Macro 2

I really should just go out and get a macro lens, but what I've got will do for now. Here are some more macro shots I got while hiking in Rock Canyon yesterday evening. I'll start it off with a flower for Cayla's sake.

Macro

I really enjoy macro photography (close-up photography of small things with big detail). I don't have a macro lens which makes it a little more difficult, but here are some of my recent attempts at some macro shots:

Raspberries and the Scriptures

This past Thursday I was at home in West Valley dog sitting a new puppy my family recently acquired. It's a wonderfully behaved puppy but don't let that fool you, he'll still poop on the floor if you don't keep an eye on him. Anyway, I let the dogs out in the backyard so they could take care of business and get some of their energy out. The weather was gorgeous and I noticed there were plenty of raspberries ready to be picked, so I grabbed a bowl and set to the task of filling it to the brim with raspberries as an excuse to enjoy the nice weather.

While I was picking raspberries I came to two conclusions: First, life would be simply beautiful if it required only gardening and reading books. And second, picking raspberries is a lot like studying the scriptures.

Let me explain the second. My younger brothers had breezed over the raspberry bushes a couple days previous and had obviously gone straight to the prominent and easily accessible raspberries. They filled up a bowl, but left plenty of huge ripe raspberries untouched. While I was picking raspberries I realized that I could stand in one spot for quite some time and pick a lot of raspberries. Then I would move down a couple of feet and pick more. When I looked back at the section of bush I thought I had picked clean, I was surprised to see many ripe raspberries still there. From my previous vantage point I had missed some clusters that had been hidden under leaves. All it took was lifting up a branch or getting a little lower to see if there were more berries before I moved on to the next section.

As we approach the scriptures we can quickly read through them and pick out the obvious insights and teachings. There are beautiful doctrines that are there near the surface so even children can understand them.

We can find even more in each passage of scripture as we spend more time and attention focusing on the passage before moving on. (After all, the goal isn't to race from one end of the raspberry bush to the other, it is to fill your bowl with raspberries) Spend time in the scriptures.

There is always more to find in the scriptures especially as life alters the perspective we approach the scriptures with. New insights come as we look for specific answers to questions as they relate to us in our own unique situation. Also, often as we spend time in the scriptures we just need to dig a little deeper. Lift up a branch, look under some leaves. This may require time to ponder and meditate. In fact, not all the berries are ripe at the same time. Some treasures in the scriptures are found after a lot of time has been spent searching, when we are ripe and ready.

Halfway through my quest to fill my bowl with berries I realized that to really get in there and get some of those raspberries I was going to have to get dirty. By the time I was done my hands were stained red and I had some red spots on my T-shirt. Scripture study becomes the most meaningful when we get out there and apply what we've learned. Don't be afraid to get dirty through work and service.

Keep your hands clean by getting them dirty through service.

To Washington and Back Again

As soon as the spring term ended I found myself on a road-trip, alone. I had planned on driving to Tacoma to do two weeks of EFY, but I hadn't found anyone that needed a ride when I was headed up there. So it was approximately 14 hours of just me and my camera from Provo to Tacoma. By the time I hit Oregon I decided I better actually use one of the rest stops and take a nap if I wanted to finish the trip alive. By the end of the trip, however, I found that pulling off the interstate to snap some photos was more rejuvenating then the nap in Oregon was.

Well, I showed up alive to the University of Puget Sound (aka UPS; an acronym that seems vaguely familiar) in Tacoma and quickly made some awesome friends with the other counselors. We tried going to a Mariners game but all the cheap seats were sold out by the time we got there, so we took a ferry ride instead.

EFY was fun, and exhausting. The kids were cool and made it easy to have a lot of fun. I wish I had the time to do more weeks of EFY, but alas, there is a movie that needs to be finished...

I spent the fourth of July with my Uncle Dale and family before leaving Seattle. It was a blast! We jumped off a yacht in Lake Union, and saw a firework show in Bellevue.

The trip back to Utah included a lovely visit to Emma's house in Spokane, and then a beautiful drive through Montana (it was actually the first time I've ever been to Spokane and Montana). The drive back wasn't nearly as hard because my friend Mitch came along.

Overall, Washington was great! I had some good times, made new friends, saw new places, and now it's good to be back.

I'm on Flickr

I joined Flickr today. Check out some of my photography here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brycegandy/

or view a slideshow of my photos.

I'd been meaning to for a while now, but I finally created an account because I didn't have a good place to share some panoramas I recently took. They're so long I can't really post them here on my blog, but on Flickr you can see a decent sized image. Don't worry I'll continue posting pictures here on my blog as well.

Rain or Shine

The world is a beautiful place, rain or shine. It's the contrast that makes it so gorgeous. There is something wonderful, something to be appreciated about the people, places, and things all around us each day. Photography for me is about finding a piece of what is beautiful in my surroundings and exposing it. Here are two recent photos... rain and shine.

Also, this last week I found out that I made PAC (BYU folk dance's performing arts company). I am soooo excited to perform with this group! It's something I've dreamed of doing, but I honestly thought that the opportunity had already passed me by. It will be fun, and I'm sure you'll hear more about it in the months to come.

In the Movie Month of May...

May has been an all consuming month of movie making for me. My short film "Man of the Cloth" has been filming the past couple of weekends, and with some luck we'll finish shooting this Saturday. It's kept me incredibly busy, and has definitely been the most valuable experience of my college education. I love making movies, and I've enjoyed working with some incredible and talented friends and classmates on this one. Actually finishing a film is nothing short of a miracle, no doubt about it.

The movie is about a newly ordained Catholic Priest in an old forgotten mining town. It will be done sometime this summer and playing in festivals internationally starting this next fall.

One of my favorite parts about making this film has been our locations. We filmed some of it in the west desert in Tooele County, but most of the film has been shot on location in Eureka, UT. That's in Juab County about an hour south west of Provo. Eureka is one of those places that you wouldn't want to go back to after a first glance, but if you spend some time there the place grows on you.

Just for fun I've put up a panorama shot of Eureka below. I like combining images to make panoramas, and this is probably the most seamless one I've done yet.