bundle of rays

Toured Bushwick, Brooklyn today with a friend. Learned a lot about graffiti and its history. Loved it.

spent the day in Mystic, CT with the fam!

On vacation this week and trying to get some practice in around the 'burbs.  The Cascades at Lake Mohegan is a place I hadn't been to in years -- not for at least 20 years.  As I was driving around with my nephew trying to think of a place to go walk around and take some photos, this place suddenly popped into my head.  It's great for dogs and we encountered a ton of them along the various trails.  Maybe I will bring Toby this weekend.  I have a feeling he'll run off and get carried away if I take him off leash so I'll have to keep him close with the retractable leash.

I took over 100 photos over the course of two hours and only had a handful that were good.  But, practice, practice, practice.  That's what it takes.  

I still can't believe that view (the second photo) exists in Fairfield.  Crazy.

Tomorrow marks class #5 and our second week using Manual mode.  Since starting this class, I find myself paying much more attention to the light around me, which is good since we've been taught that the very first setting to adjust before you do anything else is your ISO.

I left work a little early today to go take some photos by the water.  I was planning on walking 20 minutes over to the west side but I'm glad I decided to go a little closer to home to take photos.  The 7 train brought me over to Vernon Blvd and a few blocks away from the piers in Long Island City.  The weather was PERFECT and there weren't many people around at 6pm which allowed for a lot of photo taking without heads in the way :)

If the weather is nice on Saturday, I think I'll go back for some more practice and this time will bring my tripod.  I'm itching to take photos and let the shutter stay open so I can get that nice smooth effect on the water.