I am so excited! Thanks to a very generous gift I am getting a new camera this week. In the meantime, I remembered my cell phone had a lousy built in camera.
The cell phone works o.k. for flowers like the honeysuckle above. Anytime I can hold the cell phone camera right over the object, it sort of works.
Lavender (above) and honeysuckle are not only the new sights of the season but they also add their lovely scent to my natural backyard. The flowers of the kolkwitzia amabilis (below) have dropped and left their fuzzy parts.
The branch in the middle of the next shot is kolkwitzia and it's leaning towards the pecan tree on the right.
The one thing my cell phone can't do at all is photograph birds. See the tiny figure in the shot below. That's a robin courtesy of my cell phone. But by next week's nature notes I should be in full swing with the new camera I'm getting this week.
My neighbor's cat below is at the top of my driveway getting ready to harras the birds in my backyard. The cat isn't impressed by my pointing the cell phone at it.
The blackberry blossoms are beginning to bloom (shot below). You might be able to barely make out a fuzzy bug in the middle of one of the blooms.
Everything is getting very green. My cell phone turns a landscape into an impressionistic painting (to put a positive spin on it).
The primrose are in full bloom below.
In the next shot you can see the butterfly weed forming its buds. There's something slightly incongruous about waving my cell phone around when I'm enjoying nature but at least I'm not talking on it.
Click for the home of nature notes.
The first three shots were taken on May first, the day before my digital camera died.
The Queen Anne's Lace above was covered in tiny brown bugs.
I'm glad I got some photographs of my roses before my camera stopped working.
The rest of the shots were taken with my cell phone at the grocery store yesterday.
My cell phone camera is lousy for anything except something like flowers that I can hold it right up to. Even so, I'm glad I remembered that my cell phone does have a built in camera since it's the only one I have for the time being.
Click for the home of today's flowers.
I have been using the same digital camera since June of 2006. I have taken 86,161 photographs with that camera. Alas, it finally gave out on me on Monday.
For the digital photohunter post, I went to my archives from last month and thought I'd work with one shot.
An advantage to digital photography is you can work with a single image after it's on the computer.
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Click for the home of photohunters.
The first shot of the American Robin was taken on May 2, 2011 and is among the last photographs taken with my Canon Powershot.
On May 2 the camera I've used since 2006 and with which I've taken countless photographs finally stopped working. The next shot was taken on May 1, 2011.
When I got the E18 error message and my camera lens wouldn't open I checked it out online. The next American Robin was shot on April 28, 2011.
I found out that the error message can mean the lens won't open due to dirt or an alignment issue amongst other things. After following all the self help suggestions I concluded that my camera is probably not fixable by me. The next shot is of butterfly weed which is popping up everywhere.
After reading about the average cost of getting my camera fixed for this problem (if it's fixable) I determined it's too much money to spend on a camera this age which could have other problems. So I don't know when I'll have a camera again but since I have a zillion photographs I've never posted, I can keep photo blogging from my archives. The last shot is of the butterfly weed popping up around my hostas.
I'm starting to take notes on what is going on in my natural world so future nature notes may be in diary form with older photographs for illustrations. I will probably eventually have another camera but at the moment it's not something I can afford. I may try a disposable camera for vacations. They even have disposable digital cameras now for under 10 bucks. In some ways though, it will be good to have the time where I'm observing and thinking about what I see versus photographing all the time. Click for the home of nature notes.
Hard to believe we are already beginning May. These shots were all taken this week.
My primroses are starting to pop up all over the flower bed I started them in about 8 years ago.
The primroses self seed so they are something I look for every year. My red roses are doing well in spite of the tall boughs falling over and joining plants below them.
Below the roses on the left side of the shot were as tall as the ones on the far right but they got knocked down.
The white kolkwitzia below is still making quite a splash.
Click for the home of today's flowers.
