Rob's Photography Blog

For a number of reasons, I've decided to move the blog to WordPress.  You can find the blog at blog.roberttruemanphotography.com.  Thanks for viewing!!!

For all of the Nikon shooters, the new version of Capture NX has been released today.  Check out the news at capturenx.com.

Our camera club took a trip to New Hope, PA to do some photography.  I was with the kids so didn't shoot too much, but we had a blast riding the big train.  What is it with little kids (and big!) and trains?  Here's one to share...

It's been one of those days.  You know, one where you start thinking and can't stop.  So, to combat the thinking, I took a walk through Skippack - a local town of restaurants and eclectic shops.  This pictures just fits...

Wow!  What a great experience.  My family had a great time watching the kids experience "Disney Magic".  From Sarah hugging all of the princesses and Christian hugging Pluto to my mother seeing her four grandkids at Disney it was a week I'm not going to forget.  A lot of snapshots were taken.  In fact, I even flipped the D300 to P mode to fire off a bunch of shots without worry.  It makes a great (albeit expensive) point-and-shoot! :)

What's interesting is the Disney setup for their photographers.  All of them are using either Nikon D70 or D70s models (I heard D200s too, but never saw them) connected to a transmitter and barcode reader.  They snap the hell out of you and the group, scan a card and the images are retrievable online (and their photo center) using the Photo Pass card.  You can request prints from there.  It's a cool setup.  One photographer I spoke with said they're going through cameras every few months with the number of shots they take.

Another interesting observation was the complete dominance of Nikon over other DSLRs I saw.  I think I saw ten to fifteen Canons and hundreds of Nikons (mostly D40 and D40x) in the hands of the vacationers.  I'm not looking to start a flame war about which brand is better, but Nikon sure has a hit with their entry level DSLRs.

I'll post anything interesting later, but will throw this up for the hell of it.  Yes, it's way over processed, but I like the image...

I was going through my images today to update my gallery site and build a print-sales site using PrintRoom.  Take a look at the sites and let me know what you think.  I've always been hesitant to sell images, but PrintRoom makes it easy.  You get an order and upload the high-res image.  They print, mail and collect payment.  They take a small cut and you get a check.  We'll see if anything happens!  Anyway, I was browsing my images and found this picture of the Moulton Barn...

Like the Moulton House picture I've displayed here in the past, it was taken at sunrise during a not-so-pleasant day.  I love the way the clouds look so nasty, but the barn is almost glowing from the new sun.  That was definitely a trip I'd take again.

What an interesting morning!  Instead of a nice leisurely 35 minutes listening to the Image Doctors I was experiencing this...

So, I got through a lot more than just Image Doctors.  Almost 2 1/2 hours later I came to the accident.  A tanker truck overturned on the roadway.  When I got there, I pulled off to the side, drove up to the accident scene (behind the truck with the flashing <--- ) and shot a few images of them righting the truck...

I always wondered how they did that.  Basically, it's three giant tow trucks, two to inflate air bags under the truck and one with a chain on the top to pull it over.  Once they started inflating the bags it was over pretty quick.

Lesson learned... always have your camera with you. 

Today, we took a quick trip over to Ott's Nursery.  Ott's is a large indoor/outdoor nursery that changes looks many times a year.  They're really nice folks and have never complained about my picture taking.  In fact, today they welcomed the cameras and even lent us some pads for our knees.  Of course, I always stay out of the "paying customers" way (I've actually purchased a number of things from Otts!).

I like what I got.  Many of the images I took today were hand-held and all with my new Tamron 90mm macro.  Overall, I'm VERY impressed with this lens.

This first shot was the last one I shot for the day.  I liked the way all the cactus were lined up with their price tags.  I shot this with a tripod...

In a separate room, they had a Calla Lilly standing alone.  Ahhh, perfect - a flower all by itself!

And a close up (after blowing the pollen off the stamen)...

Both of these were also tripod mounted shots.

Lastly, I thought these two leaves looked interesting.  Both were shot hand held, but I thought they were still very sharp.  Some of the out of focus areas is due to depth of field.

As I said, I'm very impressed with this lens.  I think the colors are fantastic and the sharpness excellent!  Just look at the lines in the calla lilly's stamen above.  I thought that was amazing.  Anyway, if you're looking for a (relatively) inexpensive macro lens Tamron has a couple.  This 90mm is amazing.

It's been almost a month since my last post and that's simply not good!  My personal and work life is taking up more time than normal so photography has taken a back seat for a bit.  The only pictures I've taken recently are some family and kiddo playing shots.  I did, though, take the plunge on my first non-Nikkor lens - a Tamron 90mm macro lens.  It got great reviews optically and cost significantly less than the Nikkor 105mm Micro.  With the current $90 rebate, this was too good to pass up.  I'll post some images once I get a chance to check it out.

For now I'll post and image I found from this past summer.  While walking along the beach in Cape May, New Jersey I looked down and shot this...

I'll do my best to post more than every few weeks.  For now, I hope you enjoy the image!

I had a little time this evening so I went back to look at more of the "Tampa" pictures I took last weekend.  Here are a few from the Florida Aquarium.  While the aquarium isn't extraordinary, you could get extremely close to some of the animals in their wildlife area.  These were all taken with my 17-55mm lens, certainly not what I'd call a wildlife lens...

This wood duck was easily within arms reach.  He/She was in this position for hours!  By the way, I'm terrible with bird names.  If you know what any of these bird really are, let me know! :)

This is a bird... Really, I have no idea what kind of bird.

Here's a shot of a slider turtle.  Again, you were able to get amazingly close to the animals...

In Apollo Beach, the Tampa Electric Company TECO has a massive coal-driven power plant.  They use water from Tampa Bay for cooling and eject the water back into a protected inlet.  Since the water is warm, manatees come here in numbers during the cold month.  There is an amazing array of sea life in this inlet as well - eagle rays, jacks, sharks and tarpon.  It's fascinating to see.  I haven't had a good manatee shot (yet).  Basically they look like bake potatoes in the water.  Here's the plant...