COVID-19 Continues

Grrrrrrrr COVID-19 still has me stuck at home.  I am still hoping that as some of the medical experts have said that heat of the summer will kill the virus.  Is it possible that many of these restrictions will be eased up?  In my state, some have, but then the city is still taking precautions since there are close to 1200 cases of the virus here.

I am a person that needs to get out.  This business of sitting at home is getting to me.  I still want to go places and see things that I haven't seen or really experienced yet.  Yet my camera is sitting in its bag gathering dust on my floor.

You might have noticed that I did not post last week.  That was because I was attending a Virtual Summit on Photoshop.  As per the typical summits or conferences, some of the instructors were very informative and others were just so so or down right not interesting.  One particular instructor that I enjoyed was Blake Rudis from https://f64academy.com/.  It was through him that I learned to do a LUT (look up table) to help with my post processing.  While, Blake uses Photoshop and Adobe Camera Raw to process his pictures, I am going to split his process putting the Adobe Camera Raw part into Lightroom as a Preset and the Photoshop part into its own LUT.  Then, when I import my image into Photoshop, I can use the LUT at the first action to get the proper tone and colors to begin my processing with.  I am excited to set this up and start using it and see what it does to my processing.

Someone else that I really enjoyed was Jack "Wow" Davis http://jackdavishowtowow.com/.  Jack took a step by step approach to using Lightroom for my iPad.  He really made it seem interesting to me and I have the feeling that it is something that I can use if I am at lunch and want to see how some of my pictures may look once I put them on my desktop computer.  Presently, I use my iPad to take panoramas, so I am looking forward to using it and getting over some of the wonder that I might have after I take a picture that I feel really good about.  As I tell many of the people that I interact with, "Everything looks good small".  It is when you get it larger that you start noticing the flaws.

Plans For The Future

Like many in the world, I am staying inside.  I have several of the health conditions that those I respect, say are the most critical conditions for being susceptible to this Coronavirus that we are all dealing with.  I am getting to go out to the grocery store once a week.  This week much of the world celebrates Easter Sunday.  The grocery store will be closed so I will need to go earlier in the week to get my groceries.

Since I am staying at home, I am enjoying a state of "Wanderlust", figuring places that I would like to go once all of this is over with.  Top on the list is Las Vegas.  I want to shoot along the canals of the Venetian Hotel.   I would enjoy shooting the fountains at the Bellagio Hotel (can i get a spot in the middle so I can get the curve of the hotel and the fountains in the middle)?  I would enjoy going to Seven Magic Mountains about one half hour south of The Strip, and of course there is the Grand Canyon about one and one half hours away from Las Vegas.  If I can leave early enough, there is the Hoover Dam along the way.

One thing that I think about is getting a hat.  I have seen a couple styles that I like, but I haven't found one that comes in the color that I want.  I have been thinking of a white hat so that it reflects the light and will keep my head cool, especially in the summertime.

So what have you been thinking about doing after we get the signal that we can go outside and enjoy our activities?  I would enjoy hearing your thoughts on the subject.  Leave a comment below.  You might inspire me for more activities to take on after we get our release from these "Stay in Place" orders that we have.

Until next time, stay healthy, stay well and most of all keep hoping for as a wise man once said, "Hope is the anchor of the soul".