Thunderstorms in Austin and Stormchasing

I have always loved to watch thunderstorms. Being in the middle of a multi-year drought makes it even more enjoyable. This one was stunning. I could hear it coming from the west, sounding like an approaching train. Out of my east facing sliding window it was dead calm. The rain line passed right overhead. At one time it was pouring rain on the west side of the condo and not on the east. The temperature dropped 20 degrees, from 73 to 53, in 30 minutes

Radar as the storm hit - Source: wunderground.com

Looking the front door, the rain was intense, the lightning bright, and the thunder earsplitting. One thunder clap was from a lightning strike so close that the flash and sound were simultaneous.

Opening the aptly named storm door, I shot over the top of the door into the wind. The rain was so close and dense all I got was flash bounce from the drops.


So how is this stormchasing? It's not really since the storm came to me. Several years ago I was in a tornado, just over 1/4 mile from the funnel. It was an F1, the mildest strength if you can call a tornado mild, and it was raining so hard I couldn't see anything. I'll describe the whole experience in a future post. I'd still like to chase and see a tornado, but from a much safer distance. (Read more ...)

Austin Singer/Songwritter Monte Montgomery

What can I say that others haven't said already? Monte Montgomery is amazing. Guitar Player Magazine listed him as one of "The Top 50 All-Time Greatest Guitarists". He also won the SXSW award for best acoustic guitarist 7 years in a row. If you don't know about Monte you need to "discover" him now.

Listen to the following YouTube post. That's right, don't watch it, just listen. You will hear what sounds like an electric guitar. It's not. It is an amplified acoustic.


Monte Montgomery plays Little Wing at the Austin Music Network studio

Now that you have listened play it again and watch. Focus on his fingers. Watch for the switches between using a pick and just his fingers. Monte also uses a slide on a finger, and then plays chords using just three fingers so he can hold the slide out of the way. It is mesmerizing and fascinating at the same time. I still can't believe the sounds he gets out of an acoustic guitar.

The video is impressive and his albums should be part of your music collection. However, you really need to go see Monte live. The interplay between a gifted performer like Monte, the captivating and engaging nature of his music, and the crowd dynamics in a club creates something unique that can't be experienced with a recording. I've seen him live several times, and will be going to see him again. The tour schedule is linked from Monte's site.

This is the first of what will be a regular Monday post about music.

Get involved in the arts. Create, participate, listen, watch, enjoy, and support. (Read more ...)

Seeing Water with a Camera

Water presents a number of challenges and creative opportunities for digital photography. It is a subject that yields images that you can't see with the unaided eye. I've been rediscovering how perceptions and captured images of water change based on the light conditions and shutter speed.

In search of inner balance, and some photographs, I visited the Zilker Botanical Gardens in Austin today. Just to the right of the visitor center there is a small grassy glen with a water fountain. So, looking for something different, I kneeled down behind the fountain to shoot up into the top of the spray against a gray cloudy sky.

The initial shots were over exposed even using automatic shutter speed with aperture priority. The metering was exposing for the sky not the water. So, I set the camera to f14 and turned on the flash to stop the motion of the water droplets, even at 1/180 exposure time. The water is seen by the camera is a way you can see with your eye; the droplets are suspended and round. Post processing used a dust filter and converted the image to black-and-white.

The Japanese section of the Gardens has a number of small detail features. This second image is of a bamboo water drip above a pool. Note the stop-action for the water with the rich warmth of the bamboo and the blurred background. The shutter speed was 1/60 of a second which normally blurs moving water. I used the flash to stop the water and an f9 aperture to blur the background.

The eye sees this falling water as a blurred stream. In contrast, the camera reveals what happens to the water as it falls; it becomes a series of disconnected droplets.

A future article will look at photographing reflections in water, and the patterns and colors you can capture in water ripples. (Read more ...)