Light Sticks

[MarkBarbieri]

Our neighborhood has been without power since Hurricane Ike went through. While the weather was pleasant, we had outdoor dinner parties at different neighbor's houses each evening. One night, someone broke out several packs of light sticks. I grabbed my camera and took some long exposure shots. I probably should have used some strobes to "anchor" the shots, but I was too lazy to go home and search the dark house for them.

I didn't really have a plan for the shots. For most of them I just set up the tripod and let the kids do whatever they felt like doing. Most were shot in manual mode with random guesses for the exposure.

I don't have my main computer running yet, so I did extremely minimal processing on my laptop. If I get inspired, I'll spend more time on them later. You can see all of the shots here (http://barbieri.smugmug.com/gallery/6028521_ND3Lo#377310870_te9oT).

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377310870_te9oT-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311101_FSEx4-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311189_3yMzT-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311299_bfRXt-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311672_xSsua-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311963_DWqzc-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377312115_9ddKB-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377312308_MrzFH-L.jpg

[PhotobearSam]

AMAZING SHOTS!!!!!:thumbsup2

[Quicklabs]

Very cool, Mark!

[KAT4DISNEY]

Those are wild! Some very nice "painting" with light.

[JR6ooo4]

That's cool. Good to see a neighborhood being a neighborhood.

I spent about a whole battery with the inlaws kids trying to write their names, one camping trip. Heheheheheee

Mikeeee

[Gdad]

Very nice Mark- they should have spelled out a message- "Good Riddance Ike" or something...

[boBQuincy]

Very esoteric, very interesting. It's good to see your spirits are still good! :)
We went through the weeks long power outage in 1996 (Fran), didn't have digital cameras and couldn't get any photos developed for weeks!

[AbsolutLaney]

They are cool.

[Experiment_626]

Painting with light sticks ... a cool result!:thumbsup2

SSB

[Golf4food]

Now that's just cool. I've tried to get similar with those things without much luck - probably because I didn't have my tripod with me. Great shots.

[zackiedawg]

Some of those are really neat - they look almost like colored fire or flames. great effects with that softer glowing light.

I can sympathize with you on the power - we were without power for 8 days after Hurricane Frances in 2004, then another 4 days after hurricane Jeanne a month or two later...in both cases it was near 100 degrees, near 100% humidity, and couldn't have been more miserable. The very next year we got Hurricane Wilma's eye wall and went another 9 days without power - but though that hurricane brought much more damage, it wasn't nearly as bad being without power as a cold front came through right behind the hurricane and temps were in the upper 60's day and 40's night. Of course, the damage and effects lasted for months, with bull-dozed debris and tree piles everywhere waiting for pickup and traffic signals missing for months after the storm.

All the best for you folks getting everything cleaned up and back to normal - it may take a while, but you'll get there!

[MarkBarbieri]

I entered 5 of these in our photography club's fall contest. It was a portfolio contest, so you had to bring 3 to 5 pictures that shared common characteristics. My wife wanted me to make prints of some of these, so I printed 5 and entered. They took 3rd place, which was really cool given how good the competition was.

The pictures that I entered were these five:
http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311189_3yMzT-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311299_bfRXt-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377311672_xSsua-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377312115_9ddKB-L.jpg

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/377312308_MrzFH-L.jpg

Some comments from the critique were:

The 4th picture shown above is too different from the others. The portfolio would have been stronger without it.

I should have cloned out the upper right corner in the slide picture. The bright area is distracting and adds nothing. In hindsight, I probably should have burned some of the wood on the swingset to make it a little less prominent as well.

I was also criticized for having some dust on the pictures, which was amusing. I showed up with the pictures in the standard 18"x18" frames that I use around the house. When I got there, I remembered that the rules called for pictures no larger than 17"x20" (outer frame size). I rushed to the nearby frame store, bought 5 cheap frames, and reframed everything on the spot. I also had to trim all five pictures to fit the new frames (which had no extra room for matting. It was quite a rush and I'm afraid that it was obvious that I didn't put much time and effort into that part.

Anyway, I was surprised and delighted to have been recognized. I usually don't bother with contests (except my maniacal plan to completely dominate our weekly Disboard contest). I really only entered because we decided that all of the board members should set a good example by entering.

[tripodjw]

Congrats. They are great shots. I love wacky.

[WillCAD]

Great shots Mark, and congrats on the contest win. I may have to try that technique at MouseFest, with a bunch of wacky Disney fans running around the parks.

[webshark3]

Great shots! Hope they do well in the contest.

[abdullahkurdi]

They are great shots.