Sharon found some scary subjects to photograph during a trip to a local retailer. Their Halloween and Dios del los Muertos displays made for some entertaining and scary subjects to photograph.
Category: Albums
Photos shared during UCSD PhIG monthly meetings
15 Oct 2025 Theme Open Category – Birds: Mikky
Mikky continues to show wonderful images from his African Safari trip earlier this year. With the thousands of photos taken, he is working his way through post-processing the wealth of wildlife images. I am envious of what he has shown so far – this month’s portfolio are a bird photographer’s dream.
15 Oct 2025 Themes Fall, Scary/Halloween, & Moonrise: Jim
Jim shared a sequence of photos of the moonrise Oct 6th over the San Diego skyline from Shelter Island. It’s difficult to get any further west because North Island hangers obstruct the skyline. PhotoPills suggested the moon would rise over One America Plaza if we setup at the fishing pier. But it came up a few buildings north and did not align with One America Plaza tip till it was higher in the sky. We’ll keep trying – the weather also was hazy so the first image of the moonrise were subtle. Plus, we hoped to get the building lights but they did not come on till after 7pm. When the moon was pretty high in the sky.
For scary, Jim shared photos from the Oct 12th Oaxaca Festival in Oceanside. It was the first time being held locally. The last festival dance was the Oaxaca festival “Dance of the Devils” where particpants wear elaborate costumes with horned masks. Perfect for the scary theme.
Finding a new Fall-themed image was hard but Jim shared a bee-on-marigold shot taken during a recent pumpkin patch visit. His other image of fall colors were from a drive to the Grand Canyon North Rim a few years ago.
15 Oct 2025 Themes Fall, Scary/Halloween, & Moonrise: Gary
Gary returned from a recent trip to Page Arizona and shared some wonderful images taken in Antelope Canyon. Cathy is planning a trip there so the discussion included tips from Gary on how to be successful photographing the sandstone slot canyon.
Photos from last year’s Dios de los Muertos meetup were also shared for the “scary” theme. We are planning another meetup again this year so stayed tuned for some more festival photos.
He also shared a fall image of fallen maple leaves from a trip to Canada.
15 Oct 2025 Themes Fall, Scary/Halloween, & Moonrise: Cathy
Cathy share two images from this month’s and last month’s moonrise meetup, plus a fun experimental macro shot of soap+glycerin bubbles, and a “made scary-by-AI” Bodie church black& white image.
15 Oct 2025 Themes Fall, Scary/Halloween, & Moonrise: John
John shared an image of the moonrise over San Diego in tribute to our founding group leader Jerry Vaughn. He gave us the sad news that Jerry passed away Oct 10th. His comment that he and Jerry had similar images taken at that meetup.
17 Sep 2025 Themes Still Life, Flash, Storytelling: Gary
Gary recently returned from a Highway 395 solo excursion with his kayak and shared some wonderful images from his trip. Although he photographed the Sept 7th moonrise under the Coronado Bridge, he preferred his great images of moonset over the Eastern Sierras from Lone Pine. Photographing the moon setting at sunrise is a recent alternative of shooting the moon that we are exploring. A balanced exposure is less challenging when photographing the moon setting at sunrise. Plus it’s westward so it opens up a whole new set of foreground elements, like Mt Whitney. Other images from his trip are always historical, educational and fascinating. He also shared a flash photo taken on film where he had some help illuminating a ship with a flash during a long exposure aka ‘flash painting’.
17 Sep 2025 Themes Moonrise & Still Life/Storytelling: Jim
Jim spent most of his time post-processing the Sept 7th Harvest Moon rising under/over the Coronado Bridge. When the moon first rose above the horizon, the ambient blue hour light and moonlight were pretty well balanced. Later, as the moon rose, the brightness of the moon required compositing a darker moon photo with a bridge image. He briefly demonstated a new (to him) Photoshop layer blending technique that helped feather the moon’s edge with the brighter moonrays.
For storytelling and still life images, he shared images from the Oceanside Museum of Art Fabulous Fabric exhibition. Combining several ‘storytelling’ images of the locale, plus detailed images of some art displayed.
17 Sep 2025 Themes Still Life & Storytelling: Heather
Heather share a variety of still life ‘formats’ – classical and storytelling. Her garden images tells of a abundant seasonal harvest. Her ‘classic-style’ tabletop still life images are excellent and humorous. She also had a beautiful abstract pattern image that was hard to decipher – mold.
The cherry tomato and peppers still life was one of the best images shared. Her explanation of cooling down the Japanese beetle in the refrigerator so they would ‘pose’ for a short time was entertaining and educational. Her bug & book still lifes were also favorites of the meeting.
17 Sep 2025 Themes Still Life: Norm
Norm’s been unable to attend the monthly meetings but he recently contributed some fantastic classical still life images. I paticularly like the Orton Effect flower image.
