Run Boy Run

Check out the new single from Mikayla Joy;  Run Boy Run.  It's just a little outside my normal stylings, but it's good stuff:

Full disclosure, I know Mikayla, she's part of the Praise Band at our church.  Granted, I stepped back from PB about a year ago, but and I played with her (and her husband) pretty much very week before that...  And I've been stepping back in lately, on a limited basis.  Which doesn't have anything to do with this song, of course. 

Anyway, as I noted before, it's good stuff, and worth a listen.

Youtube

Spotify

Locust Creek Covered Bridge

A couple of weeks ago the wife and I took a weekend jaunt.  From St. Louis over to KC, and then wandering back (via Hannibal, MO).  A "Quilt shops and Photo Ops" excursion. 

On the Eastbound drive, Driving across Missouri on Rt 36, we saw a brown sign" for Locust Creek Covered Bridge. A short drive off the highway, and a short walk later, we found this cool old covered bridge.  The bridge was built in 1868, and is apparently the longest of Missouri's four remaining covered bridges. These days, not only has the road moved, but also the creek, so it provides a walkway across a dry depression. Still cool.  History here.

I took this photo with my iPhone, mostly to get gps coordinates.  But I decided to play with this version using the processing tools on my phone, and was happy with the result.  Mostly the free ap Snapseed.  There's actually quite a bit of tweaking, trying to get an "old time" feel.

Here's the original "SOOC" version, for comparison, complete with finger edging into the top-left corner:

I entered this into the ETSOOI contest at 365project, and it made finalist.  Yay!

There's battle lines being drawn...

"There's battle lines being drawn, Nobody's right if everybody's wrong"

For What It's Worth

Buffalo Springfield (Stephen Stills)

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Happenstance Photography - Top Images of 2014

Time for something a little different.  I was looking back over the past few years at my Happenstance Photography blog, adn decided to see what my Top viewed photos have been year by year.  Pretty easy, I just copy-pasted from the stats page to Excel, and sorted by views.  I'll go with the Top 5, + ties.

So, to start, here are the most popular posts from 2014, sorted by most view to least.

Abstract #8683

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St. Mary's Cross, Joplin, MO

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In The Mountains

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Mud Cave #2

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Mission Trip 2014 - Joplin Promise

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Abandoned speedramp

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There you have it.  Not necessarily my favorites (but could be!), nor my "best"...  just most popular.  Check back in 2 weeks for 2015!

Hard Times (Trouble and Strife)

Taken along one of the hiking trails at Pere Marquette State Park.  Seek says this is Virginia Creeper.  And I believe it!

Meanwhile, the photo is a little bit of a disappointment (to me).  I really wanted very sharp focus over the leaves, then off to the blurred background.  And it's close.  But the nearest parts are a little soft.  Blame it on me leaving the tripod (and the mono pod) in the car.  This is 1/30th second, hand held, f5.6.  That's about as slow as I can go (handheld).

Story of my life.

This Way Or That?

So...  last weekend our Church had a Fall-Festival a little outside town.  Nice place out in the Southern Illinois Farmlands, with a lake.  Hayrides, s'mores ny the fire pit, fishing...  good times.

It had been a nice day, and despite potential for some rain, it stayed dry.  BUT, around 5pm, we did get clouds rolling in, which provided some photo ops.  I had my "real" camera in the car, but decided the wide angle of the iPhone would better suit what I was envisioning.  So, here's my (original) take:

I'm a sucker for these kinds of "big sky" shots, as regular visitors probably know.And I do like this one...  better in color than monochrome, with that yellow color along the horizon.  I processed this in the phone, using snapseed.  Anyway, all's happy, I got my shot, time to move on.  Right?


Well, maybe not.  just a couple of minutes later (3, by the time tags), I decided to do a landscape version of the same scene.  I didn't even look at it for a couple of days, but when I did, I rather liked it, too!

In this version, the "star" of the show is the shoreline.  The contrast between the clouds and reflections certainly comes in.  And again, the muted colors along the horizon.

I posted the first (portrait orientation) photo to 365project that day.  And the second (landscape orientation) a couple of days later.  Both versions received their "popular" and "trending" designations.  Which is pretty cool.

If there's a point here, I guess it is that you should keep looking at a scene, keep wondering.  And try different takes.

So, do you have a preference?

Downed

Silver Lake Park in Highland, Illinois. It's been almost 14 years since I worked in Highland, but when I did, Silver Lake Park was a regular lunch time spot.  Not long ago I decided to swing by, even though it's a bit out of the way these days.

ACC -107 - Moving On Faith - Something You Will Never Forget

Trying to catch up on my entries to the Album Cover Challenge over at 365project.  I'm behind, this is from ACC-107, ACC-110 is already running (and I've entered).   Anyway, this is one of my favorite challenges over there, as it combines two of my passions:  Photography and music.  Yee-Haw!  Details on the challenge here.  The challeneg has been run 11 times in 2019, I've entered 8, and received 6 finalists.  No wins, though.  This entry, for ACC-107 didn't make finalist (sad face)...

Anyway, my randomly generated band name was : Moving On Faith

And my randomly generated album name was "Something you will never forget" from the quote: "The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget."

I like the graphic feel of this, but not the greatest Band/Album.  That's how random works sometimes.


Check out all of my album cover challenge entries here.

Full Serve

Old gas / service station, on the north west side of Paducah, KY.  I'm a sucker for old buildings, but that should be evident to regulars here.  This is the "13th Street Station", according to the sign (not in this photo), but that's generic enough that Google didn't find anything.

Here's a snip from Google Streetview, click to expand...

Album Review - Rossington Band

Wow...  so all of a sudden it has been 6 months since I've done an album review.  Time flies.  This one has been sitting in my "pending" bin for a rather long time, guess I should clean it up and get it out.  It's a long one, though.

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The band Lynyrd Skynyrd was  of the top rock acts of the mid-to-late 70's.  From 1973's debut, with the iconic Freebird, to 1976's live album, "One More From the Road".  They released 4 studio albums in just over 3 years, with non-stop touring in between.  I saw them twice in 1976, and they were outstanding.  After a short break of 1 year, they released "Street Survivors" and embarked on the next massive tour.  But, as any rock aficionado knows, three days into the tour, their plane crashed, killing 6 people, including leader, lyricist and singer Ronnie Van Zant.   And functionally killing Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Two and a half years later, (1980) most of the survivors would rise again, under the banner Rossington Collins Band.  This included almost all of the surviving members of Lynyrd Skynyrd, (except drummer Artimus Pyle), with a new lead singer (Dale Krantz), a new 3rd guitar player and a new drummer,   I remember eagerly picking up the album, and then seeing RCB in concert 3.5 weeks after it came out.  RCB would put out 2 albums, both pretty good, but clearly missed the lyrics of Ronnie Van Zant.   But that's not what I'm here to talk about.

After the Rise and fall of Lynyrd Skynyrd, and after the rise and fall of Rossington Collins Band, most of the survivors (except Gary Rossington and Dale Krantz) formed the Allen Collins Band, which released a single album (in 1983).  But that's not what I want to talk about, either.

A couple of years after the demise of Allen Collins Band, Rossington and Krantz (now married) formed The Rossington Band.  They released two albums, 1986's "Returned to the Scene of the Crime", and 1988's "Love Your Man".

Which is a long road to the album I want to talk about today.

Despite owning every release from the original Lynyrd Skynyrd, both RCB albums and ACB's release, I wasn't even aware of The Rossington Band until the last few years, when I found 1 song on the compilation "Solo Flytes" (which was released in 1999).  That album included The Rossington Band's "Welcome Me Home", which is really quite good.  An easy 4 out of 5 stars.

Fast forward to 2019, and an excursion to one of my area's used record stores.  And I came across The Rossington Band's album "Love Your Man", which includes Welcome Me Home.  Of course I had to jump.

So let's get to it:

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Artist:  The Rossington Band
Album:  Love Your Man
Released: 1988
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This is a pretty good album overall.  It is a bit of a product of It's time (1988), which can make it sound a little dated.  Pretty highly produced, rather "slick".  Especially the use of synthesizers,  Sometimes subtle, more often in the front, but more Van Halen-Jump than Lynyrd Skynyrd-Freebird.   The sound often reminds me of mid-80's Heart, or even Starship...

Besides Rossington and Krantz, the album doesn't feature anybody I'm familiar with.  Jay Johnson (Guitar), Mitch Rigel (Drums), Tim Lindsey (Bass), Tim Sharpton (Keyboards), Ronnie Eades (Saxophone).  All very competent.  Oh yeah, and they have a Sax player.

Best songs:  Welcome Me Home, Losin' Control, Love Your Man (the most reminiscent of RCB), Rock On

Anyway, some of this is pretty good, none of it stinks.  Overall, I'd rand this below RCB's first album, but a smidge above their second one.  And all of those behind Allen Collins Band.  I do think it would be better if it wasn't so mid-80s sounding.

Worth having, especially from a used record bin.

you can see all of my album reviews by clicking on the tag albumreviews.  Or click here.

Abridged

Just a little something...  This park is just around the corner from my office, about 0.5 mile drive to the edge.  It's a nice enough park, but doesn't really have any paths to walk, so I don't frequent it.

But occasionally it's perfect.  This was shot with the NF-SOOC challenge in mind, but the image really felt "flat".  So I decided to forego the SOOC part, and bring it into the digital darkroom.

I'm terrible at documenting my workflow, and it was almost 3 weeks ago, so I don't really remember everything I did.  The main thing was to bring up the reds to emphasize the bridge and reflection.  Pretty sure I blended in a slight bit of Topaz Simplify to make it a bit more dreamy, but NOT around the ducks.

Whatever, I think it turned out OK for a dull gray day.  It did get a "Popular" over at 365project.

Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame - 2020 Nominees

Every year (or at least most years) I do a post when the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame announces their nominees.  So, just today I saw the nominees for the class of 2020.  So, we'll do it again.

First off, remember that I did a post a few weeks ago listing 5 performers/bands I would like to see nominated.  Well, only 1 of those 5 was nominated, so that's sort of sad.  But not too surprising.

Anyway, here's the list of nominees, ranked (as I always do) based on the number of songs on my iPod:

• The Doobie Brothers (101 songs)
• Dave Matthews Band (23 songs)
• Pat Benatar (20 songs)
• Todd Rundgren (16 songs)
• Thin Lizzy (9 songs)
• Kraftwerk (4 songs)
• Rufus featuring Chaka Khan (2 songs)
• MC5 (1 song)
• Nine Inch Nails (1 song)
• T. Rex (1 song)
• Depeche Mode (0 songs)
• Whitney Houston (0 songs)
• Judas Priest (0 songs)
• Motörhead (0 songs)
• The Notorious B.I.G. (0 songs)
• Soundgarden (0 songs)

As you can probably surmise, I'm not too pumped up about the next class.  But that's not too shocking as we move further away from the 60's/70's/80's....  I do hope that the Doobie Brothers get in, but this is the first time they've been nominated, after 23 years of eligibility.

Other than that, I don't much care.  I'm sure each of the other nominees has supporters, and I'm not saying they don't (or Do) deserve induction.  Just that I wouldn't advocate them.

My prior 2 posts:  Class of 2019 - 2018

ACC - 109 - Jan Hofmeyer - Strike that, reverse it

Time for another entry to the Album Cover Challenge over at 365project.  I'm behind, this is from ACC-109, ACC-110 is already running (and I've entered).  And I haven't posted my entry to ACC-107...  Need to get posting!

Anyway, this is one of my favorite challenges over there, as it combines two of my passions:  Photography and music.  Yee-Haw!  Details on the challenge here.

Anyway, my randomly generated band name was Jan Hofmeyer, defined as:  "a suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa. It is located in Region B of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality."

And my randomly generated album name was "Strike that, reverse it" from a Roald Dahl quote "We have so much time and so little to do. Strike that, reverse it."

(click for larger version)

I quite like this entry, but it didn't get a "Finalist" in the challenge.  Oh well, it's all for fun.



Check out all of my album cover challenge entries here.

Envy

Just a little something seen in Liberty, Missouri.  I was wandering around Liberty Missouri while my wife was shopping at a Quilt shop.  This is just across Water Street from the Clay County Courthouse.

Pretty much SOOC, except for rotating to get the light post straight.  Modified in a hotel room on my iPad, but taken with mu Fujifilm X-T3.

Why "Envy"??  IWell....  why NOT?  I guess it is just a thought inspired by the green wall in the background.  Trying not to overthink it.

1221

Another from last month...  I was wandering around at lunchtime, looking for ideas for the NF-SOOC challenge.  This image is neither "NF" (50 mm lens / equivalent) nor SOOC (straight out of camera - no editing).

But I rather like it.

I think It Is Finally Done

I think It Is Finally Done.  "The World In Black And White" blog, that is. 

The World In Black And White (TWIBW) started in June of 2008.  The point was a select group of photographers (I think it was limited to 25) who would post only Black and White photos.

Sometime around September 2012 a friend suggested I join / apply, and I was accpeted.  My first post was 9/26/2012.  I enjoyed it a lot back then, very cool being in the company of some excellent photographers, and I was getting orders-of-magnitude more views than over at my own blogs*.

Anyway, over time it seemed that folk were drifting away for TWIBW, and not being replaced.  Including the person who originally suggested the site to me.  IAt some point there was talk about transitioning to a Facebook Group, but I'm not sure that ever happened.

Bottom line, the site went from getting daily posts from several photographers, to a few posts per week from a few photographers.  And fewer posted each month, it seemed.  Still getting way more traffic than my blogs, but just not much fun.  And in late March of this year, I kind of faded away.  I'm devoting my Black and White energies to Happenstance.

I popped in to TWIBW today, and noticed it has been 9 weeks since anyone has posted there.  No posts in September, oand only three since May 19.  I think it's pretty much dead.

I suppose I should look through my posts there and make sure I have all of them...  I sure wish I could get that kind of traffic, though.




*  This blog has been around since September of 2004.  Happenstance Photography was started late September 2006, although the images prior to 9/2007 were lost due to a change in web hosting, and it had become pretty stagnant until August 2012, when I resurrected it as a Black and White only blog, more of less following the format of TWIBW).

Late Summer, Almost Fal

It is fall now, but this photo was taken 9/8.  A little late posting here, but that's how it goes sometimes.

This is the reservoir just outside Staunton, IL, we were wandering the area and came across it.  I always enjoy discovering spots like this.  A nice calm and quiet moment, a pleasant spot...

I'd rather die happy than not die at all

"I'd rather die happy than not die at all

For a man is a fool who will not heed the call"

- The Band

W.S. Walcott Medicine Show

Just an interesting quote from a fun song.  Sung by Rick Danko (RIP).  Look it up on YouTube.

And an old photo (from 1978?) just for more fun.

Quilted

Detail of a quilt taken at the recent show in Paducah Kentucky.

It kind of reminded me of the Pittsburgh Steelers logo...

But maybe I don't want to think about it, now that the "Men of Steel" have started the season 1-4, and are currently led by a QB who was on the practice squad at the season's beginning....  But there's still time to right the ship.  If they win-out, they can be 12-4!! 

Wish I Could Fly Like Superman...

Metropolis, Illinois is officially the hometown of Superman.  Yep, as defined by the Illinois House Of Representatives on June 9, 1972.  You might say superman was born on Krypton, or raised (on earth) in Smallville.  Or you might say Metropolis is a prosperous and massive city in the Northeastern United States, within close proximity to Gotham City...  But you'd be wrong, because the State of Illinois said otherwise.  And Metropolis Illinois has the statue to prove it!

Southern Illinois

Taken a short diustance, and a short time before yesterday's post.  Also in Southern Illinois, between Metropolis and Vienna.  If nothing else, this proves that Illinois is not completely flat!  Interstate I-25 is about 5 miles straight ahead, but you really can't get there from here.  At least not directly.  Which was kind of the whole point of our drive.

This is a panorama stitched from 3 individual photos.  And then resized for web presentation.

Illinois Farmland

When people hear we';re from Illinois, they generally presume we're in and around Chicago.  Which makes sense, since about 75% of the state's population is...  But we're 4+ hour drive from the windy city., in the suburbs of St. Louis, which accounts for 20% of the Illinois population NOT from Chicago (and about 5.5% of the state's total).

Which isn't all that relevant to this photo, which is neither from Chicagoland, nor from St. Louis Metro East.

This is from the 2/3 of Illinois that is NOT Chicago/St. Louis.  Specifically, this is from between Metropolis, IL and Vienna, IL.  Down in the extreme south of the state, not far from Paducah, KY.

And that's a soybean field.

NF-SOOC Summary

So we're into October, and have completed the Nifty-Fiftl Straight Out Of Camera challenge.

I managed 18 images in the 30 days, plus a final image on October 1.  That's a bit better than I expected.   It was a fun challenge, I'm pretty pleased with my images.  And, I'm sure I'll do it next time.

Here's my last couple of entries, and here's a link to all of the posts.

NF-SOOC-18 (posted 9/27/2019)

Country Roads - near Highland, IL

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NF-SOOC-19 (posted 910/01/2019)

Last Rays - Edwardsville - IL

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So, you know it wouldn't be "me" without some analytics.  So what can we say:

There are 2 primary recognitions at 365project:  Popular and Trending.

In terms of Popular / Trending, the rates are pretty close.  So, at least by this measure, quality of NF-SOOC is indistinguishable.

As far as reception by the 365project community, that's reflected in comments and people selecting as "Favorite".  The numbers above are per image, of course.  In this case, there is a rather noticeable difference.  My first thought was where they were posted.  All but the last NF-SOOC image were posted in an alternate album, which may affect how images show in people's "news feeds"'.  Let's check:

So, over the past 3 months, the album where I placed the NF-SOOC images has gotten 21% fewer views/image than the main album.  The NF-SOOC images received 17% fewer Comments+Favs.  So that difference is well within expectations.

That was a lot of effort for not much so-what...  huih?

Hummingbird

It is getting pretty late in the season, and the hummingbirds are beefing up for migration.  I expectthey'll be gone in the next few days.

I really need to find a better spot for the feeder next year so I can get some decent lighting for photos!

Beans

As much as I love my Fujifilm X-T3 Mirrorless, there are certain situations where my iPhone excels.  Besides, of course, those times when the best camera is the one you have with you.

I did have my X-T3 with me when I took this photo, but I really wanted a wide angle portrait presentation.  With detail from the beans at my feet to the clouds over the hill.  In a perfect world, I'd have a suitable wide angle for my X-T3, but really, the iPhone does a bang up job...