Posts Tagged ‘travel’

Happy Birthday!

We are planning another birthday celebration for my mother tonight! She has been very busy lately, and it can be tough to keep up with her schedule. Last weekend, she was a sponsor at a wedding that I photographed, so she was in many of the photos. Since I am still working on those images, I have not found any with her from Saturday, so those will have to wait. It’s a good thing, she has been a prolific photographer and photography subject for a long time!

McKee-Beshers-2014-©TimeLine-Media
McKee-Beshers-2014-©TimeLine-Media

Recently, I have had many of our old negatives scanned into digital form so that we can catalog them better. They were just sitting in drawers around her house and garage, and no one has seen them in a long time. It is time to really get them into a format that we can view and share them. I suggest that you do this while you still remember who is in these frames.

On-campus
On-campus
At-Canada-border
At-Canada-border

Just like with society at large, the number of our photos has exploded with digital technologies. But even in the film days, my parents were prolific shutterbugs. There are negatives, prints, and slides all over the place. I may never get to all of them, but it is worth the effort to try. There are so many great ways to share them online. It is not just your memories that you are sharing, it is so much fun to add them to the collective of your friends. This has been my favorite part of social media, and it probably fuels my photographic inspiration in my job. I feel like I am adding to personal histories, and I hope that my images will last at least as long as my family’s images. They are all worth preserving!

Overlooking-NYC
Overlooking-NYC
2008-birthday-celebration-©TimeLine-Media
2008-birthday-celebration-©TimeLine-Media

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Sunflowers at McKee Beshers WMA

Poolesville, Maryland

Taking a short drive to the nearby Maryland countryside to stand in a field full of sunflowers will probably become a yearly tradition for us! Like the cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin in downtown DC, the fields of the McKee Beshers Wildlife Management area are planted with beautiful sunflowers. When they bloom is regularly monitored and posted on their website. Not as many people make it here compared to the Tideal Basin. So you can really get up close and personal with the bees and the blooms.

Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media
Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media

Since they bloom in summer, it is recommended to go either in early morning or late evening. Concurrently, it is better when the sun is not directly overhead. This, of course, makes for better photos too! The spacing in between lines of plantings makes it easier to walk in between the rows of blooming flowers.

Roadside Sunflowers

Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media
Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media

We decided to go out later in the evening. Being July, it was still hot and a little humid, but we enjoyed the colorful view. There are many fields in which sunflowers are planted. However the first one off of River Rd. is probably the most photogenic. As you walk from the parking lot, you can see the yellow glow of the flowers between a column of trees. It is like stepping into an Impressionist painting.

Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media
Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media

It is such a great place to make photos. You can take out your wide-angle lenses, your macro lenses, practice with your tripod, or take your flash off the camera for more fun. Luckily you have lots of space to work and not be in anyone else’s way. There is still some time to get out there and see the sunflowers. According to the website, there are other fields that may bloom from now until August. Grab your camera and a friend or two and make some nice pictures!

Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media
Sunflowers-at-McKee-Beshers-©TimeLine_Media

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703-864-8208

Milwaukee Art Museum

Santiaga Calatrava

My father was an artist. He was trained and worked as an architect, but first and foremost, I remember him as a visually creative person. He had a talent for translating his vision to paper. Overall, I came to appreciate as I saw his drawings be transformed into built structures! He would start with small sketches in the first place. Most would be small details, or sections that he was working out in his mind. For example there would be a staircase, two converging walls, or placement of doors. The changes would be made on translucent tracing paper where he would make edits on different layers, and flip back and forth to see differences.

When things became more formal, the paper would be filled with more numbers – measurements, and math that would make sense to engineers and construction managers. I always thought of this as the transition between just doodles on a page, to a space that will eventually be built. This came out of a blank piece of paper! I always come back to this space when seeing an amazing building like the Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum.

Calatrava addition to Milwaukee Art Museum - ©TimeLine Media
Calatrava addition to Milwaukee Art Museum – ©TimeLine Media

Museum Interior

When we walked through the building, my mind could see my dad looking from the floor to the ceiling, explaining to me some engineering or design detail. His design aesthetic was definitively contemporary, clean lined, and his favorite structures all looked like they were from the future.

Interior of Caltrava addition - ©TimeLine Media
Interior of Caltrava addition – ©TimeLine Media

This would have been his style! Inside there were poured concrete structures that did not see to have a straight edge on them. The repeating patterns of the columns inside looked like perfectly formed bones. This form continued both inside and out.

Interior of Caltrava addition - ©TimeLine Media
Interior of Caltrava addition – ©TimeLine Media

Outside was a roof made of steel fins that opened out like a sail for a ship going into Lake Michigan. The sail will open when the museum is open, and close overnight. This is a place my father would have taken us on a family vacation. I don’t know if he would have taken as many photos as I did, but I suppose that is my outlet!

Exterior of Caltrava addition - ©TimeLine Media
Exterior of Caltrava addition – ©TimeLine Media

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703-864-8208

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