Up North in October

Road Trip!

We've been to Frankfort, MI and the surrounding area many times in the summer, and J and I headed up last week to see what's different in the fall. 

We took a detour through Manistee and walked along the river and visited some shops. It was a bit cold and rainy, so we didn't stay long. We stopped at at the Arcadia Overlook on our way from Manistee to Frankfort. 

During our day out touring the Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore, we enjoyed some rain and sunny weather, often together. 

We hiked to the top of the bluff overlooking Lake Michigan at Pyramid Point, where we saw a complete rainbow - both ends and the entire arc were visible. I wasn't able to get a picture of it, because the lens on my camera wasn't wide enough to capture the whole thing. We also drove the Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive, which we had driven by many times in the past, but had never visited. 

The leaves were just starting to change in most places, so we didn't get the full-color treatment we were hoping for when we planned the trip a few months ago. But the views and cold air were new and refreshing. 

On the day we were leaving Frankfort, there was a small parade through town and we stayed to watch and hit some Frankfort shops before heading home. 

The snow fences are one difference between Frankfort in July and October.

At the Pyramid Point trailhead, there's a sign that let's you know what you should or shouldn't do. I find it a bit ambiguous - for example, if a pet is on a snowmobile, is that OK? If I need to take a nap under the trees to rest from a long hike, is that considered camping? 

The "left" part of the full rainbow. The fixed focal-length lens I had on my camera could get this much in one shot...

Here's the "right" part of the rainbow. If you put the pictures next to each other and blur your eyes, you can see the whole thing. 

You will not be the least bit surprised to know that people were indeed going way down towards the bottom. Sadly, we didn't hear any cries for help. Maybe next time. 

At the parade, the "pet costume" section featured this human dressed as a hamburger, leading some "french fry" dogs. She didn't have any ketchup, although her bun hat does appear to be sesame seed, which helps. 

Uncle Spokes the Clown displayed whimsy and expert bike navigation as he greeted his fans. At the beginning of the parade, he had seven other clowns in his basket, who exited in the classic "Volkswagen" manner. 

There's a lot to see here. Fortunately, this float remained parked in town for a while after the parade so we could read everything. There were no prizes for floats that I'm aware of, but if there were, this would be up for "Most Thorough".

An evening picture at the pier. The man on the pier has several fishing lines in the water, and there were some pretty significant waves. 

The obligatory sunset photo. Note all the benches lined up on the beach, and the snow fences ready to be rolled out. The benches are normally spread out over the beach, but they are collected before winter and stored together.

Happy Winter to Frankfort! See you next year. 

All The Miscellaneous Things

 

A so-called "American Football". Photo by Dave Adamson (link)

College Football Update

J and I go to games at Michigan Stadium to see the Wolverines play football. We've had season tickets since 1995, although we haven't been at all of the home games. 

It's not a stadium known for its high noise levels. From my experience, the loudest crowd reactions are:

1. The end of the James Earl Jones movie that is shown right before the team runs onto the field
2. When the announcer introduces the Veteran of the Game, usually a Word War II veteran, during a TV timeout
3. When the dog catches the frisbee

The crowd also cheers loudly sometimes when the team makes a good play. 

Really? More boats? 

Following my inexplicable obsession with cool watercraft: 

• This houseboat/camper boat is actually something I would consider owning if I lived near water.  Although if I lived near water, why would I need a camper for the water. I could just go home. I need to think this through more...
• This "yacht" jet ski, whose design is intended to reflect that of larger boats made by the same manufacturer, is also something I would definitely own.  

Random Stuff

Books

Looking for something new or different to read? The "Recommend Me a Book" site shows you the first few pages of a book so you can check it out and see if it's interesting. If you like it, you can find out what book it's from. If you don't like it, you can click "Next" and see the first pages from another book. 

Arch Design

This is a fun and easy-to-follow video that shows how arches are designed, and how to use a chain to easily discover whether an arch you've designed will stand on its own. 

Suburban Beasts: Hummingbird Feeder Edition w.s.g Spider

So many different types of animals enjoy the hummingbird feeder that I sometimes wonder if the hummingbirds are getting a little put off. 

This woodpecker goes to the hummingbird feeder, then the suet feeder, then back to the hummingbird feeder.

A bald-faced hornet. Don't fall in! (Other bees have, in fact, fallen in, and they can't get out.)

A hummingbird sticks its tongue out at the camera. It's like when your kids are at that age that they won't smile nicely for a picture. 

Nothing quenches a hummingbird's thirst like
sugar water that's been out in the sun for days.

This furry creature was spending some time in the same tree as the feeder,
and I got some shots of it because it was posing so cutely. 

This scary but cool spider lives in the shrubs in the front of the house.
  I've been watching it for the last several weeks. When it suddenly moved once,
I may have screamed a little.

A Hornet Story

An interesting story about the bald-faced hornet: I was watching this hornet go back and forth to the hummingbird feeder, and after I took a few photos of it, I went online to look up to see what kind of bee/wasp/hornet it was. I discovered that these hornets are pretty gentle and tend not to attack people, like some other hornets do. 

The next morning after the picture above was taken, I received an email from my next-door neighbor, informing me that there was a large bees nest in one of my trees, near the sidewalk and street. The light bulb went on in my head: I bet this is the bald-faced hornet's nest. And yes, it was. 

Normally I would have just sprayed the heck out of the nest with a can of Raid, but I didn't want to make things worse or cause further problems, or just make them angry, given that dozens of people each day walk within 5 feet of the tree, and there are kids who play nearby. So I called a service who took care of it, and even hauled the nest away when they were done. If it had been more isolated, I probably would have left it alone until the cold weather, but I didn't want someone to get stung. 

Frankfort 2022: Photos

 

An evening double rainbow captured with a fisheye lens. The second rainbow is hard to see - it's above the more visible one. 

A spider whose web was near one of the doors to the condo we stayed in. This was taken with a macro lens. 

While were in town, I signed a ten-year lease for these posts in Lake Betsie. The ropes are already attached, now all I need is a boat.

Photo memories from Frankfort aren't complete without a shot of the iconic lighthouse. 

Actually, this is the lighthouse.

One evening, we had a very silvery sunset. It was not what we expected to see, but it was very pretty in its own right.

On the last night, we had the best sunset of the trip, with the trademark orange colors.

Hummingbirds

 

We have a few hummingbirds that are regular visitors to the backyard feeder. 

A wide aperture doomed some of these hummingbird bodies to not be completely in focus, and I'll work on that next time. I was aware that I was shooting wide open, and knew this might happen, but for some of the shots, I needed the light to get a faster shutter speed. It's all about tradeoffs. (See the Wikipedia article on "depth of field" for more information on how aperture impacts how much of a subject is in focus.) 

All images were taken with an Olympus E-M1 Mark II with the 60mm f/2.8 lens. The camera was on a tripod between 2-3 feet from the feeder, and I tripped the shutter with my phone, which was connected via a wi-fi signal to the camera. 

FStoppers Article Titles

 Like many photographers, I regularly check out the Fstoppers website. It contains a wide variety of content for amateurs and professionals alike. 

During the pandemic, I've come up with some titles for imaginary Fstoppers articles that sound almost like real ones, and what's shown below is my final list. 

Fstoppers (Fake) Articles

Is the Sony E PZ 18–110 mm F4 G OSS  the Best Cheese Portrait Lens? 

7 Mistakes Photographers Make When Starting Fights on Airplanes

What Makes a Good Mud Photo? 

Three Tips for Using Off-camera Lighting During Tornadoes

Why You Should Be Using Extension Tubes for Landscape Photos

Creamed Corn Photographer Shares Her Tips

Using a 20-pound Sack of Rice to Save Your Camera After a Downpour

Behind the Scenes at a Piano Tuning Shoot

Should You Use Bar Soap to Clean Your Lenses?

Improving Low-Light Photography By Adding Light

Adobe Announces Discount Photoshop Version That Only Allows Actions Used in YouTube "How To Select Hair" Videos.

A Look At the New Fujifilm 1mm Hyperfisheye Lens

Using a Long Stick to Get A Drone off Your Roof

How To Remove Skin Blemishes With Windows Notepad

This Is An Article about Micro Four Thirds Being Dead Intended to Infuriate Micro Four Thirds Users And Drive Comments

The New iPhone Rumored to Have 11 Cameras And No Longer Capable of Calling People

All Of Your Photo Equipment Should Have Those Peak Design Red Disk Thingies Hanging Off Them

Which Is Better, Red or Blue? 

OM Systems Announces It's Not Legal to Use Olympus E-M1X On Anything Other Than BIF or Motorcycle Races

12 Things I Wish I Had Known Before I Started Stealing Film Cameras in the 1980s

Make Your Compositions Better By Leaving the Lens Cap On

Should I Stop Using Photoshop And Start Using Microsoft Paint 3D? 

A Beginner's Guide To Alcohol Flasks That Look Like Binoculars

FStoppers Reviews PetaPixel

6 Reasons Why You Should Always Do Free Work as a Photographer

6 Reasons Why You Should Never Do Free Work as a Photographer

Why I Sold My DSLR And Bought a Table Saw

How Not To Photograph a High School Football Team's Car Wash Fundraiser

Using a Tripod To Carefully Nudge Something Off A High Shelf

Traveling Light: The 32 Large Things You Should Always Have With You

If You Could Only Have One Lens, Would It Be An AF-S NIKKOR 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6 G ED VR?

What I Learned When I Listened To The Person I Was Photographing In A Thunderstorm

I Smashed My Mirrorless Camera With a Hammer And Never Looked Back

Super B(ow)logging Books

Here are some books that I've read in the last few years that were notable. Read one, or read them all!

Every Day is for the Thief
Teju Cole

A bittersweet homecoming to Nigeria for the narrator, who reconnects with people from his past, and is frustrated by the ubiquitous local corruption.   

The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World
A.J. Jacobs

I'm not quite done with this book, but it's a winner. The author wants to become smarter, so he buys a complete, printed edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, and reads every word. He shares some of the fun facts that he learns along the way, and shares the times that he attempts to inject his knowledge into everyday social situations. Can he one-up his brainy family members, and impress his coworkers?   

Good Clean Fun: Misadventures in Sawdust at Offerman Woodshop
Nick Offerman

You may know Offerman from the dry-humored characters he plays on TV shows, but he is also a first-class woodworker. He introduces you to his woodshop and his fellow craftspeople therein. His explanation of wood and woodworking tools is terrific. He's as good a writer as he is a comedic actor.

Going Into Town: A Love Letter to New York

Roz Chast

If you read New Yorker magazine, you know Roz Chast. In this book, she's written a guide to New York which is approachable and fun. She gives helpful information about finding streets and does it with her inimitable drawing style. She also wrote Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?, a book about her experiences with her aging parents. I read it after dad was already in assisted living, and it made me realize that what we went through with dad was very common. 

A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never do Again: Essays and Arguments
David Foster Wallace

The essays in this book are well-written, and he has some pretty interesting essays about tennis, but the best by far is the one about his experience on a cruise ship (which was supposedly fun).

Fake Love Letters, Forged Telegrams, and Prison Escape Maps: Designing Graphic Props for Filmmaking
Annie Atkins

This is a fun book about the props you see in movies, but often don't really see. Stacks of papers on a desk, or a letter, or money, or tickets. The author explains how they're made, and how they take their job very seriously. 

Photoshop Restoration & Retouching
Katrin Eismann

Not a book you'd probably take to the beach, but a wonderful step-by-step description of using Photoshop to repair and restore digital images of your old photos. Most of the techniques I used to restore dad's military pictures I learned from this book.  

Goliath
Tom Gauld

I mentioned this book on my blog a long time ago, but it's worth mentioning again. My advice is to find all the Tom Gauld books at your library or bookstore, and take them home. His cartoons about books are the best. 

Sleeping Giants
Sylvain Neuvel

A science fiction novel about a very unusual weapon. It's a bit gory in places, but if this weapon was actually found, the story would probably play out in the way the book outlines.