Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Time and Photos

Like many, I have my computer screensaver (now a misnomer – screensaver) set up to display photos. Photography is one of my hobbies and has been for a very long time. I can say ‘very long time’ and mean it since I am, at this writing, 77 years old going on 78 in a couple of months. Let me deviate from my primary thought of ‘time and photos’ for a moment. When I typed in the word ‘screensaver’ and called it a misnomer I thought maybe a short explanation was in order. In years past the old type CRT’s (cathode ray tubes) used as a monitor, projected a source of electrons on a fluorescent screen to create the images. I won’t get into how the newer monitors work or that some advanced CRT’s are still in use. So, with the old CRT, if one permitted an image to remain in one spot too long the image would burn into the florescent material (phosphors.) The technical expression for this is ‘long term phosphor persistence or phosphor burn in.’ To reduce the probability of burn in, a simple program called a screensaver would take over after a prescribed amount of time and cause an image to wander across the screen vs. projecting it in a single spot. With the new monitors, a screensaver in the classical sense is no longer necessary to protect the monitor from burn in. However some now use a screensaver program to project images on the monitor for entertainment or to just give us a warm feeling that the monitor and computer are turned on and functional.
Now back to the topic ‘time and photos.’ In the quiet of this overcast and rainy morning I was sitting here at the computer minding my own business, surfing and occasionally doing something useful like paying bills. I glanced over at two of my other computer monitors sitting nearby where the screensavers were running. I was distracted from what I was doing and I started watching the screensavers. Your likely thinking “Jim get a live.” Well to tell you the truth, I like my life even though it would seem boring to many. Yes, occasionally I will do things in addition to sitting at the computer and watching screensavers. I have my screensavers set up to randomly display photos taken from the 60’s to the present and I have taken a lot of photos over that timeframe. I haven’t converted too many of my older photos to digital yet. Some of screensaver photos are date stamped and some are not. I enjoy looking at photos of my family from the past and I enjoy adding new photos from the present so that I will have something new to look at in the future. Today one thing that caught my attention was some photos from just a few years ago of my Grandsons compared to some recent pictures and how fast they had grown. I look fondly at my Grandsons from earlier in their life when they were just young boys and now that they are young men. I enjoy looking at photos of my daughters in their relatively young age as well as photos at their current relatively young age. I won’t get into the definition of young & old since they are relative terms. As an old guy I do feel young at heart even though the more recent photos of myself don’t completely capture this feeling. I love living in the present since I know that the present lasts only a moment and soon will be the past.
I love nature and taking nature photos. In recent years I have taken many photos at River Farm down the George Washington Parkway from my home. I take picture there year round. One might think that this pretty repetitive. Maybe taking pictures in the same area is repetitive, however there is always something new in God’s creation that I may have overlooked or photographing at a different time of the day or when the light or clouds were shedding light differently, any of which can make a significance difference. Nature photography can be dynamic if you observe. Pictures cannot replace the actual beauty of nature in real-time, however real-time is dynamic and a photo view can bring back memories of years past.
Good thing that I have named my Blog Site, Jim’s Ramblings since today’s blog confirms that I do truly ramble from screensavers to family and nature photos.

Jim – August 12th 2014

No comments:

Post a Comment