Cog & Feather

The cover photo was taken after restaurants were shut down but before we were to shelter in place. What a crazy couple of weeks it has been.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted .. needless to say it’s been a chaotic start to 2020 and now Coronavirus has a lot of us in the US sheltered in place and taking a cautious approach to any interaction with the outside world. The number one priority is getting this pandemic beat, and the measures put in place to keep people isolated are a necessary one. But I can’t help my wandering mind and worry for all of those affected directly, whether in health or economically. What of the kids who are out of school? Especially in the Pacific Northwest, I worry about our local economy, where we have such a vibrant small business community and life surrounds food & drink so intimately. And let’s not forget our local film labs either!

And on that note, practicing photography has been hard - I’ve seen countless articles and social media posts on how to continue creatively taking photos while bunkered up, but it’s probably safe to say most of us have dialed back our shutter counts quite significantly. This is also probably an unprecidented event that during such a large scale crisis, we cannot easily document through the lens what is so immediately affecting our everyday lives.

I figure the only folks who stand to gain anything from us holing up in place are our pets. The humans are suddenly always around to cuddle, hound, and annoy. There have been a lot of dog portraits in this house, even more so than usual..

Streeeettch! Nikon Z7; Nikon Z 50mm f1.8 S — Streeeettch!
Nikon Z7; Nikon Z 50mm f1.8 S

That said, I don’t want to draw attention to how empty our cities are, but how vibrant and full of life they were, and will be, once we weather this crisis. Alex and I spent Valentine’s weekend in downtown Seattle, and I shot a roll of Kodak T-Max 400 in my Nikon F3HP, through the venerable Nikon AF 85mm f1.4D. Here are some highlights from that roll.

Be well and be safe out there, everyone.

This year’s post Thanksgiving holiday rush has felt really fast - and it’s no wonder; the Sunday following Thanksgiving was already December 1st, and for us was planning out a fairly involved holiday road trip from Seattle to Phoenix, then a flight to and from St. Louis before returning to Arizona for the New Years. Oh, and of course we’d be driving back up to Seattle after that. Not to mention that we have been apartment hunting leading up to now.

We’re leaving for our big trip tomorrow, but we did manage to sneak in a holiday photo session with our friends and their dog, Ella.

Now, the dogs were none too pleased to be wearing their sweaters at first, especially with antlers on. But in short order, Ella would go full derp mode, while Gob relaxed into his typical somewhat apprehensive self.

The evening was shot through a Nikon AF 85mm f1.4D mounted to a Nikon D300S. Flash was a Nikon SB-910 with incandescent filter bounced up and forwards. Post process would be a pain dealing with doggie red-eye but I was happy with the results.

I plopped myself into the corner of the apartment with the scene lightly backlit. Shooting on an APS-C sensor with an 85mm proved a little tight, but it was a conscious choice to keep a bit of working distance from the dogs, and I was intent on making it work. The dog moms went to work distracting the dogs which worked wonderfully.

I suppose Ella could only smile so hard for so long.

And of course, I had to sneak into the action at the end as well. Happy holidays!

Back from hiatus; sheltering in place

Elf on a shelf? How about dogs wearing clogs? It's holiday photo time!