photography

I've been primarily a Nikon shooter for all my digital SLR life; I started on film with some compact cameras and a Minolta X-700, but switched to Nikon starting with a D40, working my way up through the years to a D750 today. I love Nikon glass, I love the ergonomics, and I am very used to SLR photography and all it entails.

But after witnessing the steady rise in mirrorless camera popularity, I decided to start testing the waters with a Sony a6000. And one of the major benefits (at least in my usage) is that if you choose an APS-C system like the Sony a6xxx series, you can (in theory) have a more compact camera system that performs as well as larger SLR brethren.

In practice, you get what you pay for in terms of weight. The physics of light dictate that fast, good lenses will be pretty much the same size on whatever mount you use, and there are always some 'sweet spots' for compactness vs. performance on any kind of camera lens mount.

I was recently invited to take some pictures of the campus and interior of St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church in Shrewsbury, MO (nestled in a neighborhood just outside of the City of St. Louis), and I just finished processing and uploading them to Flickr; see my St. Michael the Archangel photos.

There are so many of these little Catholic churches in St. Louis and around the country, with so much hidden beauty. I always try to find a neat little parish near where I stay in any city I visit; usually these parishes showcase more artwork than even the diocesan cathedrals—though that's not the case in St. Louis!

Last year, when I first learned that my house was in the path of totality for this year's eclipse, I immediately logged into BorrowLenses and rented a Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6 VR lens (for photography—it's now on my wishlist) and then purchased a set of eclipse glasses for my family, and materials to build a solar filter for the lens.

I've learned from Reddit's DIY community that people like the end result first... then an explanation, so:

See the full-size image of the Eclipse composite on Flickr.

tl;dr: Buy a step-up ring of appropriate size for your lens, buy a solar filter sheet, paste the sheet into the ring, screw the ring on your lens. And practice before the solar eclipse on August 21!

See my full post with the final result here: Photographing the 2017 Total Solar Eclipse.

The original Raspberry Pi Camera model v1.3 came from the factory set to ∞ (infinity) focus, so when you used it out of the box for something like a landscape timelapse rig, or for security or monitoring purposes (where the Pi is at least 5 meters away from the subjects it's recording), everything would look crisp and sharp.

For many fixed-focus cameras and lower-end camera sensors, it makes sense to set them to infinity focus; closer objects are still recognizable, but slightly blurry. Most of these cameras don't need to focus on a person a meter away for a portrait, and they're also rarely used for FaceTime-like video chat.

tl;dr: There are many ways to capture time-lapse videos. But this one is cheap, completely wireless, and mine. If you want to skip the post and go straight for the glory, grab a copy of my Time-lapse app for the Raspberry Pi.

Time-lapses transform subtle, slow processes into something beautiful, and often make us think about things in new ways. For example, have you ever thought about just how heavy a wet snow is? The trees in your yard might know a thing or two about that! Check out a time-lapse I recorded this morning some mighty oak tree branches, as they relaxed upward as if in relief from the wet snow falling off:

tl;dr: This camera is the best DX camera yet when it comes to build quality and speed, and is the best camera I've ever used when it comes to autofocus capability (extremely helpful for sports and wildlife). Buy the D500 on Amazon.com for $1799.

tl;dr: Watch the example/demo video below to see how the Mobius performs in a variety of driving conditions:

For the past few years, I've seen countless 'fail' videos, linked videos on reddit, etc. which show both the utility and entertainment value that comes from a dashcam—a camera that records everything that happens in front of your car while you're driving.

When looking around at the options for dashcams, and knowing my preference for reliability and ease of use, I came up with the following criteria:

I recently took a family vacation from St. Louis, MO to Branson, MO, and as it was the first time driving with my new Mobius Action Cam Mini dashcam installed on our Toyota Sienna (see a full writeup and review here), I wanted to see if I could quickly whip up a time lapse video of the entire drive.

A tiny snippet of the final time-lapse video of my STL to Branson drive.

Just wanted to post a whimsical image I captured while preparing for one of my presentations having to do with Raspberry Pis at this year's php[tek]:

The banana is for scale.