Awake

A Photographic Field Trip

As soon as 4:30pm came around (i.e. The Magic Hour), I put on a warm jacket, scarf, stuffed some mittens in my pocket, grabbed my camera bag and walked to Lithia Park in hopes of finding a pretty thing or two to photograph with my new digital SLR camera. Upon entering the park, I noticed one of the theatres reflecting in the First Pond. Walking up from there, I squealed with anticipation at the thought of capturing the famous owl perched high in a knot of a tree overlooking the playground. Sure enough, the owl was there and I switched to my 70-300mm lens and zoomed in on the sleeping prowler. A couple walked by wanting to see how the pictures turned out (knowing exactly what I was doing there) and I figured out how to zoom in on the picture to make sure the owl was in focus, and sure enough he was! (No tripod, even!) I was thrilled. It's always fun to share a "local's moment." :)

I did my usual "short walk", past the Parks building to the Lily Pad bridge (well, there weren't any lily pads there at the moment!) and back, experimenting with different light settings and shutter speeds. I love that I can take those pictures of water where the water is blurry but everything else is in focus. I always wondered how that was done. :)

So, the pictures are posted in my Lithia Park set on flickr, starting here. I hope you enjoy them!

Happy Friday!