Here are a few images to start off the year

 No particular order here. Just some images that I thought looked pretty good. You'll again notice my obsession with tiny water droplets, water flowing, and reflections on the surface of water.

This image and the next few are some long exposure images several seconds long.

Some Images from Dec of 2025

 Most of these images were taken on a very foggy morning. Janet and I hiked over to Rancho San Antonio.

These are some slightly past tense mushrooms.

This "Face" is just a randomly occurring thing that presented itself to me.

Now this is what happens when a Dandelion seed head gets dowsed with fog.

Black and White

 It's been a while since I posted anything new to my blog site. So, I went through some of my more recent images and selected some images that I converted to black and white. You'll notice I have a thing for looking at old, dead trees and such. Mostly because the dried-out wood tends to exaggerate the grain structure of the wood. 

Okay. At least one image that isn't some dead tree.

Not much to say about things other than life is not always so black and white. Know what I mean?

The Comet

 This month I went out on two separate occasions and captured some images of the recently passing comet. Which one? Well...here's what Wikipedia had to say about this comet.

C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) is a comet from the Oort cloud discovered by the Purple Mountain Observatory in China on 9 January 2023 and independently found by ATLAS South Africa on 22 February 2023. The comet passed perihelion at a distance of 0.39 AU on 27 September 2024, when it became visible to the naked eye. Wikipedia

Orbital period: ≈ 110 million years (inbound); ≈ 235,000 years (outbound)

Discovered: January 9, 2023

Discovered by: Purple Mountain Observatory; ATLAS South Africa

Mean diameter: ~3.2 km

Aphelion: ≈ 270,000 AU (inbound); ≈ 3,800 AU (outbound)

Argument of periapsis: 308.5°

Comet nuclear magnitude (M2): 9.2 ± 0.3

Now, here are the images I captured over those two nights.

That streak in the upper right corner was an aircraft flying by while the camera shutter was open during the exposure. Which was for several seconds.

Overall, I'm pleased with the images. For the first batch, I used three-second or longer exposure times. I cranked up the ISO for the second batch and made no more than two-second exposure times. I wanted to reduce the trailing effect of the stars while the Earth rotated when the shutter was open.

Something New

 It's been a while since I posted any recent images. So, since I'm sort of convalescing after a recent fall from my bicycle. I have some idle time on my hands. Below are a series of images I've taken on recent walks over to and back from Rancho San Antonio. I've even entered three of the images in the Midpenninsula Open Space photo contest. I should find out if I have been recognized sometime in August. Otherwise, only those who know of my blog can enjoy my images.

I'll start out by directing my/our attention up to the sky. Looking at the wonderful blue sky with lots of interesting clouds.

Next, will be some of the local critters we usually see during the warmer months when we visit the park.

This relative close-up of the lizard face is one of the images I submitted to the MedPen photo contest. The little thing just seems to have a kind of character in its expression.

I really like this image. It is simple in composition. And yet bold in color and contrast. I considered entering this image, but it was not recommended by my small group of voters.

This is another image I like for the same reasons. But, once again, it was not picked by the small panel of voters I asked to judge the potential images I wanted to submit. So, it didn't make the first primary.

This image was chosen by the entire group as an image I should submit. The lighting and subject seemed to inspire a yes vote from everyone.

I have a thing about getting up close and appreciating the details in the image. I like the color, the shadows, and the feel of depth in this image. But, it didn't pass the panel of voters.

This image and the next two images show my fascination with droplets of water. To me, those little droplets appear as tiny, ethereal gems that materialize out of thin air.

Come on now. Isn't that just fascinating?

I couldn't let this one pass by. It's another of my reflections on the surface of water in a creek images. I just like these images. They are so real and yet they seem to look like abstract art at the same time.

I used my macro lens to capture this image. The little bug is probably no more than 6-7mm long. Yet it totally commands the subject of this image.

How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? That phrase comes to my mind every time is see one of these seed heads. This first image has almost half the little seeds missing. They've been scattered by the wind or they were disturbed by some passerby.

Here is another one almost entirely intact. At least for the moment. I liked this image so much, I thought it would be fun to push the editing a little over the line.

So, I cranked up the contrast and color saturation. Just to give it a bit of a Punk culture look. It's not the same image as the one above. But, I liked this one enough to play around with it.