John's Blog

Little Boat

john — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:17:12 +0000

There was a little confusion when we got to Lake Victoria about which boat we were going to be taking on our tour of the islands. Fortunately, it wasn’t this one. It would have taken a long time to get where we were going, and I don’t think it would have held all of us.

African Penguin

john — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:56:18 +0000

This photo was taken on our second excursion to see penguins. This time, it was off to Betty’s Bay near Cape Town.

Tree

john — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 11:51:06 +0000

This is one of very few cases where one of my photos looks better in black and white than it does in color. This was taken on our first day of Safari in Kenya, and I remember spending a lot of time cropping and playing with contrast in our image-editing party that night.

Cell Phones

john — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 12:38:13 +0000

I’m amazed at how ubiquitous cell phones are. According to the United Nations, the number of active cell phones in the world will likely surpass the number of people in the world sometime in 2011. Sure, there are lots of places where you still can’t get a good cell signal. But increasingly, the answer to the “can you hear me now?” question is, “yes, of course.”

Side Yard

john — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 09:26:20 +0000

I could probably come up with some social commentary about this picture, since it was taken in District Six. But I won’t. I just like the shot.

Not so Different

john — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:18:47 +0000

They could be kids in our schools, in our communities. They were born into different circumstances. Their opportunities will be different. Their experiences will be different. Their attitudes will be different. Their perceptions of the world will be different. But right now, they’re just kids.

Connected

john — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 11:54:19 +0000

The wiring in the townships of Cape Town is as informal as the housing. But while it looks like everyone’s connected, that can be deceiving. Electricity runs on a debit system. If you want electricity, you go down to the local fish market and buy some. It comes in the form of a code on a little card. You take that home and type the code into your electric meter, and you have however many kilowatt hours as you purchased. The meter counts down as you consume the electricity, and when you run out, it turns off. The whole system makes everyone aware of exactly how much energy they’re using.

The Colors of the Wind

john — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 11:24:42 +0000

At Disney’s Animal Kingdom, audience participation is encouraged at the “Festival of the Lion King” show. Meg volunteered, and was selected. Ignoring all of the standard rules about shutter speeds, I snapped this shot of her parading around the show, creating the blurry, swirling, colorful effect seen here. It actually fits her personality — one of brilliant colorful motion, quite well.

1.21 Gigawatts

john — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 10:51:01 +0000

The funny looking silver car seemed like it was going about 88 miles an hour down the street in front of our house. Then there was a flash of light, and burning tire tracks where the car had been. I hope they didn’t hit a cow. Our neighborhood was a farm in 1955.

Silver

john — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 11:44:50 +0000

The baby squirrel was an orphan who adopted our family last spring. He followed us around for the whole weekend. He was only a few weeks old, and wasn’t shy at all about approaching humans. A couple days later, we turned him over to the animal rescue people, who were able to rehabilitate him and release him into the wild. It was sad to see him go, but it was the best thing for him we could have done.