BAAM 2011 (Birmingham Arts & Music Festival)

Ryan and Lee Anna were invited back to town to play this festival so of course you know that means I had to go. I'm glad I did we had a great time Saturday night. The kids put on a great show and after they played we saw a little of a great Blues singer (pics didn't come out) and then got to see a little of one of Ryan & Lee Anna's old bandmates play with his new band. Remember to support local music and get out to the shows whenever you can!

Ryan tuning his guitar while Lee Anna rests her poor little leg before the show. This is one of my favorite pics I've ever taken.

Ryan playing some truly interesting music for one of the new songs they've recently written.

Lee Anna playing. I hated using the flash during the show, but the room was really dark. I DID figure out that I can adjust the intensity of the flash on my camera and it helped a lot.

Waiting his turn to play again.

I could listen to her sing the phonebook!

Caught em' looking at each other for once.

They had a pretty good crowd, especially compared to the folks who came for the bands before and after.

Patrick played on Lee Anna's last EP. He decided to stay here when they moved to Nashville and now fronts his band Miss Information Age. Very interesting show and the band has some damn good musicians in it. Her is Patrick playing in front of the Alps (The show was in the German Club).

Cousin It jams with the band.

Garden Party At My Mother-In-Laws

A week ago my Mother-In-Law Jane had a Garden Party to show off her beautiful garden and all the flowers blooming in it. I took advantage of the opportunity to take some shots of the flowers just to see what I could do. Hope ya like em....

I was standing in the bamboo thicket looking up at a dead tree. I like how the bamboo is out of focus while the dead tree is pretty sharp.

Some red flowers ;-)

From another angle.

This plant was pretty cool. It has the big huge leaves, but puts out this very small delicate flower. I really thought this was neat and really reflects life in general. We're surrounded by big leaves, with little pockets of color and beauty just to spice it up.

I just liked the colors in this one.

I have been playing with depth of field stuff and am pretty pleased with how this one came out.

Love the brightness of this one.

Who doesn't like a picture of the garden cat ;-)

Trigger Hippy, Birmingham, AL July 20, 2011

Trigger Hippy is basically a new "all-star" band working out of Nashville. Allison and I wanted to see them because we are Joan Osborne fans and she is their singer. It turns out that we're fans of the whole damn band now ;-) The bands consists of  Audley Freed, Steve Gorman, Nick Govrik, Jackie Greene, and  Joan Osborne and everyone of these folks are incredible musicians. Check out the links and if you can listen to their music you WILL be impressed. Now on to the pics!

Joan Osborne doing what she does best.

Audley Freed playin' that Les Paul1

Jackie Greene is a great all around musician.

Jackie Greene again.

Joan wore her glasses a lot because the band is so new she had cheat sheets with the lyrics up on stage with her. Us older folks need our glasses.

Jackie getting into it.

Audley wailing away!

Zoomed in on those magic fingers.

Joan and Jackie.

Joan is feeling it in this one.

Like a songbird....

This man is incredible!

The show was great and if you get a chance to see then I highly recommend it!

Shooting In Small Scale

Ever since I saw the movie Marwencol at the Sidewalk Film Festival last year I have been wanting to take pics of toys posed in life like scenarios. It's cool to kinda recreate a scene in my head or even my memory. Also this helps me learn the features of my camera in a controlled environment so that if I'm out and see a scene I want, I know how to set up the shot quickly. I decided to get out my Huey toys today and give it a go. The big one is a 21st Century Toys UH-1C gunship and is pretty big at 1/18 scale. I found a place in the yard where there was a nice patch of moss. The moss is a perfect scale model of grass for this scene. The regular grass looks like bushes in this scale. Check out the pics and let me know how I did.

Pre-flighting the aircraft.

Make sure the Jesus nut is tight so the rotors don't fly off.

Climbing down from the roof.

Ready to crank, gotta get Kyle to the racetrack ;-)  (yeah, that's an OLD Kyle Petty figure sitting in the back.)

Pilot: CLEAR!

Crewchief: CLEAR AND UNTIED!

Pilot: COMING HOT!

Engine: whiiiirrrrrrrrr

My other Huey model. This one is 1/48 scale and is actually a UH-1H like the ones I crewed when I was in the army.

A closer view. I usually sat in the rear gun well where this figure is sitting when we had the guns mounted. Otherwise I usually sat on the seat ahead of him facing forward. Part of my job was to take care of anyone in the rear of the aircraft and to also help the pilots watch the gauges as well as to make sure we were not going to hit or be hit by anything outside the aircraft. Basically I was pretty busy whether we were flying or loading/unloading the aircraft. I must have done alright, we never crashed ;-)

Some Pictures From The Lane Motor Museum In Nashville, TN

The Lane Motor Museum in Nashville is a great place to visit. It is full of all kinds of cars you have never heard of and a few you will like a whole lot. They collect European cars and have a great collection of these. I took the family with me over the Independence Day weekend and everyone seemed to have fun. If you are ever in Nashville give them a look. In the meantime here are a few of the pics I took while I was there.

Some kind of cool small car that I have no idea of the maker.

This was made by Vespa in 1956. Yep, the same company that made the scooters.

And here is another view with a scooter next to it so you can get an idea of how small it really is.

I loved this old 50's VW, especially with that wild manual AC unit hanging on the passenger window.

A nice angle shot of some really old BMW's. They were a whole lot different than the current line up from this company ;-)

I have a lot more from this place. I'll post more later on.

4th Of July In Franklin, Tn

Spent the Independence Day weekend in Nashville, TN and on Monday Allison and I took off for Franklin, TN. It's one of our favorite places to visit and we knew that the celebrations would be pure small town America. We were right and it was great. I'll post some normal pictures later, but for now check out these pictures that I've played with and some that just speak to me.

The last time we were in Franklin the theater was pretty run down looking. Since then they've done a nice restoration and have it looking pretty damn nice. Straight out of the old days as a matter of fact. One of the great things about small towns and holidays is that they shut down Main street and do stuff like having Vintage cars park up and down the street. Because of this I got a good shot of the theater that looks straight out of the history books. This one I converted to B&W. I really like it with that old time feel.

This one a played with in Photoshop and kinda got an artsy old postcard kind of look. I dig this one too.

Great shot of what a small town Main Street looks like on the 4th of July.

Vintage signs like this are one of my favorite things to hunt down and take pictures of. This one has obviously been restored and it looks great.

The statue in the Courthouse square. What kind of small Southern town doesn't have a Confederate soldier monument. This one even has cannons around it, but with all the party stuff going on I didn't get any good pictures of them. I LOVE small towns and Franklin is one of the best. They have embraced commerce and modern America a few miles away beside the Interstate, but here in the old historic downtown it is kept as cool and historic as is reasonable. They've done a great job!

Spent Independence Day Weekend in Nashville.

Allison, Caitlin, Blake and I all went to Nashville this weekend to see Ryan and Lee Anna. We had a great time and got to do a bunch of fun stuff. Saturday morning we were going to go to the Loveless Cafe for breakfast but they had a 2 1/2 hr. wait. NO food is worth a wait that long so we took off and thanks to smartphones and google we found Morell's. They have a couple of locations, but I think we ate at the oldest. This place is really unique because it is communal dining. That means that unless your group is pretty large you are going to share a table with people you don't know. In our case it was a local family. They were pretty quiet but their 15 yr. old son TC was great to talk with. A very intelligent young man who I hope will go on to do great things one day. His Mother has done a great job raising him. After lunch we went to the Lane Motor Museum, but that's another post.....

Morell's. A great restaurant in the middle of Germantown near downtown Nashville.

Our new little friend Olive. Her Grandmother was sitting with her outside so her Mom could finish eating. She was a cute little girl and gave us plenty to talk about. This picture took a little work to get. I had to hold the camera ready and focused for a long time until she looked up just right and I managed to capture that look.

This was in the front yard of one of the neighbor's house. Basically Monell's sits in the middle of a bunch of old houses in a very nice little part of town. Olive's Grandmother told us that there used to be a local ice company called Polar Bear Ice and this was their logo. It seems someone grabbed up one of the statues when they closed up. His arm is broken, but you can still tell he's throwing snowballs. It's still a cool statue ESPECIALLY on a hot July morning.

One of the neighboring houses. I had to edit out a power pole and some power lines. This area is old enough that the wires are just kind of thrown up anywhere.

At the end of the block was this nice old building. It has a restaurant too, but it was closed. I think it's more of a dinner place. I like this style of building though.

Stay tuned there is more to come from Nashville.