The Main Street Cruise at Abacoa

The September monthly meetup for the PBC Photo Walkers was at Abacoa in Jupiter. One of our members recommended this location as a great photo opportunity for our group. Since this event is held on the first Saturday of every month, planning it was quite simple.

I think we had about 20 photographers show up but I was told later that some came a little late and didn't hook up with the group. Many of us had never attended this car show and we were really pleasantly surprised at the festive atmosphere and huge assortment of classic cars and trucks.

I came home that night all excited to show my pictures to Gregg, since he loves a good car show but couldn't make this trip. I soon realized that he was more interested in seeing photos of entire cars, instead of the little pieces and parts of cars that I had fun shooting.

 

I only ended up with a few decent pictures of entire cars (actually not even the whole car).

What I have learned is that someone who enjoys looking at old cars (and not necessarily artsy photography) may prefer many of the images created by some of the other photographers who attended this event. At the time of this posting our meetup group's September album showcased 148 photos from the car show and as usual, I'm extremely impressed with the talent in our group.

As a photographer, I try to look for the fun and interesting shots. While taking pictures at my first car show with my first SLR last year, I realized that reflections in cars can be super cool. I give my friend Jack 100% of the credit on finding the reflections in the second picture below. I completely copied him.

Of course... it's always fun to take pictures of our friends taking pictures (especially when I can also take advantage of the previously mentioned reflection in an amazingly clean car). Below is Art, Jack & Dina.

Also, my "photographer's eye" has learned to constantly be on the look out for other interesting shots, like the guy watching the festivities from his balcony and the group playing poker.

 


 

I really love our photography group! We always have a great time getting together and every month I'm amazed all over again at the talented friends I have made.  

Lion Country Safari

I really enjoy having a photo blog. I started this at the beginning of the year and it's original purpose was to post a "photo-a-week" from a different location in Palm Beach County all year. After about 20 weeks I realized I was in big trouble... not because I couldn't find 52 different photo ops in Palm Beach but because I couldn't always travel around the county every week. Also, I didn't just post one picture, I posted a series of shots from a location and added a nice story to go along with it. Suddenly, Sunday would come and go and I was getting somewhat stressed out that I couldn't think of my blog theme for the week. Since it was becoming an additional source of stress (who needs that?), I finally made the decision to  revise my blog's purpose and just post pictures whenever I feel inspired.

These photos were taken less than 10 minutes from my house at Lion Country Safari in West Palm Beach, FL. I went a handful of times as a child (I have VERY fond memories of Grandpa taking us) but I didn't go as an adult until about a year ago, after I bought my SLR camera. After the first time, I realized that it was pretty crazy for me not to buy annual passes since it's so close to where I live.

This past weekend my goal was to take pictures close to home for the latest DPC challenge, "high key" (just Google it if you don't know what that is). The weather was nice so I drove south and hung out at Lion Country Safari for about an hour and 1/2. My goal was to shoot zebra in the safari section and giraffes in the feeding area and then go home.

The zebra was easy, although I did have to keep my eye out for the safari police because they frown on visitors opening their car windows.

The giraffes are incredibly fun to take pictures of. They are SO extremely sweet and friendly and they will let you very close to take pictures. I have a ton of different shots of the 4 or 5 giraffes that they allow in this feeding area but I chose this one because I loved the way it looked like he (I think it was a he) was just leaning on the post. In fact, I think he had an itch and was just scratching.

So, I ended up submitting the giraffe (at the time of this writing it wasn't doing as well as I hoped... not sure I nailed the high key affect but I really love the shot anyway) and I have a few more shots in my Lion Country Safari Flickr set.