Black and White or Color Images?

Here's another shot of the Irises that I shot yesterday. I've converted this one to black and white. I am really liking black and white lately, it's so timeless. I also really like color, though. I suppose everyone has their own opinion as to which is their favorite and why. I just keep doing some of each and that seems to be working for me. I think it would be sad to just choose one or the other because they each have their unique and different qualities. Each has its relevant and important place in the fine art of photography.

See more of my flower images HERE.

Macro of Iris Flower

I took some macro photos today of beautiful Iris flowers. We had given my mother a bouquet of them from Mother's Day and told her I wanted to photograph them, so she gave me three of them, one of each color, to have at my house so I could shoot them.

I usually like to do things outdoors as naturally as possible, but since these were already cut, I went ahead and added some dew to them and shot them in my kitchen with natural light. (my favorite)

The sun was going in and out of the clouds so I had to wait at times for it to come back. That's part of the drawback shooting in natural light. You can't control it the way you can with studio light. I still like it, though. Maybe the challenge is part of what draws me to it, who knows? I suppose the reason doesn't really matter, it's what I do with it that counts. Hopefully I've done this flower justice with the light God lent me today.

"Flowers appear on the earth;
the season of singing has come,
the cooing of doves is heard in our land.
"Song of Solomon 2:12

Return of the Burrowing Owl

As a perfect ending to an already wonderful Mother's Day, my husband took me out to look for raptors in our area. I realized that the burrowing owl we saw last fall would probably be back from migration, so we headed over to take a look.

We went only about 5-10 minutes from our home when we saw this burrowing owl on a fence post. We stopped a little ways before reaching him and I took a few shots through the windshield just in case he flew off as we got closer. My husband slowly crept the car forward and I opened my window so I could get some good shots. He didn't move, but did look at us as he sat perched on one foot.

We slowly crept even closer. I had my husband turn off the car so it wasn't shaking. We started the car again and I was afraid he would fly off at that point, but he didn't. The owl held his position and we crept up until he was directly in front of me.

The natural light was a lovely, soft, afternoon glow. At first the owl was strongly backlit by the sun, but as we moved forward the light got better and better and I was able to get some really great shots with good bokeh. He was perfectly relaxed, even closing his eyes as if in perfect peace and just enjoying the afternoon sunshine.

At one point, he began to let down his other leg as another car passed and we thought he was going to fly away, but he didn't, at least not that time. Later he did take flight, and I was able to actually get out of the car and take some environmental shots as he had landed over near what was, I assume, his burrow. It was on private property, so I couldn't get close enough to tell.

Anyway, those are the details of my latest burrowing owl encounter. It really is amazing I got any sharp images as I don't have IS (images stabilization) on my lens and had to shoot hand held from the car for most of the images. I get so excited about my subjects at times, that my hands just shake. I can't wait to get a faster lens with IS so I can get even better shots.

See more of my raptor images HERE!

Day 2-20th. Anniversary Trip

Day 2-Grangeville, Idaho to Cottonwood, Idaho

Our main adventure for today was driving out to Pittsburg Landing in the Hells Canyon Backcountry, then back onto the Camas Prairie with a stop at Tolo Lake and then on to Cottonwood. These are snapshots taken from the car (which I like to refer to as drive-by-shooting) as we were driving and also shots taken as we stopped along the way. My commentary is a bonus, free of charge. LOL

CLICK HERE TO SEE DAY 2 PHOTOS!

Thanks for looking!

DAY 1-20th. Anniversary Trip

This just posted! Day 1 of our latest travels, complete with commentary...see it HERE!

To celebrate our 20th. wedding anniversary, we decided to explore some of the wonderful state Idaho. Our focus was mainly North Central Idaho, but our trip extended into Montana before it was finished.

Current Project

I am currently working on images I captured on a recent nine-day trip I took with my husband to celebrate our 20th. wedding anniversary. I took nearly 3,000 photos. I will probably post by day. Stay tuned...

Tax Day T.E.A. Party-Boise, Idaho

On tax day, I attended one of the T.E.A. (taxed enough already) parties that went on in over 1,000 cities all over the United States on April 15th. Over 2,500 people came out to protest in Boise, Idaho.

Below are many of the people as they came over from Ann Morrison Park. It was a great sight to see the line of people coming. It seemed they would never stop coming...

After some speakers, including Bill Sali, we began our march toward the capitol building. We were escorted by 20 police. People were very peaceful, law abiding and smiling as we walked along, even thanking the police and even apologizing to people waiting in their cars for their wait as we temporarily blocked the streets of downtown.

Many carried signs and flags. Some had tea bags hanging from their signs, hats, jackets, etc...

It was quite a rush as we walked and I saw the capitol approaching. It's so great to be an American and have the right to protest and have freedom of speech. I hope it lasts many more years here in our great country.

The excitement of the crowd grew with each step and my own pride swelled with love and patriotism for the best country in the world.

In spite of all the things we were upset about, there was joy in the air and smiles on faces, no matter what you may have heard from the mainstream media. Even the police were in great spirits.

People were polite, even helping me up on a bench for some better images. It wasn't easy walking and photographing, especially since my main purpose was to participate and not just cover this event.


Above is one of our finest (who has no doubt fought for the very freedoms we were there to protect, yesterday) as we closed in prayer to the awesome God on which our country was founded.


I would encourage anyone to participate in an upcoming TEA Party, (I believe the next one is on July 4th.) who believes we are being taxed too much, the government is too involved in the private sector both in business and our own private lives, our liberties are being unconstitutionally taken away and our voices are not being heard. I could go on, but I won't.

For more images from this event CLICK HERE.

Spring Cover 2009

God has blessed me with a third magazine cover! The name of the photo is "Ritter Creek", Thousand Springs, Idaho.

For more information on CHOIS (Christian Homeschoolers of Idaho State) CLICK HERE.

To see more of my published works, CLICK HERE.

To God be the glory!

Lunar Eclipse

On February 2o, 2008, I stood on my front porch in freezing cold weather and photographed the lunar eclipse. It was so cool to watch the colors change as each phase emerged. I decided to make a sequence of images into a "poster" type collage. This is my final product. I like how it came out. I've had comments from friends and family that have said it looks like something from a science textbook. I'll take it! My daughter has a space room, maybe it'd look good in there as a 16x20 poster or something. There's an idea...

Don't miss a post!

Good morning!

If you're like me, you have many blogs bookmarked or in mind that you'd like to return to on a regular basis, but you forget. And, of course, by the time you remember you've most likely missed some posts by your preferred blogger. Or, you may just be new to this whole blogging thing. Well, I have a couple of ways you can remember to come back to my blog. If you're a Google Blogger, you can click on "follow" in the right side column to become a follower of my blog.

Probably the best way for everyone to make sure you don't miss a post of mine is to "subscribe by email." You just click on "subscribe to Shots n' Thoughts by email" in the right side column and add your email address. You will then receive a confirmation email. Then, just click the link in your email to activate your subscriptions and you will begin receiving updates each time I post.

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I hope this makes sense to you all. I know some people aren't as used to computers and blogs and such, so I wanted to post about his option for those who don't already know about it.

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Thanks for reading!