Photowalk in Old Town Alexandria – Part III

Here are Bill’s photos from last Saturday’s Photowalk in Alexandria VA. The Old Town Alexandria Photowalk led by Jeff Revell was part of the Worldwide Photowalk that took place on August 23.

Of the 50 photographers on the morning photowalk – Bill may have been the only one who wasn’t using a digital camera. He brought his Graflex RB Super D 3″X4″ camera. Since there was a fairly short timeline for getting the photos posted to the Flickr group – Bill decided to use instant film this time. For his black and white photos, Bill used Polaroid ISO 100 Black and White Film. For the color photos, Bill used Fuji ISO 100 Instant film.

One of the boats along the docks in Alexandria.

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

Two of the buildings we passed on the Photowalk

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

Some of the flowers we saw

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

One of the shop owners in Alexandria

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

And finally some of the produce at the Farmers’ Market

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

Bill and I had a great time on the last week’s photowalk. Many photographers have posted their photos from the walk on the Flickr Group. Shawn Duffy and Mark Anderson have also posted some of their photos on their blogs. On Thursday morning, Jeff Revell announced that one of Mark’s photos was the winner of the contest for best photo from the morning walk. Congratulations Mark!

The next photowalk in the DC area will be on September 14 in Gettysburg. Andy Smith from Visual Realia is organizing the Sept 14 event. Bill and I are planning on being there and hope to see lots of other photographers on the 14th as well.

Links – August 29, 2008

Here are some links I found this week – hope you find some useful information in some of them

PhotoAttorney Carolyn Wright has a post on the news that a Judge Requires That You Consider Fair Use Before Sending A DMCA Takedown Notice and a post at Black Star Rising on Understanding Fair Use

The New York Times has an article on Photography as a Weapon

Hyperphocal has posts on Taking Better Pictures with the Rule of Thirds and on RAW vs JPEG

Shutterpad has suggestions for Stabilizing Your Camera Without a Tripod

David duChemin wrote a guest post on Photoshop Insider with some great advice for photographers.

Photowalk in Old Town Alexandria – Part II

Here is the second set of photos from the Photowalk in Old Town Alexandria that Bill and I participated in last Saturday. If you missed the first set of photos, I posted them to our blog on Monday. The Old Town Alexandria Photowalk led by Jeff Revell was part of the Worldwide Photowalk that took place on August 23.

In addition to being a great way to meet other photographers, the photowalks give me a chance to do a different type of photography. Recently, I’ve been photographing mainly landscapes and flowers. I usually use either my 24-105 mm lens or my 100 mm macro lens. I use a tripod at least 90% of the time. My favorite times and places to photograph are when and where there are few if any people around.

On the Photowalk, I was part of a group of 50 photographers walking around a city. I only used one lens this time – my 70-200 mm lens. I’m still learning to use this lens handheld – usually I put it on a tripod for stability. I was really able to relax while I was shooting – I wasn’t worried about getting the perfect exposure or composition. I just focused on getting more comfortable with my lens – and having fun!

About two-thirds of the way through the photowalk – someone remembered that the Old Town Alexandria farmers’ market was on our route. We hurried over for the chance to photograph all the great produce, flowers and art that is sold at the market. Here are several photos I took at the farmers’ market.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Many of the other photographers on the Photowalk have posted their photos from the farmers’ market to the Photowalk Flickr group. Cindy Dyer has some wonderful photos from the farmers’ market on her blog.

As we were finishing up at the farmers’ market – we heard the sound of bagpipes coming up the street and heard that there were people in 19th century costumes in a nearby park. We headed over to Carlyle House where a reenactment of the August 1814 occupation of Alexandria was taken place. On August 29, 1814, during the War of 1812, Alexandria had surrendered to the British Navy. Here are a few of the reenactors in their War of 1812 costumes.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

We’ll be posting Bill’s photos from the Alexandria Photowalk later in the week.

Photowalk in Old Town Alexandria

On Saturday, Bill and I participated in a photowalk in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia. It was one of a few hundred photowalks around the world that took place on August 23 as part of the Worldwide Photo Walk. Over 8000 photographers registered for the various walks. Jeff Revell led both the morning and evening photowalks in Alexandria. There were about 50 photographers on the morning walk – and Jeff was expecting an equal number for the evening photowalk.

Photowalks are great fun. How they work is that someone announces that they are holding a photowalk at a certain date and location. They decide on a walking route (usually a couple of miles – with the ending point near the starting point) and figure out where the photographers can get something to eat at the end. Photowalks usually last a couple of hours – ending with a meal where all the photographers check out and share the photos they’ve taken. The organizer also sets up a Flickr group where people who attended the Photowalk can share their photos. What participants do is walk, talk and take lots of photos.

One aspect Bill and I really enjoy about the photowalks is the opportunity to meet other photographers in the area. There are some fantastic photographers in the DC area – and we’ve had a chance to meet several of them on the photowalks. Many of the local photobloggers participate in the photowalks. On Saturday – we finally met Shawn Duffy, Mark Anderson and Cindy Dyer in person. I’ve been reading their blogs for months – so it was nice to finally have a face to put with their names and photos. Cindy already has her photos from the Photowalk posted on her blog – Mark has posted some of his on Flickr. It’s always neat to see what caught other photographers eye as they followed the same walking route that we did.

Here are the first set of my photos from the Photowalk. I’ll be posting more photos from both Bill and I later in the week.

The Old Town Alexandria Photowalk started at Founders Park. We walked along the Potomac River, up through town, spent some time at the Farmer’s market and then ended up at the Torpedo Factory for lunch.

As Jeff Revell was doing the introductory briefing on Saturday morning, his phone rang. It was Scott Kelby – author of the Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers and organizer of the Worldwide Photowalk.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

We started walking along the Potomac River and eventually got to the plaza and dock area behind the Torpedo Factory. The ropes on the guardrails used by the city of Alexandria to keep people from falling into the water caught my eye.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

This is the Cherry Blossom – one of the boats that gives tours on the Potomac River. I loved the look of the paddle wheel and the wrought iron work on the boat. Several photographers took some great photos of the same boat and have already posted them on the Flickr group for the Photowalk.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

A couple of subjects that lots of photographers photograph on the Photowalks are cute kids and dogs. In Alexandria – I found two little boys playing with a dog. The three were happy to pose for me.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

After photographing in the dock area for a while, we headed into town. Objects in store display windows can be really fun to photograph. Here’s a pair of ducks – one wearing a sombrero – I spotted in the bicycle store window.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Just down the street from the bike shop, a small patch of sunflowers were growing against a building wall. I think just about every photographer on the photowalk took at least one photo of the sunflowers. Here’s my sunflower photo.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

When I spotted the headline on the paper – I had to photograph Saturday’s Washington Post in one of the newspaper boxes on the street. There were other things happening in the world besides 8000 photographers going out for walk.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I’m not sure what this post is for – but I loved the design. My guess is that its for bicyclists to have a safe place to chain their bikes to.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

My final photo for today is a cute little bunny decoration in a planter on someone’s front porch.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I’ll post my photos from the farmers’ market and the War of 1812 reenactors on Wednesday, and Bill’s photos on Saturday. Hope you enjoy the photos.

Eastern Neck National Wildlife Refuge

In June, I spent a few days on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. One of the places I spent some time was at Eastern Neck National Wildlife Refuge in Rock Hall. Of the National Wildlife Refuges on the DelMarVa peninsula, Eastern Neck seems to have the fewest people visiting – which means it is quiet and peaceful for photography.

Eastern Neck has all sorts of wonderful marshes full of birds. I tried photographing many of the birds I saw. The visit proved that I still really need to work on my photographing of birds with my 100-400 lens. There’s a reason you aren’t seeing any photos of birds in this blog post – I deleted them all.

One of my favorite places for photography at Eastern Neck is the butterfly garden behind the old visitor center. On the refuge maps – this is the area with the Bayview-Butterfly trail.

Here are some of my photos from my most recent trip to Eastern Neck National Wildlife Refuge.

This is one of ponds on the road out to the butterfly garden. Everything was so green and lush the day I was there.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I was able to photograph two different types of butterflies at the butterfly garden. The first is a Zebra Swallowtail Butterfly – perched on the orange flowers of some butterfly weed.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

The second butterfly is a Monarch Butterfly on a purple coneflower.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

A new trail has opened recently at Eastern Neck – an interpretive nature trail leads from the visitor center to the marsh. At the shore, there is a photography blind and a wildlife observation platform. Native plants have been planted alongside the trail. I photographed a pair of dragonflies along this trail.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I had a wonderful time at Eastern Neck National Wildlife Refuge – and am looking forward to heading back there in the fall and in the winter when the migrating birds including tundra swans return to the refuge.

Links – August 22, 2008

Here a few sites we found this week – hope you enjoy them

PhotoAttorney has an excellent post on The Importance of Conditions in Free Licenses

If you don’t yet had a copy of Bert Krages’ The Photographers Rights – be sure to download it.

William Neill has a post on Luminous Landscape on Thinking in Themes

Beyond Megapixels has a post on Macro Photography 101 Part 1and Part 2

TWIP has information on File Format Basics – JPEG

Beyond PhotoTips has some Obvious Street Photography Tips

Photo Nights for Charity has information about an upcoming event in the Washington/Baltimore area with David Hobby of Stobist

TED has a video How Photography Connects Us To the World with David Griffen of National Geographic

Black Star Rising has a post on How To Send a DMCA Takedown Notice

Looking ahead to fall color – The Foliage Network should be really helpful in figuring out when and where to be photographing this fall. I’m hoping to get back to the Smoky Mountains in October to do some photography.

Plagiarism Today has a post on Tineye: Protecting Images, Prevening Orphans

HyperPhocal has 6 Tips for Getting Started as a Pro

Digital Photography School has a post explaining the differences between Full Frame and Crop Sensors

A Photo Editor has a post on why SEO Is Not Just for Wedding Photographers Anymore

If you are in Maryland or Pennsylvania – be sure to check out the Susquehanna River Birding and Wildlife Trail site. It has info on lots of great places to explore.

PhotoWalkPro has suggestions on What to Shoot on a PhotoWalk – a very timely post since the World Wide Photowalk is this weekend. Bill and I will be participating in the Saturday morning Photowalk in Alexandria VA. We’re looking forward to meeting several other DC area photo bloggers who will be on the morning walk including Mark Anderson, Shawn Duffy and Cindy Dyer.

Great Falls on the Potomac River

One of our favorite waterfalls to photograph is Great Falls on the Potomac River. Located about 15 miles from Washington, DC, Great Falls is just a short drive away and every time we visit – the photographic opportunities are different.

Great Falls can be photographed from two National Parks – the Great Falls Park in Virginia and the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Park in Maryland. To see the falls from the C&O Canal Park – you need to enter the park at the Great Falls Tavern Area at 11710 MacArthur Blvd in Potomac.

Here are some of our favorite photos of Great Falls.

The first photo is one I took earlier this summer from Virginia. It shows the area above the falls.

Above Great Falls (c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Bill took this photo in late April a couple of years ago a few days after some major spring storms. The water level was very high as the runoff from the storms came down the river from West Virginia.

Great Falls (c) 2005 William Lawrence

A couple of months later, Bill returned to the falls to photograph them with a lower water level. He went out to park early on a Saturday morning to figure out exactly how long after sunrise the sun hit the rocks. The next morning, he photograph this view of Great Falls from the first overlook on the Virginia side of the river.

Great Falls II (c) 2005 William Lawrence

I took this next photo earlier this summer. We’d had some big rain storms so the water was once again rushing over the rocks at the center of the river.

Great Falls Rocks (c) 2008 Patty Hankins

The final photo is one taken from the overlook on Olmstead Island on the Maryland side of the river. It shows the falls with the trees in Virgina ablaze with fall color.

Autumn at Great Falls (c) 2006 Patty Hankins

Bill and I are out at Great Falls pretty regularly – so I’m sure we’ll be posting more photos of the area in the future. Hope you enjoy them.

Links – August 15, 2008

Here are a few links to sites we found this week – hope you find them interesting

Hyperphocal has posts on 7 Tips for Photographing Pets and Copyright Registration – Who Needs It

Digital Photography School has a post on Understanding Shutter Speed and one on what to pack for Travel Photography

Andre Gunther has a post on the 10 Most Common Photographic Mistakes

TWIP has a post on Photographing Icons – They Matter

Shawn Duffy has launched a new blog – DC Photo Guide - with all sorts of info about photography in the Washington DC area.

Berdan’s Sharpshooters Firing Demonstration at Antietam

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

As promised in Tuesday’s post – here are the rest of our photos of Berdan’s Sharpshooters from last weekend at Antietam National Battlefield. These photos are all from the firing demonstration that took place behind the visitor center.

The demonstration began with some history about the Sharpshooters and explanations of the differences between the uniforms and weapons of the sharpshooters and infantry men. David Rider – 1st Sergeant of Company C 2nd Regiment explained that it took sharpshooters only four steps to load their breech loading rifles – while infantry took twelve steps to load their muzzle loading rifles. Members of the company then demonstrated how sharpshooters and infantrymen loaded and fired their weapons standing, kneeling and in a prone position. The sharpshooter was done with all three of his shots at about the time the infantryman was firing his first shot.

Here are two photos of the sharpshooter loading and firing his rifle in the prone position. There were only than twelve seconds between the time I took the first and second photos.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I have just one photo to share of the infantry man loading his muzzle loading rifle. I think the photo tells you everything you need to know about how difficult this had to have been in the middle of a battle.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Soldiers literally had to lie on their backs and put their gun between their legs to load their rifles in a prone position!

The second firing demonstration illustrated how the sharpshooters advanced and retreated during a battle. They would start out in a line – with several yards between soldiers. Then they would alternate advancing and covering the other soldiers from enemy fire. So while one was advancing and firing, his neighbor would be reloading and preparing to advance. This was a very different method of advancing than the line of soldiers marching forward with guns and bayonets used by the infantry.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

The firing demonstrations lasted less than half an hour but during that time we learned an awful lot about how the Union sharpshooter regiments functioned during the Civil War. If you ever get a chance to see a demonstrations like this at one of the National Parks – be sure to check it out.

Finally, we have a few more portraits of the members of Berdan’s Sharpshooters.

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

This reenactor is wearing an infantryman’s uniform and carrying a muzzle loading rifle.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

In this next photo, you can see the backpack carried by the sharpshooters. It was made of leather, with the fur left on it. The pack was curved so that it fit better against the wearers back.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Berdan’s Sharpshooters at Antietam National Battlefield

Berdan’s Sharpshooters Company C 2nd Regiment (c) 2008 William Lawrence

This past weekend, Bill and I headed back out to the Antietam National Battlefield in Sharpsburg, MD. There were several sites in the park that I hadn’t yet managed to photograph the way I wanted to. After photographing some of the monuments and Burnside Bridge, we noticed there was some activity behind Dunker’s Church.

We headed over and discovered that Company “C” 2nd Regiment of Berdan’s Sharpshooters had set up a small camp and would be doing firing demonstrations during the day. Seven of the members of the living history and reenactment group were at the park on Saturday.

We spent some time talking with and photographing them in their camp. Listening to and asking questions of living history volunteers is a unique way to learn about history. It’s one thing to read about civil war regiments, their uniforms and their lives in a book. You get an entirely different understanding of soldiers’ lives when you see the size tents they used and the heavy uniform coats they wore year round. Then see the amount of gear they carried and feel the weight of one of their sharpshooter rifles – and you begin to realize what you’ve missed by just reading about history.

If you’re ever at one of the National Parks where there is a living history demonstration taking place – but sure to check it out. Most reenactor groups, including Berdan’s Sharpshooters, have websites with their schedules on them if there is a particular group you are interested in seeing and learning about.

Here are some of the photos Bill and I took in the camp area around Dunker Church.

Flags raised beside Dunker Church.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

I think there has been a coffee pot over the fire at every Civil War reenactment I’ve ever seen. Gotta wonder if anyone really drinks the coffee they brew?

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

Originally, all members of Berdan’s Sharpshooters were issues leather leggings as part of their uniforms. Apparently, many replaced their leggings with boots as quickly as they could – or at least when the leggings wore out. One soldier wrote home describing the leggings as “three day gators” – a day to put them on, a day to wear them, and a day to take them off. Imagine having to put these leggings on quickly in the middle of the night.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

The remaining photos are single and group portraits we took of the reenactors.

Be sure to look at the buttons on the jacket – they are made of black rubber from Goodyear. The Sharpshooters wore rubber buttons rather than shiny metal buttons as a form of camouflage.

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 Patty Hankins

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

(c) 2008 William Lawrence

In case you are wondering how we got the antique look to so many of the photos – we used Nik’s Silver Efex Pro software to create the aged look. Bill’s photos were taken with his Graflex SLR on either Polaroid or Fuji Instant Film, and he used the Antique Plate I style to get the darkened edges on his photos. My photos were taken with my Canon DSLR and I used the Antique Plate II style to get the lighter edges on my photos.

I’m hoping to get some of our photos from the firing demonstration up on the blog later in the week.