Tree Faller shares his point of view

Frame by Frame

By Suzette Cook-Mankins

If your were lucky enough to combine your all of passions in life and then share it with the your friends, family, and the world, you’d be as lucky as GF Baranek- Jerry B to his friends.
For Gerald Beranek, a top notch tree feller fella, it’s always been about photography and anything tree related: climbing feliing, and photography.
It wasn’t often that If your family has a history here in Mendocino County, chances are that part of that history involves the timbe industry. Maybe your grandpa worked for the old saw mill at Fort Bragg or your aunt drove a logging truck or an uncle who actually climbed trees and felled from above.
1. This is the second printing. when was the first and how many copies have been sold? the first printing came out in Oct of 96. There was 5,000 printed. Also I would like you to know that Bill Bailey of Laytonville paid for it so I could get on my feet and pay for the second printing through the sales.
2. Where can locals buy this book?Mendo Museum in Willets, Leaves of Grass book store in Willets, Gallery Books in Mendocino, Cheshire books in Ft. Bragg. Or order direct from me. Beranek Publications, Box 251, Ft. Bragg
3. Do i have permission to run the author photo of you taken by Charly Pottorff if we credit him/her? Permission is given
4. What photo in the book was your biggest challenge to get? Probably captureing the moment when the top of the Rockport tree was falling. It took months of planning to get it just right. Though it was Charly Pottorff that actually took the shot it was my camera, film, choice of lens, focal length and angle that made it what it turned out to be. A great shot
5. What advice can you give today's photogs on how to get quality photos while shooting in the woods and dense forests? In the woods always use a tripod and shoot on lite overcast days, and use small apretures
6. What was your first camera and what do you shoot with now? I shot 35mm for over 40s years. Nikon was my camera of choice..Starting early on with a Nikon S2. Today I have a Sony digital. Though I am more into video for the moment.
7. Where else have your images been published or displayed? Very often on the coverd of Bill Balileys mail order catalogs and throughout. Have won a number of recognition awards for my work through various local events
8. Do you have any future publishin projects in the works or photo projects? Currently working on a vocational video series all about tree work. Hopefully it will be done this year. though it may not.
9. Any advice for someone thinking of putting out a coffee table book? The price of printing full color table top books has never been lower. High Climbers was a very extensive work with nearly 400 images taken over 35 years. another 1 year spent writing the stories, another six months proofing them and $60,000 to the printer...... you have a comtemporary history of old growth logging on the Mendocino Coast. Other comtemporary works can easily be made about the local happenings in the area, fishing, farming, milling, development. Times are changing quick and the present is the best time to record it. It leaves for a lot less digging and guessing about names dates and places in the future.

Suzette Cook-Mankins is a 20 year veteran of photojournalism. Send comments, questions, requests to mizdigital.com

Frame by Frame

By Suzette Cook-Mankins

Photos on the Go: Documenting your travels


Grab your ID or passport, throw in a swimsuit, flip flops, some maps, a handful of clothes and snacks for the plane ride. WE ARE ON SPRING BREAK! Oh, wait. Don't forget your camera and these easy to follow tips on how to make the best travel photos ever.

Tone it down

You don't want to worry about technical stuff when you're on vacation, so don't bring all of your fancy gear. One camera body plus an automatic wide to telephoto zoom lens is enough. Better yet, your point-and-shoot digital camera and a couple of extra batteries with a recharging device will fit in a waist pouch and really be hassle free.

Travel photo topics

If you truly want to reveal all about the places you visit, make sure your photographs represent each of these subjects: architecture, natives at play, natives at work, details, faces, food, local news and events, Norman Rockwell moments (aka humor), scenery, transportation and self-portraits.

Architecture

The structures that house citizens, national treasures or government branches say it all about a country or a city. Whether it be the ancient ruins of Pompei, the newly constructed shingled roofs of Assisi or the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., each of these buildings defines the culture that built them. Take full building photos and detail or close-up shots of parts of the buildings you find interesting.

Natives at Play

What do the locals do for fun? Once you locate them, photograph their hobbies or activities and then do as the Romans do and join them! If you're in Italy, it's bocce, in Bermuda, it's cricket. Figure out a way to get a good angle of locals at leisure.

Natives at Work

It's so interesting to see how other countries and cities function in day-to-day life. In Venice, all traffic comes in the form of water transportation, so when they make postal deliveries or taxi you to your hotel, it's from a boat. In a train station in Assisi, the sweeper passes by a regular commuter who lifts his feet just in time for the maintenance man to do his job. Take the picture!
Details

This means getting up close and personal with people, objects, animals, anything you choose. Look at textures of linens hanging on a clothesline, the pointed tips of gondolas, a furry coconut that has just landed on the beach. Take a quick photo and closely look at your close-ups when you've returned home as a reminder of the subtle details that you might want to remember.

Faces

Meeting and connecting with people are why we travel as much as we like to say it's the scenery. Photograph the young and old at their best and worst. Close-ups of faces reveal character. Candids (unaware of the camera) are best and most honest. Be sure they are comfortable being photographed. You can grab a candid but if you're spotted, you are obliged to say hello and ask for permission to continue.

Food

Baked apples in brown sugar surrounded by fresh cut fruits all strategically placed over a hand-woven linen table cloth. Breakfast in Italy, please document this delicious sight so you can brag to your friends about eating on an open, sunlit terrace each morning. Will they believe you when you describe how different pizza is in Italy where it was invented? Bring back the proof.

Local Events and News

Try to attend an event that is planned for locals, not necessarily for tourists. Like the inauguration of a new mayor in Cozumel or the championship soccer match between Roma and Parma. In Italy, a championship soccer game means closed streets and thousands of fans circling the Coliseum with flags waving from car windows. It also means carabinieri (swat team) all about, so know your rules and local language and stay safe.

Norman Rockwell Moments aka Humor

For sixty years this artist chronicled the American scene. He painted common people in common, relatable situations and the drawings ended up in the Saturday Evening Post. He captured humans beings human. Now it's your turn. Try to capture a moment in your vacation spot that anyone can relate to. Two teen-agers wringing out their shirts after running around a water fountain on a hot day in Roma. Youngsters having trouble deciding on which flavor of gelato to order. Been there, done that. Moments that make you chuckle when you witness them make for great images that you can show to friends and co-workers and pass the chuckle on.

Scenery

These are hard to mess up because we usually travel to destinations that are off-the-charts amazing. When you finally settle down and decide to photograph a scene, try putting the horizon line in the bottom or top third of the image to avoid cutting the frame in half. Photograph as the traditional horizontal and then shoot the same scene vertically. Now comes the depth part. If you make sure there is an object in the foreground and middle ground and let the scene go out in the distance, it will put the viewer right where you were when you made the photograph. Try framing your scene by shooting through a window or let vines or other foliage wrap around the landscape like a photo frame.

Transportation

How you get around once you reach your destination is a story in itself. In Cozumel it's VW Bugs with fabric convertible tops you roll back. In Italy it's trains, subways, ferries, bicycles and gondolas. Each system has distinct characteristics and distinct photo opportunities. Capture the mechanical and aesthetic nature of your rides. Shoot them coming and going, interiors and exteriors. Keep safe while you shoot, don't try anything crazy from those mopeds in Bermuda.

Self-portraits

It's ok to be a tourist and be in front of the camera, not always behind it. So if the guys dressed like gladiators at the Coliseum in Roma drag you into a photo to hail Caesar, laugh it up and have fun. Then run to the nearest photo lab, print out a dozen copies and mail them home as postcards. If you're traveling alone remember to take photos of yourself on a timer, by turning the camera back at yourself or by finding abstracts like reflections or shadows of yourself.

Buy a Postcard

It's okay to purchase postcards featuring your favorite sites. You don't have to feel guilty about it, really. That lit up image of the Statue of Liberty took a pro photog 50 lights and a crew of five to capture, so it's fine to spend a quarter for it. Take the pressure off of yourself and focus on capturing memories that only you have access to and know you'll appreciate later. Bringing back brochures, pamphlets, and postcards with photos as souveniers will only enhance your scrapbook and give you details to spark your memory later.

Memories and Memory and Tech advice

If you're shooting film be sure to pack a variety of ASA's and lots of it. Bulk packs are a smart buy. If you travel overseas, it's best to have your film developed locally and bring negatives and prints back. If you're digital you'll want to make sure you have plenty of memory, 2 gigabytes ought to do it or the ability to download to a laptop or external drive and burn backup CDs before erasing your memory cards and starting over. Always shoot at your largest file size if you're digital camera is rated at 5 megapixels or less. It's safe to shoot at medium quality with digital cameras rated at 6.0 megapixels or higher. Always shoot in color knowing that you can convert images to black and white later. You might want to try capturing a digital movie or two by setting your digital camera to the movie setting. This will create moving images and capture sound.

Local Ain't So Bad

If you're not leaving the country or leaving the state or leaving the county or even leaving town, take a day to explore where you live through the eyes of a travel photographer. Try applying all of this advice to photographing your home town. We choose to live in gorgeous Mendocino County for a reason. Try to remember why you landed here. Happy Trails!

Suzette Cook-Mankins is 20 year veteran of photojournalism. Send comments, questions, requests to mizdigital.com

Photographing Gray Whales can be puzzling

Frame by Frame

By Suzette Cook-Mankins

There is a 47 foot-long exact size jigsaw puzzle of a California Gray Whale at Point Cabrillo Lighthouse on the coast. If you’ve seen it, or better yet, if your kids have played a part in piecing it together, you understand the fascination with it and also the great educational value that this artwork thought up by Site Manager Lisa Weg has become. Coastal Artist J.D. Mayhew created the masterpiece with the help of fellow artist Katherine Smith as a way to give perspective on whale sizes which range from 35 to 50 feet in length. It was 9 years ago that the puzzle made it’s debut during a whale migration and festival season.

This photographer is also a puzzle-doer working on a whale puzzle of her own. After three years and five trips out to sea in winter and spring, draped in gear and layered in waterproof coverings, three pieces to the elusive Eschrictius Robustus (Gray Whale) puzzle exist. A spout, a back hump and a tail fin. Four if you count a splash left over from a missed breach .
If you dare to try to capture this amazing migrating beast, which will continue to pace up the Mendocino and Fort Bragg coastline through the end of April, here’s some "learned it the hard way" advice.

Morning or Afternoon

Pick an early morning or a 3 p.m. ride out to sea to avoid the five foot swells and white caps that seem to form in the middle of the day. White caps make it hard to distinguish where a spout is spraying and swells prevent a steady eye for the photographer, not to mention probable sea sickness. Take Dramamine if you have ever had a hint of sea sickness in the past.

Point and shoot vs. manual

Set your manual lens for the smallest aperture possible which means the most depth of field for focus. F-11 or f-22 will help more distance be in focus, whereas a f-2.8 allows only a few feet in your focal range. Whales appear with little notice and you’ll need that focal cushion. On a cloudy day, 400 ISO, f-11 at one 500th of a second ought to do it, but check your light meter. Automatic folks be ready as well. With digital cameras turn the screen off, if you can, to save battery power. That way you can leave your camera on longer without running out of energy. Always set your image quality on high or maximum so you can crop images later and still print them at a large size with sharpness and clarity. You will be depending on spotting the whale first with the naked eye then putting the camera to your eye. If you own two camera bodies try a 55mm (normal) on one and your largest zoom or telephoto on the other. A 300mm is a great lens for distance photographs.

Group project

The best way to approach this assignment: team work. You and your traveling companions should divide the boat into port (left) starboard (right) and bow (front) and stearn (back). If you have all of the bases covered, your chances will skyrocket. If you’re the only photog, position yourself where you can easily switch from side to side or if you want the best view go to the bow but beware of errant waves reaching you and your gear. Watch the deck hand very closely and remember, if the captain and crew don’t get you a sighting, they might have a mutiny on their hands, so they are very motivated to be spotters.

Anchor yourself

You will need to hold steady while you click your shutter release. When the boat swells or rocks the odds are against you. Try a side of the boat and brace your back against the cabin and your leg against the boat rim for support. This will lock you in and keep your arms free for camera gear use. If you have a non photographer travel partner or a spouse, you can lean on them and ask for support as well.

Shoot first, edit later

Don’t try to evaluate your success while you’re on the boat. Don’t show off your photos to other photogs and spectators either. Chances are you’ll miss a better shot in the process and tie up your digital screen which drains batteries. Wait until you’re back on land or heading to the docks for a sneak peek.

Check for Salt Water

Your camera gear will be misted with sea water throughout your trip so you’ll need to wipe down lenses and any metal that is affected. Lenses should always have a protective UV glass filter on them. You can clean that glass filter with lens tissue and Windex if necessary. Check your owner’s manual for cleaning digital point and shoot lenses.

Chin up

If you should miss capturing the great Gray Whale, try try again. It’s fun to get out to sea and experience the power of nature, feel the wind in your hair, and get great photos of the coastline that you can’t see from land. Catch the sea lions on buoys, photograph the boats you pass, and know that you helped support a fishing vessel and its crew during the off season.

Don’t miss the man-made whale

On your way home, even if you’ve had a successful whale sighting, check out another "gray whale" that is always still and ready to be photographed. Pull over by Van Peer's Boatyard on Highway 20 and take a look at his 29th seafaring commercial fishing boat built from scratch and started almost a year ago. You get the same feeling of seeing this massive gray vessel knowing her prowess at sea. She will be launched in a few months to head to Oregon, and along her journey will most likely swim side by side with the California Gray Whale.

Suzette Cook-Mankins is a 20 year veteran of photojournalism. Send comments, questions, requests to www.mizdigital.com

Discover, digitize and restore your photographs-before it’s too late

Frame by Frame

By Suzette Cook-Mankins

It was a casual conversation between a man and his son-in-law in Dallas months ago that lead to the discovery of unstudied footage of the day that John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Amateur photographer George Jefferies casually mentioned that he was in Dallas on the day JFK was shot and that he had recorded 8mm footage of the parade which took place over 40 years ago. His son-in-law encouraged him to make that footage count. Gary Mack, the curator of the Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas, a designated life and death of JFK space, received the footage as a donation and was able to determine that it was made 90 seconds before the assassination happened. A valuable clue to an unsolved mystery was revealed and can be seen on www.jfk.org
How many more historical moments and clues and recordings of major events and historical leaders remain undiscovered or hidden in trunks or closets belonging to our aunts, uncles, parents or grandparents? Ask around and you might be surprised.
I mentioned the story to my 65 year-old mother who informed me that my Aunt Betty in New York has 8mm footage of Robert Kennedy visiting Batavia, NY, the town I was born in 40 years ago. Apparently, family members got together over the summer and had a viewing of these historical homemade movies.

Now that I’ve made this discovery, my next step is to figure out how to update the footage into a format more accessible and in sync with today’s technology. Those 8mm movies need to be converted now to DVD or digitial movie files and then in years to come into whatever the next popular movie format is. Perhaps this update in format assignment belongs to your family's genealogist- that one cousin who has the most extensive collection of family photos and a map of the family tree. Or maybe each family member should offer to digitize the photographs they have in their possession and then combine the collection and make copies.

For still frame photographs of history, we need to make it a priority to scan or digitize these prints that are probably beginning to rip or fade. Ukiah's local VFW along with Ukiah High School's ROP Photo Department did their part to digitally capture and restore over 500 images last month. Many discoveries were made during the editing of photographs donated by 30 Ukiah residents who allowed digital copies to be made of photos taken by themselves or relatives serving in World War I, World War II, Korea,Vietnam and Iraq.

Ukiah resident and World War II Platoon Sergeant Richard M. Hicks brought in photographs he took of Winston Churchill reviewing British troops in 1941. Morey McCloud shared the telegram his parents received in 1945 announcing his P.O.W. release status and entered his prisoner photo into the VFW's image library.

Other contributors included Bill Davies, one of six first sailors to go to war in 1940; P-47 Fighter Bomber Pilot Neal E. Worley, whose live combat footage ended up being used in a hollywood flick about fighter pilots; Vietnam Vet Phil Champion's images documenting his tour of duty; Irene Young's collection of women in military service including announcements about her own service; Mary Lynn Hunt's images or relatives serving WWI, WWII including discharge papers; Diane Poma Champion's WWII images of Arthur Poma; Bill Shambaugh's photos of four generations of military from 1918 to current duty in Iraq. Some Veteran's brought medals and scrapbook volumes of The Pictorial History of WWII. Thanks also to Eugene L. Davis, Billy L. Moore, Richard Hamilton, Lee Butcher, Curtis Glasscock, George Artemoff, Coordinator Don Spurlock and Ukiah VFW Officers and members, Dennis Aseltyne, Albert Hardie and Ted Hester who contributed a narrated digital story of his military service.

Ready to Digitize?

If you're ready to take on the project there's a few ways to approach digitizing and restoring images. For 8mm try checking with your local photo store to see if the service is offered. If you have internet, look up www.just8mm.com for reasonable pricing. For still images there's two ways to digitize images. You can scan them in at home at 200 percent and a resolution of 300. Then open the images in an editing program such as Adobe PhotoShop ($175) or the cheaper suggested program Adobe Elements (used or new $20-$99). These programs allow you to crop, convert to grayscale (black and white) and adjust tones and colors and sharpness.
If you don't own a scanner you can set your digital camera on high quality, zoom in slightly to a 55mm or normal focal distance but not into the telephoto end of your camera's zoom range. Turn the flash off. Put your photo into a well lit area such as the kitchen counter with all lights on or on a table on your shaded porch during a sunny day. Make sure the photograph is not in direct sunlight.

Take a photo of the photograph filling the camera view frame as full as possible. Then download the images and start opening, cropping and adjusting them to look as close to new as possible.Save each image with a name (also called "slug") that represents the subject and year of the photo. Burn a CD and print a corresponding thumbnail sheet of those photos. Set up a three ring binder and slip the contact sheet into a clear page protector, then slip the CD into that same page protector.

Be sure to label the CD directly using a sharpie. Describe the subject and include the date as well. Be sure to share the new digital library with family members especially those in upcoming generations and explain what the collection includes.
You might consider making this a family project and coincide it with your next family get together or family reunion. It's a great way to celebrate heritage and insure that future generations are aware of their family history.

Suzette Cook-Mankins is a 20 year veteran of photojournalism. Send comments, questions, requests to www.mizdigital.com

Photos under agua

Frame by frame
By Suzette Cook-Mankins

Making digital photos under agua

COZUMEL, MEXICO - You’re going on a trip to a tropical paradise and want to show off your snorkeling adventure with amazing images of exotic underwater creatures. Up until now, you’ve had good luck with those point-and-shoot disposable film cameras that you can buy at any grocery or drug store. But the thought of having to carry two sets of camera gear: one for capturing those great sunsets and another for the subsurface scene is more bulk than you’re ready to bear considering you plan to be a beach bum on your vacation. With each technology boost that enters the digital photography industry, it seems our photo lives are made easier. The latest trend in digital camera underwater housing allows amateurs and photo aficionados to dive into underwater photography while still having the option to shoot on land. It’s the best of both worlds.

For this assignment I chose to purchase a Nikon Coolpix 4300 digital camera and Fantasea CP-4 underwater housing. Total cost: $199 for the camera, $149 for the housing. This 4.0 megapixel camera is not the latest Coolpix model but the underwater housing availability for the latest digital cameras is limited.

I also chose this model because it uses the same compact flash memory card system that I use in my professional gear. In the warm salt waters off Cozumel, Mexico I chose to submerge this camera snapped into an air and water tight case that still allowed me to press the control buttons needed to make great images. Here’s a fin by fin guide on what I discovered during my first under agua digital shoot.

Go sans camera first time out

The first time you make a snorkel adventure, don’t bring the camera. Your senses are overloaded with schools of fish and coral combinations and you can’t figure out what to take a photo of. The next thing you know, you’re thirty frames into the memory card and only a minute has gone by. It’s best to familiarize yourself with the local fish species by studying up on them before you get there or by purchasing an identifying chart at a dive shop. Once you have had a glimpse of the world you’re about to photograph, then go get your gear and start shooting.

The deeper, the bluer, the darker

Snorkeling is best for your first underwater photo adventure. The light beneath the surface of the ocean drops off quickly. Because the ocean absorbs magenta, your images become darker blue the farther you get from the sun and surface. You might think about trying the color balance adjustment on your digital. A White Balance mode can offset the blues your camera will pick up. Or, you can choose to shoot as is and desaturate the blues later on your computer. Live screenOne of the great advantages to underwater digital, is the ability to look at the live screen instead of trying to look through the view piece while your bouncing around in the motion of the ocean. Looking through that tiny rectangle is very difficult. Turn your live screen on right before you place the camera in the housing and take note of the battery life on your first snorkel. I found that after about 25 minutes, it wasn’t the battery life I had to worry about, it was fogging inside of the camera because the battery

temperature rises as you use the camera. Once you know the

battery and fog cycles of your gear, you can plan accordingly.

High angles

A high angle is a view from above. You’ll want to avoid always shooting down at your subject. Using your live screen view extend your arm out below and level your camera to be even with the subject. You can take a deep breath and get some depth if you see a great image thats well below you. Try snorkeling around the beach areas where the coral and reef areas are near the surface. This is where you get your great light and reachable subjects.

Digital delay

All digital cameras have a delay from the time you press the shutter release until the actual shutter releasing. Practice with your camera on the timing of the delay. Fish can be very unpredictable and you will suddenly find yourself in the middle of a silver school. Your reaction needs to be extra fast to make up for the delay. I found that for every 20 images one or two were right on and the rest were tails of fish that had passed by and the camera could respond fast enough. With digital you can shoot and shoot without the guilt or cost that film cameras bring.

Look for Moments and Contrast

A lot of underwater photography tends to look like product shots. Here’s a lobster, here’s a parrot fish, here’s a turtle. Try to capture a moment in your underwater photos. Two barracuda circling with a tail swinging around is compelling in content and composition. Try to control the contrast of your subjects and accentuate by photographing a light blue fish as is passes a dark mass of coral. Once you get used to the many underwater colors and textures, you can start to plan your photos as you watch certain fish and look for behavior patterns.Wait and watch for the right moment that captures the subject with a deliberate background.

Balancing act

With the constant motion in the ocean, you’ll need to figure out how to steady the camera during a photo while your body is being moved by the current. Shooting with an extended arm and using your fins and other arm against the current or motion helps. If you move the camera during the shutter release it will capture a blur.

Memory and removal

After your first time out, it’s best to download you work and analyze it asap so you can make room for improvement. Each time you remove the gear from the ocean there are specifics on how to clean it, and dry it. You’ll want to carefully follow the housing instructions. I rinsed the housing thoroughly and let dry completely before removing the camera from its sealed case. You can bring a laptop computer for file downloading or a more compact portable hard drive when traveling with a digital camera. I make sure to copy from the memory to the hard drive, then burn a cd back up, then delete from the memory card and start all over.

Finding the right set up

The internet or your local photo store are the best places to research your underwater digital photography options. A search for "underwater housing" through any search engine will yield many results. You should check first to see if there is an existing housing unit available for your current digital camera. If not, it may be time to trade up anyway and you’ll get a great second digital camera to add to the household. It’s a win win situtation. And although it went against every instinct to submerge a camera in salt water after a lifetime of protecting my gear, the underwater digital housing opened up a new world and subject for me.

Suzette Cook-Mankins is a 20 year veteran of photojournalism. Send comments, questions, requests to www.mizdigital.com