Picture Overload

Um, hi.
I'm not, you know, "back" or anything. Sorry about that. This summer's schedule doesn't seem to leave me much more room than the last school year did for introspection and thought, and I need those things so desperately right now. I'm hoping that a few of my obligations will fade away over the next few weeks and give me just a bit of breathing room so I can really grab hold of what is important to me - the things I need to keep amid the major cleaning-out that is going to happen soon. It has to happen soon. So, I'm trying to keep down the things I've put down for a little while longer, until it all catches up with itself. If that makes any sense at all.
But, I did something so super-fun this weekend that I just had to, had to share it with you. Mindy and I participated in a local Photowalk. She wrote about it in more detail than I'm going to bother about, since you can just clickety-click on her name right there to read about it, see her photos and check out her new blog. Essentially, this was an organized, world-wide photography event where professionals and amateurs (though, I think it was mostly professionals, honestly) gathered in urban areas to take pictures together for a couple of hours. I was really nervous and a little intimidated, since my camera is basically a fancy point-and-shoot - no extra lenses or name-brand camera straps, no fancy bags and tripods - you know, just a couple of buttons and, well, my trigger finger.
But it's also a contest. People submit their photos in the hopes of winning prizes and such. I hadn't planned on submitting anything 'cause I looked at last year's flickr gallery and decided I could never come up with anything that good - you know, I like taking pictures and looking at pictures, but...wow. When I looked at the pictures I took, though, I thought better of it. "Why not?" I thought. I don't have too much hope of winning anything, but why not just submit something anyway? So, here are my favorites. For the most part, they are un-retouched. I am going to try and learn a little bit about editing this week, just to see what I can do to improve on what I already have here. Of course, editing can't help much with some of my rookie mistakes - a lens smudge on most of the photos by the Lake Mirror gate (though I understand it's actually "Mirror Lake!"), and having shot most of the two hours with my white balance set to compensate for flourescent light. Sigh.
But here are my favorites. By the sheer number of them, you can see that I am indecisive as ever!



(these pink things are the yucky snail eggs of an invasive species that is taking over our local lakes - especially Lake Mirror)








(the one above needs a little crop, right at the bottom, but I think it's my fave)

































It would seem that I am in love with my macro lens and my zoom, huh? Also, it would seem that I can't decide between two or three shots of the same thing. Which one is best? Aaaagh! Help me narrow it down! Maybe, if we narrow it all down by a bit, I'll put up a poll for the favorites later this week...we shall see.