Gran-D Photography

Retakes- Sneak Peak

2010-09-11T19:57:00.005-05:00

We reshot family pictures. These are straight out of the camera w/ no editing.

Brady's Senior Pictures Sneak Peek

2010-08-23T09:02:00.008-05:00

Brady chose Lebanon Hills Park for his senior pictures. He and his family have spent a lot of time there over the years. He was very easy going and a nice young man.

Jason's Senior Pictures-The S Family

2010-08-18T20:10:00.008-05:00

I finally have time to work on these pictures I took on Sat. And for some reason Blogger is not wanting to add pictures. I'm really frustrated with it right now.

It was different taking pictures of a family group. I learned some things from this experience. More to come when blogger can get it's act together.

Caitlin's Senior Pics Sneak Peek

2010-07-28T21:01:00.008-05:00

Caitlin was sure easy to photograph. I hope you like them. I'll have your copy to you by Sunday.
There are quite a few more I just wanted to get some up for you to see.

I like to put together a little collage when I take someones pictures. Just for fun.

1 Year Pictures

2010-07-02T22:31:00.008-05:00

Zach's 1st birthday pictures we went to Dodge Nature Center. Here's a preview of just a few of the pictures I took.

Mackinac Island

2010-06-21T18:28:00.012-05:00

I took lots of pictures, but, to many to put on the family blog. Thanks for taking the time to look at my photos.

Dodge Nature Center

2010-04-23T19:27:00.014-05:00

I did some editing to the pictures I took yesterday.

Dodge Nature Center

2010-04-22T22:19:00.005-05:00

I wanted to put up a few of the nature scenery pictures that I took. I will be adding more after I get the watermark on the rest. As I was walking I saw lots of different things that caught my eye. I came upon these guys working on bee hives.

A wild turkey.

A Drive to Cannon Falls

2009-10-10T17:28:00.003-05:00

We took a drive today out to Cannon Falls. It's cloudy day which began with snow fall last night. Here are some pictures that I took. Since school started I have gotten out of the habit of taking my camera. I mentioned to Brian I didn't have it with me and he turned around so I could get my camera. I realized I really have missed taking pictures and need to get back in the habit of taking my camera with me.

One of my favorites today.

Brian knew of a road with a small bridge on it and wanted to go look at it so I could take pictures. This eagle was flying above us when we got out of the truck.

This bridge has stood for 100 years.

As happens it has aged a lot over the years.

And the river was visible through the edges of the bridge.

I guess that is why they are building a new bridge just a little ways up river from the old bridge.

St Croix Falls and Taylors Falls Trip

2009-09-03T12:56:00.010-05:00

I take so many pictures when I am out I don't always want to add all of them to the family blog. I guess need to use this blog more often to put up the pictures that I like.

I looked on the Internet for a place. Since it was only pictures we were relying on you have to take it at face value. So when we were locating the place we were staying we started on this road Industrial Road. I was wondering to myself oh boy where are we going to end up? Then we saw the cemetery sign. More concern.

We saw the deer on our way back from dinner.

We really like where we ended up! And lots to photograph!

In this shot I was focusing on the Ritz box in the mirror.

Brian has a pottery project in mind and wanted some old wood for it. We were talking to a woman in an antique store and she has some old boards. Brian told her what he had in mind and she referred us to this place. There is all sorts of reclaimed lumber available.

Just what he is looking for. We had been in a pottery shop in town earlier in the day and the potter was telling us about a girl in town who was getting married. He mentioned people in town had been in that day buying wedding gifts for her wedding. When we stopped at the lumber place, in Taylors Falls, a young man working there told us the owner has just gone to a wedding. I just love small towns and the community support they show to one another. Since we missed him we will have to go back.

On our way home Brian wanted to go home by way of Stillwater. The intersections of the road we were traveling on had this Sculpture Park. So we stopped to check it out. Some very interesting and LARGE art was on display.

We were trying to decide what could compete with the boulders across the street from out house.

Brian thought it could be either of these next two.

Can you see the car?

That face is amazing.

This was in a little store on the way home.

Turkey vulture.

Rural Wisconsin and Minnesota has so many old barns. I always think of our friend Darryl when I see old barns. He is a photographer whose interest is in documenting old barns. I think his subjects tend to be the ones that are falling down and collapsing on themselves. When you travel across America you see them often.

I took this shot and then noticed the shadow of the bird fly across in my peripheral vision. Just a lucky shot to have the bird in it.

2009-08-27T15:27:00.006-05:00

Looking for a Location

2009-05-25T18:05:00.007-05:00

My friend, Caroline, asked me to take her daughter's senior pictures. I was wondering about new places to take pictures. I asked Laura if she knew areas around Mendota that would make for good backgrounds. Here are some from our excursion. These are very rough drafts and I haven't done any editing. I just wanted to show what we found.

These were taken along the Mississippi River.

These were taken at or near Harriet Island.

This one is just to show perspective on how big this tree is.

Buds to the Beginnings of Leaves

2009-05-01T15:09:00.002-05:00

Apr 16th

Apr 27th Today the temperature here is currently 55 degrees. If we don't get some warm weather soon we might be awhile before we see full leaves on the trees.

Randomness of the Weather in Minnesota

2009-04-06T19:44:00.005-05:00

One dayAnd the nextAnd the nextAnd the next this is Minnesota in April!

The Moon Setting and the Sun Rising

2009-03-13T19:35:00.007-05:00

Morning Friday the 13th looking to the west.

I turned around so this is looking to the east.

On Wednesday there were moon dogs surrounding the sun. Very cool. I guess this is what I like about daylight savings time change. I get to see a different time of day to photograph!

Sunrise March 4 2009

2009-03-04T15:02:00.006-06:00

A beautiful start of the day!

Mill City Museum Part II

2009-02-20T18:03:00.006-06:00

Mill City Museum was a fun field trip. I enjoyed taking some cool shots.
That's our reflection as we walked to the elevator.

Some of these pictures were taken in the flour tower.
A history tour in a freight elevator. Rather cool!

Highly recommended!

Mill City Museum Field Trip

2009-02-19T20:36:00.003-06:00

View from the 8th floor. St. Anthony falls.

They didn't seem to be to into the picture thing. Like my own kids they see the camera and loose interest(except Laura then she lights up).

Music Therapy

2009-02-16T15:57:00.003-06:00

We used a parachute outfitted with lights for music last week.

Sunset 2-15-2009 Home from Hudson Wisconsin

2009-02-16T12:35:00.000-06:00

Utah

2009-01-10T21:54:00.001-06:00

Sunset on Dec 9th 2008 the day Kyle was born.

Sunrise in Nov 2008

2008-11-04T16:30:00.004-06:00

This is maybe the only benefit (ok the other one is finishing work at 1:45 each day) of starting work so early. I get the opportunity to view some of the most beautiful sunrises! I believe sunrises are on of my favorite things of nature.

I really like the mist rising off the ground in this one.

One Year with my Camera

2008-10-23T16:22:00.005-05:00

It's been a year since I got my camera. I decided to see how many pictures I had taken on the anniversary (10-20). This is the 14,488th picture I took.

And would you look at who it is. Why it's Kingston Koala at Chipotle!

Fall colors Part II

2008-10-23T15:43:00.004-05:00

A few years ago we had to replace the tree in our front yard. This is an Autumn Blaze Maple. I really like the vibrant red leaves. I did some close ups on the leaves.

The neighbors pretty bush!

Fall colors

2008-10-19T14:47:00.006-05:00

Falls colors maybe you were expecting trees or something of that nature. This might not be what you expected with that title. There is a photo contest that calling for fall colors. I have been thinking of trees turning and that kind of thing. Last night after I took photos of Brian's pottery I decided to do a little with these gourds.

Brian looked at them and said "fall colors". So this maybe part of the entry for fall colors. There is one that is better than these that I won't post in case I enter it.

This is made from walnut shells. Pretty neat!

Oh by the way, this is my studio for taking these pictures. Pretty rinky dink operation if I do say so myself! But it works.

I took over 250 pictures trying to get the lighting just right. In the end I wanted to remember just how I had it set up so I can recreate the "studio" for taking pictures at a later date.

Senior Pictures

2008-10-14T21:31:00.006-05:00

A couple of my favorites.

Marley

Ferron

Tried my hand at some senior pictures today. There was a lot more cloud cover than I would have liked, but, they didn't turn out to bad.

I usually have one of the girls with me to help and carry. Since Laura is now employed full time Tama was my assistant. Here he is holding my mono pod and checking appointments (not mine).

New Lens

2008-10-11T19:40:00.003-05:00

I got a new lens today. It is more for portraits, in the picture of Brian notice the blurred background. It takes a nice sharp picture. We'll see how well I like it. I am taking senior pictures of "the boys" (Laura's brothers) this next MEA week. Tama in the middle is either a sophomore or junior so a couple more years for his pictures.

Reviewing older pictures

2008-10-11T19:01:00.002-05:00

Today I was deleting some older pictures from my memory card. When I was doing that I was reminded of some that I wanted to post here. These are from when Brian and I went to the Arboretum. This Kaleidoscope was really neat. The idea was to look up into it for the effect.

This is what I saw. These just caught my eye.

More Pottery Show pics

2008-10-04T20:16:00.005-05:00

Here are a few more pictures I took at the Rustic Road 13 Pottery Show. The pottery is the work of Jan Bilek. I usually don't like to take pictures of pottery because it is a potters work. I couldn't resist taking this picture and emailed Jan to get permission to post them. She graciously said I could. I wanted to have a link to her website. http://janbilek.com/ This picture is one of my favorites that I took that day. I love the lighting of this picture.

Here is another attempt, I like the first one better. Then I decided to take it in black and white. So so.

Pictures

2008-09-22T22:05:00.006-05:00

Do you see the butterfly in the window? It really wanted outside.

More pictures from the weekend

2008-09-22T21:47:00.005-05:00

Standing in the driveway of the show I heard someone say "do you have to go potty". I turned around and this lady was asking the question. She was talking to the DOG!! Too funny!

Decided to try this look in black and white.

And then I decided to try other shots in black and white.

Stillwater MN and Hudson WI

2008-09-20T21:38:00.006-05:00

This blog has been very neglected. Here are some pictures from our trip this weekend. Some different things in the house.

In the middle of the picture is the Stillwater lift bridge.

Rustic Road 13 Pottery Sale. Pottery Sales/Tours are Brian's interest. Mine is taking pictures at the tours. There are lots of subjects that I can find to take pictures of.

There are lots more that I will continue to publish over the next few days.

More Pictures

2008-08-02T22:56:00.003-05:00

A few more pictures from our visit to the Arboretum.

Art Festival

2008-07-06T20:20:00.005-05:00

I decided to add some pictures after looking at what I had taken at the

Eagan Art Festival.

Pictures on the 4th

2008-07-05T21:03:00.003-05:00

Fun by the fire.

Action shots.

Notice the spectator (non-action shot) on the sidelines!

Alvin Clark

2008-06-27T07:21:00.004-05:00

No relation, but, Brian did have an Uncle Alvin Clark. This cute little boy was at the McKinney's the other night. So I took some pictures of him. Wish I had a dark background for all the shots. Oh well.

City Art Festival

2008-06-26T14:37:00.009-05:00

The our City Art Festival was last Saturday and Sunday, the weather was perfect. Brian is pretty involved with the Art House (I am hoping he blogs about it if not then I will add more pictures). He was asked to demonstrate throwing pots on the wheel at the show. I found a way to keep myself busy for awhile.

Someone had lots of cool glass. Which I happen to really like.

Here is are some young friends Lil' Nate and Regan enjoying an icee.

I saw this little dog all dressed up for the party. The little girl was happy to show off the dog. No idea who she is. Just a cute picture.

Tulip Collage

2008-05-31T05:47:00.002-05:00

Trying out the collage feature on Kodak Gallery and checking if it saves and I can publish on blog. It appears a success. Fun!

Flowers from the yard

2008-05-28T14:25:00.004-05:00

Wisteria, nice flower but I dislike the bushes that this flower grows on.

White Lilacs the previous neighbor brought this down from Roseau.

The current neighbors have this planted in their front yard. I think it is a Double Petunia.

Our red maple. This tree took forever to take off. Now it is a beautiful and full tree.

Lacrosse Bloomington game

2008-05-01T22:02:00.004-05:00

Since I was at 100 for my other blog I checked this one this post will be my 20th for this blog.

I really like this shot with the player in fairly good focus and the rest blurred. Makes a nice look. I'll add more later I need to go to bed. Just noticed it's late.

Shots of Lacrosse

2008-04-14T20:44:00.011-05:00

Action shots of Lacrosse. Here are some pictures I like that I took during Laura's first game of the season. I don't know the names of the girls on this team yet, so I won't be naming the participants.

This girl was throwing the ball, but, check out the way her feet are posed.

The scoop

and the take off.

Not sure just how I came up with this look.

Great concentration!

Scenery in Oregon

2008-04-07T17:22:00.013-05:00

While driving in Oregon I kept my camera at my side most of the time. I really liked the countryside on my way to Eugene. Here are some of my results. Notice how green the grass was. That's what the warm weather can do for a place.

I was about 15 minutes from Eugene and suddenly traffic slowed then stopped! Wait it was Sunday afternoon, where did the traffic come from?

I'm sure it was the truck with the back end of the trailer on its side.

Bummer, someone had some explaining to do!

On Wednesday I took a trip to Washington to see Kathy, Ken and Brenda, Kimberly and her kids. I saw Mt Hood and was able to get a few pictures. Most didn't turn out, it was hard getting the shot I ended up with a lot of poles and hills in the way.

I was able to see Mt Rainer from Ken and Brenda's side yard.

This is the view from Ken and Brenda's back yard. They are on the Cowlitz River. Two summers ago they floated down the river from fish hatchery up river. They landed right in the yard!

An eagle flying right over where we were sitting.

In the river is an Ospery. They have a pair nesting in the trees across the river.

Nice place to live!

In 2006 Brian, Laura and I took a trip out in June, the picture below is across the river from Ken and Brenda's. That is the back of their house you see. Nice difference when you add all the leaves from the trees.

Pictures of the kids

2008-04-04T18:20:00.019-05:00

Sofie Beth

While in Utah I took some pictures of Sofie. I am putting a few here because I like to share her with others. Here she is "frowing" a penny in the pond.

The chip was a little big for her mouth.

Playing with Auntie.

Give the bear a hug. No a hug! O nice hug.

I also got some of Memphis, my great neice. I have wanted to try taking newborn picture and had a chance with her.

Memphis with the mom Laura and her dad Nakota (my nephew).

Here she is holding her grandma's finger.

Memphis with Uncle Talib.

Aunties Samira and Tanara

Great Auntie and Grandma

Growth of the Icicles today

2008-03-24T18:17:00.004-05:00

Winter (or Spring) Pictures

2008-03-23T20:22:00.010-05:00

Some random pictures that I like.

Icicles yesterday.
Icicles today.

More icicles today.

This is how I shovel (bad back, heavy snow) the driveway. Notice just enough to get out of the driveway.

This is how a kindly neighbor cleared the driveway with a snow blower. Yeah for nice neighbors!!!

My Daily Enviornment Part III

2008-03-23T19:44:00.009-05:00

Easter Dinner.

Someone in our family (Emily) doesn't care for ham. So we had a traditional Sunday Roast Dinner. In my quest to fulfill my assignment I took some pictures of our dinner. This was just after I took the lid off the crockpot. Did you notice no potatoes, mashed potatoes were requested for this meal.

Dinner is served! No picture of the salad (ok, just go look at a bag of salad and envision it in a bowl), next time.

Brian's contribution Apple Pie.

The finished product!

More daily environment Part II

2008-03-20T17:26:00.005-05:00

Playing games is something we do at school. Jingo is this game. Ashley loves to win. She is our most competitive player. She even gets mad if she doesn't win! Out goes the pouty lip and a frown creases her brow. Just becasuse our kids are non verbal doesn't mean you can't understand how they are feeling.

My Daily Enviornment

2008-03-20T14:44:00.013-05:00

Assignment for Week 11:

Capture a small snippet of your life that usually goes unnoticed
Create a visual record of your day
Share your favorite photos with us (and tell us about the emotional connection you have with it, whether or not it's technically perfect)

I see this a lot in a day. A couple of versions of this same area.

Laura and I were on our way to her last New Beginnings. I am experiencing my "last" of many events in my parenting life. Something Laura pointed out to me last month. So the next series of pictures were taken by my co pilot.

We have lived in Eagan Minnesota for 19.25 years. We attend church in Burnsville, which is where our Church building is. We have seen this exit so many times in all our years here.

I glanced over as Laura was snapping some shots of the Roadhouse sign. I wanted her to get the make sure and get the crane in her shot. Not sure if she noticed the hawk on the light post I sure didn't. For those of you who know this area this was the Marie Callendar, Roadhouse Grill location. It is now torn down. Not sure what is taking its place.

Laura's class was discussing where you might see large flags. Capital buildings and Perkins were the answers. This is a Byerly's flag so it's not the really big one. But a nice shot of a flag.

Sunrise in Feb

2008-02-29T15:58:00.005-06:00

Driving to work the other morning I got some nice shots of the sunrise. The next pictures were a little tricky. But, I couldn't help taking them.

Pine Wood Derby

2008-02-29T15:07:00.006-06:00

Brian & I attended Hyrum and Thomas's Pine Wood Derby. My first time attending a Derby. As Brian says its like herding cats. Kids every where. Brian was invited to help the boys make their cars since their dad was out of town. He went over on Tuesday evening and worked with the boys on creating their cars.

Thursday evening was the big night. Don't ya know (sounds a little minnesotan) we got a nuiscance snowfall. The normal 45 min drive to their building took me 2 hours and 15 min! Most of the time I rolled along, not even enough to register a speed. When I finally hit 15 mph it felt like I was speeding. That only lasted about 7 or 8 minutes. This makes me appreciate that I don't have to regularly drive in traffic. Kudos to Brian who had done it for 17 years here and many more in California.

This was my best shot for stop action. I think the course this week is to try to do motion pictures (outside but this will have to do). And kids in action. I took some of the kids I work with but really can't post those (privacy).

It was a fun evening we, as always, enjoyed seeing the Smiths.They were checking out Brian's pottery. Notice the kids playing the jug. Presty is behind the bubbles. I had to keep reminding them Brian needs to use the bubble wrap to pack the pottery.

But is is much more fun to pop the bubbles.

Our little friend Preston.

Moon Shots and the Neighborhood

2008-02-25T14:59:00.007-06:00

On Sat evening the moon was beautiful and the sky was very clear. So I put the camera on a tripod and used a remote switch to reduce camera shake and took some shot of the moon. When taking these pictures the shutter is opended a long time because it is drawing from the available light. The less movement of the camera the clearer the picture. I used Sarah's telephoto lens and had some better success with the clarity of my pictures.

As I looked down the street I saw some colored lights and decided to take some shots of that. As the picture was exposing I could hear a car coming up the street and thought darn that will ruin the shot. Then I realized it will actually add a neat extra to the picture. As you can see the long streak of light on the road is a cars headlights.

In the next picture you can see a long yellow streak running along the road that is the tail lights of a car driving away from me.

Just a cool picture.

If you look closely at the picture below the tree branches outline the moon and the branches appear to be illuminiated.

A wreath that caught my eye.

Shooting a Squirrel

2008-02-06T17:43:00.001-06:00

Today the sun was out and rather bright, hasn't been out much lately. I was talking on the phone and had picked up my camera just to look at it and walked into the kitchen. Out the window I saw this squirrel sunning himself on the deck. Since I just happened to have my camera in my hands I took a picture. Of course, that lead to a few more.

Yesterday's photography lesson was on composition of the picture. Looking at picture (above) it has a lot to be desired in the way of a good picture. Too busy, my subject is centered (think thirds when composing a shot) and rather lost in the stuff. So with my photo editing program I did this, seems better. A lot less distracting.

He decided to move along the deck and I moved into the dining room to watch out the window.He scampered along the railing and then stopped to scratch. He is posed rather funny. Now when you are trying to photograph a squirrel you really don't want them to notice you or the game is up. I was zoomed all the way in and this was the best I could do and stay under cover. So back to editing and this is what I came up with. The idea is to use natural frames for the picture. I did have some with the window panes for the frame But I would have liked a little more zoom. That is the beauty of digitial cameras, the ability to edit a picture with such ease. I need to figure out how to darken the subject. But overall I like this shot. You can even see his little mouth. Of course, most of the time we are pondering shooting (yes with the air shot gun) the little guy but this time he only got it with the camera.

He is a little lost in this shot but it frames him rather well.

Game over!

Catching Drops

2008-02-05T15:45:00.000-06:00

With the mild temp of 32° outside the snow is melting. I noticed the table on the deck had drops splashing and making some big drops. Pictures seemed in order. For my online photography class, a couple of weeks ago, we took freeze action pictures. So with my new found knowledge I set off to get some photos.

I like this shot (below) with the tree reflecting in the water on the table.
Because I was trying to catch drips in midair I put it on continuous shots hoping for something good. I ended up with 389 pictures. It's rather hard to catch a falling drop in a picture. I think I got some good shots.

I think I got a spectacular shot of an exploding drop. I love this picture.

I just liked the look of these following pictures.

Lil' Bit

2008-01-20T17:03:00.001-06:00

Last weekend we attended the baptism of our friends, the Paksima's daughter, Amirah. She is the niece of Mark and Tamara Smith. The .05 addition of the Smith family is Elizabeth or Lil' Bit. I took this picture of her in her coat that her daddy got for her. It even has a little muff for her hands. I just love this picture of her. Her lovely pink cheeks and her bright red lips. What a little sweety!

Photography 101

2008-01-19T13:25:00.000-06:00

Thanks to Lisa (Rapp) Powell I checked out this Photography 101 online class.
http://twopeasinabucket.kaboose.com/cg_list.asp?t=55

I took a class at National Camera & Video about SLR Digital cameras. It explained lots of what I didn't understand about my camera. With this online class they are expanding more of what I learned at that class. Also they have assignments using things like shutter speed and aperature settings. Why a particular ISO setting is picked. It was fun taking shots of water in the sink.

So here’s the question we want to focus on this week:
When should I use a fast shutter speed?

The assignment: use the kitchen sink to freeze action. I have several shots of the water frozen in action. I guess its a lot of the same thing but I like the different effects I got with different angles and the water is frozen in place.

I like the illumination of the stream of water.

With the lower shutter speed notice the water drops are not defined.

Wedding Picture

2007-12-23T21:55:00.000-06:00

Sarah's best friend Kristina got married on Dec 20th, 2007. It was a mild day with temps about mid 30s. I asked if I could take pictures as a way to practice taking pictures. They agreed with that and it turned out that I knew the photograhper, a man who has been doing photography for years. Best to learn from an experienced photographer.

The other bride is Emily's best friend, Kyrie. They were married in Nauvoo, Ill. Jake is real tall and it was hard for Kyrie to peek over his shoulder.

When we got married one of the pictures was me looking over Brian's shoulder. I was showing our pictures to someone who said, "to bad your weren't winking". So when Allison got married I asked the photographer to take that shot. I decided that I would like that to be a signature picture for each bride. So far I have two brides with that pose.

After the snow falls

2007-12-23T08:22:00.000-06:00

Yesterday Brian and I were supposed to be shopping, instead we were distracted by the landscape after the snow fell. Not far from us are roads that look rural but are really not that far from the city. We moseyed up the road and looked for scenes to take pictures of.

I took the shot of the tree and then zoomed in on the leaves.
I really love this close up shot.