Because the sensor in a digital SLR camera is typically smaller than the 35 mm film that it replaced, the physics of the focal point of the lens are changed. This is known as "The Field of View Crop Factor" or sometimes "The Focal Length Multiplier". The net result means your long lens becomes longer and your wide lens becomes narrower.

Wildlife photographers sing the praises of The Focal Length Multiplier because their 200 mm telephoto lens effectively becomes a 320 mm lens. Creative photographers hate it because now a 24 mm lens becomes a 38 mm lens and you can never get wide enough.

My personal lens investment is from the pre-digital era, so I never had the chance to compensate for this effect. All of my lens became too long for many of my purposes. I satisfy my need for wide by occasionally renting a 14 mm ultra-wide lens (effective focal length of 22 mm), which reminds me of the good old days, when a wide lens was truly a wide lens.

Wide is a lot of fun and it also allows me to keep the header imagery fresh.

The definition of penumbra is 'almost shadow' or 'almost dark' (or light). Penumbra is typically used to describe events in astronomy, such as when an eclipse occurs.

In photography, penumbra is a unique opportunity to capture texture and atmosphere in an almost occult-like light. A strip club has always struck me as kind of sad and desperate. I have been meaning to take this photo for years but the highway has been re-routed and it is especially tricky to get to. This isn't exactly the effect I was looking for (drizzle and water puddles would have been ideal), but I liked the emotion the headlights provided.

Jake's strip club is located in Coates, Minnesota. It had a litigious relationship with the community and for years the town continually passed laws to close it down. In 2002 the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled finally that the town was within it's authority to close Jake's. In an unwise effort to vote the local politicians out of office, Jake's owner had 92 patrons (sometimes called rummy's) fill out voter registration cards, using the strip club as their home address.

You don't mess with the feds. It is never a good idea to break federal voting fraud laws and especially in such a stupid manner. Several hundred thousand dollars later, the case was finally settled. The bar never did reopen and it has been vacant ever since. No doubt it will be torn down and the opportunity to capture Jake's in penumbra light will be gone forever.

Many years ago, a very good framing customer brought in this beautiful antique jigsaw puzzle to be framed. It was from the turn of the 19th century and the construction itself is a work of art. The pieces are scroll sawed and several pieces themselves are shaped as children's toys (monkeys, toy soldiers, etc.). It is a remarkable example of craftsmanship.

The only problem was that a single piece of the puzzle was missing. This seemed very tragic and because of the depth of the puzzle, it was as obvious as a missing tooth on a beautiful model in a toothpaste ad. But, it is what it is, and since it had been in her family for many, many years, it was decided to frame it up regardless, as is.

Jump ahead several years to the present...the customer removes a drawer from a dresser and low-and-behold the missing puzzle piece reappears from behind the drawer.

There is something very therapeutic in knowing that the missing puzzle piece will soon be reunited with its brothers and sisters and now the picture is complete.

The Lord works in mysterious ways.

Yoshitomo Nara is a 51 year old Japanese pop artist that has been influenced by anime and punk rock.  His sculptures seem cartoonish in nature and are typically animals or children.  Very often his subjects will have contradictory elements such as weapons or accusatory looks that belie their wide-eyed expressions.
 
The interesting thing about Nara is his consistency.  Artists like Nara have this pursuit of the same relentless vision regardless of the critics.  Nara says he is helpless in this matter because he is compelled to create them.
 
This fiberglass sculpture is called “Your Dog” and is part of the permanent collection at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.