Manai'a Explorations
HC SVNT DRACONES

Evan has been posting old photos on Facebook and it put me to reminiscing. I used to have so much beautiful hair - those curls were natural - and pretty girls liked to spend time with me. What happened?

Finally flew my paraglider with the HD HERO video camera mounted in the wing. Conditions were very light, so the flight was quite short, but at least I have proven the video mount. Launched from the first knoll at Box Canyon. H.264 MP4 pulled from the HD HERO into Quicktime Pro, saved as a MOV, uploaded to YouTube. I don't know what YouTube does to the video, but the original is 1080p, 30 fps.

A beautiful day in Tucson. The air was fantastically clear. Snow on all the mountains. Well defined, patchy clouds. I set my camera up thinking I would take a still when the alpenglow and the clouds were most intense, but wound up shooting this series, at no particular time interval. Now I can imagine all sorts of opportunities to do time lapse video, like a saguaro shrinking and swelling through the dry and wet seasons. The music is the amazing Lila Downs , La Llorona. Appropriate for a Tucson sunset.

From my bedroom window this morning.

More progress to report. The Wildernest is painted. The photos don't do the color justice - phone camera, fluorescent lighting. Cimarron will be school bus yellow with rough, black Linex across the lower panels and red jerry cans. It won't be subtle.

I am quite the disciplinarian. And my dogs are well behaved and obedient. What?

Exploration -> Experience The great thing about exploration is that you never know what you are going to find.

Flux Capacitor? Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator? Fun stuff in Pittsburgh.

We're tied to a sequential time sequence, it's the only way evolution can work - otherwise everything happens at once. But every now and then the process falters and we look through a chink at, I suppose, the eternity religions speak of. When this happens, it's such a startling experience that you hanker after it when you're back in the world of sequence. I think that's what Chatwin did: when he returned to the sequential world, he found it tiresome and set off on another expedition. - Bob Brain quoted in Nicholas Shakespeare's biography of Bruce Chatwin.

A family tradition, slightly embellished. New Year's Vittles: Cornbread with Serrano Chile and White Onion. Black Eyed Peas. Steamed Mustard Greens, Collard Greens, Turnip Greens, and Spinach with a Tahini Sauce. Roasted Cabbage with Bacos. Spinach and Garlic sauteed in Black Bean Sauce.

Fun things to do when sick in bed: Boston Terrier Smack Down.

At Full Resolution.

I always strive to be elegant and graceful. My riding technique is velvety smooth like Roy's voice.

Behind my house, before work one morning. My first images with my new GoPro HD HERO video camera mounted to my handlebars. Recording the video is fun and easy. Editing the video is a nightmare. It seems that if you want to edit video, you need a Mac, and a powerful one at that. I am doing it on my PC with Adobe Premiere Pro, but it is not an elegant solution. The camera recorded at 1280x960p, but this little web video is only 320x240, very compressed.

I finally put my digital field recorder to good use. Photos are from Bosque del Apache a year or so ago. Sound is from Whitewater Draw yesterday.