“A good snapshot keeps a moment from running away.” ― Eudora Welty
Author: circadianreflections
My name is Deborah Zajac. I'm a photographer living in Nevada at the base of the Eastern Sierras. I am a passionate nature, landscape, night/astro photographer. I shoot predominately in color and use Nikon Digital Cameras, and lenses.
I hope you enjoy seeing some of the photos I've taken while on my travels.
Please feel free to leave a comment I'd love to hear from you.
I had been looking forward to a good friend coming to town for months. We planned a reunion of sorts. Big Jay, myself, Downhill Dali, Tj, and the Cheeky Monkey spent the day up in Northern CA shooting the landscape then we met some more Photographer friends here for a Night shoot. We arrived early enough to catch both the high tide, and sunset.
The Point Reyes is an abandoned wreck that is quite a tourist attraction in this little town along Hwy 1.
Nikon D300s| Nikkor 17-35 mm @ 17mm| f9| 1/60 sec| ISO 200| Manual Mode| Tripod
Inverness, California, Point Reyes National Seashore; Wreck of the Point Reyes
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Independence Day in the United States is just around the corner. On July 4th families and friends will get together to celebrate this holiday. Plans are being made for pick-up games of baseball, volleyball, or swimming. There will be picnics, and barbeques will be fired up. Dads all over will be grilling hot dogs, and burgers, watermelons will be split, seed spitting contests will ensue, and the colors of the day will be Red, White, and Blue.
When the sun drops beyond the horizon the celebrating doesn’t stop. Countless cities and towns will put on a great show of fireworks, and many families and friends will be gathered in their favorite viewing spot to watch the show. Many of us will want to photograph these.
Steven Christenson an avid night, and astro-photographer who is a longtime resident of the San Francisco Bay Area shares with us one of his experiences about photographing fireworks, and gives us some tips on how we can capture these stars bursting in air .
Rain on Golden Palms
Photograph by Steven Christenson
Q. Tell us about this location.
Steven: Oyster Point Marina in San Francisco, CA. It was a local radio station KFOG event called Kaboom. An annual outdoor concert held in May. In addition to the concert there is a Fireworks show which is synchronized to a soundtrack broadcasted by the station.
The reasons for choosing this location were twofold: 1. Get far enough away to be able to fill the frame and ideally somewhere that we could be sure to have an unobstructed view (nobody could get in front of us without getting wet!), and 2. Get reflections in the water. HOWEVER, to get good reflections, you really need to be well above water level and it helps if the water is calm. We had roaring wind that day!
And it doesn’t hurt to make it a social occasion! I had set up a Photography Meet-up event around this KFOG event. Anne De Lemos, a photographer in our group would have become a Popsicle if people hadn’t brought extra blankets.
Q. What time of day?
Steven: Just after dark at 9:20 P.M.
Q. How difficult was this to capture?
Steven: Fireworks are always challenging, especially if you’re a first timer at taking them on. Fortunately, I had cut my teeth on several prior fireworks events, including the KFOG Kaboom event the prior year. Manual exposure is the only way to go, and I sometimes fiddle slightly with the settings after chimping a few shots (i.e. looking at the histograms).
Q. What camera and lens did you use for this shot?
Steven: A Canon EOS 40D with a 70-200mm f4L IS USM lens
Q. How did you expose for this shot?
Steven: 121mm, f11, 2.5 seconds, ISO 200, Manual Mode
I learned that two things are important:
1) A relatively small aperture – this increases the contrast since the fireworks are very bright,
2) A reasonably short exposure (1-6 seconds).
The not too long exposure allows enough time for the firework to bloom, but not so much time that later fireworks or overall glow weaken the contrast in the shot. I usually fire the shutter as soon as I see the burst. The lag time between when I see the burst and when I press the cable release button is just about perfect to get the firework bloom just as it has expanded enough to be noticeable, but is not completely formed. Another shooting strategy is to continuously expose 2-4 second shots. Sooner or later a few good ones result. On this night I used two cameras and both shooting tactics. This image was from my human actuated shutter, however.
Use a sturdy tripod, and a remote cable release or remote to trigger your shutter to avoid shake.
Portuguese & Azorean Style California Bloodless Bullfights
Photograph by Deborah M. Zajac
I first read about these Bloodless Bullfights in California 5 or 6 yrs ago. Since that moment I’ve had attending one on my “Bucket List”. When I was a girl I would watch the Bullfights on TV while other kids were watching cartoons. I loved the drama, the costumes, and the crowds shouting Ole! Recently I went to a Portuguese Bloodless Bullfight. Bloodless because in CA it’s illegal to kill the bull. They use a “velcro dart” to stab the bull. The bull wears a large piece of fabric on its neck that also has Velcro to keep the “dart” somewhat secure.
I had so much fun. The costumes are as colorful, and fancy as I had hoped, the horses are magnificent, the Matador, and the bulls are passionate, and thrilling! I even shouted Ole!
There is an order to how things are done I’ve learned.
First come the Forcados-(Forcado means Pitchfork) Eight men that line up to face the bull and stop him in his tracks. The lead man faces the bull and draws his attention then he eggs him on to charge him, and perform the “Pega de Cara” (face catch). Literally the lead man takes a full hit of the charging bull who grabs the face and head of the bull then the other men jump on to stop the bull’s charge.
Photograph by Deborah M. ZajacPhotograph by Deborah M. ZajacPhotograph by Deborah M. Zajac
Once the bull has been stopped all but one man let go of the bull. The last man has the bull by the tail. The bull chases the man around and around in a circle trying to catch him, but does not succeed.
Photograph by Deborah M. Zajac
These men are not professional bullfighters and have no training or credentials for becoming a Forcado, but they must follow the traditions of old the moment they step into the arena.
My husband whom I call Heman has been hiking a lot with me these last 2 months. We’ve hiked to Black Mountain 2 times, and up and down the PG&E trail quite a few times so I thought he might like to hike up to Mission Peak. He’s never done it before after-all.
Today he asked me if I wanted to hike up to Vista Point this afternoon, and I said how about Mission Peak instead. He hesitated a moment then said, “Why not.”
I took him up Horse Heaven Trail, and we descended via the Peak Trail.
He felt great. I didn’t. Horse Heaven nearly beat me today. I kept going and made it up to take this photo of Heman. I call him Heman because he can open jars with his bare hands! He doesn’t have to bang the lid with a knife, or some other blunt object, and he can do anything that requires muscles and strength, and he can lift me up over his head! Yes, both he and my son have on more than one occasion lifted me up as if I were a bar bell to the ceiling. I think the name suits him to a T. 🙂
Hike details:
My time to the Top- 2h4m
Total hike time- 3h24m
started at 328ft
Total ft gained- 2,236ft
Total Miles- 6.45
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