A Visual Circus : Photography and the Art of Seeing.

Keys to Copan

2012-01-11T20:57:00.000-08:00

copyrights: Thomas Bollinger Photographer

Copan is the Paris of the lost Mayan Civilization. The modern inhabitants are as mysterious as the ones who seemingly just disappeared off the face of the earth over a 1000 years ago. As you hike thru the jungle forests it becomes apparent that you the hills themselves covered in massive trees and vines are Ten story buildings waiting to be opened and explored... to be continued

Something Old , Something New ... Sepia Tones

2011-12-17T12:24:00.000-08:00

credit: Tom Bollinger

Sepia is a dark brown-grey color, named after the rich brown pigment derived from the ink sac of the common cuttlefish. In toning black and white photography it gives an image a timeless ethereal feel.

I made this image three minutes ago under the dining room table. I felt motivated to do this because of the amazing patience and intelligence my four legged best friend shows constantly. Thisbe sits patiently by and cocks her head quizzically as she watches the damnedest things like her human companions dragging a perfectly good tree into the house and covering it with baubles and trinkets ... Once again interrupting our perfectly good routine of endless walks, treat and lying around the house...

What I really love about the image is that I already know it will be one of my prized posessions long after this holiday season becomes a distant memory. Once Thisbe has gone on to her reward of endless dog treats and bird herding in the sky. This image and a few more is what I will have left to remember her by... It will instantly take me back to those few precious moments under the table and to the unconditional love of a dog...

The Visual Circus finally finds a home...

2011-12-08T06:28:00.000-08:00

Fountainhead Studios

After a lengthy search and and a couple of false starts I've found a place to hang my hat. Thanks to the folks at Fountainhead Studios for making me the newest member of their tribe of artists. Now comes the fun part with the studio build out and move. More photos to follow...

Nature Calls photographic series...

2011-12-01T20:33:00.000-08:00

Nature Calls copyrights: Thomas Bollinger Photographer

Monument Valley in the Navajo Nation usually sums up cinematic visions of John Ford movie panoramas, Forest Gump on the run, or even Dr Who and his time traveling Tardis machine. While traveling out west last summer I stumbled upon this alien artifact in the middle of this great western wasteland.

Searching for a name to describe this extremely odd juxtaposition between man made garbage and the virgin wilds I came up with a photo series and work in progress entitled nature calls. Here is a sneak preview of the series ...

1st Look Nikon D700

2011-11-26T11:34:00.000-08:00

Thisbe credit Tom Bollinger

Today I bought a Nikon D700, It's a full frame digital DSLR. As usual I want to push the envelope on the light sensitivity threshold and shoot with only available light in my house with all the window shades drawn in so almost no light entered. My very reluctant and skeptical dog Thisbe was my model for the 5 minute shoot.. Almost all the frames were shot with a 14mm to 24 2.8 nikkor .. One of the three lenses Nikon aficionados call the holy trinity of lenses. Not bad for a 1st attempt a little shake and a little soft from movement. I'm really impressed with the camera system and it only cost a couple of dog biscuits to get some priceless photos...

Switching Horses in Mid Stream Canon to Nikon 1st Look

2011-10-23T09:35:00.000-07:00

In 1992 I took my last Nikon film cameras ( an old worn out battle tank of an F-3 ) and gave it a proper burial at sea. I launched it off the side of a steamship making way at 18 knots under moonlight into the deepest oceanic trench in the Atlantic . At the bottom of the Saragossa Sea is where that old rusty film camera rests to this very day. This was the dawning of the Canon Eos era and I embraced it with open arms and began my adventure as a young professional photographer. 20 years later I'm looking for a proper cermonial end off for my Canon camera system. I'm thinking steam roller and hot asphalt this time around.

As a well seasoned veteran photographer it's time for a change...

Just to mix things up I'm switching back to Nikons.

It's not as if the Canons were bad, It's more about relearning the visual language I speak using a new set of tools. It's an expensive switch, but worth the effort to make a change every once in a while just for the sake of change.

Here is a first look of the first day back with Nikon.

Whaling in New England

2011-08-27T21:33:00.000-07:00

Humpback Whales feeding..... copyrights: Thomas Bollinger

Shooting an unsuspecting whale while it's busy feeding on small fry can be a entertaining way to spend an afternoon. This pod of whales is in for a bumpy ride close to shore as Hurricane Irene blows up the coast.

ENJOY CAPE COD series...Travel and Destination Images for poster and prints.

2011-08-27T06:30:00.000-07:00

Calm before the storm, A perfect day at the closet point to europe in the continental United States .
Race Point , Provencetown Ma. Friday, August 26th, 2011. This is actually the spot where the pilgrims landed November 1, 1620 before proceeding to establish the Plymouth Colony two months later.

Take the El Train . Chicago

2011-07-24T09:13:00.000-07:00

Copy Rights: Tom Bollinger Photographer L TRAIN SERIES CHICAGO

Copy Rights: Tom Bollinger Photographer L TRAIN SERIES CHICAGO

From the 21st century mass transit series, A portfolio of America's Mass Transit

'L' or El?

The Chicago rapid-transit system is officially nicknamed the 'L'. This name for the CTA rail system applies to the whole system: its elevated, subway, at-grade, and open-cut segments. The use of the nickname dates from the earliest days of the elevated railroads. Newspapers of the late 1880s referred to proposed elevated railroads in Chicago as '"L" roads.The first route to be constructed, the Chicago and South Side Rapid Transit Railroad gained the nickname "Alley Elevated", or "Alley L" during its planning and construction, a term that was widely used by 1893, less than a year after the line opened

Chicago Landcape Photography

2011-07-19T09:24:00.000-07:00

Thomas Bollinger Chicago Landscape Series.. Crown Fountain All rights reserved

Crown Fountain is an interactive work of public art and video sculpture featured in Chicago's Millennium Park, which is located in the Loop community area. Designed by Catalan artist Jaume Plensa, it opened in July 2004.^[ The fountain is composed of a black granite reflecting pool placed between a pair of glass brick towers. The towers are 50 feet (15.2 m) tall,and they use light-emitting diodes (LEDs) to display digital videos on their inward faces. Construction and design of the Crown Fountain cost $17 million.^] Weather permitting, the water operates from May to October, intermittently cascading down the two towers and spouting through a nozzle on each tower's front face.

The secret life of inanimate objects.

2011-06-11T07:16:00.000-07:00

Nothing is truly stable or motionless in this universe. Take an old broken down truck for instance. It may seem as though it's solid and fixed in one place, but what is the truck fundamentally compromised of? Atoms. And modern science has proven to us that all atoms are vibrating non-stop at a frantic speed. So what appears to be unmoving is in fact whirling with motion (at least at a sub-atomic scale). Nothing in this entire universe actually 'rests'. We live in an incessant ocean of motion. Furthermore, it has also been scientifically demonstrated that the atoms of one substance never make direct contact with the atoms of another! What does this mean exactly? Well, it means that there is actually no such thing as 'touching'. When a ball is being bounced on the ground, the ball does not technically 'hit' the ground as the atoms comprising the 'ground' and the atoms comprising the ball are repelled from each other before they collide into each other.

Marine Wildlife Print & Poster Series

2011-06-10T13:35:00.000-07:00

Beautiful Swimmers © Tom Bollinger Photographer Inc.

I'm Working on a series of photos of marine wildlife for publication. Looking for young & hungry designers to work with existing images and create a cohesive branding campaign. Contact me if you know anyone who might fit the bill. thanks! TB

Seeing Colors in Black and White

2011-06-07T11:05:00.000-07:00

Black & White Peacock © Tom Bollinger Photographer

Nature has hard wired our brains to compute and assign color to what we see. It's natures way of aiding us to identify things. Black and white imagery started out that way because of technological limitations in assigning color information. In doing so we discover that from an artistic stand point things seem more interesting. Seeing things in shades of grey makes us pay more attention to lines, textures and shadows. It forces us to see things differently when not distracted by our brains having to think about colors.

Delicate Arch Film, Moab... Letterbox Photos

2011-06-03T09:54:00.000-07:00

Over the last several weeks I have been working on a series of short films mostly in western landscapes, Look for a new section under short films coming soon!

Twilight In Vegas

2011-05-13T23:02:00.000-07:00

Twilight In Vegas Credit Tom Bollinger

Sin City never sleeps.

How Zebra's get their stripes

2011-04-21T05:30:00.000-07:00

Copyrights: Tom Bollinger Photographer

Stripes

It was previously believed that zebras were white animals with black stripes, since some zebras have white underbellies. Embryological evidence, however, shows that the animal's background color is black and the white stripes and bellies are additions of the animal.

A wide variety of hypotheses have been proposed to account for the evolution of the striking stripes of zebras. The more traditional of these (1 & 2, below) relate to camouflage.

1. The vertical striping may help the zebra hide in grass. While seeming absurd at first glance, considering that grass is neither white nor black, it is supposed to be effective against the zebra's main predator, the lion, which is color blind. In addition, even at moderate distances, the striking striping merges to an apparent grey.

2. Another hypothesis is that since zebras are herd animals, the stripes may help to confuse predators - a number of zebras standing or moving close together may appear as one large animal, making it more difficult for the lion to pick out any single zebra to attack.

3. It has been suggested that the stripes serve as visual cues and identification.Although each striping pattern is unique to each individual, it is not known whether zebras can recognize one another by their stripes.

4. One theory suggested by an innovative experiment posits that the disruptive colouration is an effective means of confusing the visual system of the blood-sucking tsetse fly.

5. Alternative theories include that the stripes coincide with fat patterning beneath the skin, serving as a thermo-regulatory mechanism for the zebra, or that wounds sustained disrupt the striping pattern to clearly indicate the fitness of the animal to potential mates.

An Old African Bushman Tale

Long ago, when animals were still new on earth, the weather was very hot, and what little water there was remained in pools and pans. One of these was guarded by a boisterous baboon, who claimed that he was the 'lord of the water' and forbade anyone from drinking at his pool.

When a zebra and his son came down to have a drink, the baboon, who was sitting by his fire, jumped up. 'Go away, intruders,' he barked. 'This is my pool and I am the lord of the water.'

'The water is for everyone, not just for you, monkeyface,' shouted back the zebra's son. 'If you want it, you must fight for it,' returned the baboon in a fine fury, and in a moment the two were locked in combat. Back and forth they went, until with a mighty kick, the zebra sent the baboon flying high up among the rocks of the krantz behind them. The baboon landed with a smack on his seat, and to this day he carries the bare patch where he landed. The zebra staggered back through the baboon's fire, which scorched him, leaving stripes across his white fur. The shock sent the zebra galloping away to the plains, where he has stayed ever since. The baboon and his family, however, remain high up among the rocks where they bark defiance at all strangers, and hold up their tails to ease the smarting of their bald patches.

Los Angeles Class Submarine

2011-04-19T18:48:00.000-07:00

A nuclear submarine can easily stay submerged for several months at a
stretch but there is a limit to the amount of food they can carry as
this has to be brought along on the mission.

Nuclear submarines can produce its own oxygen supply from the water
that surrounds them and there is plenty of that down there!  Like the
International Space Station it has generators that use electrolysis to
split the water molecules into the oxygen for the people to breathe. 
They also carry emergency oxygen cannisters should there be a problem
and they need to surface.

The carbon dioxide and toxic gases that build up within the submarine
are adsorbed onto scrubbers that clean the air, again similar to how
the International Space Station does this.  A simple air scrubber is
soda lime which traps the CO2 from the air.

The real question is...Do bees know when elephants are angry ???

2011-03-01T16:09:00.000-08:00

Bull Elephant copyrights: Tom Bollinger

Excerpt from British Wired Magazine... Elephants have a specific call to warn the herd of the presence of angry bees.

A team of scientists from Oxford University, Save the Elephants, and Disney’s Animal Kingdom studied elephant families, including individuals that the team already knew, in the Samburu and Buffalo Springs National Reserves in Kenya.

Scientists know from previous studies that the elephants will make a specific noise to mark the impending arrival of a calf as well as warn of the presence of humans but wanted to test whether any other perceived dangers would have a call. The team also knew that elephants will flee when a bee colony is accidentally disturbed, but set about recording the elephants' actual reactions.

"In our experiments we played the sound of angry bees to elephant families and studied their reaction," explains Lucy King who led the research. "Importantly we discovered elephants not only flee from the buzzing sound but make a unique 'rumbling' call as well as shaking their heads."

Lucky Shuttle Launch date 2/24/11 STS-133

2011-02-26T13:03:00.000-08:00

A spectacular launch after a long wait.

copyrights: Tom Bollinger photographer

STS-133 was originally manifested for launch on 16 September 2010. In June 2010 the launch date was moved to the end of October 2010 and the mission was set to take place before STS-134, which in turn had been rescheduled to February 2011. STS-133 had the longest vertical flow period (170 days)

Mr Peacock lives upon our rooftop

2011-02-22T08:02:00.000-08:00

copyrights: Tom Bollinger photographer

Having just moved into an old house that no one has lived in for years in an urban tropical forest, It's an old coral house in the Northeast Grove built during the Great Depression. When people ask us to describe the style of architecture and design the term Mayan shabby chic is usually the first description that comes to mind .. We have discovered we have a host of new furry and feathered friends living in our midst, in reality we are the interlopers. The afternoon avaian strut starts on our rooftop an hour or two before sunset and is followed by a host of activities involving the the entire tribe it a long list of mating and display rituals that is a constant source of amusement... To be continued later...

Orchid History

2011-02-11T07:00:00.000-08:00

Millions of years ago, as dinosaurs roam the earth and primordial forests thrive, flowering plants were beginning to evolve and carpet the ground with their fascinating colors and sweet smelling scent. One of these floral plants was the orchid. As the earth begins to age and new species emerge, the orchid family continues to grow and expand to all regions of the world except Antarctica. People become fascinated with this exotic and unique plant, making orchid history very interesting.

It was the Japanese and Chinese drawings and literatures around 700 B.C. that described the importance of the orchid as an herbal cure for maladies and other illnesses. While dating back to the early Greeks, the history of orchids shows that this flower was once associated with virility of man, thus the name orchid originated from the Greek word "orchis" referring to word for testicle. Over the years, it has been a symbol of love, magnificence and beauty.

Moreover, in Greek times, they believe that an orchid can determine the sex of the unborn baby. If parents would like to have a son, the father would eat large tubers of the orchid. If they want a daughter, the expectant mother then eat the orchid's small tubers. Orchid tubers are known as part of the plant-giving stored nutrients during the dry and winter periods. They never have actual records showing the correlation between the baby's sex and the orchid eaten, nevertheless, the plant played an important role in their culture during that time.

Orchid history tells us how this flower was used as an aphrodisiac and a food ingredient such as ice cream. A Spanish conquistador named Cortez discovered the orchid among the Aztecs in Mexico in 1519. He was given a vanilla flavored cacao drink. Evidently, the natural vanilla extract came from the orchid Vanilla planifoli. The Aztecs were the first to cultivate the extract from the orchid to use as a drink, an aphrodisiac, healing herbs, and as well as perfume.

A Mexican tale tells of a story of young lovers who were punished by the gods for trying to elope. On the ground where they fell grew an orchid resembling the embrace of two lovers.

Orchids were unknown in Britain until 1568 until imports from the West Indies and China came. The Royal Botanic Gardens in London started growing 15 species around 1700's and had a hard time growing more variety because of the difficulty of cultivating it outside its native environment.

Windows of the Soul

2011-02-09T10:39:00.000-08:00

Rhonda's Eye photo credit: Tom Bollinger

They call the eyes the windows of the soul for good reason. The soulful look in a puppy's face; the wide eyed look of astonishment; the glazed look of someone not in control are 'expressions' of the feelings and emotions. We can tell so much from a person's eyes because they reveal so much of the true person inside.

We can also read other things about that person from the way they use their eyes.
It is called NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming). Basically we use 3 ways to recall information from the brain. For most people they use one predominantly; it is the way they view things in life.

The neurological system regulates how our bodies function, language determines how we interface and communicate with other people and our programming determines the kinds of models of the world we create. Neuro-Linguistic Programming describes the fundamental dynamics between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic) and how their interplay affects our body and behaviour (programming).

About one in 23 people are also capable of synaesthesia - the ability to connect a word, smell, taste, touch or sight with a specific memory, and to do it in startling clarity. Many of these people also have what we call 'photographic memory' and are mostly visual people with extremely well defined other senses.

Doggy Vision

2011-02-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

Thisbe's Eye photo credit: Tom Bollinger

There are a number of myths associated with dog eyesight. Most of the dog owners believe that their canine friend are totally color blind. While it is true that dogs rely more on their olfactory and auditory senses more than the eyesight, a dog's sight is as important to it. The only difference is that, compared to humans, dogs see the world from a different visual perspective.

The reason for this dog eyesight development is very simple. Dogs are predators and unlike the prey animals that have eyes on the sides of their heads to increase the field of vision, dogs have an eyesight that increases its ability to focus on the prey and distinguish texture, brightness and most importantly the movement. Moreover, unlike humans, the dog eyesight has a broader field of vision, they have excellent night vision as well...

Personal Green Space

2011-02-04T05:06:00.000-08:00

photo credit: Tom Bollinger, Poolside Miami Beach

Personal space is highly variable. Those living in a densely populated places tend to have a smaller personal space. Residents of India tend to have a smaller personal space than those in the Mongolian steppe, both in regard to home and individual.

Personal space has changed historically together with the boundaries of public and private in European culture since the Roman Empire. This topic have been explored in A History of Private Life, under the general editorship of Philippe Ariès and Georges Duby, published in English by the Belknap Press.

Personal space is also affected by a person's position in society with more affluent individuals demanding a larger personal space.

People make exceptions to, and modify their space requirements. A number of relationships may allow for personal space to be modified and these include familial ties, romantic partners, friendships and close acquaintances where a greater degree of trust and knowledge of a person allows personal space to be modified

Great Blue

2011-02-03T04:31:00.000-08:00

Photo Credit: Tom Bollinger Photographer

The Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) is a large wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common near the shores of open water and in wetlands over most of North and Central America as well as the West Indies and the Galápagos Islands. It is a rare vagrant to Europe, with records from Spain, the Azores and England.