I picked up a few lenses for my Nikon on Craigslist at a great price. I’m not sure if I will keep them forever, but it’s nice to know that I can sell them for more than I bought them for. The one I used for this photo was a Nikon AF-S VR Zoom-NIKKOR 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED Telephoto Zoom Lens. The lens is great for outdoor sports photography. However, it doesn’t fit in my bag (with the lens hood on anyway), and 70mm is too telephoto to make this lens at all versatile. The 300mm zoom isn’t that much of a difference from the telephoto end of my 18-200mm so I don’t see myself using this lens much. Still, it delivers nice sharpness and bokeh for scenes like the above. By the way, I took this photo at Garfield Park in Ashland.

July 17th, 2011 | Tags: Nikkor 70-300mm VR, nikon d7000, photography, volleyball | Category: only in ashland, people | Comments (1)

My German skills are weak, to say the least, but I’m pretty sure the sign reads Schoolhouse Brewery. This is the fairly new home of a German restaurant in Jacksonville, Frau Kemmling Schoolhaus. The building was previously a school; now the upper two floor are an unrelated business with a brewery/restaurant on the bottom floor. I had lunch at Frau Kemmling Schoolhaus for the first time recently and the food and beer were both excellent.

July 15th, 2011 | Tags: jacksonville | Category: outside of ashland, places | Comments Off on Schoolhaus Brewhaus

The Ellies again… this time heading into the capitol in their page attire.

July 13th, 2011 | Tags: ellie, salem | Category: outside of ashland, people, places | Comments Off on Oregon Capitol Building

Ellie, and her friend Ellie, went to Salem back in May to be honorary pages for a day. Here they are on the capitol steps before changing into their page outfits.

July 11th, 2011 | Tags: ellie, salem | Category: outside of ashland, people, places | Comments Off on Honorary Pages

Today’s photo was taken by Ellie on Interstate 5 on the way to Salem, from inside of a moving car, back in May. I’m not sure if that is a rainbow or just glare from the window she was shooting through. In any event, it looks like it was a pretty drive. Oregon has a lot of these kinds of scenes.

Stick around for tomorrow’s entry to find out why Ellie was going to Salem.

July 10th, 2011 | Tags: clouds, ellie, i-5, skywatch | Category: nature, outside of ashland | Comments (1)

Back on father’s day I was trying out my 24mm prime lens while on a bike ride up in the Siskiyous. As luck would have it, just as I got my D7000 out of the bag to take a photo of the Caterpillar Trail sign, a few riders came down so I got to test out the responsiveness in low light.

For the first rider I had the dial in the “Auto-No Flash” mode and didn’t have time to change it. Needless to say he blurred a bit as they were coming down the trail fast. That first shot was taken with a shutter speed of 1/160, ISO200, f6.3. I had a few seconds to adjust for the second guy pictured above. I quickly spun the dial over to Scene and then moved the scene to “sports.” I then fired off the above three shots in rapid succession. The camera fired at 1/1000 with an ISO of 500 and f4. I was pleased with the result of three well focused, sharp images (in poor light even), with a frozen rider in each.

July 8th, 2011 | Tags: biking, photography, siskiyous | Category: nature, only in ashland, people, places | Comments Off on Caterpillar Trail

While this kind of photo is the more common one you see of Mt. Ashland looking across town, you can also get pictures, like today’s, from some of the farms and pastures that grace the Grizzly side of the valley. I had to get to just the right point along this fence to have Mt. Ashland squeeze in between the gate and trees.

July 6th, 2011 | Tags: mt. ashland | Category: only in ashland | Comments Off on Mt. Ashland through the gate

For the second year in a row, I’m not in the USA to celebrate Independence Day. Instead, I’m teaching today in Copenhagen, Denmark. I took today’s photo of some vintage fireworks and other Americana last month in the entryway at Butte Creek Mill. There were some fun, old items in the display case like this “Remember Pearl Harbor” pin, Dixie Boy Brand Flashlight Crackers, Doughboy Mammoth Caps, and other old-school fire crackers.

July 4th, 2011 | Tags: butte creek mill, eagle point | Category: outside of ashland | Comments (1)

From the same spot as this location, I pointed my camera in the other direction to capture the above view of Ashland Creek in Lithia Park.

July 2nd, 2011 | Tags: lithia park, water | Category: lithia park, nature, only in ashland | Comments Off on Downstream