Lost Time (and Phones)

It's been awhile.

This year's been a good one, one with lots of stories too numerous to relate to you here. There are a couple that come to mind seem adequate to blow the dust off of the cover of this blog.

I've begun piano lessons. I began taking them a little over a year ago, surprisingly I failed to mention them in my posts here. I love piano. The incredible beauty that is the ability to express emotion and ideas through your fingers on a keyboard never grows less astonishing to me. I've always felt a connection with music, but never as much as when it is my fingers playing the keys and my feet pushing the pedals. I'll share pictures, maybe even a video if I can work it out, of my piano playing.

School is going well. My classes are mostly electives, which makes for a breezy senior year experience. I am taking advanced photography with one of my favorite teachers, Miss Peery. I've learned so much from the ability to choose my own assignments and the feedback I receive from my class and Miss Peery. And the very nice Canons that I get to check out and take on adventures is not a luxury lost on me. In fact, I've printed four of my images professionally 11 by 14 at the extravagant cost of 20 dollars (thanks adoramapix, it was well worth it). One of them is framed and on my wall, and another is framed on my floor (I'm working on hanging it).

Now to the lost phones part of this post. As a very nice birthday gift, my friend took me to Lagoon, an amusement park north of Salt Lake City. Both of us lost our phones off the first ride of the day, a tame roller coaster built a loooong time ago. Her's was later recovered. Mine, however, suffered a more mysterious defeat. My phone automatically backs up photos taken to Google Drive, and about an hour after my phone's disappearance, a couple of girls who I don't know took some selfies on my phone. Google shows that my phone has been inactive since that day. Curious, eh?

Now I'm saving up for the new Moto X Pure. If there's anything life's got going for it, it's unpredictability. And baseball. And piano. Oh, and ... well, I guess life's pretty okay.

Baseball, Ray

My family has a definite soft spot for Baseball. Tonight we went to the game of a little league team that my dad's friend and him are coaching together. It was a lot of fun and they played really well, but the game was called after some lightning in the bottom of the 2nd. We were up 6-0, but the game will have to be replayed because they didn't play four innings. Bummer, but it was fun to see them play so well!

Now we're sitting at home, listening to music, and largely accomplishing nothing. Gotta love Friday nights...

Out of Commission and Photography

This week has not been the most enjoyable, nor the most exciting week of my life by any stretch of the imagination. Saturday, soon after eating dinner I began to feel sick to my stomach. That night I spent hours in the bathroom vomiting until I could make it to my bedroom, where I had to remain sitting up else I would ... well, you get the idea. No fun. I felt horrible all weekend and the beginning of this week, but I got over it!

Because I've been sick with boredom, I've been doing a lot of research into photography on YouTube and other sites. I've discovered a couple of really well shot and well informed channels that I've taken an interest to. The first is called the Art of Photography. The channel is ran by the presenter, Ted Forbes, who is a brilliant presenter and very knowledgeable of all facets of photography. His channel features photographers, past and present, as well as a series of episodes that address various photography strategies and ideas. 

The other channel I found was actually featured on the Art of Photography. The channel is called simply Ben Horne. Ben's a landscape photographer who shoots landscapes with a large format camera (those super cool wood box/billows camera thingies). His work hits close to home for me, because he photographs Zion National Park annually, as well as other places in Utah, to stunning effect. He backpacks most places, and the videos he makes of his expeditions are works of art in and of themselves. His channel only has about 5,000 subscribers, but I hope that his videos gain the recognition that they deserve.

Bowling and Art

Those two go together, right?

Wednesday night my young men's group and I went to Fat Cats to bowl. Those kids are so much fun and we had a blast.

For my Art 1010 class I'm taking through UVU, we were assigned to do an art project. I chose to do a little mosaic thingy out of paper. Not the most original idea, and it sure as heck took forever. But hey, I think it'll get a good grade, and that's what matters.

 I really like the compass rosey looking thing, but I kind of botched the background. What can you do?

I Got Nominated!

Awhile back I discovered an interesting site for photographers who are trying to get their photos out in the open and learn a little bit of extra cash. It's called Snapwire. The idea is that you submit photos to various requests and if your photo gets selected, the requester awards you anywhere from a few dollars to hundreds for your photo, depending on the request. It's a great idea, but thousands of photos are uploaded to each request, and the odds of yours being selected are pretty slim. In addition to selecting the winner, the requester can nominate people's photos as well, which awards the nominee points that can be used to access bigger and more professional requests. Snapwire basically turns selling photos into a game.

I submitted the above photo to a request that was looking for something that focused on the color blue. I got nominated! It's the first photo that I've uploaded to get recognized. Because of the nomination, more people have seen my portfolio and have started to like my pictures, sort of like liking something on Facebook. I'm pretty excited, and there's a chance I'll get selected! Probably not going to happen, but hey, I'm hoping!

So now I'm all excited and I've been trying to take more specific pictures for various requests. It would be so cool to make $75 or $100 off of a photo. The best part is, even if your photo is selected you retain all the rights to the picture, only allowing the requester limited licensing rights. I think it's a pretty cool idea!

Shootin' Stuff

One of my family's favorite activities is to drive up West Mountain and shoot stuff. We like to bring rifles of various calibers and shotguns and shoot targets and clay pigeons for a couple of hours. We've tried to invite my good friend to go with us the past three or four times, but something's always come up. This time around he was able to go along with another of our friends. It was a blast (pun intended).

I'm that teenagery kid in red

We had a lot of fun and even busted out my great-grandpa's old 30.06 to shoot about 20 rounds. That things bloody expensive to shoot at about a dollar a round, but there are few things as satisfying as hitting the target close to the center. I'm kicking myself for not taking a picture, but one of my shots hit an eighth of an inch from the center. Proud moments.

Spring break is officially over, which means school tomorrow. I've been feeling pretty bad the last couple of hours though, so there's a chance I might sluff. We'll see what tomorrow brings!

Battle Creek Falls

Today I may or may not have slept until noon. It was bliss. 

Also, we went and hiked Battle Creek Falls! It was an awesome time to hike around with my family. I took my new camera and exposed a roll of film. I hope they turn out! Because I was taking pictures on that camera I didn't take anything digital, so I stole some pictures my sister took. Thanks sis!

Tomorrow my family and I and a couple friends are going to go shooting. I'll try to remember to take some pictures this time around!