My friend Flickr

I've been shooting a lot the last few days and have something like 120 new images up on Flickr. My personal photostream can be found here. Platypibri's Photos. Riverside actually has it's moments where it is quite beautiful. I did a couple camera safaris to Fairmount Park and The Hidden Valley Wildlife Reserve which runs under and along Van Buren out towards Mira Loma. Here's a panoram I shot there.

If you get a chance to check them out, let me know.


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And that's enough for now.

Brian Norwood

Platypi Online: The Platypus Portal

Tangle of Lights

Before you get to trim the tree, you start with this. I think next year I will be a capitalist consumer pig and just buy all new lights. Still, it has it's own kind of beauty.
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And that's enough for now.

Brian Norwood

Platypi Online: The Platypus Portal

Kodak Z712 is

I'm really falling in love with photography. I find myself wanting to shoot all the time. And I am fascinated by cameras and I'm always looking for the right one for me. I'm not to worried about the megapixel race, as I could easily do what I do with with a 4 or 5 MP camera. Thing is, from The Wild Animal Park and Sea World to Point Lobos and Monterey Bay, I tend to be far from what I am shooting. Black Friday let me get a little closer to being a serious shooter. Best Buy had the Kodak Z712is on sale for $168. It features a staggering 12x optical zoom. Bad time for me to buy, but such a good deal. So, I am unloading some gear as we speak to pay the bill. (Adding a 2 GB SD card and a 15 minute NiMH AA battery charger took it a little out of my budget) Thanks again to my wonderful wife for letting me be a little irresponsible (within reason). I've only had it for a day, but I really think I've finally found the camera I'll have for a few years. I've attached a few of my early experiments. I like the image quality.

	This is Chani, one of my cats. She gets into moods where she likes to be photographed, and today was one such day.
	This is, of course, my daughter Katie. If you don't know her by now you should read my Dad Blog.
	The night before a full moon and a 12x zoom got me pretty close to our closest celestial neighbor.

I love the night sky. Some day I'd love to shoot long exposures through a telescope to watch the distant stars come out. Anyway, I'll try not to bore you all too often with this kind of stuff (and I'm sure I won't be buying any more cameras anytime soon), but snapping pics is my current obsession. And isn't that what a blog is for?
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And that's enough for now.

Brian Norwood

Platypi Online: The Platypus Portal

My New Photographer Hero

I thought about putting this on the dad blog, but settled on here. I've been shooting a lot of pictures and trying to really get better at photography. I don't always have 10 or 12 hours to spend on a piece, but I am still interested in making images. So I've been checking out blogs and sites of photographers. I came across this guy on digg. Jan Von Holleben has some of the most creative photographs I've seen recently. I particularly like this set I'm linking to called "Dreams of Flying", but I encourage you to check out the whole site. It's good stuff. He's not a hero for technical reasons, like say, Scott Kelby, but he really has a unique way of looking at the world. I found it very inspiring.
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And that's enough for now.

Brian Norwood

Platypi Online: The Platypus Portal