My Prehistoric Restaurant Experience

One great aspect of my trip to Orlando was a chance to meet two more runners, one of whom I’ve known online for a long time, Petra. She and I jokingly refer to each other as cousins, and online sisters and in one time she even sent me a card addressed to “My best friend I’ve never met”. Petra, and her husband, Scott, wanted to eat at Downtown Disney. We both thought it would be easy to meet, get on a bus Downtown Disney (a restaurant and shopping center) and meet. We decided to meet at T-Rex named for the Tyranosaurus Rex dinosaur. 

At 12:30 Petra called and we both thought we could get quickly there from our then current locations, I at the Shades of Green hotel, and she and Scott from Wide World of Sports where they were picking up their race packets. It turns out we all were given misinformation on which buses went where, all had to go back to Disney resorts and start over and arrived more or less at the place an hour later, very hungry. 

Both the outside and inside have many T-Rex dinosaurs, one large one roared at intermittent times. 

While underneath him (her?) there was a stagnant baby Rex. 

As many centuries are represented in prehistoric times, the restaurant has red areas (representing the arid times) and blue areas (representing the Ice Ages. 

I took so many pictures that soon Scott was asking if I always took so many photos or was it just the restaurant that was inspiring me. As I was starting to answer, Petra answered for me that as a photographer, yes, I am always taking photos. 

The decor was unbelievable intricate and beautiful. 

This undersea kingdom of lights was both beautiful and a bit frightening to behold. I was actually glad we were put in the Ice Age section where a small wooly mammoth by our table while jerky and noisy, wasn’t even a little scary. 

Finally I had Scott take a photo of my friend and I. Though I can’t make us look like prehistoric creatures, I can make our photo look like it might have been published in a newspaper printed long long ago, so here is a black and white version of Danielle and Petra, having met in person at last. 

Blue Moon Photography Mission

(This is blogged a bit out of order as the things on this post actually happened before the race that I blogged about on Friday. Additionally this is being autoposted for me, written while I was still in California. If you’re reading this on the day it’s posted, I’m in Florida training for the Walt Disney World Marathon (to be blogged later).

When I first got the Meetup Invitation to be at Ocean Beach (at the Sloat parking lot of the San Francisco Zoo), I chuckled to myself and wondered how anyone would get up that early considering it was planned for New Year’s Eve. As time passed I realized that even though I had the New Year’s Resolution run scheduled just a few hours later I could, if I went to bed very early on New Year’s Eve, get up and shoot this event and still make it home to San Jose to shower, change and get to the race with time to spare.

So when it was 8:00 p.m. I went to bed (though I was unable to get to sleep till 9:00 p.m., waking up only briefly to get a Happy New Year text a little after midnight, then sleeping until 2:00 a.m. when my friend Chris heeding my Facebook request for people to call me early to help me wake up called to say “It’s 2:00 a.m., do you know where your friends are?”. In all fairness Gaius called also, yet at 3:30 a.m. I was almost at my destination, not sleeping.

I wasn’t sure if it would be too dark to shoot our goal, the beautiful moon, a moon blue in name if not in color, over the water, preferably with its light on the water below.  At first I just used some very long exposures and high ISOs to create images like the one above (1250 ISO, f 2.8, 1 sec).

After shooting horizontal, vertical and tilts (the tilts were inspired by the posts I had to use as a make shift tripod), I started shooting details around me as if art paintings, including:

a fellow photographer’s camera:

the ocean through a rusty divider/crowd control device:

and a series of benches and posts of the type I used as my tripod substitute:

The moon was hidden beyond clouds for a lot of the time. Still as the day approached we got some flashes of light and some pretty blues and grays in the sky.

After a while I started wondering if perhaps I should leave at 5:00 a.m. since the moon wasn’t peeking through a lot. I really debated it and might have left, yet I decided I didn’t want to miss anything in case we got a dramatic image and I heard later that I missed out.

So that was the reason why I was on the beach when a loud bang rang out and some time later another. It turned out that someone decided to ring in the new year by firing a rifle (underwater for safety) twice. One of the photographers in my group had talked with him (though he was unable to talk him out of the idea) so he came back to the cliff area overlooking the beach where most of us had stayed. Soon when a ranger came by he was telling his story and then some unexpected action happened.

First many police arrived in several cars.

They interviewed potential witnesses (including some of us, I hadn’t seen the man or talked to him, though they took down my name and number anyhow), and started surveying the area with lights. At one point they had a light on a fellow photographer down on the beach and asked me to call him, which since not all of us had exchanged names was just me joining them in “hey photographer, come up here, the police want the beach cleared”.

I was having a discussion with myself that went something like, “We’ll they’re here, get some editorial shots now” mixed in with “Just get as close as you can without them taking your camera and memory card away”. I really don’t know if they were noticing what I was doing, I didn’t take that many shots of them, still I was surprised the officer in the below picture didn’t confiscate my camera or at least tell me to stop taking photos.

After I had a few good photos, I decided to ask if I would be able to leave at 6:00 a.m. as scheduled. I was told I would be. Then ten minutes later an officer told us they were temporarily closing the beach, yet we all had to go stand by the bathrooms (which happened to be locked the whole time) and wait. When I tried to explain that I needed to leave for a race I was told I would wait until they dismissed me. Though it seemed like hours, they did come back in about half and hour and tell us we could go back to taking photos, or leave.

Before I left I took a few more images, with the moon now ironically, casting a lot of light. While the moon was never blue, there were was a blue ring around it, and this last shot, straight out of camera, was one of my favorites. I’m glad I got up early and made the trek, the experience was definitely worth it.

Wishing 2009 Goodbye, Things I Learned in 2009

This time of year is one of reflection, and often promises to make something new or different occur in the next year. Less than three months ago, I started blogging again after having taken a break due to some issues with my former blogging platform (the photo above was from one of my first entries) and have been doing it steadily. Along the way I’ve learned some photography things and so I’ll be using my blog entries from this year to help me outline Things I’ve Learned in 2009.

I learned I can start a blog simply with not a lot of ideas in which direction to go, and still be blogging a few months later. I’ve also learned that 3xs a week is good number of times for me to blog.

I’ve learned that weddings performed by a monk in a Buddhist Temple can be very similar in many ways to the Christian weddings I am more familiar with.

I’ve learned even when your plans get rearranged in a major way, for example, losing electricity for your entire party, you can still have a wonderful time.

I’ve learned some children get in planes and become almost instinctive co-pilots, and that by helping volunteer to photograph them in these planes, I can make help them preserve in an instant a memory for a lifetime.

I’ve learned I have some talented and funny amateur comedians as friends, and that it is joy to photograph them. Some images of Raf on stage, crack me up just looking at them, even weeks later.

I’ve learned some images are worth risking finding out what happens if you go beyond a No Tresspassing sign with a group of other camera carrying adventurers.

I’ve learned even if you have a seat facing the back of the stage area at the San Jose Holiday Parade, you can still get some great images if you’re ready for them.

Finally I’ve learned taking the wrong turn can sometimes lead to a great location you didn’t anticipate for a unique background for your photos.

And with that I’d like to acknowledge 2009, on its way out. So with that in mind, my last photo for the year is of a Beanie Baby (Ty named it Loosy, even if it’s supposed to sound phoenetically like Lucy, that’s a weird name) that was put in a box to preserve it. Somehow the goose ended up in a position that looks like it’s trying to salute, so I’ll have her salute 2009, and look forward to welcoming in the new year.

Christmas Services through the years

For many reasons, Christmas is my favorite holidays of the year. One of those reasons is the beautiful pageantry of the Christmas (or now more commonly just prior to Christmas) worship services. Most of those I remember growing up involved candles, a lot of singing and often children acting out the story of the birth of Jesus in a manger. While I don’t unfortunately have any photos of those services from when I lived back East (most likely it didn’t even occur to me to try and take photos then), I have enjoyed capturing the services at Menlo Park Presbyterian several times now.

The photo above and just below are from the Christmas Eve service in 2004, and were shot with my film Leica M7. While I wish I had easy access to the negatives, they are in storage, however, the scanned images come across almost as well. The pictures make me miss the colors of film, yet it’s helpful now to see images as I’m shooting them in very low light situations, like all of those during these services.

This was the last year that Pastor Doug, with the candle below, was one of my pastors, before he took an assignment in Tennesee. This occassion was one of the first times I brought my Leica to church (though I’d shot in the church before with the camera I used more then, the Canon 10D. At the time I’d brought it both to test it out fully, as I had just bought it a month previously I was still learning how most effectively to use it, and to be somewhat stealthy. However, just prior to the service Pastor Doug saw me, I did have a very good seat about 6 rows back, and thanked me for taking photos for them, so I had to concentrate on making them especially good even though I had no idea what the service would entail (every year they change it).

Although I attended the Christmas services between 2005 and 2008, it wasn’t until last year’s services that I returned with camera in hand to take the photos. This time I had my new Leica M8 (which had debuted in 2007, I just took a little longer to adopt it into my camera bag), and had the pleasure of my friend Colleen’s company. We sat roughly in the middle (the best seats we could get for the service) and I shot more with the 90 mm then I had the previous year with film.

That year, having seen several services simliar in their lighting (though not all of their content), I really appreciated the subtle moods created by the lighting and effects.

The finale that year, with the children’s choir joining the adult singers and worship leaders onstage was my favorite of all of theirs. Since we were sitting in the middle I had to dodge standing proud parents in my frame, so the framing of this one isn’t perfect, yet it’s among my favorites for capturing the action and enthusiasm onstage.

This year when Colleen and I planned to return to the service we discussed in advance which one we should go to and decided to go to the earliest service, that at 5:00 p.m. and to get their very early to get good parking and a good seat. While we got an amazing parking spot, even though we were in the church an hour and a half early, all of the seats near the center of the church, in fact most of the seats in general were taken or being saved (in some cases someone was saving all of a row for their friends and family. At first we tried to sit in the middle, several rows back from where we had been last year. Since we had plenty of free time I decided to shoot some detail shots.

For this one I briefly went up on the main stage. The only person to ask for permission was a musician, and while he gave it he probably wasn’t the right person to ask. Still I took this and quickly went back to my seat before anyone could object.

Colleen who knows me very well knew I didn’t think I’d get the type of shots I wanted from our seat, so she asked if I wanted to sit in the balcony. I liked the idea and went to scout us seats and we finally sat there. While waiting for the service to start I asked the soundman who I was sitting right next to what cute things the service would have this year. He told me there would not be an elaborate candle lighting service, nor a children’s choir. There would however fog produced during the song “The Darkest Night of the Year”.

With our seats up high I certainly got a different perspective than I have in years past. In some ways perhaps a ground seat may have been better for capturing this, though I may have had many people in my frame as it was so crowded.

Kwanza Celebration in History Park

On Sunday I attended the first Kwanzaa Celebration at the Zanker African American History House at the San Jose History Park. The celebration included a first floor tour of Zanker House, which is believed to be a house of a Buffalo Soldier (an African American soldier during the Civil War period). 

In the first room of the tour a table was set up with items representing Kwanzaa, a non-religious African American holiday celebrated over 7 days which help children learn about seven principles: unity, self determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economy, purpose, creativity and faith. 

Kwanzaa celebrations include gathering corn, fruit, books (representing education) and lighting the seven candles representing the seven principles (one on each day).

Ellen Rollins served as the main tour guide and I learned much about about Kwanzaa and post Civil War African American History (including those in California) in less than an hour. It was a great experience and I had to photograph her in front of the Kwanzaa table.

At one p.m. the Kwanzaa inspired parade started. Many of the groups were filled with young children dancing in colorful outfits.

One young boy had the honor of carrying the Kwanzaa candle holder, which he did with a solemn expression. Behind him were children carrying the principles. I don’t know if they were able to indicate which ones they wanted to carry, so I don’t know if this was cooincidental, how focussed and determined the young girl looks who was carrying the self determination place card. 

The mime group stopped to perform along the street. 

The parade ended with Santa Claus and two of his elves being escorted to the Children’s Area where they would hear last minute Christmas requests.

San Jose Holiday Parade 2009

It’s unusual for me to be on the other side of the camera, yet on Sunday morning a television camera was pointed at me, and the panned to others in the front section waiting for the San Jose Holiday Parade to begin.

I was sitting shoulder to shoulder with others who had been waiting since 5 a.m. or earlier to get a seat right near where the main stage was, where acts would perform before and in between the paraders. Since I was not one of the lucky VIP ticket holders (who can be seen in the bleachers in the next photo), for a lot of the time the performers had their backs to me (so as also to have the right angles for television capture), however, it was a great show through and through.

When I last attended the parade, two years ago, I’d missed seeing Circ de Soleil. I had thought that they would travel along the parade route, yet apparently they, and other acts only perform on the stage. This year, having asked the right questions at the balloon Inflation party, I knew where to be so I saw it. Every year they bring a different act, this years was one with different poses with yo-yos.

Though Garfield was one of the balloons that was filled with helium at the Inflation Party, I was not able to stick around to see him inflated. On the day of the parade he, along with other balloons including a Jack in the Box, Oscar the Grouch and others, tended to twist and sink in the wind. When this happens the volunteer balloon escorts have to run around in a circle and right the balloon.

Sometimes even ecological messages find their way into the parade:

When I first saw this “Bring Back (Plastic) Bags” float, at first I was confused. I was racking my brain trying to remember if San Jose had banned plastic bags being given out in grocery stores the way San Francisco did. After a few moments I realized instead they were trying to get people to bring their plastic bags back in when they shop, which is a great idea. When I grocery shop I use cloth bags, which in my opinion are much stronger, anyway.

I remember asking where the Imperial Storm Troopers were as I had seen them two years ago in the parade. They did show up, with one wearing a Santa hat as usual. This year they also brought Darth Vader in a tank, and a Darth Vader balloon with a light saber that apparently had not fully inflated.

Many of the acts were floats with dancers including Harley Davidson’s Toys for Big Boys float and the United States Marine Corp’s Toys for Tots float.

One of the best parts about being so close to the stage was that the performers often came up close to us.  I especially enjoyed seeing Sharkie come riding out with the special Fire Department / San Jose Sharks Fire Engine.

There was also singing and dancing for a finale that involved dancers from six different groups. All the acts had had some confetti on them when they finished. The confetti just kept raining down at the end and these young ladies kept dancing through it all. What a great performance and parade it was.

Urban Exploration: Mission # 1

“Do you have a camera, tripod, dark clothes and a healthy sense of adventure?” From the moment I saw the opening line on the Meetup group, I was intrigued.  Featuring small exploration groups to abandoned, fenced in, and roped off areas sounded like a great opportunity even as the site warned off the possibilities of slippery areas, collapsing roofs, broken glass, guard dogs and more.

When I first signed up for the group they had not yet had their first mission (meetup), however, it was scheduled for a night when I had a previous commitment. I was surprised and delighted when the group rescheduled to another night and emailed a confirmation as soon as I got the email.

True to the spirit of the group, we were in areas that were open to the public and danger free only when we first met up at our secret location, a closed business and its nearby small public park in San Francisco.  This photo above, which shows our leader on the dock walking back to us after trying to determine if the person on the dock was part of our group or not (he wasn’t), was the only one of my favorites taken while we were at a place open to the public.

Though we had seven adventurers sign up, only four people showed up.  It was a great number to have people to walk with, talk to, and also keep it to a manageable size. We got to our location by walking around a fence, climbing down into very slippery rocks and over a small ledge. The photos I took were worth every second of brief slipping on rocks, freezing cold (I should have worn thicker socks) walking slow and clutching my equipment protectively.

I haven’t shot enough night photography, so I really explored changing ISOs and shutter speed times to make for some differences in colors, moods and tones in the photos. These two with some small changes show quite a difference in color and tone.

These two with their man made rainbow colors, and motion of rising steam, are among my very favorites of the night.

I’m a big fan of artistic graffiti, particularly when it’s very detailed and colorful. Since the areas we were in were technically off-limits to the public, this meant the artists who did this work, and I do consider them to be fellow artists, made their creations without knowing if anyone would see and appreciate them. I definitely did snapping photos of this as well.

One work that really touched me was this piece with the contrast of the overlying rock and the elaborately painted, possibly spray painted, rock formations below. I’m still not sure if the artist or artists responsible climbed into the hole and made them or, less likely, yet possible, created them and lowered them into the hole.

I wanted just the right angle and closeup of this piece, so I took other photos.  At one point I got so close I was worried I might fall in, yet, I was able to maintain my balance and distance to stay above ground.

Sometimes the simplest pieces of artwork can be the most meaningful. As someone who has friends who have found their way back from drug and alcohol abuse, I had to take photos of this from several angles,  ironically choosing a simple one to bring back the message. I wish the artist who created this (along of course with my friends), continued success on their sobriety.

One thing I learned from my experiences as a photojournalist, was to make sure to look around at every angle of your surroundings and try to take photos of your background from many different perspectives.  Though our main focus was the ships and graffiti, behind us was the long fence topped with barbed wire, blocking off a busy road and several urban buildings. This one while light looked kind of desolate and reminded me a bit of the Stephen King movie “The Stand”.

The column of different colored windows on the structure, perhaps a hotel, contrasted with the other colors on the buildings, really caught my attention.

Overall, the trip was not too dangerous. We did get spotted by people through the fence, mostly joggers. There were no guard dogs, or security guards, thought this was set up to be a trip of only moderate danger as it is just the first one.

Though the main focus of the trip was landscape photography, I did want one quick portrait of our leader. I really enjoyed this exploration and look forward to other, possibly more dangerous, treks with the group.

Christmas in the Park – 30th Year in San Jose

I’m a big fan of San Jose’s Christmas in the Park having gone at least once every year since I moved to California 13 years ago. It’s an event in which local non-profit groups,businesses, and high schools get to adopt and decorate a tree in a creative fashion, which is displayed with others in downtown. Non-profit groups and high schools are given the trees, with a few of each chosen by lottery. The businesses need to purchase trees for $400 (they receive a placard identifying them as sponsor near the tree), the money collected funds college scholarships for art students.

The first time I went it was with a friend with two small pugs, one of whom was a little too clever and got off his leash and ran through the crowds. That was the last year I’ve been with a dog, it’s really not a good event for them, that aside, each year I’ve gone with one or more friends and been very impressed with all the creativity.

This year I went with Colleen and the very first tree we came to was one for the quite recognizable characters of the movie, Up. While sometimes it feels like I’m the only person who hasn’t seen this movie yet from Pixar, I did think the tree was very well done.

The trees alternated between serious and whimsical ideas. This one, celebrating Christmas and landmarks from over the world, was one of my favorites of the serious themed ones.

This year was the earliest in the season I’ve ever been to Christmas in the Park. We were there on opening day, the Friday after Thanksgiving, also known by retailers as Black Friday. Since it was the first day, not all the trees were decorated yet, I’d estimate only half were finished though yesterday was also an allowed day to decorate the trees. Still there were many great trees to look at on Friday.

This little fellow, juxtaposed with the white doves and message of peace, had me cracking up for a while.

Since this has been the year I’ve been the most physically fit of my life (including completing one 10K, two half marathons, and two full marathons), I of course gravitated to the physical fitness message tree complete with great advice such as eat apples, eat vegetables and climb a rock. The latter is a great reminder, I’ll have to make sure to at least try indoor rock climbing at some point in the new year.

While some trees had very simple messages, this one with one figure punching through the tree and another jumping out of it, still has me a little stumped. Still the “Jumping into the Holidays message” despite looking like a superhero movie advertisement, was a great visual.

This large display combined the idea of an African jungle with Christmas.

These little snowmen are running their own mining community.

Another great part of the Christmas in the Park Tradition is all the moving displays. This year’s included the singing frogs Caribbean Christmas and my favorite, the mice showing exactly how Swiss Cheese is made.

Memories of Fall – Catching up on Blog

I’m originally from the East Coast, having lived in New Jersey, New York, Iowa and Connecticut at different points in my life before moving to California. (Connecticut was one of the harder moves as the name was hard for me to spell, I still remember being called up to the blackboards with other kids to sound and write it out and finding it quite difficult even with the teacher helping break it into the three words of Connect, I and Cut).

Since I live in a much warmer state now than any previously, I’m usually wearing short sleeves year round, and rarely wear a coat even though I really like my trench length leather jacket. People are always asking if I’m cold and I’ll usually say no, having not really thought about the temperature till then.

One thing that reminds me of how cold it is, and how it’s getting, is seeing dogs wearing their sweaters. I can’t remember having seen a lot of dogs wearing clothing back east, yet its possible I just wasn’t paying attention. This little fellow above, Monte, frequents a few coffee shops I go to. When I saw him wearing his fall sweater for the first time a few weeks ago, I started really feeling cold.

Fall is also a time of celebration for the anniversary of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library at San Jose State University. When the library was first proposed, it was opposed by many faculty, staff and students, who thought the quality of the library would suffer as it was to be shared for the most part with the residents of the city (certain materials still can only be checked out by students).

As someone whose had the privilege to use the library both as a SJSU student and community member, I think it’s a great project and I’m thankful for it. I was just at the library yesterday taking out a lot of books as usual, it occurred to me that the library’s 6th anniversary had happened not so long ago this fall. I don’t remember seeing any invitations for events happening for the anniversary this year, so I found a few shots of performers from last year’s event to share.

Though I did stay for and photograph some of the speakers, my favorite parts of the celebration were the performers, who of course also made the best photos visually.

They included jugglers who performed for small groups and individuals and a martial arts group who performed a style that was a combination of dance and fighting moves to music.

WordPress Networking at Red Rock Coffee Company

As I wrote in Tuesday’s post, I’m always amazed by the power of the Internet.  On Saturday I was reading about a meetup for WordPress users and thought what a great that idea that was.  I thought it would be great if I could find a group near me, so I plugged in my zip code into Meetup, and found a group that was meeting the next day for their second meeting ever.  It must have been fate.

The meeting was being held at Red Rock Coffee in Mountain View. I’ve passed by the place a few times (quite often when I lived in Mountain View and would go to Castro street for books, candles, and Mongolian BBQ), yet had never been there before for coffee.

At first I worried I would not be able to find the group, yet I soon found the meeting organizer, Christopher Price the CEO of MechaWorks, at table on the second floor wearing a name tag. The tag helped, and I knew I was in the right place.  (The second floor has a large number of tables for groups).

Mechaworks staff use WordPress every day literally. Their blog reports on the changing technological world. They use photos, many of which are on the page as small, click to enlarge thumbnail size ones.

One of the great things about this meeting was that the people who came were all at different levels of WordPress blog usage and requirements.

Christopher was of course very WordPress savvy and gave me some good tips for finding plug ins that would allow users to click on photos to make them larger (though I will have to host my blog on my own site for that), as well as how to turn off comments on a particular post (I love comments and appreciate them, so that is more of a theoretical bit of information).

It’s funny, when I’m at an event that I’m not an official photographer at,  like this one, sometimes I’ll be shy about asking if I can take pictures. I was at the meeting for about half an hour, learning and listening, before I even asked the group if they minded if I took a few. Everyone agreed, and in fact gave me business cards at the end to get their photos.

I learned at lot at this meeting and look forward to future meetups, with hopefully even more people attending. The coffee (MechaWorks provided free coffee), was good, I had a white mocha which I usually get at places new to me, next time I might try something more adventurous.

While there I also noticed the place was very much into causes and community. The large white board style calendar downstairs was filled with group meeting information for almost every day. Additionally, both the artwork outside on the windows, as well as table literature was focussed on various causes in which the place supports.