American Spirit

during New York PAUSE for COVID-19

I spotted this sign May 5, 2020 on the way to Fillmore Glen New York State Park.

Stopped on the way home to document this message.

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Copyright 2020 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Mouse Collection

Happy Mother’s Day

Here is a project completed for a “Fundamentals of Photography” refresher course. The task is to use a variety of lenses of my choice to document scene from my surroundings. These photographs document a family heirloom, mouse figurines collected by my wife, Pam’s, mother, Patricia Crist, assembled by Pam into two display cases with assorted figures created by Pam’s daughter, Denna.

Copyright 2020 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Correction

Eranthis hyemalis

A fellow blogger, Audrey Driscoll’s Blog, provided the correct and exact species name for the post “Wildflowers Late Winter / Early Spring.” The posts are updated. Thank You, Audrey.

Copyright 2020 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Happy March Wedding Anniversary

Unexpected Beauty

Coronavirus is raging this March 20th (I schedule posts several weeks ahead now), on this day of our anniversary, easy for me to remember falling close to or on the Spring equinox. Earliest spring flowers were up for a week when I spied this group of crocus blooms on a hill. We do not remember them being there, so I called Pam to enjoy them.

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These are extra special, Pam’s parents planted them years ago. The above images are the same photograph. On the left, white balance is set to “cloudy.” At the time, late afternoon, the sun was behind low clouds, providing back light. Perfect lighting for flowers, which is why I interrupted springtime yard cleanup to run inside for the camera.

My intent was to increase the f-stop to over 20 for the following photograph. Metadata on the photograph shows I was only successful in increasing it from 5 to 5.7. ISO was increased from 100 to 400. There was an intermittent breeze and my intent was to avoid blur.

In retrospect, I neglected to change to Aperture mode so any change to F-stop I made was reset. This is a beginners mistake, so photograph turned out well. The colors are richer in the f/5.7 shot.

Copyright 2020 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Tenacity

The tenacity of Ironweed resonates with the human spirit.

A lone sprig of Ironweed hangs on from a cliff edge moss carpet off the South Rim Trail, Taughannock Falls New York State Park, Finger Lakes Region.

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Ironweed Gallery from this hike

Copyright 2019 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills