I was walking out the door on my way back to work after lunch when this guy landed on a flower bud. So I popped back inside to grab the camera. 
I haven’t been able to identify the specific type, so if anyone knows, please let me know.
I used my 3-stop neutral density filter and my polarizer which cut out enough of the light to let me get something worth looking at.
Our friend Barry is the gun totin’ type. He made a bunch of targets and goes out shooting every so often. He invited me to go with him on Saturday to do some shooting, but also to take some pictures and video. We went with him and some others. We drove out into the Central Valley to some Bureau of Land Management land where it’s legal to shoot. So it’s pretty much a desolate set of hills and canyons which make nice backstops.
We set up a pistol and rifle course to run through. I had not shot a pistol before this so I was fairly lousy with it, but I was a little better on the rifle. Because of my lack of experience I did the course with a .22 pistol and a .22 rifle. But later on I was able to fire an assault rifle, a .45 pistol, a 9mm pistol, and a .357 magnum revolver. Those are pretty fun guns to shoot–the .357 really packs a punch.
Here are my favorite pictures and the video of my run through the course is at the end, you won’t want to miss that, I’m sure.
We were out pretty much the whole day, we left town before sunrise and got back after sunset. It was long and exhausting. The high temperature out there was in the 97-99F range. I did pretty well with the help of my Subway visor and my polarizing sunglasses, but by mid-afternoon I had a pounding headache behind my eyes. I’m just not used to that much intense sunlight.
I also made a rookie mistake of taking ibuprofen (for said headache) on an empty stomach. That made for a rather unpleasant experience of focusing on keeping my stomach calm while riding home, exacerbated by the fact that nausea is a symptom of severe dehydration and it wasn’t immediately obvious whether it was the ibuprofen or if the 5L of water / Gatorade I drank wasn’t enough to keep me hydrated. But the nausea subsided half way home and I haven’t experienced any additional issues, so I guess I’m alright.
And now the moment you’ve been waiting for: Kyle’s run-n-gun, with the oh-so-manly .22 pistol and .22 rifle (which I managed to drop the magazine out of while swinging it off my back). I don’t think I did too badly having never fired a pistol until this day. I did a lot better later after practicing and learning how to properly fire and suppress the instinct to compensate for kickback before the shot occurs (not that the .22 has much kickback, but those larger ones sure do).
You can download it too: 2011-08-27 – Kyle Run and Gun (small). Use “right click -> Save file as…” to download it. The file is 30.1 MB so it may take a few of minutes to download (depending on your Internet connection speed).
These are the final chipmunk pictures I ended up with from the hundred or so I took during the campout we went on in July.
On Sunday, breakfast was Eggs Benedict, but we opted to switch out the poached eggs for scrambled instead and to skip the Hollandaise sauce.
After packing up and checking out we headed to the ocean. We stopped on a roadside pullout which was a cliff overlooking a beach. As I mentioned in the Part 2, I like taking long exposure shots. This was my first chance to try it out on the ocean though. I took a whole lot of ’em, here are the best (remember you can click on the images to view them larger).
I got these long exposures by using a neutral density filter and a polarizer to cut down on the light. I also used the smallest apertures I could. Even so, the exposures were a little bright, but I was able to get things worked out pretty well by using RAW images.
Here’s that scene with a regular shutter speed:
I really like these shots. It was sunny, but the wind was blowing and it was a little chilly. So we wrapped up in the blankets I keep in the trunk. We sat on that cliff watching the ocean and taking pictures for about an hour. It was Jess’ favorite part of our whole trip.
Once we finished we got back in the car and drove down Highway 1 for a little while. Jess really wanted to get down to a beach so we stopped at Doran Beach. The water was cold. Very cold. But it was sandy, unlike CT beaches. I didn’t bring the camera with me so we don’t have any pictures, but we walked down the beach for a while before turning around. It was nice, but the constantly blowing wind seems to give Jess a headache.
After that it was time to head home. It was very nice to get out of town and spend time in a more secluded part of the state. A last peaceful hurrah before our world is up-ended by a baby in a few months.