Today's Gospel describes the challenges we face both externally and internally after we accept the call to follow Christ. Will be be shallow soil? Will we wilt under the thorns? Will we make ourselves good ground for the word of God. So as we face East and fix our gaze on the light of Christ what ground are we standing in? What do we need to do to grow well?
A good thought for tonight.
-ehw
I will take a little time to enjoy the family today....so I'll leave a minimum wake on the web! Enjoy your loved ones and worship The Lord today!
The weather broke wonderful this afternoon in Miami. I could tell the locals were loving it. The lonely benches were full, men and women dressed up to go out, boats started moving in the marinas, and families were back in the park walking. I was loving the break in the weather myself as the breeze kept me cool and comfortable in the afternoon sun walking to dinner.
Today I wanted to catch a few people in "street photography" mode. I got two keepers. The first was this skateboarder. He was having his fun here near, using this launching pad six to eight feet from three lanes of traffic. He was quite good with his tricks. To him they were just warm ups. If it was me on the board, it would be death defying.
Home tomorrow! I cannot wait. I know it will take more than a few minutes to get used to the noise of five extra bodies running around with their own agendas, but that is what being a Dad is all about right?
-ehw
This building on the Bay in Downtorn is massive, modern and very interesting. Yet just three blocks away is historic downtown Miami...are buldings just as interesting in different way!
I've never seen a perfume store this large before! Of course I probably could have used this store to hide my sweaty self!
There were also other veteran buildings to enjoy....
Classic architecture! Love it...I just hope the electrcal gets updated to keep up with modern technology Walgreens will want to cram into that store!
You'll also find neat little eateries tucked in like this cafeteria right across from resturants I could not afford to eat at!
And four blocks south of the cafeteria is this across the canal...modern wow factor.
Miami is an amazing city in many, many ways!
-ehw
Gesu Catholic Church
Whenever I travel have a little game..its called make a pilgrimage. Today as I finished up the daily session, I looked at the weather and it said thunder storms due in town by 3PM. Since I could fill out my homework anytime, I figured I better make the pilgrimage sooner rather than later.
The weather held up all of 15 minutes after leaving the hotel. I then ducked into a resturant and got lunch. I waited for a break in the weather to make the final dash up and over four blocks to the city's oldest Catholic Church, Gesu. As I walked up I could see all the symbols of my faith on the outside. I entered the door and felt myself overwhelmed by a sudden feeling of being at home while being away from home. I was happy to have a wonderful environment to focus on Jesus, the blessed sacrament, and have the story of salvation envelope my senses. This was a wonderful gift people made a hundred years ago for us today.
As I left out the door for another adventure I said a thank you prayer to those who labored and freely gave to make this sanctuary. I prayed that others may also come and find the Lord's lessons here in the stained glass, the lives of saints presented, and the sacrament of the Eucharist. I also...yes...left a little contribution so it will be there for the next soul who seeks refuge for a few minutes from the wild world outside.
-ehw
P.S. I did a little experiment today and edited as much as I could with my camera for color, contrast, and sharpness. I did a little cropping in Snapseed. Interiors worked the 23mm out, and outside I used the 18-55mmm zoom.
The old and new altars in the Sanctuary
An amazing baptismal font
I always try to find and photograph St. Joseph...what a good example of a father he is.
Everything has meaning, everything presented beacons one to join Christ on the Cross.
I love a rainy night...ok twilight! The rain was very, very light but the open ground was soaked! So that of course means dark, contrast filled colors if captured right!
The mood was pretty somber as well. I thought the taxis would get busier (and therefore happier), but the rain was so light it actually felt good in the humidity...sort of portable Miami air conditioning in an old school manner!
Even the park benches were quite lonely.
Maybe some sun tomorrow? Oh that is another song...."The Sun will come out tomorrow! Tomorrow! You can bet your bottom dollar...." Ok I'll be quiet before security comes up and makes me an offer I cannot refuse.
-ehw
P.S. For you gear heads all these came from my Fujifilm X-E1. Today was zoom day. I travels with my standard zoom (XF18-55 F2.8-4). Nicely made lens, and it did allow me to reach out and grab a few photos without moving my feet. I will say that the biggest thing it did for me was the mild telephoto effect. The second and fourth photos show what happened when I racked it all the way out to 55mm...or a short telephoto of about 78mm Full Frame equivalent. The telephoto allowed me to compress the elements in the frame, and they seem closer than they would with a standard focal length.
Something else I learned is that I got the shots in low light by increasing my iso to 3200. However this also made much the photo very bright, approaching daylight scenes. So I went back into the camera and applied negative compensation to bring the scenes closer to what I saw. I did not want a night vision goggle effect here.
Finally these are almost exclusively out of camera jpegs. Your camera probably has a very powerful RAW converter. Use it, save variants and shoot some more. If the product is good, variants will help you explore the what if's of your camera's potential.
Good Morning Miami! @ 540AM
After a rough introduction Sunday, Miami provided a lot of fun today. The town is an engineering marvel. Everywhere I turn in downtown there is something fantastic to capture. The people also have a rather nice temperment here to us tourists...especially those that don't speak the prefered language downtown, Spanish. The town does shine with a Central and Southern America twist. You can see it in the business links, food, culture, and vibrancy of the town. Despite all that it does really have an American flavor to it all. In the business district there is the normal go get 'em attitude I found in New York earlier this year. So all in all I am finding exploration here rather fun.
The old Miami Freedom Tower..once a newspaper's home and now a museum to Cuban Culture
I am enjoying the juxiposition of the classic 1920's Miami and modern day construction. The bridges between islands are facinating...and the huge skyscapers extending all the way to the water's edge. Wow!
Even inside our hotel there are so many fun things to photograph...outside my room by the elevator these lights just screamed to be photographed.
Oh I hope tomorrow to get even better light to photograph this remarkable town.
-ehw
P.S. All photos shot with the Fujifilm X-E1 and the XF23mm lens. I took the day to practice with one lens and one focal length. I did this to make my mind conceive and execute the photo in a 35mm equivalent on a 35mm film camera. The lens is fantastic. I just need to get better at using it.
One other interesting test I made was to work harder at using the internal controls of the camera to create the tonal curves. One, Three and Four are examples of this with minimal cropping or alignment corrections in Snapseed. The camera is much better than I am still.
Cheers!
I'm off on another adventure to Miami, Florida. Attending a work convention in downtown. So far this downtown is different than most towns I've visited in this country, and I'm doing my best to explore the unique flavor of this city. One minute you're looking at a Little Havanna or Latin America area, turn around 90 degrees and view the avant garde billion dollar condo sykscrapers.
So I'll endeavor to bring you a few good photos from the city while avoiding the fun any city can offer. For instance today I saw three teens rescue their bicycles from a theft right in front of me. It was very interesting...guy riding down the street on two similar bikes, then a bike rams the guy perpendiculary to knock him down. He got in protest only to face the two girls whose bike he stole, and the teenage young man who was with them. The perp said someone sold him the bikes... and gave them up without a fight. As this resolved itself a guy decided to try and run a red light right through my body about 30 seconds later in the cross walk. Just a minute after those two episodes I watched fancy boats (worth three of my homes) float on down the waterfront in a leisurely manner, and families enjoying life in the park.
This war memorial is from 1942 and right down the street in Bayfront Park. The lighting was not particlarly wonderful today, so I resorted to B&W on few photos to get something interesting from my travels. The photo below is the reflection of my hotel in the hotel across the street.
