Steven’s Notebook

Photography is, when all is said and done, an art in which light is a very important element. Where there is little light, we do what we can to compensate. We use strobes, we use fill lights, we use reflectors — sometimes with good results, but often not.

There are times to just say “the heck with it” and work with what little light exists. My older son played in a benefit concert this weekend, and I have several photos for which I used flash. I’m not as happy with any of them, though, as I am with this shot (for which the strobe did not fire).

Technically, it’s not a good photo - it’s “noisy,” details are lost in the shadows, and I had to push the exposure and contrast way to far. But in the end, this image best captured his smile and the enjoyment he was having on stage. For me, this is the best picture from the day.

I work in a 5-story office building which shares the parking lot with another just like it. Ten floors of offices, I’m not sure how many employees work here. On a “normal” spring or summer day there are three bikes in the lot - my FZ-6, a Ninja and a Shadow.

Today is Ride to Work Day, and it’s a beautiful early-summer day too — sunshine, no threat of rain and the temp’s still under 90f — so I was really hoping to see more motorcycles in the lot (and bicycles in the racks). Such was not the case, unfortunately:

I took a quick walk around the lot and this was all I could find… the Ninja rider and I were apparently the only ones braving the sunshine today.

Did you?

I’ve ridden every workday so far this month; my goal is simple — no four-wheel vehicle commuting this summer, barring any hurricanes later in the season.

I went for a nice ride this past weekend, about 110 miles in all up into the North Georgia mountains. You know it’s going to be a good ride when you see a sign like this

and plenty of roads like this

which lead to a destination like this, with plenty of good conversation and cold iced tea

Click on that last picture, btw, for a much better view of Two Wheels Only. It (the photo, not the motorcycle resort) was built with Hugin. I’ve mentioned it before, and friend Allen discovered it this past week. Highly recommended (both the photo-stitching software and the resort).

A little excitement today: I was riding the motorcycle southward along Maxwell St, doing about the speed limig safely on my side of the double-yellow, when I was passed by a black Ford F-150 doing what appeared to be double the speed limit. I barely had time to realize he was there and then he was gone… followed by an unmarked car with blue lights flashing. When I got to Westside Parkway, I could see that the truck had blown through the red light down toward Fanfare Way, and the LEO followed.

I chose not to follow them, though I would have liked to see what went on and how it ended. I have friends who are officers and know that they really don’t like having extra citizens around that they have to watch out for should the person they’re chasing decide to pull a weapon.

It was a bit un-nerving though, how quickly they appeared; I heard the truck before I saw it, and it really was already pulling into the oncoming lane to go around me at that point. I’m not sure if I should be displeased with myself for not checking the mirrors more often or not — thinking back to that section of road and the incident, I’m estimating that the truck wouldn’t have been visible behind me for more than about 3 seconds by the time it caught up with and passed me.

Allen and I went for a motorcycle ride today, to particpate in a Poker Run for charity. We got our first card and a map, but neither of us had a good place on our bike to hold the map. I’ve got plans to get a tank bag with a map pocket but haven’t done that yet, so we decided we’d just follow someone else.

Allen suggested a rider on a Triumph Sprint ST who had his map taped to his tank, but I chose otherwise. We’d talked to a Honda rider who was pulling out as we were ready; he seemed to me to be the sort of guy we might enjoy riding with, so we dropped in behind him. In some regards, I was right — he rode at a good pace, not too fast nor too slow, and was choosing good roads. He seemed to be taking a diffrent route than I remembered seeing on the map, but I figured that was ok; maybe he knew a better set of roads to the first checkpoint. After several miles, we realized that wasn’t the case and we pulled over and to figure out just where we were headed. It turned out that he wasn’t riding to the checkpoint at all. He had just stopped by the ride’s start to talk with some people, and was riding with a completely different destination in mind.

We got ourselves turned around and were able to re-join our group at one of the checkpoints, and had a good day’s ride. It’s an important lesson though, for riding and for life: If you’re going to follow someone — even should the journey be going well — it’s important to know that they’ve got the same destination in mind. Also, if you’re unsure, stop and check. On our motorcycle ride, that meant consulting the map. In other cases that might mean a good talk with your mentor or a return to reading The Good Book. It’s never too late to get back on the right path.