was a steady stream of bikes, pedestrians, and barges, it never felt crowded. It's just that when your shutter is open for such long periods of time it's always difficult to catch a break. Such is the nature of shooting at night. Once I get used to doing it again I'll regain my patience, and I can always go back for another shot.

The weather was as perfect as it ever gets, and we soon found ourselves at La Tuna Ice House with cold beers in our hands before closing-out the First Friday activities at the Blue Star Art Complex.


Getting to take the kinds of pictures that I like while spending quality time with Sylvia and enjoying our city's beauty was a real pleasure tonight.
It used to be that having a Friday night show get cancelled on short notice would absolutely ruin my week due to the lost income, but these days I don't need that money and I really don't enjoy staying up for 23 hours straight working two shifts.
I'll get to bed at a reasonable time and try my best to stay there for as long as possible--which is a true luxury. It's a lot like the feeling I used to get when it snowed too much overnight for the school buses to deal with, so when the alarm went off I would listen to the radio as they went down the list of school closings, hoping for the best news a kid could get.


Tonight was actually better than a snow day because I didn't have to spend it alone or trapped in the house.

Christmas Lights Win?

Wasn't trying to do anything more exotic than use my rare half-day-off wisely. Put up the lights on our house, and the tree/snowflake ensemble in the yard.

Everything worked (for a change) and Sylvia was surprised when she turned onto our street and saw it. She said "Awwww" in a very cute way. It wasn't until later that we realized nobody else on our street had beat me to it, (also for a change). A grocery trip yielded only one other house with lights within a mile, so it looks like we won the race this year, if there is a race at all.

Pretty lights! Happy Thanksgiving.

2011 Wrapped Up

This was our Christmas Card photo:
Sylvia felt strongly about it, but I'm keeping my choice private in case it's needed in the future.


This one was probably #3, but would have required a return trip earlier in the evening and on a partly cloudy day to fill-in the black sky top-right:



Christmas trees are kinda cool in infrared:



A photo from the last Televators show:
Wish I could remember the photographer's name to give him proper credit, but it's my opinion that pics of me given to my band are fair game for blogging.
Bet he's as mystified as I am by club owner's lighting choices--they're like crows and ferrets fascinated by bright and shiny highlights moving around.



Here's my personal favorite from the Tennessee trip:
Nothing special--guess I just like the view. Means something to me.



For a change I tried staying "in the moment" this Christmas instead of looking for photo-ops, and concentrated on prep and hosting during our party.
It was a bit of a relief at the time although I kind of miss not getting anything worth sharing, now that I look back.

2011 Christmas Card Search

I know some of you look forward to this particular yearly tradition here at Views Of Texas. It's a favorite of mine, too.
With my wider usage of Facebook in 2011 I'm a little more in-touch with friends and family than in years past, and have been surprised and touched by how many people have mentioned that they keep and maybe even frame my card photos. Thanks for the extra pressure y'all--as if I wasn't stressing hard enough already!



Between my trip to Tennessee and learning songs for the Televators show two weeks ago, there wasn't a lot of time to look for likely candidates. Add all the recent rain and recording studio sessions to that, and we managed exactly ONE photo excursion. A record low if your mathematical savvy is limited to "more = better". Fortunately I was working fast and smart, with few mistakes.

We went downtown on December 6th, and it was more than a little breezy with temps in the low 40s or maybe even less. I was wearing flannel sleep pants under my jeans and several layers on top plus scarf and hat. Syl and I were both toasty-warm most of the time, but in order to manipulate camera buttons and tripod parts I only had a fingerless biker glove on my right hand so the tips were frozen solid. I need one oversized mitten every December.


We started on the Riverwalk, mainly because this is the first year with the new LED lights.
Most locals hate them. A LOT.
Personally, I think the old lights which were draped over the top of the big trees looked pretty, but didn't illuminate the trees themselves all that well so it was rather a jumbled mess of colors in vertical lines. Boring, and random. At least now you can see the shape of the trees.
Part of the problem might also be the colors.
Before, there was mostly red, green, and yellow bulbs. Mostly blue now.
I'm not going to comment on the digital camera white-balance issues with LEDs--saving that for the CFL discussion when the USA finally tries to outlaw tungsten lightbulbs.



There weren't many people getting in my shots due to the cold, and the long shutter speeds usually made them all but invisible so long as they kept moving. Sylvia yelled out "Free beer at MadDog's" once to unclot a major artery, though. I'm a lucky man.
Hated the big illuminated H E B in front of the Alamo tree. A classic case of a sponsor crossing the line far enough to shoot themselves in the foot. We truly love HEB as a store, company, and local patron of all good causes but whoever thought this was a good idea needs to be busted back down to grocery bagger.


I do a new "Rivets" shot every single time I'm on the Presa street bridge. Looks like a new paint job--very smooth. Went for focus on the distance rather than the near rivets this time, and like it a lot. 45 seconds well spent, then moving right along to the next photo-op which will probably include one of the little arched footbridges over the San Antonio River. Sometimes a theme becomes apparent after-the-fact.




Someday, this view will be perfected.
I liked it a lot last year (or was it 2009?).
All I know is that it makes a really nice wallpaper on my new Dell widescreen monitor.



The newspaper recently ran a story about how squirrels are chewing through the wires on our new lights, among other failures including overwhelmingly negative public reaction.
The original plan was to remove the bottom 10 feet or so in January but leave the rest of the strings up all year, but that's just wishful thinking now. They finally realized that the old lights draped over the canopy were out on the fringes of rodent territory. The new ones are speed bumps on squirrel highway--I bet they're chewing on them for the same reason that I want to set fire to the big annoying rubber speed bumps in my neighborhood.


During our final choice card photo's long exposure, a cranky old grammity stopped and asked "Do you live here? Do you like these new lights?"
When advised that yes we actually do, she replied "Not me--I hate 'em! I miss the old dingley dangles."

There's a joke in there somewhere...

December Miscellany

Went to a fine Christmas party, but only took one picture, and it was in the bathroom:
Wonder if anyone noticed a big flash in the gap under the door?
Sometimes I would rather drink and play with fire than take pictures.


Spotted at Target:




Doing yard work, I discovered that someone's been camping in our alley:
Five blankets/comforters, two pillows, and 2 books--'Garfield's 30th Book' and 'The Biggest Loser Calorie Counting Guide'.
When I tell this story, the reactions are evenly divided by gender.
Every woman says "How sad" and every man gets a little annoyed that there was a bum right behind my house for who knows how long.

With several weeks of regular rain the campsite was a soggy filthy useless mess, so I filled up our trash receptacle and it's long gone.



Remember this post from last year?
We finally know what the steam engine looks like with all it's lights:




I had forgotten all about this:
They contacted me a few years ago and asked permission to use my photo, which was nice considering how many times I find my work on sites that never asked and don't give me credit.
If you click on the pic it goes to that image on my Flickr pages, which is why I remembered. Trimming the fat, I was about to delete it.

Merry Christmas, Y'all

I went in a totally different direction for our card photo this year:
We LOVE our "Sneaky Santa" ornament.

Hope all of my readers have a delightful holiday.

Tired Of Waiting

In our search for this year's Christmas card photo, on Thursday we listened to the people who said that the 'Museum Reach' part of the Riverwalk now has pretty lights.
Didn't take a single picture, because it was actually the exact same lame decorations as last year, just seen by people who didn't even know about Museum Reach a year ago, I guess.

On Sunday evening we made one last attempt, heading down to St. Paul Square and Sunset Station. Sylvia had seen the lights all over the locomotive while I was failing to find parking on Thursday--it was too crowded and I gave up.
Our return visit was at the perfect time of night, giving me time to scout around before the sun went down all the way so as to be in-position with a few minutes to spare.

Southern Pacific (Texas & New Orleans) 2-8-2 #794 was fully decorated, and it's headlamp was lit:
This photo was taken about five minutes before the "perfect" time--stars are starting to be visible but the sky is still too-bright of a blue.
When are they going to light this thing up???

As usual, the tree inside the station is beautiful, with the star in the stained-glass acting as a tree-topper.
Clever.



Back to the loco: Sylvia asked the security guards about the lights, and they said that different organizations are responsible for the lights on the grounds and those on the train, and were under orders to leave it alone.
They chuckled when she told them she was about to start flipping breakers if it doesn't get lit in the next few minutes.
Well, the Friends Of The SP 794 were either late or not coming down on Sunday at all, and I had already lost the sky light levels I wanted.

So we took matters into our own hands.
First, Sylvia threw a big master breaker, but nothing happened.
I was very proud of her balls.

After a while I got fed up (and cold) so I opened a steel box and looked inside with my flashlight.
A bunch of the breakers inside were labeled and I started flipping the likely suspects.
Lights started coming on!


The only breaker I didn't flip was labeled "Computer", and I was afraid of it.
Didn't want to accidentally enable the engine's smoke system, but in retrospect it might have been the one that powered all the rest of the lights--as you can see, I only got about half of the loco lit.


I was trying to keep track and return things to the way I found them, but within seconds the tourists started crowding around and "Ooh-Ahh-ing" so I decided to just leave the breaker box hanging open and get away while the getting was good.


Update: We finally put up the #1 tree tonight, and also decided to go in a different direction for the card photo.
I shot it in 5 minutes in the comfort of home, featuring our favorite ornament on the #2 silver tree that's in our front window.
Now we're both very happy with the results.

To be honest, there's only so many iconic SA locations that are decorated, and I've already used the best ones.
The new plan is to look for smaller "detail" scenes wherever and whenever they can be found, with me working hard to nail all the technical details.
My 50mm F1.8 lens is perfect for this approach, and really shined tonight.

Riverwalk Views

I'm back, and as promised here are some scenes I shot tonight while scouting around downtown for this year's Christmas card photo.
To tell the truth, it took me a long time to get back in the groove after so long away from night photography.
Camera settings and tripod handling is second nature, but actually seeing and feeling the scene in front of me, and finding my vision of it, didn't come easily.

Tower Life Building as seen from La Villita.

Back wall of The Little Church At La Villita.

Shot a very similar view from this spot 2 years ago, and our card last year was shot from street level behind me.

The old courthouse on the left, I don't know what's on the right.

Finally, something I like.
Sylvia and I both went "Oooh!" when it popped up on the computer screen.
Not really sure why it works for me yet, but I trust my gut.
Still, it won't be on our Christmas cards this year--I can do better.
I have to do better, because in years past the bar has been raised pretty darn high.


What was funny tonight was how many times people would watch me working a scene with my DSLR and tripod, then slide into my exact spot with their pocket cams as soon as we left.
Hopefully this doesn't come off as arrogant, but I could tell that they weren't going to get usable results just by glancing at their cameras and techniques.
Every copycat brought home pics that are dark and blurry because in all cases my shutter was open for 2 to 10 seconds or more and there's no way to get anything decent hand-held even if they crank up the iso speed. Not at night.
I was a little flattered, but Sylvia took it personally and seemed highly offended.
She scoffed twice, and one time said "Good luck!", which was also flattering.

The freak show of tourists and locals was interesting, too.
Inappropriate/impractical outfits and bad hygiene kept us amused.
We were cracking each other up the whole time with a running commentary that would have gotten us shanked if we didn't speak in code.

I had a wonderful time!
The best part is that I get to keep doing it until the card photo is found.

What's also nice is that I have two from last year and '08 that I'm fine with using, so there's no pressure.


BLISS Video from Friday night is streaming at: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/crashtastical

2010 Is Here--Nothing Changes

Just like 2009 we went to JIM'S for our 1st breakfast of the year.
I ordered the same exact thing.
It was good, of course.



On the 2nd I went downtown just before sunset to try for the next card picture.
Was hoping the new Museum Reach section would have decorations on par with the old part of the river, but aside from a subtle (to be kind) string of LED lights and a bow on random light poles, it was no different from September.
See if you can spot the Christmas decorations in the pic of SAMA above and the art fish below.

FISH! Since it was too late to abort Plan A, I decided to ride it out and try to have some fun.

This shot was only made because a large group of people had interfered with a previous one by walking into the frame and then milling around (moo-ing, actually) even after noticing that I was waiting on them to move. (Moooove?)
This time they came up the Riverwalk from behind me, so I held out my arm and said "A moment, please".
After chimping, instead of letting them pass I pretended to make adjustments and took this identical one just to have them wait 15 seconds more.
Christmas is over, so I'm back to only being nice to people who aren't rude or stupid.

Reaching the museum again at the end of my trip I found these trees lit with many green floodlights that I had never seen before. I don't know if this is Christmas-related or permanent, but I know it's pretty.
There's the edge of an observation area complete with benches visible on the left.
A nice place for kissing.

I had walked all the way to the Pearl Brewery complex, as you'll see next.

How Was YOUR Christmas?

Ours was great, and is almost over.

I'm still trying to figure out why my prints come out exactly like they look on my monitor unless people are the subject, which results in too much red and much darker than they should be.
Strange...
I got to use the IR remote my brother ordered from Hong Kong in July again.

Tried to buy another slave flash today using a gift card but it was sold-out everywhere due to a major price reduction because it's being discontinued.
Crap!! At the listed price I could have bought a bunch of them to sell for profit every time I taught someone how this clever flash stuff works.

As much as I want/need a specific lens for my camera system, getting a bass amp rig assembled is more important right now.
It's ironic that we'll be ordering a tube preamp/DI from B&H Photo in NYC, which is where I have gotten some essential camera stuff in the past during the holidays.

Hoping to find a decent used pickup truck this week while the sun is shining, and shooting next year's Christmas Card photo a few minutes later.

Merry Christmas

This is our Christmas Card photo for 2009.
It was our first choice for last year until I went back to Main Plaza and got this one, which not only sold a lot of prints for me in '09 but is now impossible to obtain due to new trees and other stuff that's in the way.

This situation also confirms my goal of shooting our card photo a year ahead of time from now on.
I'll be out looking for 2010's picture next week when there's more spare time, yet all the lights and stuff are still up.

Those of us at Views Of Texas hope YOU have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!


If you didn't get a card, we ran out of stamps or cards or time or lost your address. It's been very difficult to get things done with only one car, and I've been sick. We still love you.

Project Ornament

The fine-ass John Lennon Rickenbacker guitar ornament from my last post got me thinking, and there's lots of time for that since I've not been sleeping worth a damn this week.
Swine Flu? Allergies? Rock&Roll Fever? Food Poisoning?
Doesn't matter--my mutant healing powers are back so all is well again.

Anyway, I decided that it might be cool to make my own ornament to honor 2009 as the year when I not only got back on-stage again but also bought myself a new instrument for the first time in over 20 years.
So last night I took a suitable photo of my 8-string bass and got it printed a few hours ago.
Used Krylon photo spray adhesive to mount it to some quality cardboard then hand-cut the outline with an ExActo knife. Sandpapered to taste.


Almost looks like a real bass got hit with a shrink-ray.