My first cover shot!, originally uploaded by MattB (somedudeus).

Not quite National Geographic, but I was excited to see my photo chosen for this edition of the Gunnison Valley Journal.

I shot this a couple of summers ago near the top of the Flag Creek trail while riding Flag Creek - Bear Creek - Deadman's Gulch with an Olympus e510 and the 14-42 kit lens.

IMGP9174, originally uploaded by MattB (somedudeus).

I've been spoiled by dramatic weather this summer. With all the storms and rainbows being such fun subjects, I wasn't sure what I'd find on this cloudless evening. I rode to Signal Peak and noticed the light hitting these wires and thought it might make for an interesting shot. I decided to make it a B&W to accentuate the contrast between wire and background.

IMGP8847, originally uploaded by MattB (somedudeus).

I had a good day shooting at the car show recently. I got there when the sun was already a little low for shooting the cars but was still illuminating the buildings on the East side of the block.

Well, I didn’t miss all the fun being on call for the holiday weekend.

I also got some stuff done around the house that I probably wouldn’t have otherwise.

The balloons land nearby and I got a couple of fun photo opportunities. The first was what I named a balloon eclipse. I ran out to the shadow I saw it casting to get this one. The second balloon shot was fun because I saw the alignment of the two balloons and the moon (that’s it to the right of the smaller one).

I had some down time while the family was at the parade so I got out the Vivitar TC and combined it with the DA40 for some close-ups of flowers.

Then We were lucky enough to get some of Mary’s fantastic Mexican wedding cake cookies, Oh so delicious…

Then we had a fire and watched the fireworks from the yard with friends.

I started out searching for a set of extension tubes to add some macro capability to my newly purchased Pentax K-x. After the requisite Googling I found not many of the tubes would pass through the aperture information which is a feature I'd like, and the only ones I could find were not no longer made and not available. In my search I came across some forum posts talking about this Vivitar TC and it seemed like it does just about everything I want. It magnafies your image 2x, so the SMC A 50mm I use with it becomes a 100mm. It also goes down to 1:1 which is considered "true" macro (meaning the image cast on the sensor is actual size). There were a couple on eBay and I scored one for about $75. For a macro hobbyist it's great.

Here's a flower:

Some morning frost on the car window:

These adapters are also no longer made, so eBay is your friend (or maybe KEH). Also be sure to get the one that says "P/K-A R-P/K" to be able to pass aperture info between the lens and camera.