Springtime in Utah.
Winter over the weekend, but today was spring. Good temperatures & granite thenbeers, bbq, and bluegrass post-climbing.
Sugarhouse BBQ on Thursdays. $2 drafts, half-off appetizers and live music. Hard to beat.
Sun-affected the next /
Great skiing both days, and even better that Polly was able to get out touring and skiing again. The thin clouds produced a really cool halo in the sun. The sun eventually lost out and the mountains have been slammed with snow since (close to 40” in the last 48 hours).
The rest of the photos are on the Skiing 2010 set on Flickr .
Wind-affected one day /
(the skiing was still good)
Dust storm /
I didn’t shoot this in black & white… that’s just how much of the West Desert is suspended in the air right now. Hopefully the coming rain will wash all this junk away.
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One more
Brian taping up for Generic Crack.
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Back! Great short weekend.
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Headed out this weekend for the third weekend in a row on the road or in the air. This time around the travel doesn’t feel tiresome though.
Next week I’ll also be working on building a website for a friend and sitting down tonight to do the layouts was a great chance to creatively breath in through the process of coming up with some ideas. The goal was to do a new layout that I know I can make the HTML and CSS code for quickly. I wanted something green, simple and new. No copying.
Great creative exercise.
Having a reason to try something new but constraints on how it can get done seems a great way to stretch and grow.
Back to the travel, its nice to know that creating things gives me a chance to breath in and knowing that balance can come in many forms.
The photo above was from a moment between at my brother’s wedding last weekend. I like it.
Just Married! /
My brother’s married! Great to weekend in AR to see him get hitched. Also great to see aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, and grandparents again this year. Best wishes to both Jesse and Tera.
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Good day of storms here along the Wasatch.
The Creek, just for a day. /
Now the rest of the story.
This past weekend in the Creek was one of those time when you know the weather is going to be bad, but not sure how bad. We woke up Saturday morning to overcast skies, so we took our time making breakfast and packing up. No rush to go climb in the cold and clouds. But then, the clouds kinda broke and started burning off as the sun got high enough. It might be a good day after all.
I was told my Subaru Outback wouldn’t be up to the task of the mud and rough road to get us back to the Second Meat Wall, and after the drive in, I wouldn’t argue the point.
The hike up the base of the cliffs, like all the approaches in the Creek will get you warmed up. Though for the first part of the day the wind kept the sun from feeling all that warm. Andrew got the day going by putting up a cool route that had some a-typical climbing the Creek: no hands rests, big bucket holds, stems, step arounds and some face climbing.
After climbing yet another ‘unnamed’ creek route (I always end up on those) and lunch, Brian and Sam wanted to go check out Top Sirloin. Turned out this route was not only in the shade, had snow at the base, but was also dripping wet from the melt-out. No go. So they decided to put up a route that changes cracks to the left of Josh workin’ the redpoint of Pastafarian.
Brian was pretty happy to be climbing much better here than the last time he was in the Creek. Two smooth leads seems to be a good way to start the season.
After Brian put up the route, I followed and cleaned the gear and set a fixed line for me to take some shots of Sam’s turn to lead the route. By this time the sunny day had returned to being overcast and we could see the rain coming in the distance over Canyonlands National Park. Thankfully there was a last burst of the sun as Sam was leading.
That didn’t last long though, and we got into camp just in time to ‘batten down the hatches’ before the wall of storm hit. We woke up to 2-4” of snow in camp and promptly retreated to Moab for breakfast and coffee. I had buried my camera into my pack for the hike down as things were blowing in and so I missed getting any shots of the storm or snow the next morning.
The rest of the photos are here (the first 15 in the set).
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Break in the clouds. Good trip for one day of cooperative weather.
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Working in a world of CAD design, spreadsheets and FDA paperwork its nice to be able to pause, step outside, feel the cold air, and take a photo that I can enjoy. Breath out, then step back inside and go back to work.
I really think there is something to be said for finding a balance between what you love and what you do to pay the bills. For me its photography, for other people its travel or climbing.
I also would add that balancing work and passion only goes so far as having a clear reason for the work you do. It might just be the job that pays the bills for now till the next better thing comes down the pipes. However, knowing why you’ve got the job you have, even a crummy one to get by, is the key to working on your terms.
The hard part right now is there are fewer jobs out there then there have been in a generation. But, despite the grim unemployment rates, I’ve also heard several stories of folks who have made the most of it by just staying with it, day after day, persistently.
All that to say, I’m happy for the balance photography brings me.
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“If you design something without any regard for or understanding of the end user’s interaction with the product, what exactly are you doing?”
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Sunset drive to Park City.
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Polly and I got to get out for another nice, snowy hike up the Little Cottonwood Trail in with snow softly floating down. Every time we’ve been up there to hike, its also been snowing. Its been good for her hip to get out and move.
See the rest on Flickr here.
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A phone upgrade for me has made posting mobile photos much easier and I’m really excited to be able to work on seeing and posting simple shots like these more often.
Aperture 3 /
I’m trying out Apple’s Aperture 3.0, and its very different from Adobe’s Lightroom that I’ve been using. I think it feels slower, but maybe its just different and causes waits in places I’m not used to waiting. The full screen editing mode is great. The interface almost goes completely away and lets you just work on an image without looking at the usual trappings of software. The brushes interface is brilliant.
Not sure if I’ll switch workflows yet, as there’s a noticeable learning curve and would cost a bit to buy the new software, but I like it so far.
Would you believe that something that looks like this:
Could go into making a really tasty soup?
More photos on Flickr.
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“Mechanical Design: Creativity of balancing form, function and cost. Its the left brain-ed version of art.”
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Roasted Red Peppers
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Californian FB, Bold
Very cool tumblr blog of fonts and type as expressed by ampersands. I like following it.