This was my first successful 360 picture of the night sky – previously only seen on facebook until I figured out how to get the 360 degree panoramas to display on the family site. If there is another clear night this winter we will have another go!
Nature at Bass Lake
We’ve been back from vacation for a couple of weeks now but I’m still working through a bit of a back log on getting pictures off of the camera. Here are few pictures of nature around Bass Lake both large and small. The panorama picture of the storm passing to the north of the lake is one of my favorite pictures. Enjoy!
Storm over Bass Lake
Storm over Bass Lake
View of the new house from the lake shore
View from the back side
IMG_0825.jpg
IMG_0588.jpg
Crystal took this one out by the swamp. A frog and a bee on the same milkweed plant.
Fungus Among Us
Wild flower on Bass Lake
The profile is his best side.
I was getting close to him and he stated to take an aggressive stance. Seconds after this picture he went for me.
A wolf spider giving me the stink eye. Eight of them.
Athens
Last week Crystal and I attended the NESA Fall Leadership conference in Athens. Kai and Nora stayed in the capable hands of Puraida and, though we missed them, it was nice to have a trip with just the two of us. I lugged around my big Nikon so was able to take some multi-exposure shots and then render them as HDR images. This is much easier to do well with a tripod but the days were bright which made things a little easier. Enjoy the pictures!
The Winter Wonderland
Our winter vacation back to Danbury Wisconsin is over (as are the lengthy flights home). It was wonderful to visit family and friends and connect during the holidays. Playing in the snow and sitting next to a fire while the snow fell outside was a treat as well. As a parting homage to Wisconsin winter here are a few more outdoor shots that I took over the last month.
Let it snow!
While more snow falls I thought it was a good chance to post some pictures of the last major snowfall a week ago!
At Grandma and Grandpa Wiemanns’
Summer Photoshop
Well our early summer vacation has drawn to a close. We have successfully made the transatlantic trip once again with little incident unless you count Kai’s meltdown in Amsterdam when he was going on almost 20 hours with no sleep.
Below are a series of photoshopped or otherwise enhanced images that I took over this vacation at our house in Wisconsin. I still have a few more galleries of different family visits that I will post in the coming days so stay tuned!
Summer 08 – Panoramas and HRD
This summer I took a number of panorama and HDR (High Dynamic Range) shots. Panorama shots I get by taking multiple pictures from the exact same vantage point and then stick them together into a single seamless (If it is done right) image on the computer. The HDR ones can be a bit more fun but requires multiple images taken at different exposures of the exact same scene (which is why there are no action HDR shots).  Normally I use a tripod to keep the camera steady between shots but I left a critical piece back in Saudi so that was no good. I ended up taking these by taking three images in rapid succession hoping the camera didn’t move too much between them.  You can learn more about HDR photography here.
Bangkok Photography
I took a few fancy pictures while we were in Bangkok including a few panoramas that I stitched together and a couple of High Dynamic Range images. Enjoy!
Manifa in the Rain
I continue to play around with the blog format and I’m having lots of fun and learning a lot as well. ((Like how to include footnotes in my posts. I also hope that the bugs are worked out of the subscribe option for new posts–I don’t think a notice when out last time. If you’ve subscribed already, thanks! If not, you can use the link at the top of the page if you want to get on the list.)) Right now I still use my old web design program to manage files and create the layout for these posts; however, that is probabably mostly out of habit. I can get done all of the things I need to get done through the web interface so it won’t be long before I retire Dreamweaver at least for this site.
In other news we’ve been getting a little more rain lately. Mostly overcast but with a few light showers on and off which is nice (especially when it has
n’t been as cold)–however, it looks like this is going to end soon and things will clear up.  I don’t have any new pictures of the rain but I did take this panorama shot a couple of weeks ago when the kids were playing outside with thier umbrellas. On the left side is the edge of our garage and on the right is the edge of our house on the other side so this is pretty much the full view of the front yard of Manifa 650. If you look on the left side you can see two Kai’s and one and half Nora’s. I built the panorama by stiching together multiple images that I took from the same spot. While I stayed still the kids did not so they show up multiple times.