05.03.10
Posted in photo at 7:46 am by heidihoho7
It was a busy weekend for both Bela and myself – his story will come next once he arrives home… As for me I signed up for a photography workshop with Nels Akerlund and his wife Anna at the Anderson Japanese Gardens in Rockford, IL.
It’s a beautiful time of year with flowers blooming, trees with blossoms and fresh leaves, big hostas already grown, and rain showers at night which left wonderful drops of water over much of the flora. In other words the perfect time to be taking photos in the gardens.
Our weekend started off with an orientation on Friday night where we met Nels, Anna, and most participants. We talked about the plan for the next 2 days then took a quick tour of the gardens with a light rain misting on us and what would have been perfect conditions for photography; but alas it was just a walk though. Our real fun was to begin at 5AM on Saturday, which meant a 3:15 wake up for me! So after a short night’s rest I was back in Rockford ready for some great photo fun with tripod in hand.
Now i know most of you will be like what? heidi used her tripod almost exclusively?? I know, hard to believe! But there were many wonderful waterfalls and water features and we were out at sunrise so I took advantage of the great light and location and took some nice long shots for my fave velvety water.
We had 4 hours each morning to explore the gardens and see what we could find. Many of us hit the main “money shot” areas: main falls, the south falls with the lantern surrounded by blooms and maples, and the 2 big ponds with koi and bridges. But what was more fun was looking for the small details – the drops of water on the hostas, the inchworm on the Japanese maples, the patterns of rocks and stone gardens, or the textures of the maple leaves or reflections in the water. The small details ended up being my favorite images from the 2 days.
Each morning after our shooting time we’d head back into the basement of the Visitor Center where we’d start downloading our images. Nels and Anna would give a short lecture either on the basics of editing/ file management or give us a demo on Lightroom. This is where i got in trouble (not real trouble I don’t think, but i can be a smart ass)…
Our classroom was set up before we got there and it just so ended up that the 4 nikon users were all in the back row, i have no idea how that happened but i found it quite ironic seeing as how Nels is a Canon user… so some fun was had with that fact … then we go around and find out who are Mac users and who are Windows users… and of course I get strike two with my Win 7 machine… and to finish off the trifecta, i mention that i’m a Bridge user. (Gasps were heard)
So the whole weekend a friendly banter went back and forth in regards to all of my “evils” and a “we’ll convert you to Lightroom just wait”! Of course when something went wrong with the canon/mac/lightroom i was sure to pipe up 
of course the same could be said for whenever i had issue… like when Lightroom decided it wouldn’t work for me on sunday. (I figured it knew i really wanted to use Bridge so it just helped me convince Nels since i couldnt get it even open or the beta version either and ended up having to use Bridge anyways.)
I don’t think i’ve completely convinced them that bridge isn’t truly evil but at least i was able to show them that it does match lightroom for the basic functionality that they were showing the group (so stop badmouthing Br you Lr users hahahah!!!). And no i’m not sold on Lr yet, yes it’s prettier, fancier and has a nice WB picker but i’m not digging the fact that everything is tied into the library – like when LR wouldn’t open and i figured i’d just use Br – well all my ratings and edits were tied into Lr so I’d have to start all over. I like that Br ties it to the file so no matter where it goes – the ratings and edits go with it! I need to see of Lr has that option but until i find that option i’m sticking with my beloved (and FREE with PS) Br
Ok i digress! after our lectures we’d have time to edit our photos and submit them for a group critique and slideshow. This ended up being the fun part (besides actually taking the photos which of course was the best part of the weekend) – I always love seeing what everyone comes up with at workshops. I am always asking myself – where was that photo taken? Why didn’t I see that? It helps to broaden my horizons and constantly reminds me to look closer, wider, up and down, and look beyond the obvious photos – try to get creative! Ok, and i steal photo ideas too – on sunday i tried to recreate a few that i’d seen on saturday as well as try to do some shots that i hadn’t seen.
I’d been using my 18-200 lens (i know not the best lens in the world but i love it so) and my 50mm macro. But on the 2nd day i ended up breaking out my ultra wide 11-16 tokina so i could do some hand holding. With the bright skies later in the morning, not a ton of them turned out great but i did end up liking a few of them – it gave a totally different feel from the previous photos. One thing that i did see in the slidehow that got me interested was some ultra violet photos another woman had taken – I’m quite tempted i have to admit – they ended up being beautiful and super fun. just another option in the never ending world of photography!
So overall I’m super pleased with my weekend at the gardens. I got some shots that i’m proud to call my own and made a friend or two in the process 
My only hope is that Nels and Anna don’t ban me from attending more workshops haha!
For a few more images please visit my picasa Anderson Gardens album
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09.24.09
Posted in Road Trip, friends, photo, recreation, travel, vacation at 10:50 pm by heidihoho7
Ridgeway & Resting
Thursday morning i went out with John and Randy for a sunrise shoot just outside of Ridgeway, we got some pretty fall color with mountains in the background. While out with the boys I started to realize that I wasn’t feeling so great, and we opted to skip out on breakfast at True Grit to make our way back to the cabins. Once there i decided that i’d take the rest of the day off – i took a wonderfully long nap and bela and i laid low while the rest of the crew went off to Jimmy and Wendell’s for a tex-mex dinner. (and i believe there was fishing at Buddy’s as well as we had fish in the freezer that night)
Have you seen the Muffler Man?
Friday I was feeling better so bela and i decided to go geocaching. Neely and Jen went out with a local friend to go horseback riding and andy wanted to get a bike ride in. As it happened our first geocache happened to have the same name as the place andy wanted to start his biking. So as andy got his bike ready, we found our first cache in the area literally 50′ away. We made plans to meet up in a few hours and parted ways to our own adventures.
Our next cache was at the water reservoir near town. We made a quick side trek to the viewpoint – supposedly we could see all four states and i think we did see most of them… we enjoyed the view and moved on to find the cache fairly quickly right off the main road. The next cache ended up being behind a cemetery that had the coolest little outhouse. we didn’t go inside but i did take a few pics. Our final cache of the day was one of the best caches we’ve ever found – the muffler man. This was one of the craziest spots we’d ever been – this guy creates people and scenes out of old muffler and car parts. We were just mesmerized by all the scenarios he thought up – and then factor in there are goats all over and following us around. The goats helped us find the cache that was hidden right in the middle of it all. We wandered around and took pics of our favorite muffler concoctions.
We were about out of time so we headed back to town to meet up with Andy for a light lunch at the local coffee shop. Back at the cabin we enjoyed a quiet afternoon and it was decided to have a yummy final dinner of our fine local ingredients: freshly caught fish from Buddy’s pond and a puffball mushroom found in the neighbor’s field, in addition to some yummy garlic potatoes. Since the gals had been cooking most of the week, the boys were put in charge of cooking.
Things were just heating up when all of a sudden Jen asks if we’d seen Figgy (1 of her doggies). None of us had, and after John had been taunting us all week with the “better watch out or the coyotes will get them!” we were a little anxious to find Figgy. After an initial check around the cabin with no doggie, things started getting a little crazy. Everyone goes out to search – Bela opted to make sure the cabin didn’t burn down and watched the food and I took over with Fiona (Jen’s youngest), while she assured me she knew where Figgy was, as we kept wandering around the cabin looking and yelling for the doggie. Luckily Jen found Figgy a mile or two down the road on some private property and the search party was called off. Dinner was started up again and we all enjoyed our dinner with relief and a bit of sadness knowing we’d be heading out the next day.
Rock Art and Fine Dining
Saturday morning we finished our packing and got on our way to Albuquerque, waving goodbye to the family and wonderful cabins in the mountains. The drive went by fairy quickly, even with all 4 doggies. I have to admit i liked having the wee doggies – they seemed kind of kittie like sitting on our laps. We convinced andy and neely to make the side trip to Petraglyph Nat’l Monument – we weren’t supposed to have doggies so the kids dropped us off so we could do a quick look see. We enjoyed a quick trip around Boca Negra Canyon, which literally borders the city. There were some cool glyphs and some obvious graffiti but overall quite cool to see all of the rock art with a complete view of the city and mountains in the background.
We all opted to take an afternoon nap (actually i think andy may have gone for a ride/run but he’s crazy and we already know that) after checking in to our hotels. The doggies even had their own bed! The kids picked us up and we were on our way to a wonderful dinner at a little french place the urban spoon suggested. While enjoying the excellent food we also were entertained by the kids coming in for their homecoming dinners. We had great fun guessing who was with who and why they dressed the way they did – Neely did not approve of the hat at the dinner table! We found it pretty cool that our waiter was born in chicago but had lived in texas for a while but was now in ABQ – what are the odds of that!? Just another sign of a great trip we think!
We flew home on sunday morning while the kids finished their long drive to Austin. Overall a wonderful trip with great friends as always!
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09.21.09
Posted in Road Trip, friends, photo, travel, vacation at 10:36 pm by heidihoho7
The next day we convinced Neely to join us for some more exploring. We got up pretty early and made our way up to Telluride in time for the sunrise. It was quite foggy and quite beautiful with the aspens starting to turn in the valley. I jumped out and take a bunch of photos (may post some HDR ones soon as well) and they ran off to grab some coffee. I am happy with my pitstop and we continue on our drive. We head on up through Ridgeway with another beautiful view of the valley below, but opt not to stop at the True Grit restaurant to continue higher yet to Ouray.
We all know of Ouray as an ice climbing mecca and Neely had been there once before years ago. It was a super cute little mountain town- the total opposite of Telluride with it’s touristy & money-money feel. We drive around and decide we’d like to explore a little bit and happen upon Box Canyon – which happens to be where the ice climbing takes place. What’s interesting about this “Ice Park” is that they run pipes along the top of the canyon and when it gets cold enough they create their own ice falls for climbing. now some other areas do this but this is the one place that is known to have great ice and has a festival each year to celebrate it’s awesomeness.
Since it was fall and not quite cold enough for ice we continued on up the mountainside in the hopes of more exploration and fun. My photo books had some info about some roads/trails so we kept working our way up and did a little more off roading (at least it felt like it) and enjoyed getting “off the beaten path”. Of course we saw regular cars up at the some of the parking areas – but we all agreed there had to be some good scrapes on the bottoms. After scraping the bike carrier multiple times we finally decide to take it off – but in the process realize we’re now quite hungry. So we start our way back down to Ouray and stop in town to grab some breakfast. The food was so-so but it didn’t affect our opinion of the town.
Our bellies full, we decide to head back to Telluride and see if we can get a view of Bridalveil Falls at prime light. You can feel the money oozing out of people’s wallets as we drive into town, a very different feel from Ouray or even Ridgeway but it’s quite pretty nestled in the mountains with the waterfalls in clear view. We skipped town and just drove straight back to the parking areas to the falls. We decided to give the 4WD road a go and see if we can make it to the top. After some fun bouncing around we decide to stop at the first waterfall – which we determined later wasn’t bridalveil but quite pretty. I think it was here that Andy decided to get in his daily workout and start running back to town. We’d meet him somewhere on the other side after we checked out the main falls. We continue on up a little ways and decide to park at a dicey switchback. It wasn’t terribly far to the falls and the hike was quite nice. We missed the noon light but the double falls were still a sight and the mist felt wonderfully cool if you got close enough. We opted to cut it short and started to work our way back down – eventually catching up with Andy just outside of town.
After our day of exploring we start to feel a bit tired and decide to head home for another family dinner and relaxation. We had 1 small detour as Andy still had some energy left and wanted to try to bike home as well. We got him started at the parking area for the Lizard’s Head. while there we happened upon a hiker who needed a ride back to his car – wife and dog had had enough that day. So, we opted to give him a ride and let Andy get a head start. With the small detour Andy had enough time to determine that it was way too windy and a bit scary to make the whole ride home. So we loaded him back up and made our way back.
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