Dragonfly Festival 2016 Take Two

After reviewing my photos from yesterday's Dragonfly Festival, I decided several more are blogworthy, and therefore decided this follow-on post was in order.

In addition I meant to mention in yesterday's post that conditions were not particularly ideal for taking photos: bright sunny day it was not, at least during the time Deb and I visited the Festival. Usually it rains a little before it rains a lot, but not yesterday. We were treated to a rare "instant deluge" of rain! Fortunately, most vendors had tent tops, and most of the Festival attendees made their way quickly under the nearest tent when the deluge began. I was able to do the same, though not until my camera equipment managed to get a little wet. Fortunately, my gear is designed to be "weatherproof", so after a quick wipe off, and waiting for the rain to stop, I was able to continue my photo taking.

As mentioned, the darker skies created extra difficulty for some of my shots. Many photos in yesterday's post and this post are at ISO 3200 and ISO 6400. Also, unlike my photos at last year's Dragonfly Festival, this year I decided to take many with my 75-300mm (150-600mm equivalent) telephoto lens. So, while I could "bring the action in closer" for my shots, a few of them were not quite as sharp as I'd like since highly zoomed shots normally require much faster shutter speeds and that's hard to do successfully on a dark day, where one needs to let as much light in through the lens as possible.

This next photo is the only one in this post taken with my 12-40mm lens.

Closer View of Dancer

Idyllic Setting

Brass Player

Sharing Under the Rain

Pushing Off Rain Water With Several Helpers

Dragonfly Festival Organizers Steve and Andrea Enjoying the Event

Dragonfly Studio Color

Gabrielle and Other Vendors

That's Chuck on the left in this next photo. I didn't realize he was in the shot 'till later. He's the official inventor of the floating fire devices.

Street Scene One

Street Scene Two

Water View

Scary Horns

Street Scene Three

Natural Designs

Wooden Delights

Gabrielle Enjoying the Day

Happy Potters

Dragonfly Peeking Out from Behind Tree

More Dragonflies Hanging Around

All photos © 2016, all rights reserved.  Contact me for licensing or to order prints.

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Dragonfly Festival 2016

The third annual Dragonfly Festival celebrating the arts descended upon Ashland this afternoon. Here are some of my favorite photos that I took at the event.

Grace

The Lighting Crew

Fire on Water

Hearts

Beauty Under Cover

AFM Organizers Relaxing

Pass the Kindling

Reflections of an Artist

Young Musician

Gabrielle's Dragonfly Wares

All photos © 2016, all rights reserved.  Contact me for licensing or to order prints.

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Medfield Day

Towns in this part of Massachusetts like to declare a special day each year, usually in September, to celebrate their existence.  I had the good fortune to attend "Medfield Day" a few weeks back. Of course, there were several other towns celebrating the same day as their town day as well. It turns out that Medfield really knows how to throw a proper Town Day celebration.  It was extremely well attended, and many of the activities were designed for kids. The weather was outstanding.

In addition, Deb was invited to do a pottery demo by the Cultural Alliance of Medfield and sell some wares.

My view on events follows below.

Downtown Medfield has a rather nice water feature.  There were varied booths along all sides.

Blue Meets Blue

Splash of Color

Of all the activities I observed at the celebration, I was most pulled in by watching the kids completely engrossed in painting pumpkins, especially when the painters themselves had already had their faces painted.  There was just too much fun going on here!  See for yourself.

Let's Get Dirty

Nice Face Paint Job

Mixing Green

Red Tones Surround Her Butterfly Face

Focused

Total Concentration

You Gotta Love That Expression

Shiny Fire Engine Gauges

Steady Hand

Here's the face painting artist herself.  I wonder who painted her face?

Glitter at Work

Almost Done

This girl takes her face painting very seriously. Her mother, who was standing right next to me, told me this. Such intensity!

The Effect is Complete

As always, Deb gets many interested onlookers who find the clay throwing process intriguing.

Parallel Viewing

This highly cropped photo is a self portrait if you look closely into the lenses.  That's me kneeling to take the shot. You can see Deb throwing too.

Selfie

Artist's Hands

This next one might just be my favorite shot of all the day's pictures. Gifted hands.

How an Artist Plays With Mud

Scrunched Face Onlooker

Is that Cool or What?

How Does She Do That?

All photos © 2015, all rights reserved.  Contact me for licensing or to order prints.

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