January was delightful as I started the New Year with my husband hiking through Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest. I participated in two Trail Dame hikes, and received my membership goodies from the Trail Dames. There were a few dinners out with family and I went to see the show Avenue Q. Of course there was lots of cat loving time! I was thrilled to see so many repins on Pinterest for the wedding thank you sign I made for my son. You can find my Pinterest I’m Crafty board here. I have enjoyed my first full month of yoga and was so happy to have my hair done. A day at the salon is always a good day! I finished the Hunger Game series and can’t wait to see it at the theater!
Thank you January for a sweet month!

~It’s all good. Donna

Manual focus 1.4, flash not used. I don’t normally shoot on manual focus, mostly because my eyesight is not that great, but here I simply turned the focus ring until the lights were blurry and snapped this shot.

50mm, 1.4

I used auto focus on this shot, focusing on Justin’s hand. The tree was a few feet behind him. Focusing on the subject with the light source a few feet behind the subject will give you this effect.  50 mm, 1.4, no flash

50mm, 1.4, manual focus ~ Simple white lights.

50mm 1.4 – auto focusing on the snowflake

Holiday Cheer Beer!

Ginobili was sitting on a table by the window. The Christmas lights were reflected in the window pane. She is such a pretty girl! I tell her that all the time. Yes, I talk to my cats and tell them how lovely they are. Crazy cat lady? Maybe. Anyhoo, I love learning new techniques and with all the sparkly Holiday lights, this is the perfect time to keep working on that bokeh!

It’s all good ~ Donna

McDaniel Farm Park Edition

McDaniel Farm is located on 134 acres and it has been restored to depict a typical 1930’s farm in Gwinnett County. The farmhouse itself is furnished with items that might have been  found in a home during that time period. There is a barn, blacksmith shed, carriage and tenant house. The park area offers 3 miles of paved and soft surface trails. There is a pavilion, grill and restrooms available as well. This is one of the loveliest parks I have been to and it’s located less than 10 minutes from my home. Sweet! My husband was out of town this weekend and Saturday was a gorgeous day so I packed up and headed out to the farm.

My traveling companion. Pumpkin Spice Latte. So good!

McDaniel Farm House. Eight family members lived in this tiny place.

If you are out in the Gwinnett County area, McDaniel Farm Park is a lovely location for an afternoon picnic. It would also make a terrific location for a photography session. I did see a photographer setting up with a client when I was on my way out.

For more weekly winners and to be inspired, visit lotus.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Last year I was fortunate enough to hear about Scott Kelby world wide photo walks and I attended the event at Marietta Square in Atlanta. If you missed those photos, you can click here to see them.  The 2010 event had over 1,100 photo walks and over 33,000 people from all over the world participated. For those who are unfamiliar with photo walks, they are a social photography event where photographers get together to walk around and shoot a section of town. There is a group leader who organizes the local event and there are 50 spaces for photographers to join in on the walk. A photo contest is involved and the best image from your shoot can be submitted for prizes. If you would like to see last years photo winners from the event you can click here.

This year I attended the photo walk on October 1st at Little Five Points. Little Five Points is a district in Atlanta that was established in the early 1900’s. It is home to vintage clothing stores, Criminal Records, bars, restaurants and music venues.  I had the most wonderful time exploring the area and sharing the experience with my husband who joined me not with camera in hand, but a hand who carried my tri-pod around for me. Yes, he is awesome like that. The best part of the experience for me was meeting the photographers who attended. Last year I walked with Mishelle Lane, who is a brilliant photographer, and this year I met such a nice group that were all so sweet and shared their knowledge of photography which is most helpful.

The photo walk this year started at 6:00 pm and ended at 8:00pm with a small group of us hanging out for dinner and drinks. I especially enjoyed the walk since there was both daylight and night time photo opportunities. The worldwide photo walk site lists 1,116 photo walks this year with 28,000 participants. I love that I was able to part of such an amazing event.

Here are some of the photo walkers! Thanks to our group leader Gary Howie for the photo! Now, on to some of my favorites from my walk.

This cutie was sitting on a car rear view mirror. After I snapped this shot he climbed into the car and sat on the steering wheel. When I peeked inside the car, there were various ropes and toys hanging inside for him to play with. Interesting!

Little Five Points has a whole lot of colorful, elaborate wall paintings so I captured quite a few photos of the eye candy.

There were many sweet bikers out that evening proudly showing off their beauties.

As I mentioned before, Little Five Points has several music venues, so you will find colorful posters of upcoming shows.

A few years ago I spoke with this gentleman that I passed by on my way to a show. He was there again, happily beating his drum. He had his photo taken many times by our group and he smiled the whole time.

Walking along the sidewalks in Little Five Points, you will see many eclectic clothing shops. If you are a fan of vintage clothing, you will love it!

We took a walk around the back side of the buildings and I saw this unusual tall, skinny door. I love the colors and contrast.

Take a walk around the back side as you will never know what you might find. Brittany Spears perhaps?

So my husband carried my tri-pod and I didn’t even use it. I hand held my camera for a few shots of the nightlife.

There was a gentleman out playing his heart and soul on the harmonica. He was kind enough to allow our group to photograph him. Gary who you see standing, played back some of the photos he took and that harmonica player was thrilled to see his images.

photo credit: Gary Howie

Well folks, I have many more images to share but I do think this post is long enough! Thanks for stopping by and I do hope through these images, you get a feel of Little Five Points, in Atlanta. I look forward to next year’s photo walk and if you live in the Atlanta area, I hope to see you there too! You can find more information on Scott Kelby and The World Wide Photo Walk here.

Thanks again to Gary Howie for leading our group and sharing his group images. A special shout out to Dustin Grau, Hoke Smith, and Greg Williams. I enjoyed our dinner conversation and thank you for sharing your photography knowledge and stories with me.

To see my shots of Criminal Records, take a look here.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Criminal Records Edition

Yesterday I participated in Scott Kelby’s World Wide Photo Walk at the Little Five Points location in Atlanta. One of my stops along the way included Criminal Records. This place is an awesome shop filled with Vinyl Records, comic books, DVD’s , magazines and so much more. This place brought back many memories of when I was a teenager and shopped in record stores and back then it was about vinyl and cassette’s  baby!

This awesome store may be shutting down after 20 years of business.  It is sad to see yet another independent record store closing due to the shift toward digital music. I am hanging on to my vinyl and those cassette’s too!

For more weekly winners and to be inspired, visit lotus.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Take Me Out To The Ball Game Edition

Celebrating Bobby Cox who was  inducted to the Braves Hall of Fame on August 12th.

Retiring Number 6.

Ice cold Slurpee to beat the heat!

For more weekly winners and to be inspired, visit lotus.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Scenes from the Bowling Alley Edition

19 camera clicks and with the help of my husband, this little animation was made.

For more weekly winners and to be inspired, visit lotus.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

All images taken with my Canon 40D using my 24-70mm lens. Camera set on tripod using a remote shutter release cable. 2-4 second exposure time, f/7-f/11. ISO 100. I kept playing around but stayed within those settings. This was my first time attempting to shoot fireworks with this set-up.  I am happy with the results! For a great tutorial on shooting fireworks, visit Mishelle Lane aka Secret Agent Mama.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Historic Downtown Buford, Georgia ~ Backside Edition

On Saturday morning, bright and early, I packed my Belle and headed to the City of Buford. The air was cool and crisp. It was a welcome change to the high temperatures that later came in the day. I walked along the back roads of Main Street.  I was delighted by the textures to be found in Historic Downtown Buford, dating back to 1872.

For more weekly winners and to be inspired, visit lotus.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

]]> http://www.mysweetthings.com/2011/06/26/weekly-winners-june-19th-june-26th/feed/ 3 http://www.mysweetthings.com/2011/06/21/wing-mirror-objects-in-mirror/ http://www.mysweetthings.com/2011/06/21/wing-mirror-objects-in-mirror/#comments Wed, 22 Jun 2011 01:42:31 +0000 Donna http://www.mysweetthings.com/?p=1039 A wing mirror (also fender mirror, door mirror, side mirror or side-view mirror) is a mirror found on the exterior of motor vehicles for the purposes of helping the driver see areas behind and to the sides of the vehicle, outside of the driver’s peripheral vision (in the ‘blind spot’). ~ From Wikipedia

Our wing mirror was a source of entertainment for me on our drive to Florida. Camera in hand, I snapped away passing the time. Once I snapped the first wing mirror photo, I kept snapping along the many roads we traveled on. I really love this series, and the beauty of the landscape makes me smile. What a wonderful journey!

Home.

It’s all good. ~ Donna