World Wide Photo Walk Springfield Winner

I am pleased to announce Josi as the winner of our Springfield Photo Walk Competition. Her photo will go on to the World Wide competition for a chance at the Grand Prize!

I really struggled with selecting a winner as there were so many wonderful entries. I normally am not a fan of the HDR style either but this picture and its composition and color kept grabbing my attention.

Congratulation Josi!

Check out other pictures at: http://www.flickr.com/groups/1153880@N20/pool/

World Wide Photo Walk - Part 5

More photos of the action on the World Wide Photo Walk. One of my favorites is the last one of Josi in the empty parking garage.

Mark's comment back on part 3 made me realize I didn't take a single photo of the end of the photo walk when many of us sat down and had lunch at Springfield Brewing Company. It was fun watching everyone sharing their screenshots and getting to know one another.

World Wide Photo Walk - Springfield Missouri Part 4 - A Guest Post

Another shot of our intrepid Lesley who was our model for the Photowalk. This beautifully framed shot is by Viktoriya and was sent to me to share with everyone. Thanks Viktoriya!

New Orleans 2009 - A City Recovering

New Orleans is alive and well. Now granted, it still has a long way to go, as I saw when we traveled out I-10 East, but there are throngs of people there and the city looks vibrant again when you drive in after dark. The Quarter is full and bustling. People are smiling. Cash registers are ringing.

There is still a lot of work to do. I wondered why the government has not spent millions of stimulus funds on the South to rebuild. It seems to remain neglected even under new leadership. Too many other promises I guess. The Gulf Coast of Mississippi is a wreck, but the people I saw were happy and in high spirits. Only now are things beginning to be rebuilt on a very limited scale. Mississippi is far worse than New Orleans.

Our drive along the Gulf Coast of Mississippi was a startling wake up call to me that we still need to pray for many Americans struggling to come back home.

World Wide Photo Walk - Springfield Part 3

Due to my recent trip to New Orleans to take care and visit Teresa's mom, I am seriously behind on this blog and giving an update on our photo walk. I have received 50 entries which I am now responsible for judging and turning one lucky winner into Scott Kelby for a chance at a grand prize. From what I have looked at each and every one of my photowalker's pictures is a winner in thier own way and I deeply appreciate the time and care each one of them put into their pictures.

There has been some activity with the High Noon Photo Contest, but not much. I will be setting up a Flickr page to show all of these entries soon. The deadline for entries for this contest is August 15th. You can find guidelines at

http://ozarkphotos.blogspot.com/2009/05/announcing-first-annual-ozark-photos.html

I will get some more pictures posted soon and thank each of you for continuing to check on the ever faltering posts to Ozark Photos.

World Wide Photo Walk Springfield, Missouri: A Special Thanks to Lesley!

One of our photo walkers, David Strong, brought a young lady who volunteered to be a model for our photo walk. She did an absolutely fantastic job and was totally outnumbered by photographers 40 to 1. She held up well and I took this shot at Springfield Brewing Company at the end of our official walk.

World Wide Photo Walk - Springfield, Missouri Part 2

Some of my favorite images from the World Wide Photo Walk. Have you ever tried "leading" a bunch of Photographers? It is like herding cats! It was truly wonderful, looking everywhere seeing photographers and seeing people coming together and talking photography and seeing friendships form. We had lunch and seeing everyone excitedly looking at their view screens on their cameras was a truly rewarding experience for me.

World Wide Photo Walk - Springfield, Missouri

I wanted to get a quick posting with the group photos of our Springfield World Wide Photo Walk. We had a great time and it just seemed to reinforce my belief that photographers are some of the friendliest and most helpful individuals around. In our Springfield group we had participants from as far as Columbus, Kansas; Harrison, Arkansas and even New Mexico!

Fellow walker David Strong even brought a model, Lesley, who was immensely popular and was the center of a lot of attention. I am working on my overall pictures of the photo walk; I shoot in Raw so it takes me a while to process photos, and will share those soon!

Thanks to all who participated and I have already noted that several have posted thier contest pictures!

Springfield National Cemetery - July 4th

A quiet moment at Springfield's National Cemetery on July 4th.

Happy 4th!

I hope every one of my US readers has a great 4th of July. This flag is taken on my home pole today. It is the Grand Union Flag, a replica of one of the earliest US flag designs which, of course, paid homage to our home country. I personally love this design.

North Yard at Commercial Street

We are having a plant shutdown this week. Due to some work the maintenance guys are doing we started work an hour later than usual Wednesday morning so I went down to Commercial Street to do some train shots. No active trains but I had some fun shooting the rail cars in the North Yard.

A Long Absence

Sorry for the long absence. I have had a severe bout of non creativity which still continues but is gradually improving. I wanted to remind everyone of the "High Noon Photo Contest" , be sure and read the post below to be involved.

This is a clematis from the Master Gardener's Demonstration Garden at Nathaniel Greene Park here in Springfield. It was taken early in the morning.