Re: [Texascavers] Fellows of the NSS

[speleosteele]

As Carl said, it's not too soon to be thinking about nominating people for 
2008, but it's close to too late.  The deadline is Nov. 15, which happens to be 
tomorrow.  Today's the day, folks.

Bill 


 Carl Kunath carl.kun...@suddenlink.net wrote: 
 No, it's not two years in a row, but there have been gaps even worse than 
 that.  
 
 Bev Shade received the NSS Fellow award in 2006. 
  
 Besides 2007, other years without a Texan being honored are:  1972, 1974, 
 1975, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, 2002, and 2003.
 There is a complete listing of Texans honored by the NSS in 50 Years Of Texas 
 Caving.
 
 Beginning in the mid-1960s, there have been a total of 51 Texas-based cavers 
 who were made Fellows.  Of those, several received other honors such as 
 Certificate of Merit.
 
 As Linda Palit has pointed out, those honored must have been nominated by 
 others and their nomination supported by letters of praise.  They must then 
 be approved by the NSS Awards Committee.  It may be that we do not have a 
 worthy nominee(s) each year, but there ARE rather large gaps in the record.
 
 It's not too soon to begin thinking about nominees for 2008.
 
 ===Carl Kunath
   - Original Message - 
   From: Gill Ediger 
   To: texascavers@texascavers.com 
   Sent: Tuesday, November 13, 2007 4:13 PM
   Subject: [Texascavers] Fellows
 
 
   Just got my NSS News. Does this make the second year in a row that no 
   NSS Fellows have been awarded to Texas cavers?
 
   --Ediger
 
 
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[Texascavers] Paging Will Rupley -

[Don Cooper]

Please contact off list for any contact information.
-WaV

[Texascavers] French climber to scale 300m chinese cave wall :

[JerryAtkin]

 
French Spiderman returns to scale Chinese  mountain  
CHANGSHA, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) -- A French daredevil will climb a central  China 
mountain on Sunday, his latest stunt after scaling a Shanghai  skyscraper 
illegally earlier this year.  
French Spiderman Alain Robert arrived in  Changsha, capital of Hunan 
Province, on Wednesday. He is set to make a  bare-handed ascent of a huge cave 
on 
the 1,518-meter-high Tianmen Mountain  in the scenic area of Zhangjiajie, said 
Zhang Biao, an official with a  local sports association that set up the 
promotion.  
Invited by the scenic spot's management  company, Robert will first be 
transported to about 1,300 meters via cable  car at noon and then attempt to 
scale 
the left side of the steep  300-meter-high cave.  
The 45-year-old said he was confident of  reaching the top without the aid of 
any mountaineering gear because the  task was similar to another feat he 
performed in the province five years  ago.  
He is scheduled to leave China two days after  his climb.  
In May, he was detained briefly after climbing  Shanghai's tallest building, 
the 88-storey Jin Mao Tower, without  notifying the local authority. Wearing a 
Spiderman suit, he attracted  thousands of spectators and caused a traffic 
jam as he climbed up and down  the skyscraper in 90 minutes.  
For his actions, he was banned from the country  for five years. However, the 
management company in charge of the cave  managed to persuade authorities to 
let him back in as his upcoming stunt  is designed to help boost the profile 
of the region and bring in tourists.   
Robert is well-known for his exploits. In 1996,  he climbed the Far East 
Finance Center in Hong Kong. According to media  reports, it took him only 25 
minutes to scale the tower's 48 stories. In  1998, he annoyed Japanese police 
by 
climbing the Sinjuku Center Building  in Tokyo. The following year, he climbed 
the 443-meter-high Sears Tower in  Chicago.  
It is said that he has been arrested and fined  more than 100 times for 
climbing buildings around the world.  
_http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-11/14/content_7076692.htm_ 
(http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-11/14/content_7076692.htm) 




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[Texascavers] Digital (cave) Photography

[Scott Nicholson]

Since the current topic is (Cave) Photography

I'm finally upgrading/updating my camera setup from film to digital.  
I've used Canon/Pentax/Nikon 35mm SLR gear for many years...and I'm in the 
middle of the learning curve about Digital SLR cameras.

I've almost decided on the Nikon D200.

Does anyone out there have any feedback/suggestions as I make the leap into the 
digital photography world??
 
Scott Nicholson
Broker/Waterboy
The Discovery Team
(512) 94-SCOTT {947-2688}
Keller Williams Realty

RE: [Texascavers] Digital (cave) Photography

[Louise Power]

Last summer I bought myself a Canon PowerShot A630. Don't know how it is in 
caves since I don't cave any more, but it's great for outdoor and indoor shots 
and has a lot of bells and whistles which will take me some time to, if not 
master, at least get the hang of. Cost on sale less than $300.
 
Louise


List-Post: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 10:03:25 -0800From: csnicholson@sbcglobal.netTo: 
texascavers@texascavers.comSubject: [Texascavers] Digital (cave) Photography





Since the current topic is (Cave) Photography
 
I'm finally upgrading/updating my camera setup from film to digital.  
I've used Canon/Pentax/Nikon 35mm SLR gear for many years...and I'm in the 
middle of the learning curve about Digital SLR cameras.
 
I've almost decided on the Nikon D200.
 
Does anyone out there have any feedback/suggestions as I make the leap into the 
digital photography world?? 












Scott Nicholson
Broker/Waterboy
The Discovery Team
(512) 94-SCOTT {947-2688}

Keller Williams Realty

[Texascavers] RE: Digital (cave) Photography

[Minton, Mark]

  Scott Nicholson said:

Does anyone out there have any feedback/suggestions as I make the leap into 
the digital photography world??

  A really nice, small camera for quick point-and-shoot underground is the 
Pentax Optio WP and its successors the W10 and W30 
http://www.pentaximaging.com/products/product_details/digital_camera--Optio_W30/reqID--9587364/subsection--optio.
  It won't give you the kind of quality that an SRL will, but you can't beat it 
for routine photos on the go.  We use one for documentation on almost every 
trip we take, and get some remarkably good pictures.  It is waterproof and has 
a real optical zoom.  The only thing it really needs is a better and/or 
external flash.  It costs $200 - $300.

Mark Minton

[Texascavers] Houston borehole

[BMorgan994]

Once upon a time I made the mistake of visiting Houston. I think it might  
have been 1989. I wrote a story about it called A business trip to Texas. 
Here 
 is an excerpt:

Houston is a microcosm of all our urban sins, a Los Angeles about to  happen 
saved from critical mass only by the oil slump.  I sat in my motel  room in 
despair until I remembered Wild Bill Rupley, an old caving friend that I  met 
in Belize.  A comprehensive tour of all the punk rock clubs and sleazy  bars in 
town brought my spirits back.  The next evening we were at a loss  until I 
mentioned the great gray green greasy Buffalo Bayou which flows through  the 
oldest and most decrepit part of downtown Houston.

Wildlife is where you find it, so we outfitted ourselves with headlamps  and 
canoe and set out to explore Houston the hard way.  The idea was to  explore 
the maze of sewage tunnels beneath the city, and to shine the eyes of  trolls, 
rats, bag ladies, and other wildlife. Beneath the bridges.  The  bayou was up 
due to recent flooding so we had a fine fast ride through the  suburbs.  Our 
first discovery was big borehole, a vine-draped tunnel  entrance at least ten 
feet in diameter leading back into the bowls of tho  city.  Not having taken 
the proper equipment (rubber galoshes) we were  finally stopped by a deep pool 
of poop that flooded the passage.  We could  hear a waterfall beyond, the 
passage beckoned, but prudence dictated that this  was a dry weather cave.
 
The beer supply was running low, but we managed to re-provision at an all  
night 7-11, then continued on down the bayou.  Beneath the bridges the  ruins 
of 
ancient civilizations could be seen everywhere, but the inhabitants had  fled 
to join the Anasazi.  Only one vagrant was seen, but he submerged into  the 
debris upon our approach and escaped before we could photograph him to  
determine the species.
 
Once we reached the tidal portion of the bayou, the wildlife changed.   
Regular black rats were replaced by numerous semi aquatic wharf rats.  Were  
those 
the cute little fur bearing nutrias that I had envisioned raising as a  child? 
“Mommy, will you buy me a swamp so I can make big money raising  nutrias?”
 
We wondered about predators, supposing that the rats were at the top of the  
food chain, when whuump sploosh one of them disappeared beneath the greasy  
surface.  Shortly thereafter the mystery was solved when we ran headlong  into 
an alligator gar that attempted to turn the canoe over and eat us.  It  was at 
least seven feet long.  Bill, who was in the bow, was visably  shaken.  Now 
that Piranhas, Alligators, rats, and Mambas have all had their  moment of glory 
on the silver screen, I would recommend Gars for the next  scifihorrorflick 
extravaganza. “Just when you thought it was safe to canoe down  the bayou ... “
 
By the time we reached the last and greatest arched bridge our minds had  
become as murky as the turbid waters of the bayou.  I chanced to knock  the 
paddle against the side of the canoe and thereby discovered that we were in  a 
gigantic echo chamber, the frequency of which depended on where we were  
relative 
to the apex of the arch of the bridge.  The senseless hoots and  gibbers that 
followed were compounded by the weird acoustical aberrations of the  echo 
chamber.  The police left us alone, supposing that we were only an  errant band 
of 
gibbering gibbons, siamangs out for a fling.

Sleazeweazel



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[Texascavers] Photoshop

[Mixon Bill]

Yes, a few of those photos from Brazil are rather garish. In fact,  
though, in a couple of cases it looks like a less-edited version of  
the same scene is in the set. They also appear, as least on screen, to  
have been overly enthusiastically sharpened. Nevertheless, I've sent  
that URL on to Urs Widmer of Speleo Projects in case he wants to  
contact the photographer. I think several of the photos would qualify  
for the annual Caving Calendar from Switzerland. Presumably the  
photographer could submit unedited, or nearly so, original images for  
consideration.


The NSS Photo Salon does have a separate category for digital images.  
In fact, entries in that category are judged more strictly, on the  
theory that there's no excuse for defects in a photo that's been  
manipulated in a computer. I think most of the photos entered in the  
last couple of NSS salons have been digital, although I haven't really  
paid attention. I'm sure that's the case in the print salon, which I  
inspect during the convention. I use the Photo Salon night on  
Thursdays to stay in camp and let my liver regenerate, so I don't see  
the slides (or, I suppose I should say, the projected images).


The meaningful distinction these days, seems to me, ought to be not  
digital vs film, but natural vs something really offbeat, such as a  
montage or something that has been manipulated in an unrealistic way  
(say, using some special-effect filter or adding simulated lens  
flare). But I suppose it might be hard to decide where to draw the  
line. What computer manipulations are just improving a photograph, and  
what are creating something different?--Bill Mixon


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Re: [Texascavers] Photoshop

[Chris Vreeland]

I use Photoshop to some degree on all my cave shots. You can brighten  
underexposed areas  bring out detail, you can darken overexposed  
areas,  generally improve the quality of the final image with a  
little work. It's just the fake over-saturation of colors that  
weren't that bright in the actual setting that gets to me a bit. If  
you underexposed by an f-stop, by all means, lighten the shot up a  
bit, if it makes it presentable -- but show the cave as it really is.


I do this with my scanned slides as well as shots from the new  
digital (Yes, I highly recommend the Nikons) so the real film vs.  
digital debate is kind of moot. The best thing about digital in the  
preview screen. It sure is nice to be able to look at the image and  
say Okay, I'm going to open 'er up an f-stop, and point that flash  
you're holding about 5 degrees more to the left, and hold it up  
higher. Ok, THAT's a keeper. (having a memory card that'll hold 275  
RAW files is nice, too)


CV

On Nov 14, 2007, at 8:54 PM, Mixon Bill wrote:

Yes, a few of those photos from Brazil are rather garish. In fact,  
though, in a couple of cases it looks like a less-edited version of  
the same scene is in the set. They also appear, as least on screen,  
to have been overly enthusiastically sharpened. Nevertheless, I've  
sent that URL on to Urs Widmer of Speleo Projects in case he wants  
to contact the photographer. I think several of the photos would  
qualify for the annual Caving Calendar from Switzerland. Presumably  
the photographer could submit unedited, or nearly so, original  
images for consideration.


The NSS Photo Salon does have a separate category for digital  
images. In fact, entries in that category are judged more strictly,  
on the theory that there's no excuse for defects in a photo that's  
been manipulated in a computer. I think most of the photos entered  
in the last couple of NSS salons have been digital, although I  
haven't really paid attention. I'm sure that's the case in the  
print salon, which I inspect during the convention. I use the Photo  
Salon night on Thursdays to stay in camp and let my liver  
regenerate, so I don't see the slides (or, I suppose I should say,  
the projected images).


The meaningful distinction these days, seems to me, ought to be not  
digital vs film, but natural vs something really offbeat, such as  
a montage or something that has been manipulated in an unrealistic  
way (say, using some special-effect filter or adding simulated lens  
flare). But I suppose it might be hard to decide where to draw the  
line. What computer manipulations are just improving a photograph,  
and what are creating something different?--Bill Mixon


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Re: [Texascavers] Photoshop

[JerryAtkin]

 
I believe any photo can usually be improved with a bit of touch up;  whether 
you did it in the dark room in the olden days, or in PhotoShop at  present is 
irrelevant.  You are still working with a single exposure in  which the 
photons that were captured, document an instant in time that was  selected and 
engineered by the photographer - for better or worse.  It's  takes experience 
and 
talent to select the appropriate lighting, camera  angle, exposure, and 
composition for that single photo.  Only so much can  be added or deleted in 
subsequent digital manipulations.
The digital photos that give me pause are the  composites, where several 
exposures are combined and edited into a final  version.  To be fair,  a lot 
of talent is required to set up and  engineer the shots; and to digitally merge 
them into a beautiful  photo.  But something unnatural has been added I 
think.  You'll never  see those scenes in the cave, however magnificent they 
are.  
To a purist,  they are unfaithful representations of the underground, and pass 
into the realm  of pure art.  This is neither bad nor good, but certainly 
different then  traditional photography.
 
Jerry.
 
 
In a message dated 11/14/2007 9:45:41 P.M. Central Standard Time,  
cvreel...@austin.rr.com writes:

use  Photoshop to some degree on all my cave shots. You can brighten   
underexposed areas  bring out detail, you can darken  overexposed  
areas,  generally improve the quality of the final  image with a  
little work. It's just the fake over-saturation of  colors that  
weren't that bright in the actual setting that gets to  me a bit. If  
you underexposed by an f-stop, by all means, lighten  the shot up a  
bit, if it makes it presentable -- but show the cave  as it really is.

I do this with my scanned slides as well as shots from  the new  
digital (Yes, I highly recommend the Nikons) so the real  film vs.  
digital debate is kind of moot. The best thing about  digital in the  
preview screen. It sure is nice to be able to look at  the image and  
say Okay, I'm going to open 'er up an f-stop, and  point that flash  
you're holding about 5 degrees more to the left,  and hold it up  
higher. Ok, THAT's a keeper. (having a memory card  that'll hold 275  
RAW files is nice,  too)

CV







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Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Chris Vreeland]

I've gotta agree somewhat. While the composition is excellent, and a  
lot of work went into setting up those shots, someone needs to lay  
off the over-saturation a bit. (a lot) I've noticed that's a trend  
lately with cave photography, and photography in general -- get a  
good picture, then jack the color up so bright as to be utterly  
unrealistic. I'm not a fan of the technique.


Chris

On Nov 13, 2007, at 10:52 AM, David Locklear wrote:


If those photos are today's standard for good cave photos, I would
like to see what the very good or the excellent look like.

Will the average caver be able to take good cave photos?

Is it now just a matter of how good of a digital camera and lighting
you can afford?

Or can you get photos like that with cheap digital gear?

Will mastering Photoshop become a pre-requisite for being a real  
caver?


David Locklear

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Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Gregg]

Hi,

It's always been about lighting.  Partly that's what you can afford.  
Partly its how much time it takes to set things up.  If you think about 
it, most indoor flash pictures of people are crap, and that's despite 
the fact that most of a person is usually at one distance from the 
camera where illumination is approximately constant.  Good flash 
pictures taken by professional photographers involve multiple sources of 
light, continuous bright lights, diffuse light sources, and time to make 
all this work. It's not a situation intrinsically unique to cave 
photography.  The reason we think its different is that we get around it 
all the time above ground because daylight photography has light coming 
from everywhere.


That doesn't mean that you can't get good cave photography with a 
camera-mounted flash.  It happens all the time - but usually only for 
close-up objects.  To get good photos, you need shadows, which moves the 
flash off the camera.  Then you don't the shadows to be completely 
black, which gets you the second flash.  They you need tripods or 
assistants to hold these things. . .


If you give a mouse a cookie. . .

Digital photography helps because you can see the results of a 
time-consuming shot straight up, while with film you take several 
variations on the same shot with different lighting etc. and hope you 
got it right.  Now that I have a cheap digital camera that still has a 
lot of pixels and good control features, I'm thinking of getting some 
slave flashes and trying nighttime and cave photography on the cheap.  
The wimpy flash on the camera isn't good enough for cave photography, 
but it can set off the slaves.


Thank God being a good photographer was never a prerequisite for being a 
real caver.



Gregg




David Locklear wrote:

If those photos are today's standard for good cave photos, I would
like to see what the very good or the excellent look like.

Will the average caver be able to take good cave photos?

Is it now just a matter of how good of a digital camera and lighting
you can afford?

Or can you get photos like that with cheap digital gear?

Will mastering Photoshop become a pre-requisite for being a real caver?

David Locklear

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Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Ted Samsel]

Death to Photoshop

-Original Message-
From: Chris Vreeland cvreel...@austin.rr.com
Sent: Nov 14, 2007 7:57 AM
To: David Locklear dlocklea...@gmail.com
Cc: speleoste...@tx.rr.com speleoste...@tx.rr.com, Texas Cavers 
texascavers@texascavers.com
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

I've gotta agree somewhat. While the composition is excellent, and a  
lot of work went into setting up those shots, someone needs to lay  
off the over-saturation a bit. (a lot) I've noticed that's a trend  
lately with cave photography, and photography in general -- get a  
good picture, then jack the color up so bright as to be utterly  
unrealistic. I'm not a fan of the technique.

Chris

On Nov 13, 2007, at 10:52 AM, David Locklear wrote:

 If those photos are today's standard for good cave photos, I would
 like to see what the very good or the excellent look like.

 Will the average caver be able to take good cave photos?

 Is it now just a matter of how good of a digital camera and lighting
 you can afford?

 Or can you get photos like that with cheap digital gear?

 Will mastering Photoshop become a pre-requisite for being a real  
 caver?

 David Locklear

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http://home.infionline.net/~tbsamsel/

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RE: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Louise Power]

Ted,
 
You are wrong, wrong, wrong. If you worked in desktop publishing as I do and 
had to make publishable photos out of other people's c*** or if you needed to 
restore fragile family photos, tintypes, etc, that are just barely visible 
because of time or deterioration, you'd fall on your knees and kiss the feet of 
whoever invented Photoshop. Maybe it's not right for you or for your particular 
application, but for those of us who do need it, it's the only thing that will 
work. Perhaps NSS just ought to ban enhanced photos in the competition. Or 
limit enhanced photos to another category.
Louise 
 Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 11:18:32 -0500 From: tbsam...@infionline.net To: 
 cvreel...@austin.rr.com CC: texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: 
 [Texascavers] Good cave photos  Death to Photoshop  -Original 
 Message- From: Chris Vreeland cvreel...@austin.rr.com Sent: Nov 14, 
 2007 7:57 AM To: David Locklear dlocklea...@gmail.com Cc: 
 speleoste...@tx.rr.com speleoste...@tx.rr.com, Texas Cavers 
 texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos 
  I've gotta agree somewhat. While the composition is excellent, and a  
 lot of work went into setting up those shots, someone needs to lay  off 
 the over-saturation a bit. (a lot) I've noticed that's a trend  lately with 
 cave photography, and photography in general -- get a  good picture, then 
 jack the color up so bright as to be utterly  unrealistic. I'm not a fan of 
 the technique.  Chris  On Nov 13, 2007, at 10:52 AM, David Locklear 
 wrote:   If those photos are today's standard for good cave photos, I 
 would  like to see what the very good or the excellent look like.  
  Will the average caver be able to take good cave photos?   Is it 
 now just a matter of how good of a digital camera and lighting  you can 
 afford?   Or can you get photos like that with cheap digital gear?  
  Will mastering Photoshop become a pre-requisite for being a real   
 caver?   David Locklear   
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Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[CaverArch]

Louise,

I agree completely, and I've used Photoshop for some of the same reasons you 
have - most importantly personally to improve the legibility of scans of many 
19th and early 20th century family letters and other documents.  The program 
helped enormously in scanning the journal kept by one of my German Texan 
ancestors as he came across the Atlantic from Bremen in 1850.  The seas, 
unfortunately, must have gotten rough because he abandoned the journal well 
before reaching New Orleans.  And of course Photoshop is wonderful for 
restoring old pictures!

Roger Moore
Houston



In a message dated 11/14/07 11:19:44 Central Standard Time, 
power_lou...@hotmail.com writes:
Ted,
 
You are wrong, wrong, wrong. If you worked in desktop publishing as I do and 
had to make publishable photos out of other people's c*** or if you needed to 
restore fragile family photos, tintypes, etc, that are just barely visible 
because of time or deterioration, you'd fall on your knees and kiss the feet of 
whoever invented Photoshop. Maybe it's not right for you or for your particular 
application, but for those of us who do need it, it's the only thing that will 
work. Perhaps NSS just ought to ban enhanced photos in the competition. Or 
limit enhanced photos to another category.

Louise 

 

[Texascavers] RE: Good cave photos

[Minton, Mark]

  Louise Power said:

Perhaps NSS just ought to ban enhanced photos in the competition. Or limit 
enhanced photos to another category.

  I believe that is already the case, isn't it (separate category)?  From 
http://www.caves.org/committee/salons/Slide.shtml:

CATEGORIES - Classification letters are:
A. Story Series (maximum of 20 slides, include a caption for each slide in the 
series)
B. Scenes from Nature, including closeups and images, whether taken with single 
or multiple flash or in natural light (each of these was a separate category in 
the past)
C. Enhanced  Surreal Imagery, including non-standard lighting, film 
processing, gels, computer enhancement, unusual subjects for a cave setting 
such as models in atypical attire; this is also the category for those images 
that have been digitally manipulated.
D. Humor. Humor images are scored by the judges, but selected for show by the 
Slide Salon Co-Chairmen. If you have a slide that may not be up to full 
artistic standards, but is a crowd-pleaser for its humor, please consider 
entering it

  Note category C.  It is certainly true that you can't believe something 
these days just because you saw a picture of it!

Mark Minton

Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Simon Newton]

There are some interesting light techniques, that when used with digital
cameras, can produce some amazing photos without massive
strobes/lights/etc.

I'm sure people on the list have seen 360 Degrees of Lechuguilla Cave
computer tour that came out recently (
http://www.360parks.com/lechuguilla_cave_virtual_tour.shtml).  All of the
360 degree panoramas were illuminated with handheld lights - they literally
painted the cave with light for minutes during open exposures.  It's a
simple technique that has been around for a while, but with digital cameras
you can quickly view the result.  If you want to take a stab at 360 degree
images you can mess around with a bunch of photos in software like Stitch.

Maybe it's time to spend money on a nice sturdy lightweight tripod and ditch
the heavy battery packs.

Simon


-- Forwarded message --
 From: Gregg iar...@io.com
 To:
 Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 10:03:00 -0600
 Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos
 Hi,

 It's always been about lighting.  Partly that's what you can afford.
 Partly its how much time it takes to set things up.  If you think about
 it, most indoor flash pictures of people are crap, and that's despite
 the fact that most of a person is usually at one distance from the
 camera where illumination is approximately constant.  Good flash
 pictures taken by professional photographers involve multiple sources of
 light, continuous bright lights, diffuse light sources, and time to make
 all this work. It's not a situation intrinsically unique to cave
 photography.  The reason we think its different is that we get around it
 all the time above ground because daylight photography has light coming
 from everywhere.

 That doesn't mean that you can't get good cave photography with a
 camera-mounted flash.  It happens all the time - but usually only for
 close-up objects.  To get good photos, you need shadows, which moves the
 flash off the camera.  Then you don't the shadows to be completely
 black, which gets you the second flash.  They you need tripods or
 assistants to hold these things. . .

 If you give a mouse a cookie. . .

 Digital photography helps because you can see the results of a
 time-consuming shot straight up, while with film you take several
 variations on the same shot with different lighting etc. and hope you
 got it right.  Now that I have a cheap digital camera that still has a
 lot of pixels and good control features, I'm thinking of getting some
 slave flashes and trying nighttime and cave photography on the cheap.
 The wimpy flash on the camera isn't good enough for cave photography,
 but it can set off the slaves.

 Thank God being a good photographer was never a prerequisite for being a
 real caver.


 Gregg

RE: [Texascavers] Good cave photos

[Ted Samsel]

You missed my joke.. I use Photoshop everyday,,  adobe illustrator..  ARCGIS..  sometimes ERDAS
I do web pages  computer cartography everyday.. 
-Original Message- From: Louise Power Sent: Nov 14, 2007 12:18 PM To: Ted Samsel , Chris Vreeland Cc: Texas Cavers Subject: RE: [Texascavers] Good cave photos 

Ted,You are wrong, wrong, wrong. If you worked in desktop publishing as I do and had to make publishable photos out of other people'sc*** or if you needed to restore fragile family photos, tintypes, etc, that are just barely visible because of time or deterioration,you'd fall on your knees and kiss the feet of whoever invented Photoshop. Maybe it's not right for you or for your particular application, but for those of us who do need it, it's the only thing that will work. Perhaps NSS just ought to ban enhanced photos in the competition. Or limit enhanced photos to another category.Louise  Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 11:18:32 -0500 From: tbsam...@infionline.net To: cvreel...@austin.rr.com CC: texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos  Death to Photoshop  -Original Message- From: Chris Vreeland cvreel...@austin.rr.com Sent: Nov 14, 2007 7:57 AM To: David Locklear dlocklea...@gmail.com Cc: "speleoste...@tx.rr.com" speleoste...@tx.rr.com, Texas Cavers texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Good cave photos  I've gotta agree somewhat. While the composition is excellent, and a  lot of work went into setting up those shots, someone needs to lay  off the over-saturation a bit. (a lot) I've noticed that's a trend  lately with cave photography, and photography in general -- get a  good picture, then jack the color up so bright as to be utterly  unrealistic. I'm not a fan of the technique.  Chris  On Nov 13, 2007, at 10:52 AM, David Locklear wrote:   If those photos are today's standard for "good cave photos," I would  like to see what the "very good" or the "excellent" look like.   Will the average caver be able to take "good cave photos?"   Is it now just a matter of how good of a digital camera and lighting  you can afford?   Or can you get photos like that with cheap digital gear?   Will mastering Photoshop become a pre-requisite for being a real   caver?   David Locklear   -  Visit our website: http://texascavers.com  To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com  For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com   - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.comhttp://home.infionline.net/~tbsamsel/  - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com 

http://home.infionline.net/~tbsamsel/

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[Texascavers] House with a Cave

[Linda Palit]

Cavers,

I f you are looking for a house in SA and have the bucks, this one is
gorgeous and the cave is nice - about the size of my living room with a
couple of dig leads off if I remember correctly.  Last time I was in the
cave it was being used as a playhouse for the kids.  Contact me if you want
a picture.

Contact the owner if you want more pictures and  if you are interested in
purchase. 

 

Linda

 

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Richard Swint [mailto:tosp...@satx.rr.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, November 14, 2007 9:23 AM
To: li...@tcmacaves.org
Subject: From the TCMA Website RE: San Antonio Caves

 

Linda 

 

I am writing to you to tell you of a house which is going up for sale in San
Antonio with a cave in the front yard of the house. The cave is listed in
the Texas cave books as Cueva Cave. The home is in The Town of Hollywood
Park (south of FM-1604 and west of SR 281). The home is completely remodeled
and photos are available, but we are currently getting them ready to post on
the web hopefully with a video. The only owners of the house have died and
my wife is the executor of the estate. The house was built in 1972 and is a
little over 3000 sq ft and on .48 acre lot, and has been completely
redecorated with new carpet and paint throughout. Please help me to get this
property to the caving community as potential buyers. I will understand if
you cannot help. The family is looking for $350k-400k for the property.