We went down into the Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park one day, and I caught this fun piece.

Ya think?

Back in the ’70s (if memory serves), a lava flow came down the mountain and flowed over the road. This sign has been there since.

We first visited the balloon festival a few years ago, and it was a great photo opportunity. I hoped to get some similar shots this time around.

Balloon Glow

The festival was held at a different park this year, and the setup was a bit different. The sun set behind us, so I couldn’t reproduce the sun shot I took last time, and the balloons weren’t inflated until much later in the evening which made some of the lighting trickier. On the plus side, though, they dropped the barriers and let us get close to the balloons and talk to the pilots, which let me catch some pictures of the engines they used to heat the air in the balloons.

Flame On!

I thought about switching to my faster prime lens to solve some of the soft focus issues I was having, but then I’d have given up a wider angle. Instead, next time maybe I’ll bring my monopod instead and see if that helps at all. Or maybe just sack up and switch to manual focus.

And with that I think I’m back on schedule for Photo Friday. Sure, I cheated just a bit, but the important part is I’m getting it done, right?

The director of the school, Shihan Joseph Walker, and myself

The black stripe down the center of the belt signifies the next step is Shodan, or black belt. This means I’m done testing for rank for a while, and it’s up to me to keep going to class, refining my technique, and helping other students until the big test comes.

Ten years ago, I never would have imagined I’d come this far. I’ve learned a lot, and I’m in the best shape I’ve been in since I was 19. (Yeah, I still cringe when I see pictures of myself in a gi or running kata, but I’m working on that, too.) I’m very fortunate to have found a school of this caliber so close to home, one that offers equal measures of instruction and inspiration.

Now I’m going to go cut that obnoxious white label off my snazzy new belt.

Anyway. Here’s what you missed last week:

Sensei Miller breaks three boards with an empi strike

My instructor demonstrated a break at the end of the basic class, and he broke three boards with an elbow strike. He actually started from a standing position and dropped his elbow onto the boards. These are 10×12″ pine boards, 1″ thick. Not easy to break, necessarily, but safer than things like bricks, patio blocks, and coconuts.

I used a 50mm prime lens so I wouldn’t have to mess with flash. I got a little bit of motion blur, and next time I may try setting my own shutter speed to try to get a little more. There’s a fine line between capturing the subject in focus and getting the blur of the action.

Break day itself was successful, though, and you can see more pictures here. You can see me holding boards for some of our students, and you’ll find my break, a basic stomp kick where I broke three boards. Next time I’ll try three with a hammer fist or elbow, not sure which yet.

Now I’m going to get some much-needed sleep.

The Wife’s cousin got married, and at the reception he and his mom came to me and asked if I could take pictures of the cake cutting, the first dance, and so forth. Turns out the (alleged) pro photographer skipped out on them, saying she didn’t expect the reception to go so late. She returned a few minutes later for the cake cutting, but then was gone again before the dances. I planned on taking pictures anyway, but I wasn’t about to turn down an opportunity to get front and center on the action. (Normally I’ll defer to the pro so the couple gets way they pay for.)

I started with several pictures of the groom and his side of the wedding party smoking their cigars out on the deck over the lake at the reception hall. A short time later the first dances started, and I covered everything from the couple’s first dance through the bouquet and garter tosses and then several shots of the guests relaxing and having a good time.

Near the end of the night I snapped this:

Nobody wants to dance with the Little Bird.

She looked so quiet and lonely, like a school girl flying solo at the homecoming dance, so I snapped a picture. I was very happy with the way my external flash bounced the light off the ceiling. This was actually shot in a fairly dark room, but you’d never know it from this picture or many of the others I shot.

In this next shot, I felt a little more creative:

The Bride & Groom

As we entered the church and the reception hall, someone ran a slideshow of pictures of the bride and groom from various points through their lives. When the dances started, the DJ switched over to more of a standard lightshow setup on the projector. When the couple took to the dance floor for their first dance, I asked the DJ to put the pictures back up on the wall as I thought they’d make a great backdrop to some of the pictures. I didn’t intend to share any of the wedding pictures publicly, but the above is a good example of how some of those pictures turned out.

Lessons learned? Always have the camera outfit ready! If I’d opted to travel light with just the camera body and my prime lens, I wouldn’t have been able to capture the remainder of the evening for them. Fortunately my new camera bag makes carrying my kit a lot easier.

Next I’ll have to invest in another media card or two, though, because I had to do some culling on the single card I brought. I shot several pictures at break day in karate class that same morning and didn’t have time to dump them to the laptop, so the card was already almost half full when I arrived at the wedding. Another 2GB card or maybe a larger one and I should be good to go.

Teeth

In addition to the basic portrait-style shots of him at work, I wandered around the shop and shot a few extra pictures for both his site and Photo Friday.

Sawdust

The project and shoot took about an hour. I stuck to one lens because I didn’t want to get sawdust in my camera, and I went back and forth using the flash. He had a window in the shop that brought in some really nice, natural light, and he had plenty of tools and earlier projects around to take pictures of.

Nativity

I got to thinking it would be nice to have a skill like carpentry that I can make a little money off of. Something I could show up at events with, sell a few pieces, maybe take a few commissioned projects.

Then it dawned me: I’ve got the whole writing thing to do that with. Duh.

You're not fooling anyone, fat man!

If you look closely, you’ll see the line. Every year, the Wife and I joke that this means I can’t hit the bars and pick up chicks any more.

Oh, and the best part of this pic? Doing the shot when I was done.

Karateka on the beach

A total of 13 of us went to Hawai’i together, and as it was organized by our karate school and the majority of us were karate students, I thought this would make a great entry for the collection. Not so much for it’s photographic value, but for its sentimental value.

This was shot on the beach near the Outrigger Keahou hotel in Kona, Hawai’i. We worked out  here every morning at 6am, with the exception of the last day where we went down to the Magic Sands beach and got down into the surf.

Elvis no esta muerto.

Meet Chris. He trains at the same dojo I do, and he’s probably the most enthusiastic student on the mat. He loves karate, he loves Elvis, and he always brightens up the dojo with his spirit.

Chris also has Down’s syndrome, and he has a hard time learning new things. However, he more than makes up for it in determination and effort. He’s busted his butt to earn that yellow belt and those stripes, and he asks us every day what he needs to do to earn that last stripe and that next belt. He’s a good reminder that hard work pays off. When he doesn’t earn his stripe during review, he doesn’t get discouraged. He’s disappointed, sure, but he just shows up for the next class and works even harder. He asks for extra help, and he applies what he’s learned as best he can.

Progress is a result of effort, not time.

A lot of people could learn from his example.

I didn’t take near as many pictures as planned because I was running the slideshow and helping with the video presentations, but I made sure to grab a few photos of the Kamiza.

The left side of the Kamiza display

The kamiza is the highest seat in the room, often the north wall. In a martial arts dojo there is often a Kamidana Shinto shrine placed on the kamiza, and it’s the wall we bow to upon entering the dojo. In the Academy of Okinawan Karate dojo, a cross replaces the kamidana and students are encouraged to bow to what they believe in.

The right side of the Kamiza dispaly

When a student is promoted to black belt, the school holds a kamiza ceremony where they formally join the other yudansha in the top spot in the dojo. The new black belt brings a bottle of sake to share with the other members of the ceremony, and Shihan keeps the bottle for use in future ceremonies to represent the other black belts. The bottles were set up at the banquet hall to represent the school’s history, and the legacy Shihan has created so far in promoting 40 black belts in the school’s 40 years of operation.

The weekend went very well, and Peoria’s Journal Star ran a nice article congratulating Shihan on his 50 years in the martial arts. The banquet was followed by a selection of seminars on Sunday afternoon, and by all accounts everyone had a great time.

I feel fortunate to be part of such a great school, and while I intend to celebrate earning my Ikkyu (first degree brown belt) rank very soon, I look forward to the day I’ll earn the right to add my own sake bottle to Shihan’s collection.