Day 363: Grounded in Flight

That day number is the last of my day numbers EVER that will be reversible. :( The end is sooo close now :(

This was taken on the US Air Force Academy base, near the famous chapel (day 50). I was over there because Dad had surgery at the clinic over there for his knee. He suffered a "patellar tendon rupture" which is basically a tear of the tendon right below one's knee cap in his right leg on the way down the stairs to play Battlefield 2 with me last Sunday. Since then he's been immobile and obviously off work too. So today his path to recovery (ETA: 6-12 weeks) begins... I went over to the academy to talk with him real quick before mom took him to the care clinic where he will be recovering for the next week. After they headed off I managed to find my way over to the chapel area and I ended up staying for about an hour and a half as the sun set. I got some fun HDR shots.

Anyway, I've always wanted a good picture of one of these plane statues, but no lighting condition is ever conducive to artistically photographing them. Then came HDR. I'm really working on making my HDRs more realistic looking now. I got pretty well caught up in the "pop" factor with my first few, but now I'm getting kind of serious about exploring the possibilities of the art in a more serious and realism-seeking manner. I think the $80 bucks (20% off coupon :) of my christmas money I spent on Photomatix (That's a link to it's website) may well have been my best spent Benjamin ever! I'm still excited about the possibilities. If nothing else comes of this new fascination, at least posterity will wonder why I have three bracketed pictures of EVERYTHING I photographed in the first half of January ;)