Mu-43.com - Micro Four Thirds User Group
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Time Gone By - Messer/Whaley Farm, GSMNP
The Great Smoky Mountains National Park has several old buildings that were once used by the families that made their lives in the mountains. It was a hard life in a rugged land that eventually became the National Park. One of these sites is the Whaley/Messer farm site.
About a mile up Porters Creek Trail you come upon the site seemingly deep in the forest. The farm was originally built by Pinkney Whaley in the late 1800's. The double-cantilever barn was built in 1875. Eventually the farm was sold to John Messer who had married Pinkney's cousin.
By the 1930's most of the farm buildings had been torn down, or used to rebuild a cabin for the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club. The cabin was used by the Hiking Club up until 1981.
Here is a view from beside the cabin. In it you can see an old mill stone, the old farm spring house in the middle distance and the 1875 barn in the distance....12Dec 4, 2017 -
A Few Pictures More … Macro
Hooded monk – looks like – beetle, on the butterfly bush against the red nasturtium. What big eyes, to see in the dark - the only time I find them.
Caught out in the rain, this little shovel headed beetle. In my hand it will dig into the shadows, strong as a dray horse.
A wasp, I think, only found twice after the rain and wind forced her to land for the duration. Lovely blue in the black.
My old favourite, orange tail resin bee. Finishing off her nest and the cycle begins once more.
Drone fly, came and went, as is the way of nature. Nothing stays the same for long. Keep up by unloading the expectations.
Wasp, taking a break after being rescued from the watering can. She recovered quick enough and was away on the breeze.
And a few Assassins ...
Out in the hot sun. A few shots before she flew away, a rare occurrence that, assassins flying.
A younger version, from a winter’s night, others could be found nearby. At some point they must become a danger to each other.
You can see it’s a youngster by the wing buds – not developed much at all. Nice to get the blue car in the background.
The kill … the only consideration being hunger, instinctively. Slip that lance between the armour and pretty quick the beetle is a meal.
It doesn’t lend itself to many angles for portrait. Here on a dried out banana skin, taking advantage of the others feeding there.
Too small to make a meal, that fruit fly on an old banana. But others, bigger, do come and die while dining on the fermenting pulp.
Is there such a thing as a pretty assassin bug? Not really, but they can be appreciated for being what they are, unselfconsciously so....12Oct 14, 2018 -
Daks Over Normandy - Duxford event 4th June
The following are images from the Duxford event - 4th & 5th of June - which started on June 2nd and ended on June 5th when the whole of the DC3/C47 aircraft departed for Normandy (did not witness this as due to some operational constraint the departure was delayed by an hour and we had to drive home before this occured).
June 4th was a windy, damp day, but some flying took place although the planned parachute drop did not take place.
And we were treated to the wonderful sight and sounds of the Dakota's taking off and landing.
After landing the 'troops' emptied out of their aircraft and walked past the crowd line (I think they were as disappointed at not having jumped as the crowd was).
Slowly the weather worsened but several fighters put on a good show regardless (by this time I spent more time wiping rain off the lens as I did taking pictures).8Jun 11, 2019 -
San Gabriels - Big Mermaids Canyon
Here in the LA area, we have plenty of obscure yet fantastic back-country canyons and washes to explore. This morning, I decided to check out "Big Mermaids Canyon", a minor tributary of the San Gabriel west fork just east of Cogswell dam. There are no trails here and you can't get very deep in bushwhacking before you reach some impassible pools, but there is an awful lot of beauty in that short trip...
Black bear on the west fork road. This shot would have been impossible without the EM1mkii- got it handheld at 1/20s at 200mm while straddling a bicycle!
The first of two falls in the Big Mermaids canyon. This one was pretty easy to work around, but it only gets worse from there.
Side view of this first falls. There are some nice hand-holds to get up, but its still pretty tricky getting a clean shot.
A nice quiet spot on the creek
End of the road. This second fall is as far as I'm willing to go today. The water is at least chest deep by that fall.very deep and very cold! Camera is on a tripod, using the wifi and remote control on Oly app (phone is in my hand)
One of the locals here (California Newt). The stabilizer and good close-up on the EM1/ 12-40 combo works great for awkward handheld shots like this one.
32mm at f4, 1/13th second and ISO 64
Another small set of falls further up the West Fork.
And another waterfall. This one was shot using high resolution mode and resampled (camera is resting on a log). The EM1 does seem to handle moving objects much more gracefully, and the level of detail is stunning!3Jun 4, 2019 -
Mottisfont squares (roses and others)
I took a visit to Mottisfont Abbey yesterday. The house and gardens in Hampshire, southern England are owned and run by the National Trust and its walled gardens are home to the National Collection of pre-1900 old-fashioned roses. Many of roses are only just getting going but there are plenty of other plants and flowers too. Here are a baker’s dozen of my favourites from the day (I was really digging head on compositions it seems!)
All taken on my E-M1 Mark II with the stellar Olympus 12-100mm PRO (not being identified in the EXIF) and all wide open at f4.0. If I’d taken a little more time some of them could have benefitted from a deeper dof but it was a family trip with my wife and 2 daughters, both under 5, so there wasn’t that much time dedicated to photography. I’m pleased with what I’ve come away with.8Jun 4, 2019
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