Janet Brien's photos

This beautiful bird is one we see often, but I've never gotten a really good picture until now. I was so happy to see several of them this morning and made a point of trying hard to get some nice images. From the Cornell Lab of Ornithology: "The large, handsome Golden-crowned Sparrow is a common bird of weedy or shrubby lowlands and city edges in winter along the Pacific coast. Though it’s familiar to many during winter, Golden-crowned Sparrows vanish for the summer into tundra and shrublands from British Columbia to Alaska, where little is known of its breeding habits. Gold-rush miners took cold comfort from this bird’s melancholy song, which seems to reflect the bleak beauty of its surroundings." Please click on the link above to learn more about this beautiful bird!

While I was taking pictures, I managed to get some birds in flight, and though they aren't the best in clarity, I think they are really neat, especially the one which shows the Junco with open wings and its reflection in the heated bird bath! :)

2 more pictures in notes above ! :) The weather forecast said it would be cold this morning. REALLY COLD. They were right!! It was 14.5°F when we got up, and it was all I could do to force myself out the door into nature's freezer! But I simply HAD to see what happened to the frost when it was that cold, so I bundled up like little Randy in "A Christmas Story" and out I went with Molly at my side. She couldn't be happier in her thick double coat and had a grand time frolicking about while I marveled at the world around me. At first I didn't see anything all that special, but then I saw some boards with screws in them and could hardly believe my eyes!! The frost looked like miniature Christmas trees! So huge and detailed!! I knew I had only about 15 minutes before I would be forced to get back inside, but in the end, I refused to go back for 30 minutes because I was enjoying the beautiful frosty sights so much! I found many "furry" screws like the one above, frosty planks, twigs, and leaves. and even I found a mushroom in the grass that was looked like it was covered in diamonds! I saw so many cool frosty things that by the time I got back to the house, I was very glad that I forced myself to go out into the cold! You all would be snorting in laughter to see me sticking my feet, one at a time, into a hot sink of water to get the feeling back into my toes! :D :D Too funny!! :D Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American industrialist, the founder of the Ford Motor Company, and sponsor of the development of the assembly line technique of mass production. Contrary to popular belief, Ford did not invent the automobile nor did he invent the assembly line. Ford however was the first to develop and manufacture the first automobile that many middle class Americans could afford to buy. In doing so, Ford converted the automobile from a relatively unknown invention into an innovation that would profoundly impact the landscape of the twentieth century. His introduction of the Model T automobile revolutionized transportation and American industry. As owner of the Ford Motor Company, he became one of the richest and best-known people in the world. He is credited with "Fordism": mass production of inexpensive goods coupled with high wages for workers. Ford had a global vision, with consumerism as the key to peace. His intense commitment to systematically lowering costs resulted in many technical and business innovations, including a franchise system that put dealerships throughout most of North America and in major cities on six continents. Ford left most of his vast wealth to the Ford Foundation and arranged for his family to control the company permanently. Wiki: Henry Ford Explored on December 5, 2013. Highest placement, page 3.

I'm going to tell you right now, this is a photoshopped image! :D The mushroom you see was laying in a bunch of grass and weeds, and I was only just able to get a picture without leaves obscurring the mushroom. I thought it was so beautiful though, I tried to think how I could share it. Then I remembered that I'd taken some pictures of a very cool stump that was bristling with frost, and to my great happiness, I happened to take one picture at an angle that would work for the mushroom! So, I carefully cut the mushroom out of its grassy image and then darkened tha background in the stump image, cut out a layer to go "in front" of the mushroom stem, so that I could nestle it into one of the gaps in the stump, and placed the mushroom in place! :D To me, this is a nice way to be able to share two images I wouldn't have bothered with if I didn't put them together! And what's extra cool is that I didn't even think about this possibility when I took pictures of either of them. It just worked out. :)

This isn't the most exciting picture in the world, but the reason I think it's special is the wonderfully detailed frost! Almost like snow flakes, I think this was so cool I needed to share this image! What's also interesting is that the detail in this frost is so small that you cannot see it with your naked eye. I could tell there were "teeth" and sharp edges, but I couldn't see the details. I did know that the frost was going to be very special to look at, and I was right! :)

2 more pictures in notes above ! :) This morning Steve and I got up before dawn so to make it in time for our early eye exams and I think all of you would have snickered at how well I portrayed a zombie! :D We were out of the house by 7am and could not BELIEVE how cold it was--20.5°F degrees!!! And even though Steve had the car warming up for 5 minutes before we left, we needed to scrape the frost off the windows because it wasn't melting! :D I looked mournfully at the beautiful frosty morning as we drove along and wished I could be out there taking pictures...of the two huge flocks of Canada Geese in the frozen fields...the light shining through everything and sparkling beautifully, the misty hillsides...it was so lovely. But who was I kidding? I really just wanted to go back to bed! :D Though I hoped I wouldn't have to, my eyes were dilated for the exam, which meant I wouldn't be taking pictures until after the medicine wore off. Forlorn, I bid my hopes for frosty pictures goodbye, but I wasn't too sad because there would be plenty of opportunities in the coming weeks for more frosty goodness! After I got home, I had to wait until 1:30 pm before my pupils shrunk from eerie basketball-size back to normal, and since it was beautiful outside, I told the dogs were were headed for the ridge, and all of us exploded out into the beautiful cold day to seek adventure and good times! :D The ground was hard and crunchy here and there and though it wasn't frosty, it was still very cold at about 38°F degrees. I wondered if I might find some frost after all. Making my way carefully up the steep trail to the top, I avoided the smooth and slippery path which was slick and muddy. I'd done my share of sliding on that mud in the past, and was very careful to pick my way up cautiously with my camera and macro flash. We headed to the far end of the ridge line, all of us exuberant and happy, and along the way I found a couple of beautiful "caught" leaves glowing in the afternoon light and I also found a manzanita trunk that had twists in it that reminded me of a straight candy cane! As we neared the far end, I slowed to a stop in front of "Snakey's Log", because for some reason, it often has something wonderful for me to photograph under it! Moosey gave the log a sniff and I told him, "Move along, Mister, this is my log!" :D Lifting it up, I found a surprise! It was a very large, red centipede, curled up and beautiful. I managed to get many wonderful pictures before it slowly disappeared into a hole, but I won't be sharing those today. For fun, I gleefully showed Steve when he got home and chortled mirthfully when he looked and yelled, "EWWWWWWWWW, GROSS!!!" *cackle* Big baby. :D I recognize that my fascination with creepy crawlies is not shared by a lot of people so when I do share some of my "icky bugs", I'll save it for a day when I can warn you and let you decide if you want to see my pictures! :D However, Snakey's Log had ANOTHER prize for me...a large group of mushrooms growing on it and peering up from around the sides! SO COOL!! I got many pictures, and no, not sharing them tonight either, but maybe in the next couple of days. And yet...a third prize, which I AM sharing...and it's picture #2 tonight: another shining amber droplet with a sea of melting frost bokeh behind it! How wonderful to get another nice picture of these mysterious little droplets! After replacing the log and beginning our return walk, I stopped at a pile of logs to check them out for mushrooms....DOUBLE PAY-DIRT!!! Not only were there mushrooms, but they were covered with frost!!!! Hooray for patience and tenacity!!! I thought I might get lucky but I wasn't sure. Here then, is my Picture of the Day. A beautiful, frosty mushroom, who waited in darkness for me to upend its log so I could find it wearing nature's finest jewelry! :) Thomas Henry Huxley PC FRS FLS (4 May 1825 – 29 June 1895) was an English biologist (comparative anatomist), known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his advocacy of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. Wiki: Thomas Henry Huxley Explored on December 5, 2013. Highest position, page 4.

This amber droplet was very light in color, which explains why it appears clear in this image, but it's another one of those odd droplets I showed the other day. The log it was under had some melting frost sparking behind and I hoped I could get some fun bokeh. It worked!! Hooray!

This picture is one of those surprises that makes you stop and say, "WOW!" Technically, there are issues--there is a bit of jitter and more of the spider could be clear, but in this case, I think this picture is about magical moments, caught at just the right time. This tiny web was so fine I wouldn't have seen it except that there were many fine dew drops giving it away. I thought I'd take one picture to see if I could capture the droplets, but I didn't expect to get anything. When I looked at the image on my computer, I was totally surprised to find that I'd captured the image of the tiny spider who made the web, complete with droplets on its abdomen. What amazed me was that the flash shone right through the spider and caused it to glow and created iridescence on its legs!! I love the rainbow-colored droplets and all the wonderful bokeh. It's like a spider in a little galaxy, strung with stars!

2 more pictures in notes above ! :) I planned to get out of the house early enough this morning to catch the frost, but I dawdled too long and it was all gone by the time the dogs and I bounced out the front door. Just in case, I headed down to the shadiest part of the "light side" of our lower forest, hoping I might get lucky. Nope. Just a tiny bit here and there, but I'd missed the real show. Oh well, it's going to be very cold the rest of the week, so I'll try again tomorrow! :) As the dogs had a fine time nosing around and looking for icky things to chew on, I began studying stumps, logs and branches. Our Oaks get positively COVERED with various lichens and fungi, and there seem to be endless varieties as I pay more and more attention. Every stick, every log, every piece of bark, has the potential of showing me something interesting and new! I feels like I'm in a gigantic toy store in the woods, with hidden surprises everywhere, just waiting to be discovered! It didn't take long to find my day's treasure trove! Examining a couple of logs without seeing anything special, I reached over to grab a fallen branch and toss it aside...when my mind registered "CIRCLE" and I froze in mid-toss. I have trained myself to look for circles, ovals, and rounded shapes over leaves, and this has really helped me to find mushrooms. In this case, the circular shape was exceedingly small, and it took me a few seconds to race along the branch with my eyes to find what got my attention. MUSHROOM! There it was! Tiny and shriveled, this little mushroom was a brand new discovery for me! In the past, I've never found mushrooms on the thinner Oak branches, only the thick ones. But here it was! And then...I spotted another! And MORE! In twos and threes, many little mushrooms were poking out through the various species of lichen and moss attached to the branch! It was like a little village of fungus, all of them so precious and tiny, ranging in size between 1 mm and 1.5 cm! I had a hard time knowing where to begin, there were so many wonderful little shapes, positions and fun groupings! My biggest challenge was finding a way to balance the unwieldy branch without mashing mushrooms and still being able to get the angles I was after. Many pictures later, I was satisfied that I got my Picture of the Day, so I lay the branch back down, and just for fun, took a very good look at the tree's trunk and a living branch...YES! Lots and lots of tiny mushrooms!! I thought to myself, "I bet they've been here all along, and I've just never noticed them until now!" Isn't it just amazing how much there is to see out in nature?!! :) When I got home, I found myself becoming overwhelmed at the sheer number of magical little scenes I'd been lucky enough to capture successfully, and it was really hard to narrow down my favorites. In the end I decided to go with this picture because the mushrooms are so cool looking the way they are peering down from their woody perches, the gloom deepening into darkness behind them. I found myself thinking of one of Gollum's riddles to Bilbo, one of the many they trade back and forth in the heart of the Misty Mountains. I have always loved those riddles, so I used the one I was thinking about as the quote for today. (If you don't know the answer, it can be found here: Lord of the Rings Wiki: The Hobbit: Riddles in the Dark John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE (3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. J.R.R. Tolkien Explored on December 4, 2013. Highest placement, page 3.

3 inset images and 3 notes above! :D This trio of pictures all have mushrooms that were too small for me to use in my normal sized images, so, as I've done in the past with other subjects, I made a collage! Aren't they adorable?! :D

2 notes above! :) This tiny 1cm-wide fungus is a perfect example of the pictures I can now take because I'm using a flash. Previously I'd run into high ISO issue or the bright sunlight would blow out the image. Here, you can see texture, the depth and shadows within each crevice, and the fancy faux fur lining! How cool is that?!! :D

3 more pictures and a note above ! :) It rained most of the day but I kept checking to see if it stopped, and finally it did, if just for a short time. I left the house without the dogs because I didn't want to spend 20 minutes drying them and wiping off mud! And since I was off on my own, I made a bee line for the lower forest, since I won't take the dogs because there's no fence to the main road. As I left the house, I knew it was windy, but I didn't realize that stray droplets were coming down and spraying everywhere, so I ran inside to get a plastic bag to cover my camera while I crossed the smaller meadow, bracing myself against the chilly draft. Immediately upon entering the dark and moist lower forest, the wind dropped down to a slight breeze, and I was comfortable again. Ah, macro heaven! Where do I look first?!! :D I immediately began finding little mushrooms, but they were buried in leaves and were too much work to excavate, so I moved on. I found some beautiful moss-covered stumps with wonderful sporophytes and pretty lichen. Then I found some beautiful Orange Jelly fungus and some itty bitty baby shelf fungus, and also some interesting white fungus that looked like rows of molar teeth! FASCINATING! I took pictures as I went along, and then arrived at a favorite area with many rotten logs and plates of bark. Everything was bristling with tiny fungus, moss, and lichen species, and when I found a large chunk of bark, I dropped down onto my knee pads and carefully turned it over. "OHHHHHHH!!! Look at all the little white mushrooms!!! WOW!!! SO AMAZING!!! All over one section of this bark were dozens of extremely tiny shell-shaped mushrooms in various stages of development. I spent moments slowly gazing at all of them without my glasses, delighted at this stunning microscopic show I was able to enjoy. I noticed that many had miniscule, period-sized dew drops on them, and suddenly I found a droplet on the edge of an absolutely perfect, heart-shaped mushroom! Happily, I took many pictures from various angles and apertures, hoping I'd get that impossibly tiny droplet in focus. When I got back to the house, I discovered that only a few were in focus, but to my delight, the one I was most hoping for was exactly right!! HOORAY!!! :D Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC)was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology. Together with Plato and Socrates (Plato's teacher), Aristotle is one of the most important founding figures in Western philosophy. Aristotle's writings were the first to create a comprehensive system of Western philosophy, encompassing morality, aesthetics, logic, science, politics, and metaphysics. Wikipedia: Aristotle Explored on December 3, 2013. Highest placement, page 3.

1 note above! :) There were so many wonderful little mushrooms to photograph, I could have been there for an hour with various groupings, but I decided to find two groups that looked very different, and this one I just loved. Three mushrooms just about to open to their full size, and under them, an adorable, tiny, brand new mushroom that looks like it's wearing a frilly Spanish dress! OLAY!! :D

These tiny mushrooms are mature and fully open. At their full size, each is a maximum of 5mm in diameter! So tiny and precious!!

2 more pictures in notes above ! :) We had to go into town today for groceries, and I asked Steve if we could stop at a little nature area on the way so I could take pictures off the property for a change of scenery. When we got there, I spent about 15 minutes looking around and in that time I found some very beautiful small shelf fungus as well as a pair of HUGE shelf fungus that measured about a foot or more across! Incredible! I also found some really cool tiny opaque/translucent mushroom-like fungus under a log, extremely tiny BLUE fungus with white edging, and some baby pill bugs! I was really happy with my pictures and looked forward to choosing one for my Picture of the Day, but when we got home from our errands, I took a look outside, and saw some really fascinating clouds in the sky. As I stood looking, the sun set over the far hill and then I was RUNNING for my camera! HOLY COW THE COLORS!!! The colors were so intense they were coloring the walls in the house!! First I took pictures of what you are seeing here, and it just got prettier and more amazing as the seconds passed by. And then I looked out towards the south and nearly dropped my camera...HOLY SUNSET ON FIRE, BATMAN, THE SKY IS A RAINBOW OF COLORS!!! As I charged from room to room, looking for the best window to shoot from, I yelled at Steve to come and see, as I bounced out the back door and out onto our upper deck for pictures of the sunset over the Table Rocks. I've never ever seen colors like that over the Table Rocks before, and you can see that picture above as an inset or in the next picture. WHAT INSANE COLORS!!! Greg Anderson is the founder of Cancer Recovery Foundation International, a global affiliation of national organizations whose mission is to help all people prevent and survive cancer. Greg Anderson Explored on December 2, 2013. Highest placement, page 1 (#26).

This is the very same sunset, but I am turned to the southwest instead of the west. This is the most colorful sunset I have ever seen from this direction! Unbelievably pretty! I count my lucky stars every day that I live in a place that is so full of natural beauty.

It is extremely hard for me to wrap my mind around the fact that I am now on my last month of this 365 Project! It's been such a long journey and though I started it with great confidence, you never know what will happen. This project seems so simple. I mean, what's the big deal, right? One picture a day. So what? However, it's not so simple, and the fact of the matter is that in my list of people doing the 365, only 5 of the 15 are still doing it! I have run into my share of issues--time crunch, low motivation, low inspiration, technical issues--but I never had an issue with the #1 365 Project Killer: BURNOUT. Before I began this project, I spent months thinking about it, and then I read about the issues people run into. I didn't want to fail, and the top issue is that many people get so excited about this project that they take tons of pictures every day, and by the end of the first month, they're sick and tired of photography and walk away. Month by month, this project loses people, and many times it's out of their control. I've been very careful to monitor my mood, and control my photography so that I don't burn out. And thankfully, I'm now entering the final stretch and I'm just as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed today as I was on Day 1!!! It's just so awesome that my carefully laid plans have worked out. Granted, I will need to take some time off after my project is finished. I plan to do something that ISN'T photography for a while, like play some video games or whatever. I'm very passionate about photography, but it's not good to always do the very same thing every single day. Nice to do as a challenge, but when I'm done with this project, I'll take some time off to do something else for a while. (But I'll very likely be posting most every day--you guys have no IDEA how many pictures I have backed up and ready for show 'n' tell! :D :D) Finally, I have to give a shout-out to all of you for the awesome support you've all been giving me! It's been incredible. Words just don't cover how I feel, and I just want to say THANK YOU!! *big hugs all around* HERE'S TO THE FINAL MONTH!! HUZZAH!!! HUZZAH!! HUZZAH!! :D

3 more pictures in notes above ! :) A couple of weeks ago, I finally started going out with our Canon macro flash and forcing myself to get used to the extra weight. It's been tremendously rewarding and every day I've been able to take pictures that I wouldn't waste my time with previously. When working at a macro scale, your depth of field needs to be very deep if you want to get an entire object in focus, and that's simply not possible without a tripod or a flash if you're as close as possible and the subject is tiny. Believe me, I've tried to be stubborn, but it's a waste of time. Even though my camera handles very high ISO extremely well, a tightly cropped, extreme macro is not usable with ISO higher than about 600-800 or so (depending on various factors). Needless to say, lower ISO is better. I know it, and I was just TIRED of fighting with light constraints. I'm still learning to use this flash (and I know I have a lot to learn!), but I'm comfortable with it now and my reward is being able to look at everything with a high potential of getting a great picture! Suddenly, the zillions of tiny things in darker places are now available to me. Talk about EXCITING!! Today the dogs and I went up onto our ridge again and I made a bee line down to the end of the trail because that's where there's a high percentage of conifers and a moister environment. I found lots and lots of mushrooms and other interesting non-macro subjects (like some cool oak burls and a cute picture of Molly glowing with happiness), and enjoyed peering closely at countless logs, bark and rocks. I got images of 9 different mushrooms in groups of 1-3, and as I was about to head back, I looked down and saw this crazy lichen! I've seen one similar to this, but not so ornate and beautiful. Next to this lichen I found another very odd type of lichen too, and I will share that another day. I'm so happy that I was able to get a crisp picture of this cool lichen to share! :) (By the way, I think this lichen is called Cladonia cervicornis) Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., ONH (17 August 1887 – 10 June 1940), was a Jamaican political leader, publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator who was a staunch proponent of the Black nationalism and Pan-Africanism movements, to which end he founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League. He founded the Black Star Line, part of the Back-to-Africa movement, which promoted the return of the African diaspora to their ancestral lands. Marcus Garvey Explored on December 2, 2013. Highest placement, page 8.