art and architecture, San Francisco

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photo by Donald Kinney

For my FaceBook page yesterday I needed to crop the center of this image down to a 1:3 aspect ratio and found the result to be perhaps a bit more dramatic than what you see here. That's what's great about photography--I can change or improve the image using various Photoshop tools.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Embarcadero Center is a lonely place early on a Sunday morning. The perfect time for making photographs without the normal distractions.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Some day I'm going to get the full story on this piece of art, but in the mean time I think the sculpture brings a bit of love to the coldness and mean indifference of the Financial District.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Oh, it's been snapped a billion times and no doubt one million of those snaps are mine, but I've never been able to pass up a snap of the Crocker Galleria plexiglass roof and what lies beyond.


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feathers in the morning

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photo by Donald Kinney

I believe duck-hunting season has ended, not that it should have ever started.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Well, I suppose hunters would know enough not to shoot the Great Blue Heron.



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photo by Donald Kinney

But give a red-neck a bloody gun and you NEVER know what's going to happen.

EXTRA: "Jen" has a recent blog post that I think is really great; "Ten reasons why a writer should write like a photographer shoots. Check it out.


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thistles, standing as sentinels

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photo by Donald Kinney

There are signs of a new crop, but currently last year's thistles, although lifeless, are still standing guard.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Nicasio at it's finest. The arrow on the right side of the picture is important. Drivers, including those drunk and/or stoned, must negotiate two 90 degree turns at a reasonable speed while traveling through Nicasio, California. The front steps on that old house get crashed-into on a fairly regular basis.


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a tale of poppies and golf balls

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photo by Donald Kinney

Thursday afternoon was blustery--not quite conditions conducive to wildflower photography. I opened the lens wide and practiced, once again, my hand-held snap-shooter technique.



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photo by Donald Kinney

So, I don't want to get distracted by explaining my Photoshop technique on this image--but to summarize, I "squashed" the image top-to-bottom with Photoshop's "Content-Aware" tool. Those hills are actually twice as high as they appear. Why (do such a dumb thing)? For more emphasis on the lichen and poppy. I'm also employing a narrower aspect-ratio, suggested to me by well known photographer, Brooks Jensen.

But getting back to what I was meaning to say... Here's the deal...

There I was, squatting down for my shot at a delightful vantage point high above "Big Rock" at the top of Lucas Valley, and right in front of me is one golf-ball. And then over there another, and another, and pretty soon I have 34 golf-balls in the oversized pockets of photo-shooter's vest. And they're all in perfect shape, as far as I can tell. 34 so far, and there's probably a few more. My theory is that someone was hitting a few balls from that scenic spot, got tired of the activity, and just dumped the huge stash of golf-balls.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Sending a big   s h o u t  -  o u t   to my buddy SF Mike
Well, a while back I mentioned that I had occasionally been finding golf-balls along one particular stretch of my beloved Lagunitas Creek. I brought one home for my beloved Kitty one day but she showed little interest. I SHOULD have been picking the balls up all of these years because by now I would have quite a collection. But I've started collecting in earnest once again--so far I had 4 "creek" golf-balls saved for my buddy SF Mike (a.k.a. Michael Strickland). And 4 + 34 = 38. That ought to keep Mike and his golfing friends swinging for a while! I don't see a brand on the balls, but most of them say "soft-core" and are printed with three black bands.


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moody atmospherics

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photo by Donald Kinney

The clouds at Nicasio on Monday afternoon were moody and dramatic.



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photo by Donald Kinney

A bird soared,



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photo by Donald Kinney

while the sun made a valiant attempt to pierce the thick layer of clouds.


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more from Stanford University

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photo by Donald Kinney

I can't seem to shake my penchant for selective focus. But really, it is how we see. Our eyes do not give us a view with everything sharply focus--we examine narrow fragments of what is in front of us. A video camera would have done a fine job here, first focusing on the light globe, then throwing the focus to Hoover Tower in the distance.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Sunny California in the rain. Almost unbelievable.



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photo by Donald Kinney

"Please believe me"...



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photo by Donald Kinney

"Here".
"Fit all these topics together in a 5000 word essay".
"I want it by Monday".


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morning, San Francisco Bay

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photo by Donald Kinney

And while everybody else gets in their silly cars and drive across silly bridges, the gulls are already home, thinking about breakfast, and establishing territory.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Well, I've just decided not to show my "entrance to San Quentin" photo. The gawd-awful prison is located in the area, on what would otherwise be a delightful spot on San Francisco Bay.

That's the Bay Bridge (above) and part of the also gawd-awful Alcatraz.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Hmmm... Angel Island. But some called it the "Island of Tears". This was an immigration station in the middle of San Francisco Bay. A temporary prison for those Asians denied access to American soil in the 1800's.


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Stanford University

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photo by Donald Kinney

Feeling just a little bit out of place, one week ago I made my way down to the Stanford University campus for the first of ten sessions of Art-237, Developing your Photographic Vision.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Fortunately, to attend the Continuing Education night-classes, no entrance examinations are required. I guess they didn't realize I was going to show up...



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photo by Donald Kinney

I was surprised to find that Leland Stanford's church sits smack dab in the center of the campus. The stone-work and mosaics are out-of-this-world. The church was locked up tighter than a drum but if the exterior is any indication, there is great architecture inside.

The church has been called "the University's architectural crown jewel".
Designs for the church were submitted to Jane Stanford and the university trustees in 1898, and it was dedicated in 1903. The building is Romanesque in form and Byzantine in its details, inspired by churches in the region of Venice and, especially, Ravenna. Its stained glass windows and extensive mosaics are based on religious paintings the Stanfords admired in Europe. The church has four pipe organs, which allow musicians to produce many styles of organ music. Stanford Memorial Church has withstood two major earthquakes, in 1906 and 1989, and was extensively renovated after each. [source:  Wikipedia]



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Leland Stanford, a Californian railroad tycoon and politician, founded the university in 1891 in honor of his son, Leland Stanford, Jr., who died of typhoid two months before his 16th birthday. The university was established as a coeducational and nondenominational institution, but struggled financially after the senior Stanford's 1893 death and after much of the campus was damaged by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Following World War II, Provost Frederick Terman supported faculty and graduates' entrepreneurialism to build self-sufficient local industry in what would become known as Silicon Valley.

Stanford, is an American private research university located on an 8,180-acre campus near Palo Alto, California. [source:  Wikipedia]


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gilding the lilly, or taking it a few steps too far

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photo by Donald Kinney

Well, I was probably wrong, but after I decided on this as yesterday's banner image, I began experimenting with a few ways to accentuate the drama.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Again, not that the image is hopeless to begin with, but when I do have a hopeless image my first trick is to "posterize" the image; limiting the number of colors from many to a few.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Okay, back to reality...
I'll leave you with a peaceful scene from Rodeo Beach.


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more Douglas Iris

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photo by Donald Kinney

I made these using my new "casual" method of photographing, a technique where I've been letting myself become absorbed my environs,



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photo by Donald Kinney

concentrating less on the camera and more on the oneness of it all.


David Douglas introduced the Douglas-fir into cultivation in 1827. Other notable introductions include Sitka Spruce, Sugar Pine, Western White Pine, Ponderosa Pine, Lodgepole Pine, Monterey Pine, Grand Fir, Noble Fir and several other conifers that transformed the British landscape and timber industry, as well as numerous garden shrubs and herbs.
(source:   Wikipedia)


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Eschscholtz and his California Poppy

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photo by Donald Kinney

The seasons have been just about as confused as ME this year, but all of a sudden we have a rampage of wildflowers on display all across my beloved Marin County.



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photo by Donald Kinney

The California poppy (Eschscholzia californica), also called the golden poppy, is a perennial and annual plant, native to the United States, and the official state flower of California.   (source:  Wikipedia)

Between 1815 to 1818 the Russian Government sent Johan Friedrich von Eschscholtz; a physician, botanist, zoologist and entomologist; on an expedition to collect specimens in Brazil, Chile, California, the Pacific Islands, and on either side of the Bering Strait, Kamchatka, and the Aleutian Islands.



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photo by Donald Kinney

So, since Johan got there first, the California Poppy is named after him. Scores of plants are probably named after Eschscholtz, but it must have been quite an extraordinary discovery when he found the what we know today as the California Poppy. Few plants are more beautiful!


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birds in the morning

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photo by Donald Kinney

Soon after I made this shot I realized that many might think I Photoshopped the bird into that precise spot. But no, it's not faked. Just took some luck.



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photo by Donald Kinney

I've attended sunrises with more impact, but Tuesday's was yellow and orange in a way that made a good backdrop to shoot the birds.




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photo by Donald Kinney

Birds and ducks...



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photo by Donald Kinney

And more birds and ducks...



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photo by Donald Kinney

And of course, finally, the sun starts to rise at an alarmingly fast pace.


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going buggy on a wild iris

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photo by Donald Kinney

The wildflowers must be somewhat confused by the lack of rain in January and February, but nevertheless, they're starting to bust-out with a passion.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Going buggy, so to speak...


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up early with the birds

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photo by Donald Kinney

Oh lord, not another sunrise...

I've just started attending a night-class at Stanford and last evening I had the rather frightening duty of briefly explaining to 20 of my peers (plus 1 highly regarded instructor) what Donald Kinney is all about. Most were aghast to hear that I am so willing to get up so-ridiculously-early in order to catch the sunrise.


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