These have not yet bloomed, but I really like the shape and color of these. Though these aren't exactly the shots I had in mind, I still like them. I think that since I take so many photos of flowers, I tend to try hard to use a lot of different perspectives in order to make a better photo. However, I do sometimes focus on a certain idea that gets stuck in my head. (Since I am writing this post well after I took this shot, I can say that I tried these shots again, later on in May. For those shots I was more successful in capturing a shot that was closer to the image in my head.)
For my birthday I got a gift certificate to buy some camera gear. One of the things I bought was a collapsible reflector to reflect light onto whatever I am photographing. Well, today it arrived in the mail, so I went out to try to use it. The flowers above were back-lit nicely by the sun, but the stems and such were in the shade, so I positioned my reflector to add some fill light. This worked great, except for the bottom right corner of the photo, which is the reflector. I, of course, didn't notice this until later, but I am otherwise very happy with the photo, plus I like that I caught a bee flying by.
I've taken several close-up and macro shots of California Poppies, but no group shots. This year there are a lot more poppies out, including some really nice bunches. I really like this photo because I feel like the center flower really draws the eye.
Today we went on a whale watching trip from the Santa Barbara Harbor. Though we only saw one whale at a distance, we did get to see some bottlenose dolphins swimming alongside the boat. This was the coolest thing ever! They were so close that we could even hear them squeaking at each other. I took a ton of shots but they were moving very fast so it was a real challenge just to capture them in the frame. The two photos here are the best. The buoy at the bottom is at the entrance to the harbor and apparently is always covered in seals. All in all, it was a super fun trip, and, since we only saw one whale at a distance, they gave us a rain check. So we get to do this again!
Another red leaf with the sunlight shining through. I was a little bored and uninspired today while walking through the garden, but I like this photo.
There are some new roses in the garden! I love that I can just about point my macro lens anywhere on a rose and have a great shot.
Today was a busy day and I almost forgot to take my photo. I looked around the house for something to photograph, and after a whole lot of searching, I decided to try to take a closeup of the back of a compact disc and the light reflecting on it. I'm pretty happy with how it came out.
Today we went for a walk down to the slough to watch the sunset and get some photos. We found some goats that were being used to clear out some vegetation. They were really cute and photogenic, but I didn't have my photo game on so the shot above was my best one. Then the sunset over the slough was amazing, complete with swans! The shot below took several tries. I really wanted to catch the reflection of the clouds on the water. I think I took about 30 photos of just this. Then I took just over 100 shots of the sunset and swans. It was a fantastic photo outing.
Another day in the garden. This time I was drawn to those cool blue flowers again. I randomly took the shot above without really looking at the photo until it was on my computer. I'm pretty happy with it, though it could use a little more depth of field. The shot below took several tries. I wanted the green and yellow background and a good composition.
Today I went across the street to photograph some very colorful flowers. My intent was to photograph the flowers from below to capture the light through the petals. I'm pretty happy with how they came out.
My good friend Nicole came up with the idea of walking on the beach from Coal Oil Point at the end of Goleta, all the way to downtown Santa Barbara. Lots of people seemed very excited about this idea, but in the end, only three of us showed up. (Though some people had very legitimate excuses.) They missed out, because it was awesome! The day started out foggy and grey, but the sun came out for quite a while in the middle of the day. The tide was also pretty low throughout the walk. The photo below is a tree at Goleta Beach that Nicole fell in love with. I like that I accidentally framed Paul between the tree trunks. The fifth photo is of Nicole and Paul on a giant driftwood teeter totter that we found. In the end, we didn't make it all the way on the beach to downtown, but most of the way. I had to quit early and get a ride home, while the others continued on sidewalks to downtown. Turns out that walking on sand is exhausting.
I've definitely been waiting for these flower to bloom. They are huge, cone shaped flowers that are all over Santa Barbara. The main reason I have been looking forward to these flowers is because I wanted to get some good close-up shots. I love that this one flower is a composition of a bunch of smaller flowers.
These are Nell's latest two knitting projects. For some reason they were extremely hard to photograph. I tried to show the patterns in the knitting as well as I could.
I've been waiting for these to bloom again. This is the flower of a fennel plant. I think I posted some side shots of these way back in my blog. I love how they look like fireworks going off.
I am pretty fascinated by the center of flowers. Sometimes they look so alien. Plus, they make for cool photos.
This is a closeup of a somewhat new prickly pear cactus pad. The scientific name is opuntia cactus. It is growing new cactus spikes. More importantly, this is not a flower photo.
Since we are rat sitting for some friends, I decided to try to get a fun shot of the rat. That mostly worked. Rats are super active and don't like to stay still for photos. Oh well, at least I got a fun shot of Nell. Oh, and we also went out for my birthday, but I didn't take my camera. Happy Birthday to me!
We had big hopes of climbing outdoors today, but the weather did not cooperate. We were so hopeful that we even drove up into the mountains to the trail head, but it was super misty and icky. I took the opportunity to get my camera out for about 3 minutes before we decided to spend the day climbing indoors. This is the best shot from the 3 minutes with the camera.
Another trip to the garden and I found some new flowers! I've photographed these before without much luck, so today I decided to do a super close-up shot.
Today I took Zoe, Monica, and Susan for a hike in the mountains above Santa Barbara. It was a pretty nice day for a hike. Behind them, and just to the right, is a trickle of a waterfall, behind them even farther is Tangerine Falls, which was also a trickle. It was a fun hike though.
My sister Monica, and my niece Zoe visited us this week. Today I took them up into the mountains above Santa Barbara for a picnic on the rocks at a place called Lizard's Mouth. It was pretty awesome to get to show them around Santa Barbara, and the first stop was to show them the views from the mountains. The second stop was the beach near our apartment. Monica found a nice rock to sit on to look out over the ocean.
A few days ago, I posted a photo of a sun lit pink flower. Today I noticed that those flowers have a pretty cool looking center, so I set about trying to get a good shot. I'm pretty happy with how both of these came out. I like how the pollen is scattered about.
So, there are a ton of calla lilies in the garden, and I'm still trying to capture the beauty of their curves. Since I said I wanted to do some in black and white, here they are. I put the bottom photo in for comparison. Calla lilies have so much depth, that I'm finding it hard to get all of the flower in focus, but I'm pretty happy with these photos.
It snowed in the mountains above Santa Barbara. Since I knew that my friend Maxine had never really seen snow in her life, I took her up into the mountains for some fun in the snow. She had an absolute blast! She threw snowballs, made a snow angel, and she built and eviscerated a snowman. Oh, and a very nice man loaned us a sled, so she got to sled for the very first time in her life. It was awesome. We didn't have our cameras out for very long because we were afraid of getting them wet, but I got a few good shots. The shot below shows how excited the locals were to see snow. There were quite a lot of people up there just for the snow. 
I failed to take my photo during the day today, but I took my camera to a pot-luck at our friend's house in hopes of getting a good candid photo. I succeeded, but the candid I got was of Joey. He's a pretty good sport, but doesn't really like to sit still for photos, so this is the only photo of 30 or so that was in focus.
