Photo of the Day - March 2021

[tizeye]

Welcome to Photo of the Day. The POTD thread was started by iGary in May, 2006 and converted to a monthly thread in November 2007 by Arn. POTD is one of the most popular picture groups on MacRumors, often exceeding 500 posts and 20,000 views per month.

Photo of the Day is intended to be a showcase for your best pictures. There is no limit to your gear, just your imagination. P&S and film cameras are welcome along with DSLRs. There are no themes like the Weekly Contest, and no winners (or losers) either.

Policies

*One Photo per Day - Don't post more than one photo each day.

*Multi-Quote - To comment on several photos, click the "+ (Multi-Quote) button. This puts all your comments in one post. Multi-Quoting is required on all of the MacRumors forums.

*SFW (Safe for Work) only - This is a site - wide rule. If you wouldn't show it in a public place, then it's NSFW (not safe for work). Think before you post.

*Describe your photo - Tell what it is and where you took it. If you know the EXIF data of a photo, include it. The following EXIF fields are recommended: Camera, ISO, Focal Length, Shutter/Aperture and Lens.


Note: Anyone may start the Photo of the Day thread on the first of the month GMT. Please copy a quote of this post to maintain all the formatting.

** To see all of our past POTD threads (up to July 2013) please see the sticky thread here**
** To see all of the POTD threads from August 2013 onwards see the thread here**

20" iMac Early 2008, Collector's Edition Unibody MacBook 2.0 GHz
21.5" iMac Mid 2010, iPhone 6S Rose Gold iOS 10.1.1
iPhone 3G 16GB, iPod touch 2nd gen 8GB, iPod nano 3rd and 4th gen 8GB, iPod Classic 160GB, iPod Shuffle 1GB
Tons of other gear I don't feel like putting in here...

 

[tizeye]

Banded Water snake (non-poisonous) greeting me along a walk. The way to tell the difference between them an a juvenile water moccasin that still has the multi-color pattern is the mouth. Notice the vertical bands both sides of the mouth, where missing on a water moccasin. If you want to examine really close...the eyes of the water snake have round pupils vs the diamond slit pupils of the water moccasin - but I perfer the more distant jaw identification.

 

[stillcrazyman]

Gardenias blooming.

 

[dimme]

Pacifica-210228-39.jpg by Charles Martorelli, on Flickr

 

[prog99]

Another one from yesterday. Ben Avon summit plateau, iPhone XR panorama.

 

[MBAir2010]

taken minutes ago:
moon_ibis_wire by expo bill, on Flickr

 

[Captain Trips]

So for the latter part of last month I posted a fair amount of pictures of Sherlock, Cat IT Manager. Sadly, he got cancer (behind his eyes) and we had to put him to sleep on the Tuesday before Christmas. Worst. Christmas Present. Ever.

I had also picked up the "Wish You Were Here" CD by Pink Floyd around the same time. Whenever I hear the title song I think of Sherlock.

I probably have some more good/funny pictures of Sherlock I can post, but we have other cats and non-cat pictures that I can post for a change of pace.

Original photos taken with the camera on my iPhone XR with a Focal length of 4.25 mm and an F number of f/1.8

 

[Mark0]

A wee Robin in the garden yesterday.
X-T3 with XF 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 lens.
1/400s / f5.6 / ISO 800

 

[soulreaver99]

My 1st photo of the month so I’m making it all about me ?

 

[decafjava]

Pic from January and a trek in the Swiss Jura mountains. The dome is on the peak called La Dôle where there's a radar station for commercial aviation and a weather station used by the Swiss meteorological service. Snow has almost gone already...

 

[OldMacs4Me]

So for the latter part of last month I posted a fair amount of pictures of Sherlock, Cat IT Manager. Sadly, he got cancer (behind his eyes) and we had to put him to sleep on the Tuesday before Christmas. Worst. Christmas Present. Ever.

I had also picked up the "Wish You Were Here" CD by Pink Floyd around the same time. Whenever I hear the title song I think of Sherlock.

I probably have some more good/funny pictures of Sherlock I can post, but we have other cats and non-cat pictures that I can post for a change of pace.

Sorry to hear that. Tough time of the year for that kind of loss.

 

[OldMacs4Me]

So with the indoor rinks still closed, wife and I ventured out on a nearby lake a few days ago. As you can see the ice was rippled from surface melting then refreezing during heavy winds. Spent the better part of an hour skating slowly and holding hands, so if one of us stumbled the other could prevent a fall. Still there were some good photo-ops. Such as these ice bubbles. Decided not to completely remove the typical Fuji cyan bias.

 

[Captain Trips]

Sorry to hear that. Tough time of the year for that kind of loss.

Thanks! "Fortunately" he had FIV (apparently felines and humans can get an immune-deficiency virus), so we knew he wouldn't live as long as our other cats. So we were mentally prepared to lose him sooner than we would like, but we were hoping he would have lived more than the 5+ years he did.

There are plenty of cats (and dogs) that need a good home, and I hope we run across another Snowshoe needing adoption some day.

[EDIT: clarified that cats & humans can get an immune-deficiency virus, as opposed to both getting FIV.]

 

[Clix Pix]

 

[Captain Trips]

View attachment 1737127

Nice, is that a magnet? Or just a machined piece of metal?

 

[shanson27]

 

[StrollerEd]

My visit today to South Queensferry - insignia on the postbox indicates that it is Victorian

iPhone 12P with a small dose of p-process

 

[Apple_Glen_UK]

The sky over Portrush this evening after a very sad day in Northern Ireland - my mother-in-law’s funeral. R.I.P. Linda.

 

[Clix Pix]

Nice, is that a magnet? Or just a machined piece of metal?

Actually, it is two titanium "wallets". Not long ago I learned about The Ridge Wallet, and was intrigued, so decided to try one and liked it so much that I then purchased a second one. They're very small, designed for carrying one's credit cards, driver's license, etc., and can have either a money clip on the back or an elastic band for securing bills. The curved part that you see on each of them is where the user pushes the cards up so that one or more can be extracted from the wallet without taking everything out. It's a rather ingenious and deceptively simple design.

Of course the minute I received the first one, before I'd even put it to use I promptly got the camera out and had some fun photographing it -- and so when the second one arrived a couple of days ago, I again decided to see what I could do with the two of them stacked together, as once more that curved cut-out section just begged to be photographed.....

 

[Captain Trips]

Actually, it is two titanium "wallets". Not long ago I learned about The Ridge Wallet, and was intrigued, so decided to try one and liked it so much that I then purchased a second one. They're very small, designed for carrying one's credit cards, driver's license, etc., and can have either a money clip on the back or an elastic band for securing bills. The curved part that you see on each of them is where the user pushes the cards up so that one or more can be extracted from the wallet without taking everything out. Its a rather ingenious and deceptively simple design.

Of course the minute I received the first one, before I'd even put it to use I promptly got the camera out and had some fun photographing it -- and so when the second one arrived, I again decided to see what I could do with the two of them stacked together, as again that curved cut-out section just begged to be photographed.....

Wow, I never would have guessed that. Your picture reminded me a little bit of some small magnets we use to keep paper attached to our refrigerator. Learn something new every day. ?

 

[Clix Pix]

Setup was pretty basic: On the dining table I used a piece of black velvet fabric over a wood cake stand that I sometimes use for elevating my subjects, then lit the scene with one Photek lamp positioned over the cake stand, sat down at the table so that I was at more-or-less eye level with the subjects, then positioned them in various ways and fired away.....

 

[Captain Trips]

Setup was pretty basic: On the dining table I used a piece of black velvet fabric over a wood cake stand that I sometimes use for elevating my subjects, then lit the scene with one Photek lamp positioned over the cake stand, sat down at the table so that I was at more-or-less eye level with the subjects, then positioned them in various ways and fired away.....

Thanks for going into detail how you setup the shot. ? ?

I occasionally take pictures of the miniature figurines I have painted for use in war-games and roleplaying games, but the pictures never really looked very good. Part of it was because of the camera on the older smartphones I used to have, but a big part was figuring out how to "focus" (pun intended) the attention on the subject and not have surrounding stuff in the room get in the picture.

I will have to give something like this a try.

 

[Clix Pix]

Definitely when shooting anything on the dining table, I always need to use something to block the view of the rest of the dining area/living area and large foam core boards from a crafts store like Michael's work very well for this purpose. A black one works well to provide a dark backdrop, too. I also have some photo surface boards which I use from time to time either to place the subject on or as backdrops, too. The main tool, though, for shooting small items is a macro lens if one uses an interchangeable lens camera (mirrorless or DSLR). If one doesn't have a macro lens, an inexpensive strategy also used by many photographers is either a special diopter "filter" put on the front of a standard lens or extension tubes mounted on the camera body along with the chosen lens.

Basically, the idea in photography in general is to keep it simple -- when shooting just about anything, whether it's a macro of a small item or a group of people, whether it's outdoors or indoors. Before pushing the shutter release, look around the prospective subject: above it, behind it, in front of it, beneath it, and beside it, and if there are any distracting items in the way, remove them if possible, or simply shift your own position or the subjects' position in order to remove the distraction from the camera's view. Trying to take a photo of your family standing or sitting under a favorite tree? Make sure that there are no tree limbs appearing to be coming out of someone's head! At a scenic park and want to capture the memories? Make sure before you snap the picture that oops, that large overflowing trash bin that is nearby won't be appearing in the photo, too!

Another important component in digital photography is the post-processing/editing part of it. I shoot in RAW and I use various software programs such as DXO Photolab 4 to edit my images, put the finishing touches on them. (RAW images have to be processed and edited, whereas jpeg ones don't necessarily need to be as they are already processed in-camera.) In the case of this particular image, for instance, I cloned out the occasional bits of dust or whatever which inevitably showed up on the black velvet cloth, and also boosted the exposure and color a little to give the image more "pop", as well as applied a bit more contrast, too.

 

[Buck987]

 

[JamesMike]

So for the latter part of last month I posted a fair amount of pictures of Sherlock, Cat IT Manager. Sadly, he got cancer (behind his eyes) and we had to put him to sleep on the Tuesday before Christmas. Worst. Christmas Present. Ever.

I had also picked up the "Wish You Were Here" CD by Pink Floyd around the same time. Whenever I hear the title song I think of Sherlock.

I probably have some more good/funny pictures of Sherlock I can post, but we have other cats and non-cat pictures that I can post for a change of pace.

View attachment 1737028

Original photos taken with the camera on my iPhone XR with a Focal length of 4.25 mm and an F number of f/1.8

I understand, went through it with my Millie 12 days ago.