Just My Two Cents » photography

Sidney Yates Building

jeffself — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 17:21:37 +0000

Here’s an image of the Sidney Yates building I made from my trip to Washington, DC over Thanksgiving. As I mentioned in my post of the Washington monument, I also took this from my wife’s minivan while we were driving by. This building was built in 1879. That blows my mind.

Washington Monument

jeffself — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:03:15 +0000

While on my trip to DC over Thanksgiving, I took this shot of the Washington Monument while sitting in the middle row of my wife’s minivan while we drove by. A little bit of post-processing, and here you go:

U.S. Capitol

jeffself — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 14:12:30 +0000

Here’s an image I made of the U.S. Capitol while visiting D.C. over Thanksgiving. I think that day was colder than any day this winter. We did the tourist thing and took the tour of the Capitol and Library of Congress.

Yellow Cab

jeffself — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 13:39:32 +0000

Since receiving the Creative Efex Collection by Nik Software for Christmas, I’ve been going through photos I previously shot. I came across this photo I made while visiting Universal Studios in Florida over Thanksgiving 2009. I was sitting on a bench across from an old yellow cab. With the help of Color Efex Pro and HDR Efex Pro, I made this. Enjoy.

Photos from Captiva Island, FL

jeffself — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 20:12:11 +0000

This post is a little late. I was in Captiva, FL back in December but since I’m trying to get back into blogging, I thought I’d add some photos I shot in December. Captiva Island is a beautiful place on the west coast of Florida. Its an island just west of Fort Myers just above Sanibel Island. Captiva Island is known for its beautiful beaches and terrific sunsets over the Gulf of Mexico. It’s home to some great wildlife as well. While vacationing at South Seas Resort, I made sure I took plenty of photographs. You can find my complete set on my Flickr site. Here are some of my favorites:

Photography in 2012

jeffself — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:59:08 +0000

2012 is the year I get serious about photography. I got a Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS lens for my birthday and finished up my buying spree by getting a Manfrotto 468MG Ball Head and Gitzo GT3541XLS Carbon Fiber tripod. I love to shoot old things, like barns, houses and automobiles. However, I live in a city that transitioned from a rural community years ago. Fortunately, we still have some old barns standing. I’ve spent the last couple Saturday mornings shooting a couple.

Here’s a shot of an old bar or some kind of storage facility. I’m not up on my farm lingo. It sits right next door to Oscar Smith High School.

Here’s a shot of an old barn about a mile from my house. I’ve been eyeing this barn for about a year. My son used to call this the ‘Twister Barn’ because he thought it was damaged by a tornado.

And here is my favorite shot of the same barn:

My goal this year is to shoot something every weekend. I’ve got several other places in mind. It’s just a matter of getting the time to do it.

Lightning strike over Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel

jeffself — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 14:50:56 +0000

Lightning strike over Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, a photo by Jeff Self on Flickr.

We were supposed to have fireworks but this storm cancelled them. No problem though. Storm provided plenty of it’s own.

Software for my iMac

jeffself — Tue, 24 May 2011 15:22:19 +0000

With the new iMac 6 weeks from being delivered, I’m thinking about the software I’ll install. So here goes:

Aperture 3
Photoshop CS5
iLife ’11
iWork ’09 (unless ’11 comes out by then)
Chrome
Firefox 4
Final Cut Pro X (Currently have Final Cut Studio, but think I’ll sell it and buy it from the Mac App store)
Handbrake
VMware Fusion (still need to run Windows 7 and Linux occasionally)
Python 2.7 (don’t like touching the installed version. like to add packages here)
RVM (greatest thing ever invented for development. sandboxed ruby environment)

Hoping that OS X 10.7 will be shipping by then. I will still install from scratch however. I think since I’ll have two drives, I will have to partition the 2TB drive to hold the /Users directory.

Harbor Park

jeffself — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 12:42:47 +0000

harborpark2, a photo by Jeff Self on Flickr.

Here’s a photo I took of Harbor Park last night before an exhibition game between the Norfolk Tides and Norfolk State University.

Christmas Storm 2010

jeffself — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 03:46:24 +0000

What a December. First, we get snow on my birthday. That’s the first time I ever recall that happening. Then, we finally get our first snowfall on Christmas since 1948, I believe. It started around 8pm Christmas night and hasn’t stopped yet. We expect it to continue through the morning. We have at least 13 inches now. Expecting 1 to 2 more inches tonight.

Here’s some pictures I took today of the snow.