clyde

Posts by: clyde

Meteor or Satellite?

0 Comments May 25, 2014|clyde|People & Places

Predictions for a possibly amazing meteor shower were running wild late last week. I wanted to take some photos and my daughter wanted to stay up late. We both thought it would be fun to do something cool with each other, so we headed out in search of something. Since some of the predictions suggested the meteors produced by this shower could be much brighter than normal, we thought it could be cool to set up where a cityscape could be on the horizon in the foreground. Sadly, this is DC, and there is no real distinctive cityscape except that the one shot from the Netherlands Carillon of the Capitol, Washington Monument, and Lincoln Memorial.

Since the Camelopardalids radiant was supposed to be near Polaris, we thought setting up at the Thomas Jefferson Memorial where we could look north across the Tidal Basin at the Washington Monument and U.S. Mint could be an interesting location to start and then based on how things went and what we saw on Twitter, we would try some other locations as the night went on.

By 12:30am, we hadn’t seen anything and we only saw disappointed people on Twitter, so we packed up and headed to the exurbs where, like everyone else, we still didn’t see didn’t see much of anything and then went home.

Checking the few photos I did take, I saw a light streak in a 30 second exposure taken just after midnight that I’m not quite sure about. I couldn’t see any trace of pulsing or flashing lights that airplanes and helicopters have. I think it’s on trajectory that traces through the expected radiant, which suggests meteor, but it doesn’t have the form, shape or color fringing that most meteor photos display. That leaves satellite, but I don’t know enough about them to know it would be possible to see one that close to the northern horizon at that hour…particularly through the urban light conditions.

And the Fans Cheered

0 Comments February 2, 2013|clyde|Puck

The Washington Capitals beat the Philadelphia Flyers last night and gave the fans something to cheer about in their 3-2 victory. I thought this photo captured it kind of nicely. Ted Leonsis thought the crowd was loud and pointed everyone to Japers’ Rink to read all about it in the clips. That’s cool because that’s where I would point you to if you wanted to see 42 more of my photos from the game. (They’re also on flickr if you’re into that.)

Happy To Win

0 Comments January 28, 2013|clyde|Puck

The Washington Capitals defeated the Buffalo Sabres yesterday evening to earn their first victory of the season. After coming from behind to take a lead and hold it for an extended length of time, they capped off the game with a stick salute to fans. Joel Ward went RG3ing after scoring his third goal of the year, John Erskine scored and Alex Ovechkin netted the game winner.

See my photos over at Japers’ Rink or on flickr. If you’re a Caps fan, they should be well worth your time.

Still Time to Save Season

0 Comments January 25, 2013|clyde|Puck

There is still time for the Washington Capitals to save the season, but how much? When you get caught in the headlights, sometimes you have to ride it out.

More of my photos from the Capitals loss to the Montreal Canadiens yesterday are on Japers’ Rink and on flickr. Check them out!

Bowled Over

0 Comments January 23, 2013|clyde|Puck

It had been over eight months since Verizon Center hosted NHL hockey. Finally, last night, the Washington Capitals played the visiting Winnipeg Jets. A sellout crowd of fans showed up, were wanded upon entry, used their trick(y) new Season Ticket Holder cards and hoped the little machines would spit out the seat locator tabs they were promised to do. I guess they worked okay for most people. Since the scanner went into a reboot loop when they tried scanning my card, I would say that was I was not one of those people. Those that were backed up in line behind me because of it would probably agree.

If the Capitals had shown up and put on a great show, it would have all been worth it (except the security theater part…best to just let TSA keep thinking they have that market cornered). But, they did not. They pretty much got bowled over.

On the other hand, what is pretty great news is that I’ve joined the Japers’ Rink team and will be sharing most of my hockey photos over there in “Clyde’s Shots.” It should be more fun to view them over there than it’s been here.

I’ll continue posting an image or two here from each game and the full sets on flickr as well, but my attention to clydeorama.com is going to shift to help me better showcase the rest of my photography.

I hope you’ll keep following me on that journey.

So, please jump on over to japersrink.com to see Capitals-Jets: The Night in Pictures or take a look on flickr.

Conjunction Junction

0 Comments January 21, 2013|clyde|People & Places

The moon and Jupiter convene on Monday January 21, 2013. They will not have a conjunction this close again until 2026.

A Year After the Tenth Anniversary of 9/11

0 Comments September 11, 2012|clyde|People & Places

In March 2002, six months after the September 11 attacks, I saw photos of the first Tribute in Light produced by the Municipal Art Society of New York and I was blown away. I wished I had been able to see it in person. Beginning in 2003, it has been produced annually on September 11. It took until the tenth anniversary in 2011 that I was finally able to make it up there.

My friend Alex and I drove up that afternoon. We parked in Brooklyn near the Brooklyn Bridge Park around what should have been sunset, but we could hardly tell with the low, flat clouds. After taking some photos there, we walked across Brooklyn Bridge, down to Ground Zero, around the Financial District and took a cab back to the car in Brooklyn. From there, we headed to Staten Island, but there was too much fog to see what we wanted, so we headed to New Jersey and took photos here and there from Bayonne to Weehawken. We got back on the Turnpike to head back south around 4:00am. And then I went to work.

I posted one photo from the Brooklyn Bridge last year, but it took some time to get through to the rest.

Spirit Over Raptors

0 Comments June 3, 2012|clyde|Transportation

Another photo from the Joint Service Open House at Joint Base Andrews a couple weeks ago. The B-2 Spirit bomber “Spirit of Nebraska” made several passes at the airshow. In this photo, the B-2 appears to be headed over an F-22 Raptor that had just returned from its own aerial demonstration. Before arriving at Andrews, the B-2 flew over Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland in the opening festivities of the 137th Preakness States and, according to airshow announcer Rob Reider, was going to fly over several other events before returning to its home in Missouri at Whiteman Air Force Base.

Outside is America

0 Comments May 23, 2012|clyde|Transportation

I got my first workout with the new camera at the Joint Services Open House at Joint Base Andrews this past weekend. Learned some things about the camera and retaught myself some simple basics, like the importance of checking to be sure the memory cards are empty before shooting. Deleting many photos one-by-one is not a lot of fun…or quick.

This photo is of Neal Darnell’s Air National Guard sponsored jet truck leaving a trail of flames in front of two F-22 Raptor fighter planes and the P-51 Mustang “Bald Eagle” on the tarmac. He went up and down in front of the flight line a number of times during the day shooting fire out the exhaust and creating huge clouds of smoke. He did make any passes at speed. I think it’s because the near runway at Andrews is still undergoing renovations and the far runway that the aircraft were using was too far away with a small berm in between.

I’ll post more photos from the airshow now and again.

Bobbleheads and a New Camera

0 Comments May 21, 2012|clyde|People & Places, Puck

In a sick, fateful twist of timing (really, is there any other?), my fancy new camera arrived from a New York camera shop just a few days after the Washington Capitals 2011-12 season came to an end last week. After taking the initial mandatory cat photos I was looking around the family room for something to shoot using some fancy new features and I saw the bobblehead set on top of a bookcase. Since I won’t be taking any Capitals photos with this camera for a while, I figured, “Why not?” I think my wife laughed at me a little, but that’s okay. I think the result was worth it.

The bobbleheads pictured (Nicklas Backstrom, Brooks Laich, John Carlson, Mike Green, and Alex Ovechkin) are part of the gift the Washington Capitals gave their season ticket holders for the 2011-12 NHL season. Tomas Vokoun was also included in the set and would normally be standing to Backstrom’s right, but I left him out for two reasons. The photo didn’t look quite right with him there (I tried) and Vokoun is almost certainly not going to be back next year so the photo might have a longer shelf life without him. For more about the bobbleheads, watch the Capitals unboxing video.

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