Daily Photo - May 01-15
For 2020, I am photographing every day, and posting the best of each day in half-month increments.
2020 May 01, Friday
May 2020 is a month about getting up and running again. On a personal level, I am back to full-on photography with my new camera. Provincially, our community is healing from the mass shooting in April. Nationally, there is high hope that we are turning the corner on the Covid-19 pandemic. Hemispherically, Spring is in full swing.
One of the people not up and running, perhaps, is the owner of this shoe. For as long as I've been walking along the shore it's been hanging high in a tree branch. I've always been fascinated and perplexed by shoes left up in high places. Has it become some bird's nest?
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/1600 sec, ISO 800
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 02, Saturday
The weather in Nova Scotia is notoriously fickle. Of course, there's a line in a German song, "die frauen sind konstant, wie das Wetter im April", which translates to "women are constant, like the weather in April" so perhaps it's not just a Nova Scotian thing! One thing that can be counted on, however, is rain in May. The May showers bring June flowers, as the saying goes.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/640 sec, ISO 4000
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 03, Sunday
I'm not really a birder, or at least I'm a very nascent one. Luckily, the zoom on my new lens gives some excellent reach for snapping our fine feathered friends. I pored over the internet trying to figure out what I had caught. I finally settled on this (probably) being a Lesser or Greater Yellowlegs. It's some variety of sandpiper-like shorebird at any rate, and there's no denying those big, bright feet!
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/600 sec, ISO 400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 04, Monday
They're alive! Even the one that I accidentally depesitated, severing the root as I switched it from the communal dish to an individual pot. It's the small one in the centre. While still the shortest, it continues to grow as of my writing this on the sixteenth.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/60 sec, ISO 6400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 05, Tuesday
I sometimes collect driftwood. It's a nasty habit, I know, but I must have poor impulse control. Anyway, I think this piece looks really cool. I have turned some of the longer pieces I've gathered into walking sticks. I carve out their tops so I can affix interesting baubles. Admittedly, it's a peculiar hobby.
Olympus E-PL9: f5.9, 1/60 sec, ISO 6400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 06, Wednesday
I get more than just trains passing by on the tracks behind my house! I mean, it's mostly trains, to be sure. Still, now and then there are pickup trucks on rail-wheels. Once in a blue moon there's even this crane. I only had a few seconds to capture the picture. I shot it through my window, hence the raindrops and wet glass making it a bit blurry.
Olympus E-PL9: f5, 1/250 sec, ISO 200
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 07, Thursday
When I dunked my camera in April I also lost my phone, a red Sony Xperia Z3 Compact. On the seventh of May my replacement arrived. I went up a model to the Z5 Compact. My new phone has a yellow body. I suppose the digital detox of not having a mobile for a while was good for me, but I am rather glad to have the world in my pocket again!
Olympus E-PL9: f5.9, 1/100 sec, ISO 6400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 08, Friday
One nice thing about getting a replacement phone was that I got to take a picture of my camera! Here it is, the E-PL9 and comically outsized 12-200 lens. There is a bit of compression making the lens look larger since it was closer to my phone when I took the picture, but it really is very large when compared to the camera.
Sony Xperia Z5c: f2, 1/32 sec, ISO 100
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 09, Saturday
When the tide is low, a ring-island emerges. I'd love to get a clearer view of it someday, but this is as good as I'm likely to get. Before long the bushes and trees will start to gain their leaves, and my view of it will be further obstructed. Rainy as it can be, Spring offers unique chances to see things that are hidden by the Winter ice and Summer foliage.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/800 sec, ISO 400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 10, Sunday
Most of the time I am inside my house when I hear the train approaching; it usually passes by after dark. If it comes early, however, there's the chance that I will be on the other side of the tracks, nearer to the shore. On those rare days, I can try to capture it as it crosses the bridge at the head of the Estuary.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/1600 sec, ISO 4000
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 11, Monday
Somebody hasn't finished the job!
The economy is still gripped by Covid-19. I am lucky to be back in my office after a one-month temporary layoff; I know many others are not so fortunate. Like this tree, the country is not out of the woods yet. One of these days, though, I will walk by this spot and the tree will be gone, off to its new home in a nationally-celebrated rodent's dam. Likewise, sooner or later the job numbers in the news reports will start to go up.
Olympus E-PL9: f5.6, 1/320 sec, ISO 1250
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 12, Tuesday
My mother says that while ocean views are lovely, they are surpassed by views over water with land visible on the other side. I have to agree! Seeing the reflection of the far shore during a moment of still waters is entirely tranquil.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.1, 1/640 sec, ISO 800
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 13, Wednesday
I haven't the faintest idea what plant this strange stalk is. Had I photographed it a day or two earlier, you would see that it started almost completely translucent. I'm slightly concerned that it's some space alien asparagus come to enslave us all. It's seriously weird-looking.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.2, 1/80 sec, ISO 6400
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 14, Thursday
I've been very reticent to photograph the sunset, since I don't yet have a UV filter for my new lens. Still, this sun spire was so captivating I had to take it. The Sun was below the horizon.
Olympus E-PL9: f5.7, 1/1250 sec, ISO 640
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
2020 May 15, Friday
The government has begun lifting some of the Covid-19 mitigation measures, including restrictions on recreational fishing. I've started to see other people on my shore-side walks. As per the ongoing guidelines, I keep physically distant from the hip-wading fishers... There's literally an ocean between us! The wildlife, of course, was never about to be held by regulations. I'm posting two photos from the fifteenth: one of a human catching supper, and one of a yellowlegs doing the same.
Olympus E-PL9: f6.3, 1/1600 sec, ISO 800
IrfanView: Crop, Colour Balance
