Fruits of May

Sweet Onion



Peppers





Celery



Cucumber



Basil



Cherry Tomato!

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The final act for Broccoli

Every year I allow a couple of my broccoli plants to flower and seed.
Frankly, towards the end they look like hell.
The delicate yellow flowers turn into green seed pods and eventually turn brown.



I fill my wheel barrow with the branches of pods, gab a fist full and twist.
The seed pods burst open and little round brown seeds pop out.
In November I will plant these seeds and start the process all over again.
I can't wait till the fresh broccoli returns.

A Moment with Dragonflies

Here is a quick video I made of dragonflies visiting my garden.
These little guys are only about three inches long, and they are fast.
The video was shot using a Canon EOS 7D with an EF 100 2.8, 720p at 60FPS.
For one shot at the end I used a EFS 10-22 3.5.

Now, I need to practice trying to get them in flight!

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Pineapple Dragonfly

No, it's not a new exotic drink. Maybe it should be?
This week we had two new arrivals in the garden.
The dragonfly's are back after the coldest winter in recent memory.
And my six year old pineapple plant that i planned on pulling up has
popped out a baby.
I remember reading that pineapples only produce two heads per plant.
A year after sticking the top off a store bought pineapple in the ground
we got a small but very sweet pineapple.

That was five years ago. WOW.

I bet its gonna taste great.

Tampa Lightning with a Sony DCR-SX83

Tampa Florida is the lightning capital of North America. This is test of the Sony DCR-SX83. For this test I did not increase the lux, I set it for normal daytime shooting. The camera recorded for about two hours. I edited all of the good strikes together then slow-moed all of them in the second half of the video.

The horizontal lines during the brightest parts of the video are generated in the camera, I don't know if its the CMOS sensor or the camera's compression.

I've been shooting with this camera for about two months.
So far its been good not great, I don't like the mpeg2 recording format.
It does not play well with most editing programs.
Also, those horizontal lines mentioned above are not great.
For general sunny day shooting the kids .... very good.


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Bacon, Potatoes or Visual Torture part II

On the last day of the staycation we enjoyed a yummy breakfast.
Bacon, eggs and fried potatoes. Why am i sharing this you ask?
Torture.
A couple of you "regulars" made such a stink about my chicken that
I just had to share.
And oh yes, it was all good.
I would highly recommend getting one of these grills.
Now ...... suffer!

Lido Beach Staycation

Florida in April is so nice its hard to get
on a plane to go somewhere else on vacation.
This year we bagged the plane ride and the
carry-on fees for a few days at the beach.
About an hour drive south of Tampa are some
of the nicest beaches in the country.
Siesta Key, Longboat Key and our destination
this time, Lido Key.
We stayed at Lido Beach Resort, great room
with a view of the beach.
Here is a time lapse video I shot out on the
beach with my GoPro Hero camera and my
homemade time lapse panning unit.



As you can see the water was amazing,
beach beautiful, a great destination.

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