Gear Reviews, Tech & Photography
My Photography
Friday night I went to Omaha to join some photographers doing night photography. One of the highlights for me was steel wool photography. This is something I had always heard about but never tried, well Friday was the night and here are the results.
The process is very easy, we unrolled a pad of steel wool, placed it inside a wire whisk that had a string tied on the end. You then lit the steel wool on fire and moved it around while your camera’s exposure was going.
Last week we had some extremely cold weather in Nebraska. My garage is pretty well insulated but I sometimes get ice on the window. When I came home from work I noticed some very large crystals had formed. The neighbors side house light provided the light. I posted this to the Nebraska Through The Lens group on Facebook not expecting much and was blown away. In 15 minues I had 100 likes, in 24 hours just at 500 likes and quite a few comments.
Pretty Lights came to Lincoln on November 15th as part of his Analog Future Tour. Unlike other electronic artists, this show had real live musicians playing along with Pretty Lights. The keyboards and horn players were pretty cool. This was a more laid back show in comparison to Bassnectar but this is to be expected. It was a long show at over 3 hours of music playing. I enjoyed it for sure. All photos and video below were taken with my Samsung Galaxy Note 2.
On Friday, October 27, 2013 I was able to go see @Bassnectar in concert at Pershing in Lincoln. Having enjoyed Bassnectar for awhile and hearing about his great live shows, it was exciting to see it come to my home town. The show had some really unique things, and in total it was great. The sound was unbelievable.
Security
The security to the show was nearly as extensive as at an airport. They required everyone to take everything out of pockets, have a pat down (not as invasive as an airport), and lift up your shirt to look at the waistband. Despite this, they allowed sealed water bottles in (they took the caps at the door) and bags after looking in them as well. My observation while waiting in line was this caused a lot of people to consume anything they were hoping to get into the show before going in. This did cut down a lot on substance use inside the concert, but of course the concert still smelled like an EDM concert.
Koan Sound
Usually opening acts don’t get much attention, Koan Sounds was the opposite of that. They got the crowd going and were a surprise for me. Being from the UK, their music was a bit different and more like a club. I am definitely going to check them out.
Bassnectar/The Sound
Bassnectar’s set was over 2 hours of constant music and dancing. He had 1 giant screen behind him supported with 4 smaller pillar boards on the sides. The video was very colorful and synced to songs. Some were random fractal designs, others were moving video or stylized bits from music videos.
The music was a great selection of new and old Bassnectar. One of the things I like about Bassnectar’s music is it incorporates pieces from lots of styles of music, and this showed in what he played. It was similar to some of his recent mixtapes. It’s the Bassnectar we know and expect to hear.
The sound quality was unbelievably clear and dangerously loud. It brought new meaning to “feel the music”. I had read a little on the Meyer Sound system being used. I thought some of it was hype, but the system lived up to its reputation. Never before have I been to any concert that was as loud, but super clear, as this one was. You could feel the music in your body way more than you typically would at a rock show. As a long time follower of Bassnectar on twitter, I knew that he recommended ear plugs; I was very glad I had my Etymotic Research ER20 in my pocket. These are unique in that they evenly block volume in sound without distortion or changing pitch. They make it so you can talk to someone near you without yelling. My guess is this was the loudest and most bass heavy concert that the old Pershing building had ever seen.
All photos below were taken with my Note 2.
In August of 2012 I visited Yellowstone National Park with my family for a short vacation. The weather ended up being great and it was really a photographers dream trip. There was a lot of people but we really did not have to wait in line much around the park. I took a ton of photos but narrowed them down quite a bit to my favorites. I have 5 photos posted below and then more in my Gallery Link. The new gallery is HTML5 so it’s compatible with all of your mobile devices!
Tonight was the Transit of Venus. This is where Venus comes in line between the Sun and Earth. As a result you can see a small black dot appear on the sun. This is Venus. This will be the last time this happens in any of our life times with the next one happening in year 2117. After work I stopped by the observetory to look through a telescope and had kind of given up at trying to photograph it but after a bike ride I decided to give it a go after someone on twitter asked if I had any photos. I am glad I did because the results turned out pretty well for the equipment I have.
I shot these with a Canon 7D and Sigma 70-200mm lens. I used live view on the 7D so I would be looking at the LCD to not damage my eyes by viewing the sun directly or through the magnification of the lens. The results are what you see below.
Clicking on each image will load a larger version that allows you to see Venus better.
Today was the Annular Eclipse. Lincoln did not experience a full eclipse, because the sunset before it was complete. I was pretty happy with the results I got with my 7D and 70-200mm Lens.
Today was the first major snow storm in Lincoln. Predictions called for up to 4 to 6″ but in the south part of Lincoln we only got about 2-3″. I made a timelapse video of the storm and of me scooping the driveway. I took about 750 individual frames totally 8.5gb to make this. The music is Emancipator – First Snow (Ooah Remix).
Make sure to watch this in 720P or 1080P at full screen!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vh6cNPKYcng?hd=1