Northern Arizona Sunset
One of the things I love about northern Arizona is how many gorgeous sunsets there are. I took this picture on my way home from work.

Hand held, 1/13 second, f18, ISO 400, 29 mm
Have Fun,
Jeff
One of the things I love about northern Arizona is how many gorgeous sunsets there are. I took this picture on my way home from work.

Hand held, 1/13 second, f18, ISO 400, 29 mm
Have Fun,
Jeff
When the snow storms finished with the Southwest, it was still pretty cold outside. Here are a couple of fountains I photographed in Sedona, Arizona at about 11:00 am. No shorts and tank tops today.

Hand held, 1/1600 second, f5.6, ISO 200, 55 mm

Hand held, 1/1250 second, f5, ISO 200, 44 mm
While Flagstaff, Arizona has been pounded with snow, many other parts of the state have been receiving managable amounts of snow, and looking beautiful. Here’s a clip of the Mingus Mountains, as seen near my home.
Have Fun,
Jeff
Donate $5 or more to the United Nations Foundation for Haiti relief and you can download a previously unreleased track from Evanescence, “Together Again!” Go here to make your donation http://www.unfoundation.org/evanescence. Thank you for your donation.
Amy, you rock!
Photographs can add a whole new dimension to your writing. Magazine editors often prefer to have photographs to go along with an article, as they will attract readers that may otherwise not read that particular item. Having photographs available not only makes your writing more sellable, but editors will sometimes pay more for the photographs than the article. And by taking the photographs yourself, instead of the magazine’s staff photographer, you get to keep all the money for your article.
Your photographs should do one, or more, of the following.
When you have photographs, mention in your query or cover letter that photographs are available upon request. Also say if they are film or digital. Don’t send photographs until the editor asks to see them.
Always check the guidelines of the publication you are submitting to, but as a rule the following will be true for over 90% of the publications you will deal with.
You must be sure to use the proper film in order to get the best possible image. Here are a few tips.
The problem with many people today is that their pictures have bad composition, thanks to watching television. Television is notorious for putting the subject in the center of the screen, and this is horrible composition. It doesn’t look bad on television because the scenes change so fast, about every three to five seconds, that you don’t notice it. However, in a still photograph it shows up as a glaring mistake.
There is a simple solution to this problem. Do you remember what a tic-tac-toe board looks like, or the pound sign on your phone (for Generation X’ers)? When you look through your camera’s viewfinder, imagine this symbol being superimposed over what you’re looking at. Now, place the main subject of your photograph at one of the four points where a vertical and horizontal line cross. This technique is called the Rule Of Thirds, and it will greatly improve your photograph’s composition.
If you are going to be shooting a photograph for the cover of a magazine, be sure to check where the title goes. Magazines may have their title across the top or down one side. Leave a blank area in the photograph for this. You don’t want to have some important part of the photograph covered by the title. Also check to see if other text will be placed on the cover to prevent this same problem.
The real secret to taking great photographs is to take a lot of pictures. That means shooting thousands of photographs. Practice makes perfect, and increases your income.
Hi Everyone,
I just added a couple items to my Events page. Head on over and take a look.
Have Fun,
Jeff
The V bar V Ranch has the largest collection of Native American petroglyphs in the Verde Valley of Arizona. As you can probably tell, this is the first time I have used a camcorder, and my first go around with the editing software, but you will see improvements as I create my photography How-To videos.
My thanks to Kevin MacLeod for the use of his music Night Of The Owl from http://incompetech.com
Here’s my girlfriend’s first video, all about New Year’s Resolutions.
After much serious thinking, I have decided to close down two of my websites. JeffColburn.com, my site for artists, and CreativeCauldron.com, my site for writers, will be removed in one week. JeffColburn.com will have all of its content removed, but the gallery of my images will be moved to CreativeCauldron.com. The later will have all of its content removed, except for the gallery.
This was a hard decision, especially since I’ve been running CreativeCauldron.com for 10 years, and it was chosen by Writers Digest magazine as one of the 101 best website for writers in 2002.
But over the years things have changed. I’m now focusing on my photography, and I just don’t have the time to maintain a stock photography website, a photographer’s blog, a writer’s website and an artist’s sit.
If there’s anything you want to look at from either of these sites, this is your last chance.
Have Fun,
Jeff
I love old graveyards, it’s like walking through history. Many of the old gravestones are very informative, or funny.
This is one of the graveyards in Jerome, Arizona, an old mining town and artist’s community. One of the people buried here even fought in the Spanish-American war.
As you walk around this graveyard you see all the burial sites that have some kind of fencing around them, but I’m sure there are other people buried here that had no fencing. Every so often you see a depression on or near a path that looks just like some of the depressions in the fenced off burial sites. This is probably a depression made when a coffin finally collapsed due to age. So tread lightly here as you may well be walking on the dead.

Hand held, 1/400 second, f8, ISO 100, 43 mm

Hand held, 1/125 second, f8, ISO 100, 18 mm
Hello,
Last week I found that www.Scribd.com was letting people download an ebook of mine for free (at two separate locations on their website), without my permission and in violation of my copyright. This is a book that I sell on my website, and so far, over 500 people have read/downloaded my ebook from Scribed, which is a potential lose to me of over $18,500.
A few days ago I e-mailed two DMCA notices to Scribd (one for each page), asking them to remove the pages with my ebook on them. So far, the pages have not been removed.
You should check to see if any of your work is there.
To have your book or article removed, go to the bottom of the Scribd page, and under Legal, click on Copyright, a new page opens with DMCA info on the right.
You may also wish to contact the law firm of Camara & Sibley (http://www.camarasibley.com/news-f.html), which has started a class action lawsuit against Scribd for copyright infringement.
Have Fun,
Jeff