January 24, 2009The Inauguration of Barack ObamaThe Inauguration of Barack Obama - Washington, DC
A couple of weeks ago, I got a surprise call from Senator Webb's office asking if I wished to attend Obama's inauguration in Washington, DC. Are you kidding!? I'd barely hung up the phone before I was renting lenses and starting to plan the trip. Within the next hour, luck struck twice when a close friend's sister that lives on Capitol Hill loaned me her apartment for the duration. That put me about three blocks from the Capitol steps (the site of the ceremony) AND the ability to drive since I could park my car there in her neighborhood. I tend to prefer the train to DC, but this allowed me to keep my own schedule and, better yet, take as much gear and crap with me as I thought I might need. As far as lens rentals go, I snagged two lenses that seemed a good fit for the various possibilities. The first is a Canon 70-200 f/2.8L IS - a lens I have coveted for ages and plan to buy (AFTER I get a 5D Mark II body). Knowing there could well be some serious distance to cover, I also grabbed a Canon 100-400 f/4-5.6L IS, the first push/pull lens I've used. Both were superb and, ultimately, fit the bill perfectly in harmony with the Canon 24-70 f/2.8L that I already own. Security prohibited me from carrying any "large" camera bags, but one of the lens bags that came with the rentals had a neck strap and was within size requirements. Therefore, I carried two bodies and lenses on shoulder straps and a third lens in that bag around my neck so I would have the option to swap off when needed. The weather was bitter cold (as is so often the case in January in DC), so I crowdsourced a bit among my Twitter compatriots and assembled a great series of suggestions for winter weather gear. A few hundred dollars (ouch) later, I was ready to go with a new wind/waterproof Columbia jacket with removable fleece liner, uber-warm socks, a nice Thinsulate stocking cap/beanie, Manzella Cascade Convertible mittens/gloves where the mitten end flips open to reveal exposed fingertips, and a set of high-tech "long underwear" (for lack of a better description) made by Under Armour. Special attention is to be paid here to the gloves that are ideal for photographers. My hands stayed toasty warm with the mitten ends closed (mittens beat gloves for overall finger warmth), but with a flick I could have my fingertips ready for working the buttons on the camera. The Under Armour was... interesting. Dignity goes right out the window when a non-athletic guy like me crams himself into a pair of these things. I began referring to it as my "Super Suit" in honor of The Incredibles. This Teaser Trailer immediately came to mind. Maybe not that bad... but I did feel like a human sausage. Fortunately, they go UNDER one's clothes and not even my wife has seen me in them in "raw form". All of that said, they quite literally kept me from freezing during Inauguration as well as utterly eliminating that horrid "freezing while sweating in your coat" situation one so often encounters in the dead of winter. I'm impressed... albeit compressed... while wearing them. :) After arriving in DC on Monday, I spent the evening scoping things out and getting a sense of how everything was laid out for the big day. Light was fading fast by the time I was out and about, so most of my first shots here are evening and night shots of the Capitol building. The mood around the area was already like a gigantic block party, though, with happy and excited people literally everywhere. The capitol lawn was crawling with folks wanting to see as much up close as possible before the major security wall came down on Tuesday morning. Monday night was also special because I finally got a chance to meet Steve Simon, co-panelist on TWiP and tremendous pro photographer, in person. As coincidence would have it, the accommodations he arranged via Craigslist somewhat at the last minute were approximately two blocks from the apartment I was using. A mere block walk for both of us brought us to a decent coffee shop in the middle, a chance to chat, and a walk around the capitol grounds to see the preparations. I shared what I knew of the layout, security, etc., for Tuesday with Steve. We were ticketed to be in different parts of the capitol grounds the next day and, with millions of people attending, figured this would likely be our only chance to hang out. I started Tuesday morning at 5 AM, grabbing a quick take-out breakfast from a local diner and returning to the apartment to eat and pack gear. I was out in the crowds before 6 AM and making my way to my ticket gate. Thus began what I refer to now as "the death march". The next five hours were spent in an ever-increasing mob packing itself into an ever-decreasing space. By 10 AM I was crammed into a barricaded intersection with people packed so tightly that I couldn't raise my arms or even dig my iPhone out of my pocket. I spent much of it with my cameras and long lenses clutched to my body while I was swept along with the crowd if it moved. Granted, movement was rare andnever exceeded five steps in any direction. As the ceremony time approached, the crowd started to get a bit of a cranky mob mentality and I seriously started to wonder if I might end up in a riot or stampede. A lot has been discussed about this breakdown in security and crowd management, especially for Purple Ticket holders. Fortunately, I did make it through just a bit before the ceremony started and, ultimately, ended up on the back of the capitol lawn. While not close enough for tight shots of the platform - even with the 400mm lens - I was able to witness history firsthand rather than via Jumbotron. Any group of strangers you stood with for even a few minutes turned into a temporary group of old friends. This was most evident to me when a group of about six of us immediately fell into happy conversation and, at the close of the oath, were all tearfully hugging one another. Nobody ever got around to asking names and, I suspect, none of us will ever see each other again... but we sure were happy to be together "again" for that hour or so. :) I grabbed quite a few shots of people in my vicinity and their various emotions. There are a few shots of the ceremony itself but, as I said, they are somewhat distant. Upon leaving the ceremony and heading back to the apartment to rest for a few and eat, I managed to stumble on the other event I had hoped against hope I'd witness: Bush gettin' the hell outta Dodge on Marine One. As I came around the back of the capitol, the event was already starting and I arrived in time to get - again, distant - shots of the Obamas and Bidens escorting the Bush's to the helicopter as well as the wave from the stairs as the helicopter, thankfully, took one of the worst presidents in US history out of our collective lives. See ya. After a brief stop to download shots and actually bend at the knees into a sitting position for a few minutes, I bundled back up and headed out in search of some parade-related activities. The parade route itself was going to be a bit of a hike and I'd heard it was already essentially closed after filling up (or at least being locked down) by about 8 AM that morning. My assumption, though, was that Obama's motorcade had to leave from the capitol to start the parade, so I hung around by the barriers there and was rewarded with a nice presidential and VP limo drive-by. People already lined the barricade, so I had to shoot over their heads to get anything... but it was my first time seeing a presidential motorcade and the car they now call "The Beast". I had originally planned to stay Tuesday night, but I was exhausted by this point and decided against breaking up my next day with driving. I packed and headed out of the city by about 6:30 PM on streets with little to no traffic. This seemed great at first until I realized the city had been chopped into a million pieces with police road blocks and barriers. Ten official Inaugural Balls meant the motorcade was going to be zipping around quite a bit and security didn't want anything or anyone slowing it down. I spent well over an hour winding around the streets of DC with my GPS trying to find a way to get far enough past the lockdown to reach I-66. I witnessed some of the most bizarre, mid-intersection barrier arrangements I've ever seen and my main memory is that the city was either flashing blue lights, glowing red flares or some combination of the two. It was like some kind of scifi escape scene from a movie. All in all, I had a tremendous, albeit exhausting, time and am thrilled to have been able to witness this historical event firsthand. I have a few shots I really like and quite a few that are just taking up disk space. They are all geotagged and appear here, as usual, in both HTML gallery and slideshow form. Also, for the sake of experimentation, I'm placing them on my me.com account as well. I have a set on Flickr, too, mostly to use their nice Map View for my geotags. Lastly, I'm putting up a Google Earth map with my GPS geologger data overlaid. UPDATE: Oh, and one relevant bit of audio in closing: Super Suit! :) Enjoy! The Inauguration of Barack Obama - Washington, DC |
Posted by amahler on January 24, 2009 at 12:05 AM
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October 8, 2008The Wedding of Shawn & Matt
I'm pretty pissed off with use of the word "event" these days. We have weather events. Television events. All kinds of "world premiere events". Crap. All of it. This wedding, however... this was an "event". A two-day event at least. Shawn and Matt essentially rented out all of Bluestone State Park in West Virginia. That's 26 cabins in the chilly, wooded hills of rugged West Virginia. I've been hating summer since it started back in May, so I was itching for some frosty mountain air and at least the start of fall colors. I was not disappointed. :) It's kind of hard to put into words the scene here... but imagine being surrounded by about 180-200 of the most fun-loving, creative, musical, and happy people you can imagine all pretty much taking over an entire state park for 48 hours. Shawn's scene for years has been one of Contra dance and top-notch traditional music. Matt is an incredible pianist already with a few albums to his name. Their circle of friends includes some of the most amazing guitarists, fiddlers, mandolin and banjo players... you name it. Individually, they are all a force to contend with. Put these folks together, though, and you can see the passion. They LOVE to play together and everyone within earshot is in for a treat.
I'll quote a few key phrases from one of the pre-wedding emails: Finally, in keeping with the spirit of fun and frivolity, should you be in possession of an unusual article of clothing or an unusual noisemaker that you're dying for an opportunity to wear/perform in public, this is your big chance! It's encouraged the whole weekend, but particularly during the Wedding Processional. Shawn will be terribly disappointed if there are no viking hats, kilts, liederhosen, Mardi Gras masks, duck calls, pirate hats and swords, or clown pants! Photos and words won't do it justice. Anyone who was there this weekend knows how special this event was. I, for one, came home relaxed and happy and wondering how we could talk them into doing this again next weekend. And the weekend after that... :) As you'll see in these photos, I was pretty captivated with the musicians and there are individual images in here I plan to collect (with others) in a specific themed gallery. A number of the photos show a trio that I first became aware of this weekend: Crowfoot. All of the photo editing I've been doing the last few evenings has been while listening to their two albums that I immediately purchased from iTunes. Much to my pleasure, they appear to be playing right up the road in Charlottesville at the end of October. Adam, Jaige and Nicholas: see you there! :)
P.S. Keep an eye out for the photo of the special brew. This is a handcrafted beer by the "mad beer genius", Jonathan Thielen (who ran The Alehouse in Cabin 26 this weekend), specially made as a gift for Shawn and Matt. It is designed to ferment in the bottle for the coming year and cannot be opened until October 4, 2009. The label is designed by the amazing, Ben Crenshaw, whom I was thrilled to finally meet this past weekend (Ben's the dude in the awesome pirate hat in the photos). Our bottle is sitting here on my desk for the next year. Hey - Jonathan said a "cool, dark place". :) The Wedding of Shawn & Matt |
Posted by amahler on October 8, 2008 at 9:30 PM
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June 15, 2008Photos from Newport Trip
Newport, RI I've finally had a chance to put up a set of images from our trip to Newport, RI. We spent four days there starting June 7th and thoroughly enjoyed this fascinating island. For those not familiar, Newport was the turn of the century summering location of the American "aristocracy". I provide some additional background on Newport in my previous post with a QTVR of a massive weeping beech tree, so check there and the wikipedia link above. Average temperatures in Newport are in the 60's and 70's this time of year, so I was pretty thrilled to be leaving the 100 degree heat wave of Virginia for the trip. Understand that I despise hot, humid weather. Well, the heat wave followed us to New England and hit around 90 degrees and humid a good bit of the time. This sucked the total life out of my photographic endeavors since I spent the mornings feeling like I was wearing a greasy washcloth instead of a shirt. Yuck. I can't say the photos here are particularly stellar, but they should at least give you a taste of some of the Newport mansions and surroundings.
Newport, RI |
Posted by amahler on June 15, 2008 at 11:21 PM
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June 13, 2008The Weeping Beech of Chateau-sur-Mer
I'm planning to put together a full gallery, including some HDRs, but wanted to go ahead and post this 360 VR that I made during our trip to Newport, Rhode Island. I'll save a more extensive write-up on Newport for the full gallery entry, but I will take a moment here to say that I highly recommend making the trek there if you haven't been before. I was unfamiliar with Newport and its history until just recently when we received an invitation to visit some friends in their final weeks before they relocate to Maryland. Suffice it to say, I'm glad we took the opportunity while we had it... both to visit our friends and to see this rather unique piece of American history. Newport, in a nutshell, was the oceanside summer playground of the American aristocracy in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Names like Vanderbilt, Berwind, Oelrichs and Wetmore are synonymous with the area. These insanely wealthy, status-driven families built monstrous mansions here that they often used for only seven weeks out of the year. The most elite of the New York social scene migrated, en masse, to Newport for several weeks of nightly entertaining and continuous attempts to outdo one another throwing the most lavish parties and balls. Naturally, they took their staffs (often numbering 30 or more) of maids and liveried footmen with them to tend to their every need.
For a sense of the sheer number of estates, have a look at this Google Maps satellite view centered on Chateau-sur-Mer and the bulk of the mansions on Bellevue Avenue. Anyway, as I said, I'll write more about the trip in a separate post with a wider array of photos. This entry is all about the Weeping Beech tree that sits outside of one of the more unique mansions on the island: Chateau-sur-Mer. After touring the home and on our way back to our car, I happened to step through the curtain of branches to see what the tree looked like "inside". Needless to say, it was pretty amazing and also pleasantly cool since we hit Newport in a bizarre, 90+ degree heat and humidity wave. I've prepared an HDR version of this pano as well, but it needs a little more tweaking. In the meantime, this mid-tone (0 EV, 7 fisheye shots) set from the five exposure HDR spread (-4EV to +4 EV in 2 EV increments: 35 shots) does a decent job of representing the scene. This file is about 12 MB in size and retains a good deal of its resolution, so give it a moment to load if you're on a slow connection. 
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Posted by amahler on June 13, 2008 at 12:00 AM
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May 5, 2007Williamsburg & Jamestown
Williamsburg & Jamestown Williamsburg is one of my favorite places in the world, so I love any chance I get to do even a couple of hours of photography there (see: anniversary / pre-inauguration / inauguration). This past weekend, I traveled with my Dad and Aunt for two days in the Historic Triangle. Our main goal was to see the fantastic new exhibits at Jamestown since this is the 400th year anniversary. A few new exhibits had just opened this past weekend that we wanted to see, so we decided to hit them while the weather was nice and before the security insanity of the Queen's visit or next weekend's celebration festivities. The archaeological site being managed by the APVA is quite fascinating and their new Archaearium is beautifully laid out. We also made visits to the Glasshouse and the Jamestown Settlement, neither of which I have been to since I was in grade school. The Jamestown Settlement in particular turned out to be absolutely fantastic.
As children, my Dad and Aunt both visited Jamestown in 1957 when the original museum and "festival park" was first established for 350th anniversary celebration. Because of this, returning to see the new, far more elaborate museum built in honor of the 400th anniversary was a nice twist. We hope to make a few return visits during the course of 2007 and 2008, partly to see the various installations of a multi-part exhibit entitled World of 1607. I can honestly say that the permanent exhibit alone is one of the best I've ever seen and is certainly equal to, and in many ways, more elegant than a lot of the Smithsonian exhibits I've visited in Washington, D.C. The photos in this set include sunrise shots of Williamsburg, the Jamestowne archaeological site, Glasshouse, and Jamestown Settlement. I'm also in the process of reworking various parts of this site, specifically the slideshows. This is the first halfpress slideshow I've ever paired with music, so let me take a moment to also thank Magnatune and the Brook Street Band for their recording of Handel's Sonata No. 4 in G Major - Allegro A Tempo Ordinario. Williamsburg & Jamestown
(Note: The current version of this gallery is fairly bandwidth-intensive, so a word of warning to people on slow connections... I'm making adjustments as I experiment...) |
Posted by amahler on May 5, 2007 at 9:10 PM
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June 12, 2006Blue Ridge Parkway - Panoramic VRI decided to spend some time driving along the Blue Ridge Parkway on Saturday. I got on it at the intersection with Route 60 and drove south to the Peaks of Otter where I had a light dinner. I then drove back north again past Route 60 to the intersection with Route 56 (an ungodly windy road that also serves Crabtree Falls), returning home via Route 151 and 29 South. The weather was gorgeous, albeit slightly overcast and more than a bit chilly in the wind. I was also shocked at how few other people I saw over the course of about six hours of driving around. I stopped where the parkway crosses the James River near Big Island and decided to do a VR Panorama standing on the Harry Flood Byrd Memorial Bridge. There is a footbridge suspended underneath the automotive bridge allowing you to walk from one bank to the other and enjoy the scenery from a nice vantage point in between.  I thought the long, straight lines in both directions coupled with the water and the mountains made for an interesting VR opportunity. It's also one of the first VR's I've made with completely successful nadir (ground) and zenith (overhead) elements. The result has no visible tripod legs or mount... it's as if the shot was taken floating above the ground in a 360 degree bubble. The VR is viewable two different ways: the traditional QuickTime method or the smoother, more barf-inducing fullscreen PangeaVR method. To view the latter, be sure you download and install the free OpenGL PangeaVR browser plug-in. It's really worth the few minutes it takes to download and install. Enjoy! |
Posted by amahler on June 12, 2006 at 2:15 PM
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November 13, 2005Virginia Safari Park
Another thing I can now highly recommend is Virginia Safari Park. It's located near Natural Bridge just across 81 on Route 11. Our plan was to swing through the safari park for a bit, take some pictures and then head on up the valley to Skyline drive for our overnight stay at Skyland. As it turns out, the safari park experience was so much fun that we went through it twice - a visit of about three and a half to four hours.
Nothing about the surroundings is particuarly unlike the countryside I've grown up in around rural Virginia. What is remarkably different, though, is the constant attention you are receiving from llamas, camels, elk, ostriches, emus, zebras, pigs, bison, gazelle, deer of all kinds and numerous (and I mean numerous) other species (note: I'm going to need to research my plurals there). We didn't buy the guidebook and, despite a lifetime of watching National Geographic and Discovery Channel, I couldn't put a name to everything I saw, smelled, touched or from which I received a slobbery snuffle in the constant quest for bucketized snacks.
And, like I said, we did it twice. And we're also going to go back in a couple of weeks and take a friend who is visiting over Thanksgiving. That will be the last couple of days of their season, so go now or you'll have to wait until next year.
The drive through the winding park is the highlight attraction, but you can park your car and stretch your legs a bit walking around in the more zoo-like section of the facility. The most fascinating part of this section (among the kangaroos, various birds, goats, etc) is the giraffe feeding station. They apparently added this attraction this year and I'm sorry we didn't get to spend more time in it. You can buy some "giraffe crackers" and then feed these docile, skittish giants at their head level. Their tongues look to be about six inches long and their eyes are about the size of billiard balls. The eyelashes give them a somewhat cartoony, feminine appearance. Next time we go back, I'm buying some crackers so I can interact with them a bit more.
137 images on 5 pages Enjoy! |
Posted by amahler on November 13, 2005 at 9:10 PM
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September 11, 2005Agecroft Hall - Richmond, Va
Agrecroft Hall is a 500+ year old Elizabethan estate that was disassembled and transported to the United States in the 1920's. It was rebuilt in predominantly the same manner and used as a private residence for 30+ years before becoming a museum in the late 1960s. Much to my irritation, there was no photography allowed inside during the tour. As I said before, though, the weather was fantastic today and I had some fun shooting around the gardens. Nothing about these photos is especially spectacular, but it'll give you a taste of a pleasant, pre-fall day at Agecroft:
34 images on 2 pages
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Posted by amahler on September 11, 2005 at 8:06 PM
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August 12, 2005Archive: Udvar-Hazy Smithsonian Air & Space Visit
35 images on 2 pages This is really a fantastic place. I wish I had been able to spend more time there that day and I definitely plan to return soon for a more leisurely visit. Shots include the Space Shuttle Enterprise, the SR-71 Blackbird and the Air France Concorde. |
Posted by amahler on August 12, 2005 at 11:34 PM
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August 1, 2005Archive: Wedding Travels - France - September, 2003
These were taken with my older Canon PowerShot G2... truly a fun camera. 374 images on 12 pages This is a pretty diverse set of images covering the Upper Loire Valley by canal boat, La Roche Posay east of Poitiers and Paris (among other stops). Enjoy! |
Posted by amahler on August 1, 2005 at 10:34 PM
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Archive: Williamsburg - September 2004
51 images on 2 pages I'm just populating the galleries right now with older images while I finish the site build-out. Hope you enjoy them... - Aaron |
Posted by amahler on August 1, 2005 at 10:11 PM
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July 31, 2005Inaugural Gallery Post - St. Thomas, USVI
121 images on 4 pages Enjoy! Much more coming including re-generated older photo galleries and a proper introduction to the blog itself. |
Posted by amahler on July 31, 2005 at 12:16 AM
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