Tour de Frances, St. Louis Hills

I have a Reflex-Nikkor 500mm lens that I have never gotten a feel for.  My dad loved it, and it does have good points: it's sharp, it's in perfect condition, and it's surprisingly comfortable to shoot with.  On the down side, it's slow-- f8 fixed aperture (which is probably really a 1/2 stop darker in practice).  Also, I'm not much of a telephoto shooter to begin with.  Historically, I've preferred the large depth of field and sharpness of wide angle lenses.  I just can't seem to think of pictures so far away.

Yesterday I decided to play with the behemoth.  One of the reasons I bought a Nikon DSLR was so I could continue using the collection of Nikon lenses I had used for years on my F, F3HP and Nikkormat.  The results aren't all that impressive, but another joy of digital cameras is the low cost of practice, practice, practice.

We went to Frances Park to watch the bicycle races.

Wings of Hope in the Forest Park Grand Basin

It's no secret I love boats. Also, I have a fondness for things that may or may not work out the way they're supposed to. Clearly the Hope Floats cardboard boat race is made for me. Julie and I wandered out to Forest Park Saturday morning to see what we could see.


It was a beautiful morning- the heat actually broke for a few minutes.


Some launches went better than others.


Vikings don't seem to like bathing. Who knew?

After years of admiring the folks who risked their pride in the "Anything That Floats" Race at the Three Rivers Regatta, I think I'm ready to try making a cardboard boat for next year's Hope Floats. Who's with me?

The Safes at The Firebird

After a week of not wanting to put anything near my tender nose, I picked up my camera again. I didn't use it too much, but I wanted to grab some shots of The Safes when they came down from Chicago.







It was another night of playing with the new camera and my RAW software. Shooting in the dark isn't much of a challenge with the D5100. Friday night I decided to see how "filmish" I could get. It's not my normal way of working; I don't generally waste my time twisting one media to resemble another. Everyone has moods, though, right?