NewYork to San Francisco in 84 Days

Well, here is a Wild West story for you all. In 1886 wheelman Stephen G. Speir supposedly rode his velocipede from New York to San Francisco in 84 days; there is only a newspaper article from the San Francisco Morning Call, on September 11, 1886 stated that he had rode the entire distance, but, as usual, there was a controversy over this adventures task, well I would think there would be, just like the tall tales of the western gun fighters with there fast draws and notched gun handles; cyclists (wheelman) where caught telling tall tales about there long distance feats, the truth eventually came out that a lot of these guys admitted that they hopped the trains and rode them a distance, then they would unload them selves and there cycles from the train and get back on the roads; of course there was the newspapers just ready to print anything that would sell papers, even if the truth was stretched or fabricated, hmmm, imagine that, well nothing really has changed to much from those old yesteryears of tall tales to today’s published scratch pads we call newspapers, but don’t we all just love adventures tall tales and this one is no exception, can you imagine riding a velocipede on trails they called roads, fending off wild animals, robbers, and possibly an Indian or two then there’s the possibility of getting run off the road by one of those wily stagecoach drivers, now that is what I call adventure and a true iron butt ride! One other point here, try riding into town with a gun tucked in your belt today, now that might be an adventure!

 Once again I took an old photograph and did my enlarging process and touched it up and added some color and gave it a western era poster look.

Bill

Pastel Painting- Elk Creek

 In this painting Elk Creek empties into the Pacific; it is located about 20 miles north of Point Arena California, it is one of my favorite spots to stop at when ever I travel up or down the coast on my motorbike adventures, nothing really there but you and the view and what a view you can see far to the north as in this paintings view or you can look south as far as the eye can see, weather permitting of course. This painting was painted using Schmincke and Unison Pastels and Derwent Pastel pencils on Wallis Museum grade art sandpaper. I do use other brands of Pastels but Schmincke and Unison are my main Pastels I use; I like Unison’s colors they are by far the most unique I have seen and Schmincke what can I say, but, soft and buttery. I have to mention this when Unison came out with there 18 piece set of orange Pastels I just stared at them they were so vibrant like candy I hated to use them, same with there turquoise set. Anyway I ‘am now starting on another painting this one is yet another coastline view just outside of Carmel California probably closer to Point Sur I think. So it’s off to the studio to spread some pigment. The frame was made in Photoshop from images of real wood, I have made myself a digital lumbar yard from various images of wood.

Bill

“What a delightful thing is the conversation of specialists!

One understands absolutely nothing and it's charming.” Edgar Degas   

Tour de France (Frederico Ezquerra 1934)

July 22, 2011 Stage 19 of the Tour de France, the cyclists climbed up the Col du Telegraphe and the Galibier and finished with the climb to Alpe d Huez. In 1934 Federico Ezquerra his 1^st Tour surprised everybody with his performance in Stage 7 of that tour when he beat everyone to the top of both the Col du Telegraphe and the Galibier and proved to be a powerful rider through out the rest of the race. I have taken this photo which is in public domain which is rather small in size, I was able to enlarge it with out to much pixilation and artifacts and fixed a few things and added a little color which adds a bit more contrast and brings out the subjects of this photo, Federico, the motorcyclist and car. Although I made the poster after last years tour, after watching Stage 19 of this years tour I realized that that this photo was taken somewhere on that same route some 77 years ago, I just stare at this photo and try and imagine what it must have been like back then…. YIKES, sheer torture! The race is still torture if you ask me, but the cyclists are so well taken care of today and the roads are vastly improved as is the equipment, but its still no holiday. Poster size 16x12.

Graveyard International

Walking through the Antique Gas & Steam Engine Museum's graveyard I spotted this nice old International truck, the lighting was a little harsh but I was able to get low enough to keep the glare to a minium, also shooting in raw format allows one to be able to work with it a bit in Camera Raw and then use a little post editing using Topaz & NIK software in Photoshop, yeah, nothing like pushing a few pixels around.

Tour de France (Giusto Cerutti 1928)

One hundred and seven years ago (1903) the Tour de France had its beginning and since then has just kept on growing thru two World Wars; they didn’t race during war times but never the less it kept going on after the wars. Men enduring 3 weeks of sheer physical and mental anguish riding there bicycles through France and what ever Mother Nature would throw at them. The early races were extremely tuff they were unsupported meaning the rider had to be his own pit crew no help from anyone; it has changed a lot since then now the riders are pampered, hotels, motorhomes, pit crews, etc, but it’s still a tuff race and I have a deep respect for these cyclists; as for me I just love to ride and work on my bicycles; that’s were this Tour de France poster comes in while looking for tid bits of tour history and pictures I found The Dutch National Archives on Flickr and in there they had a section on the Tour de France.

The picture is from that archive it is small in size and resolution; I do a long and involved process to get the picture to size without a lot of pixilation and artifacts it works well with old photos. Understanding pixels and Photoshop and how the tools function and using your imagination to push the envelope can really be rewarding; sometimes you just can’t get there from that point so you try another avenue, oh well so it didn’t work, hey, you’ll probably find something new along the way and that’s what it’s all about. It’s not just a photograph in Photoshop, it’s an adventure!

The poster I printed is 11”x17” looks good at this size although it could be enlarged to a poster size of 24”x36” I think the picture would suffer with artifacts. I add a little color to bring out the subject Giusto and his broken bike. I usually try to leave Black and Whites alone but some of these old photos look good with a little color, even some people who are Black and White diehards like the look, I try to keep the colors low key. I’m working on some other Tour pictures that might make nice looking posters.



ENJOY, Bill

Assassin Bug And His Breakfast

                                              Come on CLICK the picture don't be afraid..it's just a bug!
This Assassin Bug I photographed one morning on one of our orange trees he didn’t really like me photographing him; one of the disadvantages of 60mm macro is you have to get in close but he wanted to finish his breakfast so he just kept an eye on me and when he was finished he just knocked off the self contained meal from his proboscis. These guy’s are stealth killers, lying in ambush and when the target comes within reach they really stick it to there victim with there long rostrum and then inject a lethal saliva that liquefies there insides and then they just suck there victim dry much like a spider does, oh boy sounds yummy.

 Using my tripod like a monopod holding the remote shutter release and the tripod with my left hand manual focusing with my right hand, aperture priority shot at f/8, 1/25, iso100 into a raw format. Then into camera raw, basic adjustments then I use Topaz Labs Detail, NIK Define or Topaz’s Dnoise both are noise reduction software, then sometimes I use NIK’s Output Sharpener. I usually use Topaz Detail on most photos before I use noise reduction software it’s backwards from what they say to do but I feel the pictures come out better.

The Bug Facts:
Common Name: Assassin Bug
Order Name: Hemiptera
Family Name: Reduviidae

A View From The Amasa Back

                                                                         Click on Picture
Some friends and I would make the pilgrimage every year to Moab, Utah for the Fat Tyre Festival which took place at the end of October we would spend a week or more riding our Mt Bikes and getting in a hike or two; the Amasa Back was one of my favorites to ride it’s a tough ride out to the end and back but the views are awesome, 360 degrees of some of the most amazing geological real estate to be seen; one of the few places that I’ve ever been to where you can see the Earth’s curvature including a mountain range, you can see this in the picture above of the La Sal range in the background.
 These photos (3) were taken on the Amasa Back in 1991 with my Pentax ME Super. A 50mm f/2.8 lens and Kodak Gold 100 print film was used to capture this picture. Scanning the negatives with my Canon 9950 F scanner into 16 bit tiff files then processing them in Camera Raw and then merging them into a panoramic using Photoshop’s photo merge, it did a good job but not good enough I had to manually do some editing, the final print size is a 6300x1650 or 21”x5.5” at 300 resolution. If you would like to see a better picture follow this link....
      http://williambraucksiekart.zenfolio.com/p270041601/h206e30b#h206e30b

A View From The Porcupine Rim, Utah

                                                                     Click Picture to enlarge
 One of my Pastel paintings; a view from the Porcupine Rim looking across and down into Castle Valley, Utah the picture was taken in the late morning at the top of the trail head, a very tough climb on a Mt. Bike, but oh so worth it. Most my paintings are from photographs. There’s this age old argument about painting from photos; that you don’t get the right perspective, colors are not true and blah this and blah that and if you don’t paint out doors your not a real painter, WHAT!!! Garbage, Degas used photographs for some of his paintings but then again he didn’t paint out doors either, so there…..anyway I don’t care how anyone paints just paint the damm thing and feel good about it that’s all that matters. This photo of my painting has a Photoshop made frame the painting and matting where photographed using a Canon 60mm f/2.8 macro lens (this is my favorite working lens) it has very little lens distortion if any. The frame is actually the spruce top of my B.C. Rich guitar photographed then in Photoshop I make selections out of the photo, it doesn’t matter what dimensions you use; I usually go the length of the photo by 1 inch makes a nice digital piece of lumber I also make several selections of the photo so each piece is unique and then store it in my digital lumber yard for other projects down the road, yes you could probably build a digital house with my digital lumber yard in Photoshop, that’s something Bert Monroy might do, if you have never seen any of Mr. Monroy’s work you owe it to yourself to take a look, you’ll swear it is a photograph but it is a Photoshop built picture; here take a look for your self……..http://www.bertmonroy.com/ be prepared for a realty check, it’s that good. “It is not the destination that is important—it is the journey. The incredible challenge of recreating reality is my motivation”. —Bert Monroy: Thank you, Bert that pretty much sums it up for me too!!


ENJOY, Bill B.

1890s Downtown 4th St. Santa Ana, CA.

               Pictures courtesy of Orange County Archives

This is a picture of downtown 4th Street Santa Ana, Ca. in the1890s. It is another restoration done in Photoshop by me. This captivating moment captured on film shows the mode of transportation; horse and buggy and the bicycle and of course the steam powered street car all in the same shot. The first thing I noticed in this picture was the woman on the bicycle, she reminded me of the wicked witch of the east in the Wizard of Oz., but further back is another woman on a bike too it was kind of neat seeing these women riding down a busy city street in full dress something you don’t see unless it’s an old picture from the late 1800s and early 1900s. But as my search continued for old Orange County pictures I started noticing bicycles, they seem to be in a lot of photos, I had stated in the last Blog bicycles were a big deal they were the new technology then; I know it seems weird but put yourself back about 110 to 120 years ago and all you would see is people on horses and riding in carriages and coaches, then you would see somebody go by on one of those new fangled safety bikes, you know the one’s with the rear wheel driven by a sprocket and chain that was Hi Tech then. Every cyclist should give thanks to Hans Renold for his wonderful gift, in 1887 he invented the twin roller chain and later that year the safety bicycle was born no more going over the bars (or wheel) and no more broken collar bones from riding those high wheeled velocipedes suddenly bicycles became high tech machinery.

In 1890 bicycles cost about $100.00; since most people made anywhere from $200.00 to $500.00 a year that was a very expensive item, but by 1900 the cost came down to about $50.00 for a very well made bike, the golden years for bicycles was from 1890 to about 1910 because very few automobiles were around at that time. Now what about these ladies riding bikes; well, women made up over one third of the sales of bicycles in the USA at that time, bicycles gave women the freedom of getting around without having to deal with horses and carriages unfortunately some women were arrested for riding bikes when they wore pants or shorts, such a sin! Women were a big part of the short lived golden era of bicycles in the USA.

Going To Yosemite 1896

Photo courtesy Orange County Archives.
Picture: Going To YosemiteFrank F. Bunker & Walter Bradley Hill (teacher and principal at Garden
Grove Grammar School), going to Yosemite; July 1896.

I really was touched with this photo my imagination went wild thinking which route did these guys take "1896" the grape vine and Ridge Route was just a wagon trail, Cajon pass the same thing, Route 1 along the coast probably not much better it boggles the mind, did they make it, how many tires and patches did they use, a single speed bike and there gear wrapped up and tied to the handle bars, WOW, what an adventure; anyway I did a little restore and more to this photo, I added the color because I think these guys deserved a little color for there efforts. There is a lot more that could have been done BUT old photos like this become very tedious I just like to remove the most obvious and leave it be, I thought adding a little color to this photo gave it a bit more depth without taking to much of it's old age flare away from it. One other thing I noticed while I was going through pictures of the late 1800s and early 1900s was the fact people would be showing off there bicycles it seemed like there was always a bicycle in the picture, some how you almost don't notice it because well it's just a bicycle but at that time bicycles were a big deal and to own one was a big deal, but as time went on and the coming of the automobile well there was no place for the bicycle anymore, horses were scared of them and people in cars thought they were a nuisance and so the automobile & the motorcycle became the mode of travel in America but at one time for a short while the bicycle was king and it shows in this picture.

Enjoy, Bill