This is the first in a series of posts on the trip I took to Sudan as apart of the Hoslton Conference of the UMC Mission Intern Team. From the preparation to the packing to the travelling & to the actual experiences, it was a God-led mission. The team worked very well with each other and I saw no disrespect taken to any of the leaders or to the Sudanese. The entire experience is something that is and will be hard to put into words. The stories I will share will only begin to uncover daily life and shine the light of the living saints.

Along the way, I have lots of photos to share. The "angle" I tried to use in my film shots was to show the dicotomy of the peoples. There is a lot to be upset and ungrateful about. There is very little clean water & sustainable foods, power struggles, uncertainty in the government, uncertainty in the future of the country, & etc. The people understand that they have nothing and that they don't have the necessary skills and education to acheive long lasting goals and long lasting effects in their communities and country. Even through the struggles they "remember their God" and know he is doing great things in Sudan. Their is an unfathomable amount of hope and joy in the people. The only way I can explain it is that they don't have hope in political systems or economic systems, they truly have their hope in the blood of Jesus. This remarkable reality is truly humbling to witness. It breaks all barriers of the heart, mind, and soul.

To experience this, it completely made even the littlest Western thinking/living seem worthless to me. Even now, it is hard to go to my retail job and work, come home to my quaint little abode and sit around a TV or computer to be entertained. I know it is different to live in any culture and I know that society and life is how you make it, so I have to come to terms with Western culture. I guess what I'm saying is that I want to make the most of living here with multitudes of opportunity while knowing that it is a privilege and that the majority world does not have these opportunities.

With all of this, they see mission work, such as the continuing efforts by the Holston Conference and other long term missions of other churches and organizations as a positive thing. I speak in terms of the Holston Conference because that is what I've had the most exposure to. The people continually were thankful that we "came back" and promise to "come back." It's amazing what a mere presence can do. We know that just being there is not enough, but it is a start. We were the eighth team to go to Sudan and from what one of our trip leaders (who had been 3 times prior), said things had already changed a lot since the first mission 2006. Even in the four months that Holston's long term missionaries, Boo & Phyllis Hankins, have been there, things have changed. These changes range from population to roads/road improvement to church leadership and organization.

I invite you to open your hearts and receive the living stories of Sudan and its people. There are parts where the reality is not fair and not very pretty, but without it the stories cannot be honestly told. Hopefully though, through the next few weeks of sharing the stories and experiences, you will be able to understand at least a little of what has taken place and what God is continuing to do in southern Sudan.

I've been busily working on organizing my photos and organizing my thoughts from the Sudan trip. I am not quite ready yet, but I thought I'd give a sneak peak to some of the images that I took.

I've got lots more to come! I've got a whole slew of videos as well which will show some of the basic things we saw and/or encountered.

After a day of packing and final preparations for the trip to Sudan, I came home to two packages. One contained a couple of free prints courtesy of kodakgallery.com with their $15 gift to everyone. The second came from Dwayne's Photo!

I was very excited to open and look at the slides! I must tell you, I am very very impressed with how they came out! Unfortunately, I can't really say the same for the CD. The scans came out very grainy looking and not professional at all. I hope to rescan them tomorrow using Brandy's Grandfather's slide scanner. Hopefully they will turn out better than what Dwayne's provided.

While we wait for the slides/CD to come back from Dwayne's photo, here is a roll of Fuji fall shots. I began this roll at Comers Rock where I finished up the roll of Kodachrome. I wanted to take a few of the same "images" with both rolls of film so I can compare the differences.

This fall, I had planned on two places to get some photos, that being Comers Rock and the other being Fox Creek. This year has seen a lot of rain, so the creek is flowing fast. It seems that water, huge boulders and fall color love to co-mingle for interesting landscapes and compositions!

Technically, this is the second roll for the fall season, but the first is on its way to be processed. For now, enjoy!
To view the roll in its entirety, please go to Fall 2009 #2 (Fuji) located in the Gallery on www.mikecnichols.com.

And so it begins....

Yesterday, I mailed off my first roll of Kodachrome 64 to Dwayne's Photo in Kansas to be processed. For awhile I have been debating whether or not to have the roll cut and mounted, and in the end I decided to go ahead. Several reasons for this is the roll will be scanned to CD at high resolution after processing and also if I really wanted to get prints, my local Walmart can scan slides and make prints in-house.

Hopefully, this roll will return prior to leaving for Sudan so that I can share these fall photos as well as assess how well I used this roll so that I can make any adjustments for the next roll, to be used in Sudan.

Usually when I shoot a roll, I finish it within a day or two. This new roll I finished today started about two weeks ago when we went back up to Elk Garden I re-attempted for a summer shot of Mount Rogers. I miscalculated where the sun would be and so the shadows came out harsher than I would like, but they do capture the feel of summer up there. This roll also includes photos from the Feathercamp area (near Damascus), Comers Creek Falls (which you might remember from last year's fall photo series) and photos along the Hungry Mother lake trail. I hope you enjoy!

To view the roll in its entirety you can go to Summer 2009 #6 Gallery Page and click through the images.

After 2.5 months since I placed my order, my 5 rolls of Kodak Kodachrome 64 have arrived! I am very excited to experience this little bit of passing history this fall. I will have to read up a little before using it as it has been a long time since I've used such a slow film. I have been told and read several times to rate it as 80 on my camera and shoot as normal for better color saturation, but I have yet to explore the nuances that will make every frame count.

For a while now, I've been working on getting images of Mount Rogers from each season. This started after a roll taken after a snowfall in winter. This turned into wanting a photo in autumn (taken last year) which in turn made me decide to complete the seasons. I got the spring shot earlier in the year and this past week, I got summer. I may go back sometime in the coming week to try again as it was a little hazy when we went up the first time. I hope to get a crisper image. For now, I present you the Four Seasons of Mount Rogers.

About this time 4 years ago Brandy and I took a hike near Troutdale and found some very tasty and beautiful blackberries. I had brought my camera (Pentax K1000) filled with black & white film and took a photo. This photo hangs in our bedroom and is one of our absolute favorites.

When we were up at the Scales last week, Brandy suggested that I do another photo but with blueberries. In the Summer 2009 :: The Scales (8/18/09) post you have seen the color version of this. To truly capture the same feel as the original "Blackberries" photo, I digitally made the "Blueberries" photo black & white. I don't usually mess with the coloring of my shots digitally as they are taken on film. I hope you like the outcome and enjoy comparing the two.

This past Tuesday, we made our yearly trek up to the Scales to pick blueberries. This also was the last big adventure for our Chevy Tracker ZR2. At the time, we were looking for a new car which resulted in the purchase of a 2007 Nissan Murano the next day. We made the most of the Tracker over the years and we will miss it.

As always, I shot a roll of photos up there. Along the road, there was an abundant of mushrooms of all kinds and once up there, the open views were awe inspiring. Here are a few of my favorites.

There are several more photos that are worth taking a look at by viewing the photo gallery at my site.

This coming week, I have the privilege of being the featured guest on The Fourth Set radio show on WEHC 90.7 FM. The host Jody Hanshew & I discuss little about Dave Matthews Band, The Beatles, and my most recent album, The Thoughts I Think Instead. The show also features a couple of hand picked tunes for airplay as well as a live performance of What I'm Seeking which is off of the album.

If you live in the Emory, VA area, tune in to 90.7 FM at 2pm on Wednesday, 26 August 2009! You can also tune in on the web at: http://www.ehcweb.ehc.edu/masscomm/wehc/.

Saturday evening, we headed up to Hale Lake and Comers Rock for a little picnic and some good ole mountain relaxation. Immediately upon arriving at Hale Lake, we noticed the great abundance of summer mushrooms covering the ground. As always, camera in hand, I started a new roll. What I didn't know is that I forgot to switch my ISO/ASO setting back to 200 from 800. When I got my photos back, I noticed the lack of bright colors and it dawned on me then. With the digital images, I have been able to bring out the color(s) in most images. In a way, I find this roll really neat, in an "oops, didn't mean to do that" kind of way. You'll probably notice (especially on the macro shots), that most of the colors of the leaves are muted while the color(s) of the subject(s) stand out a bit more. When compared to other stuff, they are a different feel in the color, textures, and overall look. At the end of the roll, there are shots I took at Brewer's Store in Camp, VA just at the foot of the ridge that the lake and Comers Rock are on. In these, I noticed that what I did kind of made them have an "old-timey" look and feel, which absolutely love. The first shot of Brandy and Willow is a perfect example of this. Anyway, here are a few of my favorites.
You can view the rest at the Summer 2009 #4 (8-15-09) Gallery.

Just wanted to let you all know that Autumn has arrived at www.mikecnichols.com! You can visit the Photography Shop at www.mikecnichols.com or shop from the items listed below.

This weekend, we found all sorts of nature goodies, including a ton of Indian Pipes. I've been wanting to photograph these for several years now and so I was excited. Unfortunately, I had to battle very low lighting in the woods and was not sure if the sun would peak its head out or not. Fortunately, it did lighten up enough to capture some pretty good shots.
To view the rest of the bunch, you can check them out in the Gallery on www.mikecnichols.com. Click here to go directly to the album.

Yesterday, Brandy, Willow & I set out on the trail for a nice cool summer hike. It'd been a while since I've had the chance to get out there and shoot some photos and I have been wanting to kind of do some different shots. I'm really excited with these and hope you like them!
Once again, I tried to capture some different shots (at least for me) and really focus on the flow of each composition combined with experimenting with different exposures of each shot. These are my favorites from the roll, though there are a couple "takes" on these images that add a different element and detail to the composition with their exposure. Click here to check these out and the rest of the roll.

I'm happy to say that the grillin' season has officially started! A couple of weeks ago, we got some rib-eyes and grilled them for a tasty dinner. When I grill, I am very simple with seasonings of salt and pepper. By picking good cuts of meat and cooking them perfectly, the flavor does not need enhancing in my opinion. That is what the smoke does (combo of charred wood & Jack Daniel's smoking pellets). Having said this, I do love a little bit of a "crust" on the outside of my steaks which is why I like using salt and pepper. This time, I added a "secret ingredient." We dried some of our lime basil from last year and so I sprinkled a little bit on each side. The result was excellent. It added a nice little flavor accent for the "crusty" outside of the steak.
Yesterday, Brandy came home with a couple of pinwheel steaks and some fresh corn on the cob! By giving me the motivation of "steak," I went to grilling. It was very humid and so my fire was slow to start, but eventually we had another yummy grilled meal. I once again added the lime basil to the steaks.

I grilled the corn as well, the smoke gives it such a wonderful taste. It also brings the flavor of the corn to its fullest potential. If you've never tried grilled corn, it is so easy and so yummy. You'll want to soak your corn (still in the husk) in water for at least 10 minutes. Peel most of the husk off each ear. You want to make sure there is still at least one layer of husk covering the kernals. Put them on the grill and rotate every few minutes. It takes about 12-15 minutes to fully cook. To test doneness, I usually poke the kernals to see if they are juicy. Also, it seems that the corn will turn that rich yellow color when done. Once you try it, you'll never want it any other way!

Enjoy the latest episode of Texture Time! This is a first "taste" for Willow!

Might have noticed I haven't posted in a while. Things have been uber crazy lately. Today is my only day off in a 17 day period. When I'm not working, I'm trying to relax. As of late, my focus (some would say obsession) has been the new LP from the Dave Matthews Band. As a fan, I've been starving for a new record anyway, but once it got in my hands, I instantly fell in love. Even if DMB is not the top of your lists of bands, this record should have something on it for you. The whole thing has the heart of the band and their philosophy but also is adventurous and takes great chances musically.

I will soon have some new photos for viewing. I have a couple of frames left (which I hope to fill with new photos of Willow) before I get them developed. Once I do, I'll be sure to post.

I've also been doing a lot of thinking/reflecting as of late. Even before the new DMB album hit, I've been thinking about songwriting and playing music again for people. I've been talking to a buddy and hope to collaborate with him very soon. We both don't want to be controlled by this, but we really both feel the itch for playing again. With that, I have had the desire to write again. Thinking on this, I have been trying to figure out how best to approach it. I've thought about how I used to write and look at what worked and what didn't, but it is difficult to go back to that. I am presently in a different headspace than I was 6+ years ago. I'm not saying that the headspace I'm in now is bad or good, it's just different. To figure out how to approach writing again has left me to conclude (for now at least) to let it develop naturally. The desire is there and my fingers have been messing around with some different riffs/chord progressions. I think that once I feel the music, the lyrics will come.