Category: photography

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Wild and Wonderful Hello!

Hey all, checking in from Wild, Wonderful (and windy) West Virginia. Thought I’d let you all know I’m still breathing, still riding, and yes indeed still having lots of fun playing with the ponies.

I doubt I’ve posted since the re-loaded wedding this summer,

we’ve been busy playing catchup on all the farm stuff we let sit while preparing for and escaping from the festivities this summer… and we’re still dragging our heels here and there on getting pictures up from said extravaganza.

That, and setting up for the sale or refinance of my house in Front Royal… if anyone wants to buy a house in an awesome riding area; send me a PM. It’s right about 5 miles from the BRP in FR and on the AT.

Been a strange year. I’ve ridden horses more than motorcycles this year, but had adventures on both. Been blessed to meet people and ride on some farms with trails and scenery that take your breath away, and had both horse and bike riding through Antietam battlefield.

About the only thing I can possibly think of to complain about… my commute is too short… although really, really fun… to ride to work. It takes longer to get suited up than it does to get to the office. 5 miles. 6 minutes including the trip down the driveway. But on the weekends, fun can be had in all points of the compass.

So, with running a farm and all, I’ve been pretty much lurking via iphone in downtime between feeding and fun,

Friesians and Fords,

horses and iron,

Belgians and Belg…

Our best to all,

Mark & Kirsten

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What an incredible day…

First, I get to work to find out that a couple of the pictures I had left with Dad got submitted to the local paper ended up being one of the two published to cover the Ultimate Five Run in Dyersburg, TN, which was a run benefiting Relay for Life and the American Cancer Society in conjunction with the Boss Hoss Annual Rally got published on page 10 of the local paper in monday’s State Gazette with another photo by my dearly beloved. Wow. I’m now a published (if uncredited, silly paper…) photographer.

Then I’m going through my emails, and Randy Burns, a local artist in Dyersburg whom I met, for the second time, over the past weekend at a book sale in the Dyersburg public library, had left me a wonderful comment on my Terrawolf site. Now I know this may not seem like much on the surface, but if you take a few minutes to browse over to his site, you’ll see the incredible work he does. The checkout desk of the Dyersburg Library has several of his pieces behind the counter on their walls, including one on loan from my Dad, and I cannot tell you how much I wish I had a gift for raw creation like that. I may be good behind a camera, but cameras record… a painter creates. So having a complement from a talented creator like him just made my day 🙂 And he’s a spot-on nice guy, too.

I’ll have to find myself the pdf of the race article a bit later so I can repost myself :=) And I’m behiond on a few emails, so it may be a day or so before I get back here… be well, my adoring fans :=) All 3 of you 🙂

Mark

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Oh boy… scheduling run amok…

Where to begin?

Nah, where to end: Jan 1.

There, now that that’s settled. Seems I need to be in 4-5 different places on Thanksgiving. Possibly. We’re not sure yet. Of course, once the idea is set, new information changes it.. so who knows. I’ll certainly be offering thanks when it’s in my rear view mirror…

Today is new camera day, if all goes well. I’ll be swinging by on my way into work (after jiffy lube, chiropractor, and packing) to pick up a new Canon 40D (not to be confused with a Nikon D40… I wonder how long calling it a 40D got debated… ) Hopefully my wonderful good luck will hold, God willing, and I’ll continue to be in the right place at the right time for some cool shots 🙂

In the meantime, still breathing, and currently contemplating various measures and breadths of site redesign in creative places. Amazing what resources one can play with.

Best to all,

Mark

PS.. maybe one of these days I’ll remember to tag the post befroe clicking PUBLISH! haha.

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Wierd Weatherings… Wonderful Wonderings.. Wacky Website Widgets.

So I just get off the phone from my friend in Texas who informs me that Hot, Dry, and Dusty West Texas has not been such all summer long. Lots of rain, only 5 days over 100, and all expectations are for a snowy white winter.

Must…find… snow….thrower!!!!!

Life here in Virginia might get a bit interesting if it’s SNOWING IN TEXAS….

I managed to get at least one of my photos submitted to a contest sponsored by Canon. It was one of those surprise photos that I didn’t think would turn out just from the immediate take on it, but once I got them off the camera, knew what I had in front of me. I’m still waiting to hear back from the company running the contest on what qualifies for the other… If they don’t answer, I don’t know which I’ll send in…

Signed up for BlogRush last night…. having a few issues getting their widget to acknowledge install, though. I tried a dozen or more times, and no matter how many times or how many places I put it in the layout, it won’t ack and I have to click skip… but for a site less than a week old, they’re allowed a bug or two :=)

That’s life in a nutshell…

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One of those mornings…

So I’m driving home from the day job this morning, and passing the pond by my house, I see this wonderful mist rising off from it.. the water is dead still, and the reflections of the morning light in the sky were shining almost as brightly as the sky itself… and I knew today was the day. I finished the drive home, fed the cat, grabbed the camera, and drove back to get a few shots. Talk about Opportunity knocking…

I don’t know if any of them have turned out yet, 12 hour night shifts aren’t exactly made for doing photprocessing at 7am, but… I have high hopes that I’ll have at least one really nice frame to post in the next day or so :=)

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Thump thump….

The heart still beats within my chest. Although at this hour of the morning, I rather do feel a bit undead. The rain outside has me in a rather odd, contemplative mood. Hopefully it will provide some much needed relief to the farmers… but I’ll taek sunshine any day of the week… even if I have to sleep through it to ensure the shifts get covered and the bills get paid.

I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to getting TerraWolf Photography the rest of the way off the ground. Granted, I have this huge, massive mountain of work to do that is only the barest fringes of tertially-related activities as far as actual photography is concerned, but the fact of the matter is, when trying to do something as a business, “what you do/sell” is only a tiny fraction of the reality. At least I’m getting further along in my base knowledge of the rest of it. SEO and portal concepts have finally gelled itno something I can work with and learn as I go. And I thought “Digital Darkroom” was going to be my challenge! Hah!

Finally got off my duff and bought some frames for some of my prints that I’ve been meaning to frame for a while. My wall’s been lonely, and I really want to have a daily reminder of how awesome my prints really are 🙂 Humility is commendable, but unfortunately I have too much of it to effectively market my own work as something interesting… maybe seeing it every day will help me tell other people how nice it is. Then again, maybe not… I’ve never taken complements well… always thought they were bait to get you to stand still long enough for the sandbag to drop.

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Fascinating…

For the first time since I’ve been back from my meanderings around one national park or another, I actually got a reasonably respectable night’s sleep. I think the last time I slept this well was in glacier after reaching the titular “turn-around” of my expedition.

Who knows, I may actually get my rythm back one of these days!

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“Maintenance”

Today was marked by a 32k service, getting the BMW back in order from the extensive traveling and Motorcycle photography I accomplished this summer; and matched by some corresponding low-key maintenance of ADDING keywords to this site, and a bit of snooping on status of terrawolf as a whole. Not bad for a day marked with 3 hours of real sleep, an early alarm, and not much to do but sit and wait at Morton’s BMW.

It still amazes me that I doubled the mileage on the bike in 4 months….. and still had time to shoot close to 4000 pictures…

Alas, I have not yet had a chance to check out The Laughing Gypsy nor her Jefferson County Fair photos recently, but I’ll probably do this before I get to sleep.

Best,

Mark

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God Help Me….

I’m actually learning how to publish and advertise a website online. At least I don’t have to write much of the html 🙂

This wonderful excursion into the land of Landscape Motorcycle & Travel Photography has been a much more comprehensive reach into the dustbin of admin history than I originally thought. I’ve quite simply never had to do this before. It’s interesting all the same, but I keep wishing for miracle that won’t happen… someone to step up to the plate and do the boring work for me.

But, as with all learning processes, there are benefits. I now have some direction to go with gallery improvements, and have updated the smaller galleries with keywords. No captions yet. That’s next. Keywording Terra, though.. now THAT’s a project in and of itself!

Best,

Mark

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A grain of salt?

:=)

SOMEONE need not mention salt shakers!


“Wasted away again in Margaritaville,
Searchin’ for my lost shaker of salt.
Some people claim that there’s a woman to blame,
Now I think, – hell it could be my fault.” -J Buffett