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Artwork on the Outside Wall of a Reception Venue

I've photographed this artwork many times before, but I usually isolate the art so you can't see any of the surrounding area.  Today I decided to include some of the reception venue to give the building a little more perspective. 

It was a warm overcast day, so the colors really popped.  The artist, Cal, has done many other artworks on buildings in town.  I like his work.

Special Christmas Service and High ISO

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 Every December my church holds a special pre-Christmas Sunday evening service.  That service took place two days ago. We sing many Christmas Carols from the hymnal, there is a lot of other music and Scripture is read chronicling the prophecy of and the birth of Christ.  Following the service there is always a food reception, the reputation of which precedes the event and spreads far and wide.  

I always go about an hour early. That way I can photograph to my heart's content without interfering with the somber but joyous nature of the event.  I refuse to use flash though and because the service takes place at night when there's no ambient light from outside, I have to bump the ISO up pretty high.  Even after all these years of using a digital camera and experimenting with high ISO and knowing how good the cameras of today are, I still almost hyperventilate when going past 800 or so.

But I had to go high in spite of my stubborn innate resistance. So I tried 1200--no good.  Then 1600--no good.  Then 2000--still no good but getting close.  Finally up to 2500 and knew I didn't have to go any higher.  Whew, I was getting nervous.  My camera is excellent at those ISOs, I need to learn to relax and just go with what's necessary to get the images.

It was a great evening and I'm pretty happy with the images.  They'll be a nice addition to the church history scrapbooks.