Easter Egg Harbor

What better place to spend the Easter holiday than in Egg Harbor, Wisconsin?  Eggs and Easter - What could be better?

No one is quite sure how Egg Harbor got it's name but there is a legend that Elvis prefers.  The story goes like this; From an article in the Door County Advocate of April 26, 1862. The story indicates that three or four Mackinac boats left Green Bay to deliver furs to the trading post on Mackinac Island.  The boats stopped at the yet unnamed harbor to rest for the night.  While rowing ashore there was a race to see who would reach the shore first.  Food from the mess baskets was thrown at the leading boat and food quickly returned.  First, hard tack was the missile of choice, but soon eggs flew through the air.  When the boats reached the shore, the battle continued until the eggs were gone.  Everyone enjoyed the fun and the story of the battle which was often repeated by the voyagers.  The harbor was then identified as Egg Harbor.  See more HERE.

The most photogenic billboard in a very photogenic place is for the Shipwrecked Restaurant & Microbrewery that is neatly painted on an old, abandoned silo.

Taken with Nikon D3s and Nikon 24-70 lens on a Gitzo tripod topped with a Really Right Stuff BH-40 ballhead.

The Forest Through The Trees

Sometimes it's easy to forget just why we take pictures.  Some times it's to create art.  Other times it's just for fun.  Many times it's to document an event or a person or a place.  But for some hard-core photographers it's about production.  Gotta make the images.  Elvis thinks this attitude kills creativity.  If you start making photographs for the sake of making photographs all inspiration is gone.  And when inspiration is gone the likelihood of making something worthwhile goes effectively to zero.

Another sure way to zero-creativity madness is when we focus (pun intended) on equipment.  Gotta get that new Nikon lens or that new Canon 60D, then my photographs will be great.  You get the new thing and start snapping away.

Without a specific purpose it's difficult to create something, anything, worthwhile.  If you're in that rut, stop.  Think about what you're doing and why you're doing it.  Only with purpose can we get inspired.  Only with inspiration can we create lasting photographs.  It's not about the doing, it's about the why.  Even if the why is simply to have some fun.  Elvis thinks having fun should be a specific purpose in everyone's life.

Forest on Cana Island, Door County, Wisconsin.  HDR image taken with Nikon D3s and 14-24mm lens.

Photography & Living Forever

Can you live forever through photography?  Who knows?  Photography has existed for less than 200 years.  American civil war photographer Mathew Brady has the longest track record so far, but that's only been 150 years.  Where will current digital files be in 50 years?  100?  500?  Elvis expects that future technologies will be able to read today's files.  But who will keep them that long?  A shoe box of old photographs isn't likely to get thrown away, but what about the CD's and DVD's at the bottom of the boxes?  Will anyone bother to see what's on them?  That's probably reason enough to make good prints from your best photographic files - to ensure they don't get tossed out. 

Elvis puts photographs here at elviskennedy.com for your enjoyment and in hopes that someone out there gets inspired by them.  Yet there is another reason.  Maybe Google will keep the files in their vast storage systems.  Google is much more likely to keep these digital files than Elvis' great-great-great grandchildren will be.

Dear Future:  I hope you enjoy these photographs.  Love, Elvis

Lighthouse in High Dynamic Range

Lighthouses almost always make nice photographic subjects.  When you can include some nice foreground objects and a clear reflection, all the better.  This one is another HDR shot.  The lighthouse is the Cana Island Lighthouse in Door County, Wisconsin.  You can learn more about it HERE.  Elvis had to sneak out there as it is officially closed until May 1st.  Hey, you do what you have to.  Good thing there are navigable waters right up to the lighthouse!

Elvis is going to keep his eye on this location.  If he can catch the lighthouse in the light of a warm sunset in the autumn with the leaves red and golden, and a dramatic sky...  Let's just say it could be spectacular.

California Dreamin'

Stopped in at a church, I passed along the way...  (With respect to the Mamma's and the Papa's.  Besides, all the leaves were brown and the sky was grey.).  Elvis did pass this church along the way and as the sky looked good he decided to take a 5 shot HDR (high dynamic range) photograph.  Using the trusty Nikon D3s and the newly acquired 14-24 lens a sequence of -2, -1, 0, +1, +2 was made.  Here is the result;

Photograph made along Kelly Brook, just outside of the major metropolitan area of Spruce, Wisconsin.

Note the small cemetary on the left, the outhouse on the right and the LP gas tank in rear.  All surrounded by fields.  Very rural scene.  How many people fit in the church do you think?  25?