Sony Alpha 700 – Page 20 – The Bald Heretic – Short, bald dude with a goofy beard

Rock Baby Rock It 8

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Three days of rockabilly and hot rods at the Houston Continental Club. A great chance to hear some good music and see some awesome cars. Since I was unable to attend during daylight hours I was forced to shoot at night on the oddly lit side street.

These are all shot handheld and without a flash utilizing only available light. There is no color correction or manipulation. The only post processing is a slight bump in “lightness” and a small bit of sharpening.

Please click image to see a larger version

Additional images in the Rock Baby Rock It gallery.

Beercan

In 1988 Minolta produced a 70-210mm f/4 lens that was fairly popular amongst Minolta film camera users, but which slipped out of production in the late 90’s. This lens was often referred to as the “beercan” due to it’s shape and size.

The lens is experiencing a renaissance and has become very popular with users of the Sony line of digital SLR cameras as it’s completely compatible and is optically very powerful and optically superior to most kit lenses and other lenses in it’s class. The price is very appealing as well when you consider that a 70-200mm f/2.8 lens will set you back anywhere from $800 to $2000. The Minolta “beercan” shows up on EBay fairly frequently and if you play your cards right, can be obtained for around $200-$250 depending on conditon. I’ve seen them sell for as much as $350 to $450 on rare occasions. I suspect the price is going up as Sony users become more common and set out looking for glass that performs well.

Known for its sharpness, rich color rendition and smooth creamy bokeh, the Minolta 70-210mm f/4 has become more sought after and more highly prized by the growing legions of Sony dSLR enthusiasts giving the lens a cult like status amongst Sony users.

I just took delivery on my personal beercan and it’s AWESOME! I found it via a Minolta dealer online and bypassed the ridiculous EBay bidding wars altogether. I won’t say what I paid for it, but it’s in near mint condition and I got a good deal. I have another one coming tomorrow and I plan to resell it.

Seeing it on my Sony Alpha 700 just gives me the happy

I haven’t played with it much, but here are some test shots using two of my most reliable models:

70mm

210mm

You can see the original sizes of the above images here and here if you are interested.

Zion’s Flame

Randomly encountered some “fire manipulators” in the back patio area of the Continental Club while I was out and about last night. I saw this as an EXCELLENT opportunity to play with some extended exposure shots using my tripod and the remote control for the camera

Not bad, but whirly-twirly shots like this don’t stay interesting for long so I shot a few more handheld with less exposure time and got some interesting shots

There’s a few more in the Zion’s Flame gallery.

Skyrocket

Trish and Darin Murphy’s current musical project “Skyrocket” performed at the Houston Continental Club on Friday night to a packed house. The group is made up of a fantastic batch of Texas musicians and the performance is nothing less than spectacular.

Of course you must like 70’s and 80’s cover tunes because that’s what they play, and they play it remarkably well. Trish Murphy sang Heart’s “Crazy On You” in the first set and it was spot on. Other songs for the evening included “Rock and Roll All Night” by Kiss and “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” by Simple Minds just to give you an idea of the repertoire.

Their song list is available online here.

It’s an amazing show and I highly recommend checking them out if you have the chance.

Pics from the evening are here in the Skyrocket gallery.

New Quilt Underway

Cynthia is well underway on her latest quilt. I am not allowed to publish pics yet, but I captured this one from the hall which has been screened and approved for release.

This is one of her coolest quilts yet. I can’t wait till it’s done so I can photograph it properly.

Wrath Of God

Click image to view larger size. Or even better, see a larger version on a black background.

This is my second pass at this image. I was able to clean up the chromatic aberration that was distracting in the original image as well as the HDR version. I have also (I believe) brought out more of the "menace" in the clouds. I was also FAR less aggressive in correcting the angle than I was in the first version allowing the building to have the appearance of bowing or bending in the wind that comes from shooting at a slightly up-angle with a an ultra wide angle lens like the 11-18mm

Ride The Wild Surf

The Allen Oldies Band celebrated the release of their new album “Ride The Wild Surf” last night at the Continental Club. Needless to say, a good time was had by all.

Especially entertaining was Tomas Escalante (Suspects/Clouseaux/El Orbits) and his son singing backup on “Sweets for My Sweet”, a song written by Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman and originally recorded by The Drifters in 1961.

Man May Work From Sun to Sun but Woman’s Work Is Never Done

Cynthia had the idea to put together a clone shot that would portray how she sees the distribution of the workload around here. I was able to hammer this out in about an hour. Click to see full size: