It's Been An Interesting Couple Of Days

     It has been a bust couple of days. Also, some of the most relaxing busy days I have ever had. I woke up Monday morning with the intent of finding the right photo opportunities to get for The Patchwork Knight. I was thwarted in my attempt though. The first place I was going to go was closed. That's right, they are closed only one day a week and that day is Monday. That was the place I thought I would get the best pictures, for what I needed. It is called the Enchanted Forest after all. I had to alter my plans and I headed to the secondary location which was Fay Lake. There is a little park that surrounds a lake, and they do have some random wilderness trails. I got some good pictures there, but the best part was the gentleman I ran into. He was flying drones near the lake, and when I say drones, I mean he had like 10 of them, and they were all pretty amazing in one way or the other.

     When I was done taking pictures, I decided to stop and try to talk to him, and he was one of those people that love to talk and share about their hobby, and his hobby is drones. He had been doing it pretty much since drones came out, so he has a few hours of flight time under his belt. He showed me each of his drones, and explained a few things that I didn't know. He talked about antennas that boosted the range so that he could fly further than normal, upgrades that he has done to his drones to make them faster and able to fly further, and just his love of flying, and how he always wants someone else to fly with. We exchanged numbers so that I can go fly with him some time. I don't have my controller right now, and plans to get it back this week just didn't line up, but I will have it back soon, and I will take it out and fly with him, and we will see if we can get some cool footage for you to view.

     He mentioned that he likes to make videos, and I told him about the projects I have going on. He told me he had a recording studio, and he would love to help out if he could. This is the second recording studio I've been offered, but I don't know what I would do with it right now, so I'll keep that all in mind. He let me fly one of his drones, and it was an expensive one. He told me the price, and I thought it was low, just based on the size and how it looked. I didn't take off, or land, but once it was up, he gave me the controls and I flew it around the area. It was really fun, and made me miss mine even more. We were going to try something he hadn't done before, and that was have two people controlling it. He wold control the flight, and I would control the camera, but it turns out, he needed to download some firmware to get it going. That is something for the next time then.With that two person control, we may be able to get the camera to do things it wouldn't normally do because of the gimbal involved in stabilizing the shots. We might be able to get banked style shots if we synch up the movements the right way. That would be very cool, and open up doors on the possibility of different videos. This is the drone that I got to fly.

     One of the coolest features of that drone, are the struts. When it takes off, they slowly rise up to flight position, so that the whole thing lays kind of flat when it is flying. When it gets a certain distance from the ground, they automatically begin to lower to the portion you see them in there. It is super cool.

     I talked with him for a few hours, and then finally left so that I could go home and look over the pictures I got there. They were good, but still missing what I needed for the most part. I decided to edit and proofread more chapters and get them ready for release. I'm up to 10 chapters now that are ready to go, and I did find a very big flaw. I mentioned something in an early chapter and neglected that in one further down the line, so I will be correcting that error when I get to that chapter. I knew this was a possibility based on the way I was writing with no safety net of a storyboard, or a character list, but that is all being corrected as I go now, so the story will be different but still the same.

     Since I couldn't go to the Enchanted Forest yesterday, I went today, and it was, well in a word, enchanted. It lived up to most of the hype. I either missed an area or it was over sold to me, but I still got a ton of great shots that I can use with The Patchwork Knight. While I was out there, I managed to shoot some video, and low and behold, I made a video of my adventure out there. I think you are going to like it, so let's give it a watch.

     I really enjoyed my time out there, and I'm looking forward to going out there again soon. My plan was to get home and begin more editing on The Patchwork Knight, but this video took over, and I wanted to get it done and up today, so I'm a little behind in the proofreading part, but I have plenty of time to get it all together. I may not be done by the end of the week now, but probably by next Monday for sure.

     That only leaves one thing left to talk about tonight. Favorite Song of the Week. This is a new song, by an old band. Well, they aren't that old, and this is their first song with getting the majority of the original band back together. It's been 17 years since the original lineup was together, and with the absence of one member, they finally are, and they are making good music again. The Smashing Pumpkins were a mainstay on the 90's scene. They were thrown in with the grunge sound, but they really didn't fit in there. They were kind of their own thing. Hailing from the Chicago area, they brought a different sound with them then what was coming out of Seattle, and it was fantastic. This new song, definitely harkens back to those early years and I can't wait for you to hear it, so here it is, The Smashing Pumpkins with "Solara".



     That's a goodie right? Anyway, I have to get to bed. I'm waking up early to make another video, and then later in the day I'm going to shoot for another one. The one in the morning is imperative that I get out in that morning light. The second one is kind of a hot topic of sorts right now. I think I will schedule the second one for Sunday, and the first one for mid week sometime. I think the second one is going to be fun. I hope you enjoy both of them.

     Oh, before I go, I guess I should give you a Facebook update. I'm not doing it the same as I had before. I'm not putting the app on my phone, so I will only see it when I get on the laptop, and then I only see whatever story is at the top of my feed. I check the notifications after I post what I need to, then I check what's going on with the PR, and then I'm out of there. Way different than what I was doing in the past. I would spend hours on there for no reason, but no more. I get it, I get out. I will go on right after this, because I will be posting the link to this on there.

     That's it for me tonight. I will have a new video for you on Sunday that should be fun, and wait a minute. I did want to share my favorite picture that I took today. I can't share them all, because there are just too many, but one won't hurt.

     Do you know how hard it is to get that picture with a phone? It's near impossible, but I found a way. That spider is very tiny, and I had to get up really close to get that shot, not to mention I had to get it in just the right light so that the webs would glisten. I think it works despite the spider being blurry. Anyway, now that is all I have tonight. Peace in and goodnight.