Random Photos

[jtbell]

On Saturday in Shelby, North Carolina, I visited the Earl Scruggs Center, in the former Cleveland County courthouse.

On the floor, a relic of the Covid era.

 

[nsaspook]

A little recharge at McD.

 

[DennisN]

Two fun bird sequences...

I discovered that I've managed to capture two common redstarts when they were taking off (I probably shot sequentially). Far from great quality, but I share them just for fun. Both were shot in a graveyard which is known here for quite good bird presence.

The first one, a male, was looking to the left and obviously suddenly decided to take off to the right (from the bird's perspective). The second photo I both smile at and find fascinating; it looks like the bird takes off by just jumping up while hardly stretching the wings. And the wings don't look fully stretched until photo #4:

(shot with 1/500s exposure time, and that is a little long for flying birds, as far as I know)


The second redstart taking off (a female I think, and just three shots):

(shot with 1/2500s exposure time, so the wings are more easily seen here, but regretfully still not as sharp as they could be, I think. Practice, practice, practice... )

 

[DennisN]

I was looking at auction sites recently and found a couple of unusual items: really old wooden cameras. Here's a fun one, which I think is a large format camera (though I don't know much about such old systems). Interestingly the photos are developed inside the camera, which contains a small lab (!).
It's listed as an "antique street box camera", and this is really old school...

I looked around on the net to get an approximation of how old it is, and if I understood correctly the Protar lens was manufactured in the 1910s–1920s, perhaps extending into the early 1930s.

And this thing is heavy :

Lens: Carl Zeiss approx. 160 mm in Compur shutter consists of front lens Protar lens 35 cm and rear lens Protar lens 22 cm. ... Weight approx. 5.5 kg ... Inside the box there is space for a lab where the photo paper is developed and fixed in a container. Rinsing is done in a bucket of water.

(translated from Swedish to English)

Source: Ad

I saw another unusual large wooden camera yesterday, but regretfully I can't find the ad again.

 

[RicoGerogi]

His Scaring hissing..

 

[nsaspook]

Working on a trash can enclosure and solar panel deck.

The second 'roof' element is being installed today.

It's how you get the wife to approve spending on your engineering projects. It's got to have a roof to keep the trash cans from getting wet, right?

 

[DennisN]

Four spring shots taken today...


Late afternoon springtime sun...

European aspen (I think)

Flowering almond (I think)

Springtime sun

(Lens used: Pentacon 135mm f/2.8 (15 bladed))

 

[Point Conception]

Westerly onshore winds and Thai Bouillabaisse + small fishing boats , Jomtien beach

 

[nsaspook]

The simple pleasures.

Lets go fishing.

 

[DennisN]

Another "dream cat" photo...

Lens: Helios 44M7 with front element reversed
Edits: Some color adjustments and added vignette in Photoshop

 

[jtbell]

Today I passed through Salisbury, North Carolina, following in the footsteps of George Washington.

I saw a cat cafe there, but didn’t go inside because I had just eaten lunch elsewhere. They did have some stuff in the windows, though.

 

[DennisN]

Haha, I just read one of the funniest posts I've ever read about photography .

It's about wildlife photography and a guy who has obviously been struggling a lot to get decent bird photos (and tried numerous lenses and probably spent a lot of money )...

I notify @Andy Resnick , @collinsmark and @Rive , but others may be interested too (it is hilariously written ). Here's the post:

I regret to inform you it costs a lot of money to take good pictures of birds (Olympus 150-600mm review)
(Reddit)

Some memorable quotes from the post:

"You've just got to get closer!" , "Zoom with your feet!", "You just need to work on your technique!". This is all a pack of lies.

On the OM-1 it [the lens Sigma/Olympus 150-600mm, my note] looks like a Honda Civic with a Tomahawk missile glued to the hood. Gawdy. Absurd. Malformed.

I'm still young enough I will be dumb about this and mostly handhold while taking ibuprofen and gritting my teeth, but do not let your pride and vanity cause shoulder strain.

The poster has obviously finally managed to take photos he is satified with .
And they are awesome:

 

[pinball1970]

Denton Manchester. The clouds looked so symmetrical and solid they looked like distant mountains, even some snow on the top.

I tried my best to touch it up and the light was not kind but it looked amazing.

 

[pinball1970]

Meet at Uni yet 30 odd years later you still make an effort to see each other and pretend like we are 20 again. If you cannot spot the physics UG then shame on you!
2019.

 

[pinball1970]

Westerly onshore winds and Thai Bouillabaisse + small fishing boats , Jomtien beachView attachment 359737View attachment 359739View attachment 359740View attachment 359741

That soup dish looks amazing! Chilli, Paprika??

 

[Point Conception]

That soup dish looks amazing! Chilli, Paprika??

Indeed. And basil,lemon grass + many spices. I get it with coconut milk added.The seafood soup is about all I ever order . About $5. Includes mackerel shrimp and squid

 

[nsaspook]

Clearing out old junk in the shed. One of the kids got this with a jar of Ovaltine long ago.

This is a rare bird. Adaptec ACB-5580A SCSI-SMD adapter just in case I need to read data off an old CDC 8' or 14' disc pack.
https://ftpmirror.your.org/pub/misc/bitsavers/pdf/adaptec/500519-00_ACB5580_SCSI_SMD_Ctlr_Oct85.pdf

My old Atari ST used this SCSI to SMD adapter so I could run these after writing a formatting/configuration program to make the adapter board SCSI output from the SMD drive compatible with the Atari SCSI interface. That was a lot of fun to create and complete joy when it all worked.

80MB+ of pure 8' hard drive computer fun.

 

[DennisN]

Ok, I catched a bit of the antique bug and bought two old cameras on auction because I couldn't resist them; they were small, cool looking and I got them dirt cheap.

I won't say which they are just yet (the brands are Voigtländer and Wirgin, two German brands), but I will put up photos of them here later, of course .

In the meantime I read a bit about Wirgin and stumbled on a curiosity, the Wirgin Gewirette (ca 1932-1937) which was an amazingly small camera, and here's an ad from 1940 about the camera:

(source, scanned by Voxphoto (Creative Commons))

I just find it fascinating that they could make such small cameras in the 1930s.
Early Leicas were also quite small:

(Leica I (1927), © Kameraprojekt Graz 2015 / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0, source)

 

[phinds]

I just find it fascinating that they could make such small cameras in the 1930s.

Check out the Minox from the '30's

 

[DennisN]

Check out the Minox from the '30's

You mean this one? (or these ones, as there are various models)
Wow, that is just amazing. I had never heard about those cameras.

The dimensions of the Minox subminiature camera are: 80 mm × 27 mm x 16 mm; weight: 130 g.

Minox Riga (ca 1937 - 1943, if I understand correctly). Photo by Dnalor_01 (Creative Commons).

 

[phinds]

Wow, that is just amazing. I had never heard about those cameras.

Youngster. Anyone who lived through the Cold War would know about those famous "Spy Cameras".

 

[Point Conception]

That soup dish looks amazing! Chilli, Paprika??

 

[pinball1970]

View attachment 359861

Ill give you review!

 

[jtbell]

On the Catawba River just north of Rock Hill, South Carolina yesterday:

A few miles downstream is the Catawba reservation, which I visited a couple of years ago.

More about the history of Nation Ford.

A road running southward from central Charlotte still has the name Nations Ford Road, although it no longer reaches the ford itself. The original road south of Charlotte through Fort Mill to the river has been abandoned and built over, except for a few sections of the roadbed in a park/greenway just north of Fort Mill.

A Google search for "Nation Ford" turns up mostly stuff about Nation Ford High School in Fort Mill.

 

[nsaspook]

A ZIP-tie gun.

 

[Tom.G]

I have one of those -- well worth the investment.

TIP: Using a permanent felt-tip pen, add marks on the tension scale for the different sizes of ties. Label them with the length of the tie.

Cheers,
Tom

 

[Flyboy]

A very… distinctive… bike on the Iowa State University campus.

 

[pinball1970]

A nice one again from Katie my colleague.

 

[pinball1970]

 

[pinball1970]

Guitar modding continued...



My custom surf/dream pop guitar is now assembled, and it's nicknamed "Surfbird".
Here it is:

View attachment 357202

I still need to do neck adjustment, adjust string heights and then do intonation, and after that the guitar should be ready to go.

Schematics is highly recommended to do when you build custom guitars:

View attachment 357203

Some close-ups:

View attachment 357204
Left: Roller string retainers on headstock (decreases friction and helps with holding tune while bending
& using the guitar vibrato arm). Right: Lockable tuners. Bottom: Bridge roller saddles (decreases friction and
helps with the same as the roller string retainers).

View attachment 357205
Left: The three pickups (two Rockabilly single coils (GFS Surf 90) and one lipstick pickup); five pickup combinations are possible with my wiring. Right: The volume and tone controls with two top hat bell knobs, otherwise usually seen on Gibson guitars.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm having fun, so I will probably do another custom guitar...

I'm planning on doing a Telecaster-style guitar, since I haven't got one of those, but it will likely become a little "bastard" that doesn't look like a standard Telecaster; it will be a "Weirdocaster" .

I'm thinking of fitting two Telecaster pickups into a Stratocaster body, along with a couple
of dual hot rail pickups. This will make it into a Telecaster which also has a vibrato system (standard
Telecasters haven't got any), and the extra dual hot rail pickups will make it possible for it
to double as a Stratocaster. So it will become sort of a lovebaby of a Tele and a Strat. The wiring will probably be quite tricky to do, but no pain, no gain.

View attachment 357207
Left: I've got an empty Stratocaster body and a neck, but unfortunately I will have to drill/carve out more space for the pickups. Top: Two Telecaster pickups (neck & bridge) I've got lying around. Bottom: I will have to do a custom pickguard, since my pickup combination will be very unusual.

A little extra guitar nerdiness, if I may...

Telecaster bodies are rather heavy (except Telecaster Thinlines) and not as comfortable as Stratocasters in my opinion, for instance Stratocasters have belly cuts (image) while Telecasters are usually completely flat (image). And I'm keen on comfortability and ergonomics, so I prefer Stratocaster bodies.

There are good reasons why Stratocasters are such extremely popular guitars, and it's not because Jimi Hendrix played one .

View attachment 357206

They may not be very sexy guitars, but the design is simply great; they are very comfortable and ergonomic, they are versatile and they usually sound from good to great. And if I'm not mistaken there are two Stratocasters on stage on the first photo @pinball1970 posted before, in front of what I guess is a Marshall cabinet and amp (?).

I've only played one guitar that I have found more comfortable than Stratocasters, and it's a PRS copy (a Harley Benton CST-24T) I bought cheap second hand which is incredibly comfortable. It's not a great guitar, but pretty good, and fun to play.

Yes all Marshall