Digital Images 20% Discount!

Hi Everyone, to thank everyone who has visited my Digital Images website I'm offering a 20% discount on all photos purchased over the New Year's weekend. (12/31/09 thru 1/3/10)

All you have to do is go to Digital Images by Ron Skinner, place your photo order and then during checkout enter the coupon code and you'll get 20% off the price of the photos.

Thanks for visiting my site and have a Happy New Year!!!

Note: If you have a Smugmug Pro account and want to create your own coupons, go here to find out how.... Smugmug Coupons

If you're a photographer and don't have a Smugmug account and would like to sign up for an account or try Smugmug for the 14 day Free trial period then go here Smugmug and then click "try it" and you will save $5 off the price of an account.

You can also enter this code aUvDzphm1l71Y in the Smugmug signup form to get $5 off.

Smugmug is a pretty cool photo sharing site, if you get a Power User or Pro Account you can customize your site so it looks just the way you want it and different from everone else's site.

I customized my site, you can check it out here: Digital Images by Ron Skinner

My Holiday Lights Adventure

Hi everyone, last night I enjoyed taking photos of the holiday lights in downtown Cleveland with some of my photographer friends, it was a little cold but we had a great time capturing images of the Terminal Tower from various locations in the Flats and also taking photos of the holiday lights on Public Square. The lighting on the Terminal Tower is pretty cool, the top is lit with red and green lights and the lighting changes every now and then to give the Tower a different look. Check it out if you get a chance.

Click the photo to go to the gallery

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

Merry Christmas!!!



and Happy Holidays!!!

Digital Images 15% Discount

Hi Everyone one as a way of saying thanks to everyone who visited my photograhy site Digital Images by Ron Skinner and my Cool Photo Ops Blog I'm offering a 15% discount on all photos until 12/31/2009



To take advantage of this offer do the following

Go to my Digital Images by Ron Skinner site

Select the photos you want to order

Enter the code: holiday09 during checkout!

Thanks!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

Hope everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween Everyone!!!

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Labor Day Weekend Fun

I hope everyone enjoyed their Labor Day Weekend. I really enjoyed mine. On Saturday I met up with some of my photographer friends and started out the day by exploring the Veterans Memorial Bridge. The lower portion of the bridge was open for self guided tours. This section of the bridge was once used for trolley cars. They open the bridge to the public for tours a couple of times a year, usually around Memorial Day and Labor Day.



After touring the bridge, we then explored the Flats for a few hours and enjoyed lunch at the Flat Iron Cafe




Next we headed to Wendy Park to get shots of the Thunderbirds who were performing at the Cleveland Air Show



Then on Monday, we attended the Cleveland Air Show, we saw stunt planes and wing walkers and lots of other stuff, but later in the day the weather turned bad and the Thunderbirds had to cancel their show.

I'm on Vacation!!!!

Well from 9/2 thru 9/7 I'm on Vacation!!! I'm just gonna wing it, I haven't gotten anything special planned but some stuff I might do are:

Tour the Veteran's Memorial Bridge


Take photos of the Thunderbirds flying over the city



Other things I might do is check out the Zoo and the Cuyahoga Valley National Park.

If anyone else has some time off and wants to join me or has suggestions for things to do let me know.

CPS Beach Model Shoot

I really don't take that many people pictures, I mostly take landscape and nature photographs, but when the Cleveland Photographic Society had a Beach Model Shoot at Sims Beach in Euclid I decided to sign up. I had a great time, we took photos of the models on motorcycles and on the beach. Here's some of the photos:


Click on the photo to go to the gallery

Click this link to learn more about the Cleveland Photographic Society

Maplecrest Farm

The day started off a little cool and rainy but that didn't dampen the spirits of the CPS photographers on their field trip to Maplecrest Farm. It turned out to be a nice day and we got some great photos of the horses, goats, farm buildings and equipment and even some portraits of the volunteer models. After taking photos for a few hours we enjoyed a picnic lunch. A good time was had by all.

Click Photo to go to Gallery
Go here to learn more about the Cleveland Photographic Society

No Luck Today!!!

Sunrises and Sunsets can be frustrating, sometimes you get a great one and sometimes you wasted your time getting up early, driving for miles and get nothing. Today was one of those days. Last week we lucked out with a fantastic Sunrise at Headland Dunes, great colors and cloud formations. This week even though storms were supposed to be rolling in, the sky was clear this morning with barely a cloud in the sky. So what are you gonna do, you can't give up and not get up early and take a chance because the day you stay in bed is the day you're gonna miss a fantastic sunrise. Oh well, as Mick sang " You can't always get what you want"

Animated Badge

Smugmug has added some new features under the "Share Button" on your gallery page, just click the "Share Button" then click "Show Off" and you can either create a slide show or an animated badge. Then you can click the copy code button and it will copy the code to your clipboard and you can paste it in you Blog or Forums or another website. Here's what it looks like:

Click on the large photo and it will take you to the Gallery

You can read about the new features Smugmug added here: Smugmug Release Notes

Sunrise At Headlands Dunes Nature Preserve

A bunch of us got up at the crack of dawn to catch the sunrise at Headlands Dunes Nature Preserve in Mentor and we were rewarded with a great sunrise and great cloud formations. Here's some photos taken at Headlands Dunes:
Click on Photo to go to Photo Gallery
We had such a good time at Headlands Dunes we're thinking of going back sometime and getting sunset photos.

Keep an eye on my Cool Photo Ops Blog for information on fun places to take photos in Ohio and if you have any suggestions for places to take photos let me know and I'll post it on my blog.

Great Time in the Smokies

Well I wasn't able to keep up with the blog while I was in the Smokies, but I'm back home now and posted a lot of the photos. I highly recommend a trip to the Smokies, there's lots of things to see and do there. Some of the highlights are Cades Cove, Clingman's Dome and the mountain streams. Here's a sunset photo from Morton Overlook



More photos here: Smoky Mountain Slide Show

My Smoky Mountain Trip - Day 1 Travel day.

I left early this morning for my trip to the Smoky Mountains. I'm doing a week long workshop with Jim Moore. According to my navigator Jill (That's the voice on my GPS), it took me 7 hours and 58 minutes of driving time to get here. Stay tuned to this blog as I post photos about my Smoky Mountain Adventure.

Parade the Circle

Well I attended my first Parade the Circle on Saturday 6/13 and had a great time and took lots of photos. Parade the Circle was first started in 1990 with 125 participants and about 1000 onlookers and has grown over the years. This past Saturday over 2000 people participated in the parade with over 70,000 people attending. Anyone who wants can march in the parade for an entry fee of $6.00, the participants ranged in age from little kids to senior citizens. I got there early an ran into a lot of other photographers, we went to the staging area by the Art Museum parking lot and got photos of the participants as they put on there costumes and makeup then I went off to find a good spot to shoot the parade. They have the parade every June, check it out next year if you get a chance.
Here are a few photos from the event:


More photos can be seen here: Parade the Circle Photos
And a slide show can be seen here: Parade the Circle Slide Show

My Hocking Hills Adventure

Just got back recently from a trip to one of my all time favorite places to take photos - Hocking Hills State Park. Hocking Hills is a photographer's paradise, lots of waterfalls, wildflowers, caves and interesting rock formations. Three of my photographer friends and I stayed at the State Park cottages for two nights and three fun packed days of photography.

The Three Amigos at Ash Cave

To see more photos from my trip to Hocking Hills go here: Hocking Hills Spring 2009

To see on a map where the photos were taken go here: GPS Photo Map of Hocking Hills

I'm On Vacation!!!!

Hooray!!!! My vacation starts tomorrow (5/22) and I plan on spending a lot of time taking photos. First up is the Chagrin Falls Balloon Fest this five day event is always fun with lots of colorful Hot Air Balloons to shoot. I have lots of information posted here Cool Photo Ops - Balloon Fest





Then on Saturday I'm heading down to the Flats and checking out the Veterans Memorial Bridge. If you like Cleveland History this is a cool place to check out. They open the bottom portion of the bridge for self guided tours. Trolley's used to travel through this part of the bridge to get to downtown Cleveland. More info can be found here Cool Photo Ops - Veterans Memorial Bridge Tour.





Next I'm heading down to one of the most scenic places in Ohio - Hocking Hills.





Then on the way home I'm stopping off to check out the Columbus Zoo.

All in all it should be a great time!!!

Bird Identification

When it comes to Identifying birds, I stink! Oh, I can ID a robin, or a blue jay or a blue heron and a few others but that's about it. A lot of times when I'm out taking photos I'll take some shots of some of the birds in the Cuyahoga Valley NP but I have no idea what bird it is or even how I would go about trying to identify it. Until recently I didn't have a clue on how to ID a bird or even where to begin looking in the birding books, but now thanks to the All About Birds site I have a better understanding on how to ID birds. They have some excellent videos that teach you how to ID birds. They have four videos that you can watch online right now to teach you the basics of bird identification:

1. Shape and Size
2. Color Pattern
3. Behavior
4. Habitat

So if you'd like to learn more about Bird Identification then check out this site: Inside Birding, Learn how to better identify birds

Good Sites to learn about birds

• All About Birds
  
• Birds of North America
• Northeast Ohio Birding Thanks Kirby for the link
  

If anyone knows of other great birding sites let me know and I'll add them to the list.

Looking for great places to take photos in Ohio? Then check out my Cool Photo Ops Blog

Chippewa Lake Park

I went on a fun shoot on Sunday to photograph what's left of Chippewa Lake Amusement Park. The park first opened in 1878 and closed for good in 1978. The park has sat unused for the last 31 years and Mother Nature has had her way with the park. Trees are growing through the Ferris Wheel and the tracks of the Coaster. Developers have now taken over for Mother Nature and are tearing down what's left of the park. Thanks to the Cleveland Photographic Society a bunch of us were able to photograph what remains of the park. The tracks for the Coaster are still standing and the Ferris Wheel frame ( with the tree growing through it) are still there, along with the tracks to the Wild Mouse and the Bug ride is still there with a few cars still on the track. There are still a few buildings standing but most of them are gone, either torn down or burned down by local teenagers. Pretty soon it will all be gone and new development will spring up on the site. It's a shame to see all the old amusement parks closing, but I guess it's a sign of the times.

Ferris Wheel

More Photos can be seen here: Chippewa Lake Park

To see a GPS photo map go here: Photo Map of Chippewa Lake Park

Zoo at 12mm

Recently I visited the Cleveland MetroParks Zoo to take some photos, usually when I go to the Zoo, I carry a backpack full of lenses. Not this time, this time I took one lens my 12-24mm and set it at 12mm and left it there. Why would I take a 12mm lens to the zoo? Well, I wanted to be a little more creative, by setting the lens to 12mm I paid more attention to what I was viewing in the viewfinder and unlike with a zoom I actually had to move closer or farther away to frame my shot. I also crouched down and pointed the camera up and down while framing my image. This is actually a good way to learn about the different focal length lenses you carry and how they see the world. It was also great just to walk around with my camera and lens and not lug a heavy backpack around. Try it sometime, it's a lot of fun.



To see more of zoo photos go here: Zoo at 12mm

My Adventures on the Daffodil Trail

Well I got up bright and early this morning and headed to the Daffodil Trail in the Furnace Run MetroPark I got to the park a little before 7am and was the only one there. Right near the parking lot and picnic tables I viewed the first of many daffodils along the trail.

After taking a few photos of the daffodils near the parking lot, I ventured on down the trail an came upon this sign.

The loop trail is about .6 miles long and is a pretty easy hike, as you hike down the trail you run into patches of daffodils, there were a lot of daffodils but it looked like in another week there would be a lot more.

I like to have fun when I'm out taking photos so I took my usual goofy shots, like my "Ant Eye View" photos

Here's another fish eye view




Here are a few more photos:






Here's a link to a Daffodil Trail GPS Photo Map This is pretty cool, click the link then on the map, click on the photos on the right side and you'll see where along the trail I took the photo, when the photo pops up over the green smuggy balloon just click on the thumbnail to go to the gallery.

So, if your looking for a great place to take photos in the spring I highly recommend the Daffodil Trail, get there early though cause when I got done with my hike the parking lot was full.

I'm gonna try and write about all my photo shoot adventures on this blog, if you'd like to keep up to date with my photo adventures just subscribe to the feeds or better yet subscribe via email and you'll be notified when the blog is updated. Just sign up on the right side of this blog.

You may also want to check out my Cool Photos Ops blog, on that blog I'll be posting Cool Places to take photos in Ohio and also listing places where I'm planning to shoot. The blog is a great resource with Weather Maps, sunrise and sunset times and even wind conditions that would be useful when you are going out to shoot macro. To help you get to the locations I also list GPS Coordinates for all of the photo locations and display a Google map so you can get directions to the location from your home address. I also post photos and slideshows so you can see what the location looks like. You can check it out here, and make sure you subcribe to the Cool Photo Ops blog as well to keep up to date with new photo locations.

Cool Photo Ops Blog

Spring is Here!!!!

Well Spring is finally here and it's starting to warm up, so dust off your camera and lets get out there and shoot. Stay tuned to this blog as I write about my photography adventures and also check out my Cool Photo Ops Blog where I will be posting cool places to take photos. The latest post on the Cool Photo Ops site is about a cool place to shoot in April - Lake View Cemetery. Here are a few photos from Lake View. Head on over to Cool Photo Ops for more details

Are You Ready for Spring?

I'm getting tired of this cold weather and can't wait till Spring gets here and to make things worse even the winter weather isn't cooperating with the winter photo shoots. I was supposed to go to the Sled Dog Classic this weekend but it got postponed due to bad trail conditions. So what did I do all weekend? I edited some of my Pictured Rocks photos, here are a few that I did yesterday. As you can see my Shadow really enjoyed Twelve Mile Beach in the UP of Michigan.






and here's one of my feet enjoying the beach!!!






Instead of sitting at the computer I would rather be out taking photos somewhere, I was thinking of going back to East 72nd Street and getting some sunset shots of the Seagulls, but once again the weather isn't cooperating, the skies are overcast and it's snowing again so there's not much chance of getting a good sunset shot and besides I'm not even sure if the Seagulls are still hanging around down there in large numbers anymore.

Anyway Spring is only about a month away (3/20/09)!!!!

Go here to see more Pictured Rocks Photos

Photographer Busted By Amtrak

This is a pretty funny video from Comedy Central. Here's what happened

1. Amtrak invites photographers to enter photo contest

2. Photographer takes photos of the trains

3. Photographer gets arrested

Check out the video its pretty funny:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Nailed 'Em - Amtrak Photographer

Colbert Report Full Episodes
Funny Political News

Christian Bale Parody
Joke of the Day

Stupid Photographer Tricks

Am I the only photographer that does dumb stuff on photo shoots? Here are some of the dumb things I've done:

1. Accidentally turned on auto exposure bracketting. I did this recently at the zoo. I was taking photos in manual mode, I would look at the photo and histogram and it would be over or underexposed I would then change my aperture to compensate for either the under or overexposed photo and take another shot and the exposure still wasn't right. This went on for four or five shots and it was driving me crazy, I was beginning to think something was wrong with the camera or metering system. So this time I paid attention to the settings as I looked through the viewfinder, I had the camera set to f8 and 1/250 of a second, I took a shot and all of a sudden I noticed it now said 1/500 of a second, then another and it changed to 1/1000 of a second. Huh? I was in manual mode why was my shutter speed changing? Then it hit me the camera was bracketting my shots! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I had accidentally turned on auto exposure bracketting!!!

2. Taken photos at the wrong ISO. I was out taking photos in the Cuyahoga Valley NP and had taken about 15 - 20 shots before I noticed that my ISO was set to ISO 800. I had been taking low light shots the day before and forgot to reset my ISO!!!! What a dummy!!!

3. Got out of the car and start walking to the Beaver Marsh, got half way there and then it hit me - my tripod was still in the car!!! DOH!

4. Was taking photos and wondering why the photos looked so dark? I had forgotten to take off my sunglasses!!!! Another time I was looking through the viewfinder and everything looked weird with strange looking colors I had left my sunglasses on and had a polarizer on the lens!!!

5. Back in the film days I accidentally opened the back without rewinding the film!!! What a dope!!!

Have any of you done anything dumb while out taking photos? If you have click on "comment" below and let me know what dumb things you've done, it'll make me feel better knowing that I'm not the only one that does stupid stuff!!!

Kendall Ledges Photo Walk 1/31/09

It was a cold day on Saturday January 31 when a group of photographers from the Cuyahoga Valley Photo Society hiked Kendall Ledges. It was fun going on a winter hike but it was also tiring trudging through the deep snow wearing heavy insulated boots and snow pants and lugging way to much camera equipment. I had too take a break every once in awhile on one of the snow covered benches.

If you'd like to see where the photos were taken, go here: Kendall Ledges Photo Map

The Cuyahoga Valley Photo Society has Photo Walks six times a year, they also have Photo Workshops a couple of times a year and they meet once a month at the Happy Days Visitor's Center. Go here to find out more Cuyahoga Valley Photo Society