Photo-A-Day

donaldejose · November 2024

gene_mcgill · November 2024

Feeling the speed on the MV Fairweather between Juneau and Sitka.

gene_mcgill · November 2024

Hold onto your hat and your loved ones: MV Fairweather is speeding through Peril Strait, Alaska.

gene_mcgill · November 2024

MV Columbia approaching its dock in Auke Bay, Alaska in the rain at about 2AM.

donaldejose · November 2024

donaldejose · November 2024

mhedges · December 2024

donaldejose · December 2024

Christmas tree lights shot yesterday with a 16 year old Nikon body and 25 year old Nikon lens. 70mm and f2.8

donaldejose · December 2024

This is what they look like with a Brighten Star 50mm lens shot at f0.95 reflected in a window.

donaldejose · December 2024

And with the Nikon 105mm f1.4 lens. Different effects from different lenses, but all pretty. Merry Christmas.

gene_mcgill · December 2024

CDOT snowplow driving south on the recently-repaired Middle Bridge over Blue Mesa Reservoir. The lake effect fog is due to the 5 degree F air flowing over the still-unfrozen reservoir. Monochrome SOOC with modest cropping.

donaldejose · December 2024

Bridge to nowhere. Looks like something the government funded in Alaska.

gene_mcgill · December 2024

donaldejose said:
Bridge to nowhere. Looks like something the government funded in Alaska.

I lived in Alaska during the Gravina Island Bridge, aka "Bridge to Nowhere", drama. Then Alaska governor Sarah Palin was totally for it until 2008, when McCain picked her for his VP. Then she was totally against it. The Gravina Island Bridge project was cancelled. However, Palin and the state held onto the money and spent it on other transportation projects.

The Middle Bridge in the above photo is a critical bridge for the state of Colorado. There are only four major highways that go east to west in the state and if any one of those closes, the detours are measured in 4 or more hours extra travel time and potentially hundreds of miles. If the Middle Bridge closes, the recommended detours are minimum 330 miles!

So when this bridge closed after a 3 inch crack was discovered in April of this year, the local impact was severe! Students were cut off from school and medevac between Gunnison and Montrose took additional hours until local pilots volunteered to ferry patients to and from the Montrose hospital.

The bridge is back at full capacity, as is the Lake Creek bridge down the road. It had similar, but not as severe as on the Middle Bridge, cracks and was opened to full capacity about a half hour after I took this photo.

gene_mcgill · December 2024

Lake effect clouds forming over partially frozen Blue Mesa Reservoir. Air temperature here was about 5F. Note the frost on the sage brush, deposited by those clouds. This five frame pano is roughly 150 degrees of view.

donaldejose · December 2024

Just testing some old equipment to see how well it holds up today. This is a 16 year old 12mp Nikon D700 shot handheld at ISO 1250 and 1/80 second with the 25 year old 28-70 f2.8 Nikkor zoom shot at f2.8 and 70mm. The sharpness and bokeh and noise all hold up remarkably well to my eyes. I think it could be printed poster size and still look fine from normal viewing distances. Should be totally usable at 8x10 and 16x20 inches. You can click though to flcker to pixel peep on the full size image and make your own judgment. To some extent we are chasing more megapixels than we need most of the time.