Summer Approaches ~ CREATIVE ARTS Three Day Weekend (Early Start)
Will likely be on the road tomorrow, so, posting this one early.
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Saving Face, White-tailed Deer, Doe and New Fawn
© A. Mac/A.G.
Monarch Butterfly, Deptford Pink Flower Cluster
© A. Mac/A.G.
Article is LOCKED by moderator [A. Macarthur]
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Hope to be fishin' tomorrow,
Awww, Bambi gets a face wash...
Anoon Buzz..yes it is a lovely photo..
Hot sunny day with blue sky and fluffy clouds here today - already been out for a nice walk. How's it with you?
Evening...err not to flash..got a chest infection and causing me a lot of bother. Was going to have my vaccination injection this week but will have to wait now. Cold wet and windy here...swap ya 😀😀😀
Sorry about your problems - hopefully you'll be better soon.
The photo of the Monarch Butterfly is fantastic!
Great photos, Mac. The little fawn and Mother are so sweet. Thanks so much for sharing them.
You always take beautiful photos.
He went fishing today.
That;s no fiddler on the roof, so what did it catch? I haven't even caught a cold for at least two decades.
He caught a fish out of one of our lakes. You need to go fishing, Buzz.
Great shot, Kavika
Playing with some of my photos...
© G. Gam 2021
© G. Gam 2021
Super-creative. I'll bet you're really having fun doing it.
Thanks, Buzz. Yes, I really am having fun.
You are really getting good at this G.
Thank you, niijii Kavika
Amazing editing, G. It's great how you are keeping the full essence of the flowers against the abstract background. Very well done!
Thank you very much, Raven Wing
These are beautiful examples of the endless possibilities of digital art! Proudly, they appear in our Group.
Thank you so much! I am very happy to display my efforts in this wonderful group.
Wow, beautiful G2
Thanks, Pink!
It has been said that to know China you must do 3 things - climb The Great Wall (did that), eat Peking Duck (many times, but the first time was at a famous Peking Duck restaurant) and watch the Peking Opera (did that as well). All of those things I did when visiting Beijing during Christmas holiday of 2006. You have seen photos of me at The Great Wall, one of me at that restaurant standing beside the chef who was carving the duck at our table, so today I'm going to show you what I saw and photographed at the Peking Opera. My advice - if ever you go to see the Peking Opera, take ear plugs with you, unless you love loud cacophony. Because I was not permitted to use the flash on my camera, some of the images are a little fuzzy because the action was somewhat violent at times.
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Never went to the Opera on my trips to China.
I have seen a few parts of these operas played out in some of the Chinese movies I have watched on the Internet, and they are indeed quite loud. And unless you understand Chinese, the oral parts of the operas are a bit confusing. But, the action is very interesting and play out rather well.
Thanks for sharing these with us, Buzz.
They actually had a screen above the stage with subtitles in English Obviously it was a theatre that lots of tourists frequent.
The last time I went to the opera was in Sydney at the Sydney Opera House and it came very close to causing an international incident.
Morning...so that was you..🤣🤣🤣
That would indeed very interesting to watch with the English subtitles.
And I remember your story about your trip the opera with Red in Sydney. I have it saved and have read it more than a few times, LMAO every time.
Indeed it was, shona.
Morning Raven.. please enlighten me...😀😀
Alright what did you do at the Sydney Opera house??
I wrote a story about it. I'll try to find it again and post it here, shona.
Thank you sounds like an entertaining read..raven said she had kept it so she maybe able to supply it..😀😀
It's too long for here but I re-posted it in Anishinaabe. You can go there and read it. It will be the first story on the top of the page. ''Kavika at the Opera''.
I remember it as well. It was kind of hard to forget.
Indeed it is hard to forget, but, just in case I did forget parts of it I saved a copy for my further enjoyment. (grin)
So colorful . You must have enjoyed watching it.
Visually amazing, but really LOUD.
Another Friday....another new one....
Please don't tell me the figure is wearing a covid mask.
No mask, Buzz. That is part of his headdress.
Last night my vision was waning, but this morning I can see his facial features and can see it's over his forehead.
Good one RW.
Thanks Kavika.
Beautiful Raven Wing
Thank you very much, Pink.
My fantasy garden...
© CZG 2021
Beautiful, Pink.
Thank you Kavika
That's a charming garden and well expressed. And I love the frame.
Thank you Raven Wing
Very beautiful!
I really enjoy your paintings. I see somewhat of the style of Frida Kahlo in them.
Thank you Buzz for the wonderful compliment.
A neighbor of ours (her name is on the bottom left) was on the Rainbow River (20 miles from here) yesterday and took these photos.
First rate!
Truly beautiful shots.
Great photos. Thank her for allowing you to share them with us. They remind me of Corkscrew in So. Fla. I went if the friend when I visited them in Ft. Myers a few years back. Really a fascinating area.
Wow...just stunning..
Fascinating. The one of the two birds looks like a painting.
Amazing nature shots
Not much going on in my world. I tied some spikey moss to the driftwood "stump" in my half hex tank last weekend -
Your tanks are looking more beautiful each time that you post photos of them.
Morning evil.. looks to nice..there is nothing in the tank that bites, eats you or stings...
That's a beautiful scene.
A sunset photo of where I spent my growing up years.... Miskwaagamiiwi-zaaga'igan (Lake with its liquid [water] be colored red) or as it is known to non Indians Red Lake Ojibwe Reservation.
The lake itself is huge a total of 440 square miles.
Photo from the internet.
Another beautiful sunset.
This evening. Caught two nice fish, one big one, and got to see this.
As I said before, you could set up a sort of museum and sell admission tickets. Your collection is unique and fascinating.
The hard part is isolating a piece of it for a photo. See if you can find the subject of the photo here. This is about 15% to 20% of the collection. If you look closely you’ll see that I’ve hung two large mirrors on the wall and hung pieces on the mirror. In the reflection of the mirror you can see some of the opposite wall covered in more pieces. I take great care to ensure everything is displayed without overlapping anything else. It is still visually overwhelming though.
No problem. The centre one was pretty distinctive.
You should catalogue them, with descriptions. As well, you could bring young kids through on Hallowe/en to scare the s*** out of them.
An amazing collection, Hal. How long have you been collecting them?
I purchased my oldest pieces about 30 years ago, but I got much more serious about it over the last ten years. I basically collect any three dimensional art ware that has a unique human-esque face, and I search for as many types of culture and materials as I can find. I’m also cheap as hell, so I pass up most of what I see for sale.
Thanks you for the information. To me, you have a very keen eye not only for cultures, traditions and Spiritualism, but, mystical beliefs as well in the artwork you choose. And is further enhanced by your method of presentation. It is evident that you have a 'feel' or personal connection to the artwork you select, and is expressed in your editing.
I look forward to seeing many more of your vast collection here in this group. Thank you for sharing them with us.
One for Saturday......
That's a WINNER, Raven. Not just a great image, but a PERFECT blend of colours and texture with the background frame.
Thank you very much, Buzz. I truly appreciate your feedback of my work. It really means a lot, and is very helpful. (smile)
I believe that most Americans think that the only lava beds in the US are in Hawaii. California, one of the most diverse states in the US has 75 square miles of lava beds, known as the Lava Bed National Monument and it has a fascinating history. It lies in far northeastern California it is in two counties, Modoc and Siskiyou.
Photos were taken off the internet. I have dozens of photos but have not converted them to digital. I know, I'll get to it someday.
I have been to the lava beds and they are very fascinating. Looking out over them they look like a black ocean of waves. It is a very Spiritual feeling, almost other worldliness.
Walking through them and knowing that Captain Jack and a small band of Modoc held off the US Army for months. I met and spoke with some Modoc tribal members many times and it's just amazing to hear the oral history of the Modoc, Captain Jack, and their stand at the lava beds.
That's really interesting. There's no end to learning new things every day. My only experience with lava was from dangerously standing on the very precipice of Mauna Loa looking down into the seething red lava in the seams between the broken floor below, smelling the sulphur smoke rising..
Thanks to everyone, moving towards Sunday.
A traditional Sunday morning scene … this one in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the 1990's.
Sunday Newspapers
© A. Mac/A.G.
It's a rare and happy occasion to see an A.Mac peopled street scene that is not a restoration or a street in Disney World..
I just got in from playing I Spy in the dark tonight. Flying squirrels, people!
I almost never saw these guys before last year, but they found the platform feeder one day and have been coming back ever since, except for during the winter. The internet says they don't technically hibernate, so I guess they just stay hunkered down in their burrows for several months, taking really long naps.
I didn't think I was going to have anything to post this week. I recently shot a bunch of videos of chipmunks, squirrels, various birds at the feeders, and some shots of wrens and pewees singing, but I haven't had time to edit them into a single video yet. It finally stopped raining, and today was the fist day this spring (!!!) that I've been able to transplant tomatoes and peppers, so I was in the garden until dark (no time for editing videos). When I got back to the house I heard a ruckus in the feeder tree, and lo and behold the flying squirrels had returned! A bunch of them, too. There were at least four.
I grabbed the camera and a flashlight and sat down in a lawn chair to watch. When I first got myself situated, there was just barely enough light left that I was able to see two of them flying in and landing on the tree. That was a first for me! They glided all the way in from the woods, which is 100+ feet away from that particular tree. I used to imagine them taking a different approach with shorter glides between a few other trees, but apparently not.
At any rate, I learned that several of them trying to eat from the same feeder at the same time is not a good thing. They kept fighting and chasing each other around up in the branches, and not one, but two of them actually fell out of the tree, hitting the ground with a plop.
After a while things settled down and I was able to get a few decent shots of them. One at a time, though. This is much harder to do than a person might think. They're nocturnal and absolutely HATE light, so I have to use a flashlight to set my focus somewhere, then divert the flashlight away leaving just enough light on the target spot for me to know when one of them is there. When one appears I hit the shutter, the flash goes off, and I just hope for a good outcome. Standing there with everything aimed and at the ready is quite tedious (not a good enough angle from the comfort of the lawn chair), but I got quite a few shots, and these are the best of them. I think I'm going to try using a tripod and a wi-fi remote setup later on. I did that to get the chipmunk videos I mentioned above, and it works fabulously well.
Sorry about the red-eye. I'm not sure if my camera can compensate for that, but even if it can I don't know what the settings would be. I'll have to look into that.
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Oh! I just remembered that I made a video of one that was coming to the feeder last summer. Here it is if anyone's interested (it's from back in September):
You're welcome, and thanks for the nature lesson. I particularly liked the grab and run scenes at the video's end. By the way, the photo editing programs I use have red-eye adjustment, one with separate assistance for people and animals, are you sure yours doesn't?
Nope, I'm not sure at all. I'll have to look it up. Thanks.
I just noticed that in the video there isn't a red-eye problem until the last few clips. Weird. I don't understand that.
My guess is it’s related to what’s called “angle of incidence” from your light source which determines angle of reflection from the eye to the camera. Otherwise, an excellent animal behavior video.
Great video !
Great video, Dig. That is one very busy squirrel, up and down, up and down, etc. I wonder it he ever gets full with all that exercise. (grin)
The photos and the video are great, Dig.
Well done I loved watching the video and of course your story on how you came to get the photos.
Near the city of Nanning in Guanxi Region there is a large ethnic minority group called the Zhuang people. Their costumes are extremely colourful.
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Same as many other ethnic minorities in China, they have legends and myths, such as this one.
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Here is a statue of Mo Yi, which I recall is very similar to a statue of a Native American archer of repute.
Great photos and storyline and yes the statue of him is similar to the NA archer by Allen Houser.
That must be the one I was thinking of - I believe somebody posted in on NT some time ago.
A truly great photo, Buzz. A similar statue is also in the National Museum of the American Indian, located on Mall in Washington D.C.
I took this photo when I visited the museum there a few years ago. It is truly a fascinating museum, filled with the history and artwork related to all the different Tribes in America. It is a place to go early and stay late and still not see it all.
Isn't it ineresting how such a similar statue could be created on opposite sides of the world.
Indeed it is, Buzz, and with such a difference in the time of creation.
Although the legend among the Zhuang may be ancient, the statue could be quite recent, and perhaps even created around the same time as the Native American one - but who knows?
Very possible indeed.
Our summer guests, beware when your walking in the tall reeds.
Looks like they are playing a game of 'Follow The Leader By The Tail'.
LOL. I'd think that was a pretty good reason to NOT walk in the tall reeds.
Sunday is here and here is my Sunday artwork....
Another worthy image for a legacy artworks/historical/traditions volume for future generations to learn from and enjoy.
Thank you Buzz. As always, your compliment is very much appreciated.
Thanks to all for another outstanding article. I will lock her down sometime tomorrow.
Lily in Full Glory!
© A. Mac/A.G.
A beautiful, buttery Lily holds its head up to the warmth of the bright sunlight.
Lock her down? I thought the expression was "Lock her up".
Finishing with a "flowerish", but don't forget to check out my article about the dog artist...