Cowboy Shooting

Sunday after Church I decided to go over the the Cowboy Collections Arena across the creek to see about the all the gunshots I had heard for the past hour. I came to find that there the Cowboy Mounted Shooting was having a show there this weekend. I arrived during a lunch break, but was able to take some photos before I had to leave for the ranch about 1pm. Using my Digital SLR in High Speed mode I was able to actually catch the cowboy and cowgirls firing their sidearms at the balloons, with subsequent fire and smoke. Although there is no actual bullet, the black powder is ejected from the shell and these tiny fragment (much like from a shotgun) are able to reach out quite a ways to pop balloons that are set in a course. I was also amazed by the efficiency of the youth balloon team as they ran out between riders and replaced the balloons in about the time it took the next rider to enter the arena. Additional Cowboy Shooting images may be seen in this Gallery.

New Filly

Late this last week a new filly arrived. She is by Doc O Lena Twist out of Colena Colena. The star on her head is in the same spot as her sire, but much larger. When I arrived at the ranch today I saw her with her dam in the far NE corner of the pasture, and returned to get the photo of her with her dam. Later that evening I returned to get the photos of her laying in the pasture next to her dam. The other 3 mares in the pasture are allowed no where close to her. Anytime they get close the mare gets between them and the foal and pins her ears and shakes her head.

Sketching in the Galleries: European Landscape in the style of Japanese Print

Today the sketching in the galleries class, our instructor, Michael Tole, took us first to the Asian Art Galleries where we looked at some Japanese Prints and how they use line and shading to show depth, without reflecting the true direction of lighting. When then moved to the 18th Century European Galleries where we picked an painting to draw in the style of the Japanese Prints. I picked a landscape by Claude-Joseph Vernet (1775) and focused on the castles, trees, and mountains.

Super Stakes Non-Pro Semi-Finals

Mark Pearson rides Runs With Scissors (by Smart Mate)..
Chad Bushaw rides Cats Ruby (a High Brow Cat mare).
Will Arthur rides Crossing Red River (a Hes A Peptospoonful Gelding).

Testing For the Super Stakes Sale

This afternoon I was setting up to photograph the Super Stakes Sales starting tomorrow morning. Someone turned out their horse into the arena permitting me a really good subject to test the breadth of my strobe coverage to the arena. This is a sequence of 3 images as the horse ran around the arena.

Ranch/Feedlot Sorting

This weekend I went by the new Cowboy Collection Arena in Terrell, TX to scout out some equine photography opportunities and found the new Texas Ranch Sorting organization started by Gary Ivie. I had photographed this event before at a nearby arena, but this new venue is truly spectacular, with nice bright lighting and minimal backlighting to permit action photography in ambient light conditions. These two images are of Gary Ivie sorting from two different points of view. Additional images are available in this Web Gallery.

Sketching in the Galleries: Julian Onderdonk Exhibit

Tonight my vote from last week led us to the Onderdonk Exhibit. I was interested in exploring the landcape in drawing. The challenge was to convert a color painting into a monochrome drawing. After searching the exhibit I found this undated landscape by Julian Onderdonk which was probably of the Texas Hill Country south of Fredericksburg, Texas. I started the drawing by blocking in the shapes with a stick of graphite and came back with my eraser to define the highlights. I finished the drawing with pencil defining the trees, rocks and foreground features.

Ranch Pasture

This pasture I wandered through the pasture with my pinhole. I goal on this trip intially was to get eye level pinhole images of some of the pasture wildflowers. On this particular trip I took along the pups for excercise and you will see them in a couple of the images in the project web gallery. Images also include Ivy on Cottonwood, Additional Paintbrush Images, Pool in Pasture, Mare images taken from ground level, and an abandoned barn image.

Late Evening Horse Pasture

One evening last week I wandered down to the lower pasture just about dusk to see what was up. The current residents of this pasture are two geldings in their early 20's and a yearling colt and filly. I found them at the very bottom of the pasture. The two youngsters and my horse, squirt, were grazing together. Badger was at the very bottom grazing by himself. I caught him here rolling to get the early spring mosquitos off.
Junior, the colt noticed that I was on the fence and came over to see what I was doing. The filly was close by but did not come over. Squirt rarely comes to the fence. He stayed and grazed on the fresh greens. Squirt and Badger have been in this lower pasture for about a year now. One of these days I am going to have to bring my tack to the ranch and see if I can catch Squirt and ride. After a bit the mosquitoes got too bad so everyone decided to head back up the hill, get a drink, and spend the night in upper part of the pasture where the mosquitoes were not quite so bad.

Thursday Night Jazz in the Atrium

Almost every Thursday night at the Dallas Museum of Art you will find a crowd gathering for Jazz in the Atrium Cafe. Under the colorful glass flowers of Dale Chihuly a jazz band of local note will assemble to present a 2 hour program of jazz. Throughout the adjacent galleries he music will reviberate entertaining guests viewing the art as well as those enjoying the food and beverage in the Atrium Cafe.

Fasig-Tipton 2YO-In-Training Sale

This Filly named Trippen, seems to be shocked that she went for $115,000. She is a Texas Bred Thoroughbred 2YO Race Horse going through the Texas Fasig-Tipton Sale in Grand Prairie, Texas. I have a Gallery with many images taken at the sale, including Sales Prep, Walking Ring, Sale Ring, and Scenic Shots. After I photographed Akiane, A filly consigned by Asmussen Horse Center, sold for $160,000 (image JEA_9113 in the above gallery) I brought out my Pinhole Digital to work on my Ghost Image Series.
The image to the left is one of my favorite of the series. You can see the horse stood for a little while and then moved and stood a while longer leaving 2 ghost images. Additional images of this series can be seen in this Gallery. The bottom image was taken of a handler walking his charge in the Walking Ring. The lack of lens give an ultimate pinhole affect.

Pinhole Images: Mare Pasture

Last weekend I did some more pinhole photography experiments in the Mare Pastures. Most of the images were at ground level, from a pigeons point of view. I have a few images were I succeeded in hand holding camera with the help of a fence support. I was most interested in the the images where the mares moved during the course of the exposure, resulting in dual images. Examples of this dual imagery include the mare walking and multiple leg traces showing; Or the mare was looking forward and then turned toward me resulting in side and forward view in same image. I prepared a Web Gallery to show additional images from this series.

Downtown Glass and Steel

This past Friday when I went to the DMA I found that Atrium Cafe menu was a bit pricey so I walked to the St Paul Street Rail Station to the Subway Sandwich Shop. On my walk I found these two views of three skyscrapers. I especially like the image to the left with the Air Conditioning Unit on top of the shorter tower. These buildings reminded me of some of the paintings of downtown New York City that Georgia O'Keefe painted in the late 1920's.

Late Nights at the DMA

Tonight I went to the Dallas Museum of Art for the Monthly Late Nights Event. The theme tonight a celebration of the opening of the Bluebonnets and Beyond: Julian Onderdonk, American Impressionist for which there was a member preview. I started this evening by touring the exhibit and then joining a gallery talk by the Curator. I learned quite a bit about both Julian and his father Robert. I then moved upstairs to the Texas Art Gallery landing where Gerald Jones and his family were featured in a performance in the Gallery. The music they played was that which might have been played in the opera houses, dances, and gatherings during the time the Onderdonks were living. The Texas Gallery is currently featuring paintings by Robert Onderdonk and his teacher, William Merritt Chase. There is also a case with drawings from the sketchbook of Robert Onderdonk which are being exhibited for the first time.

Thursday Night at the DMA

Tonight I took my Pinhole Digital Camera with me to Sketching class. The image to the right is an image taken at floor level of a fellow student sketching the painting on the right. Before and after class I experimented with different image ideas. The museum was quite crowded but you would not know it by looking at the image of the two figures at the base of the Big Blue Man in the Vault Gallery. You can also see the slight image of a guard to the right of the blue man. These are the only people that did not move during the 20 seconds I was taking the photo. I had lots of people walk in front of the camera, in fact I ended up having to take the camera off the ticket booth shelf I had is set on 5 sec short of time I had intended. The fact that these people moving in the gallery were almost completely invisible to the camera sampling 20 seconds of time gave sort of a "Twilight Zone" feel to the images. What if there is another dimension of life that is completely invisible to our eyes and brain because it moves too fast for us to perceive? Additional and equally intriguing images may be found in my DMA Pinhole Gallery.

Pinhole Photography: Further Experiments

After experimenting with pinhole photography the other day I thought about how could I use flash and create a double image. Digital Cameras do not permit double exposures like film cameras did, but with a dark room and a strobe, anything is possible. I set my camera up on a chair, and pointed my Norman 400B strobe toward where I would be sitting. I set my radio slave to trigger the flash and held the transmitter in my hand. The camera was set at 20 sec exposure. I stayed perfectly still and triggered the strobe 5 times and then moved over turned sideways and triggered it 5 more times. This is the resulting image.

Pinhole Photography

This afternoon I experimented with digital pinhole photography. I had put a body cap on my camera that has a tiny pinhole in it. Instead of the lens, the photo is taken through that pinhole. The exposures are long, in my case about 1/4 to 10 seconds depending on the light and ISO setting on the camera. The image will always be soft, but the depth of field great. Additional pinhole photos from this evening may be seen in this Gallery.

Late Winter Snow

Yesterday we were basking in 75 degree weather, rain came in as the sun set, Thunderstorms were with us most of the night, and rain most of today. As the sun set tonight, the temperatures dropped and then came the snow. Here are a few photos I took with different settings. I especially like the last one.

Presidents Day (a little late)

Oh well, I did not do this drawing of a bust of George Washington until tonight at the last Sketching in the Galleries class for the month. Our instructions were to deal with the profile and the interface with the background. We were also to define a space within our paper and fill it with out drawing. My drawing materials were pencil and a soft graphite stick. The Sculpture was created by Jean-Antoine Houdon (French) in 1786.

Sunday Afternoon with the Pups.

During my Sunday at the ranch I led the pups down the hill for a short tour and took my camera. I was having fun watching. I took quite a few photos but had a difficult time tracking pups quick enough to maintain focus. When we came to a tree there were plenty of sticks to pick up and run with. Even Cooksie (Mom) got into the fray.) On the hillside between the trees there was plenty of space for games of chase and roll.