CDV Photos...A Blog of Dale Vaughn Photography

Downtown Rogersville

Dale — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 19:26:45 +0000

One of the areas that has always grabbed my attention is street photography. The images are usually a photo of people who are not aware of a photographer and they are just going about their day. Whether it’s walking on a beach, sitting on a park bench or attending a public gathering, the shots attempt to capture a moment in time.

Living in Rogersville, I don’t get the opportunity for images like that often. Most people are busy going here and there and don’t usually stop to just take in the day or just hang out for a moment.

Today, I got the opportunity to photograph a gentleman who comes to Rogersville often and he usually is just walking through. You’ll see him several places around town and I’ve never seen him drive a car and he always has a couple of bags with him. So I took the opportunity and made a few images of this interesting person. I tried to capture a moment in time and then give it a special look that I hope will help you see moments like this differently in the future. I believe that we all tell a story even when we aren’t talking. I hope you enjoy them.

So much has happened and yet……

Dale — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 19:09:26 +0000

So much has happened and yet nothing happened. That makes sense to me but probably not to you. So here goes. Back in late January we started talking to Gary, a real estate guy that attends our church, about the possibility of selling our home and moving closer to church and family. All told, this move would be around 30 mile closer to Kingsport, Tn. which would accomplish the goal of being closer to church and family. We had discussed this move for years and decided that the time was right to try this. So we put the house on the market and in just two weeks we had a contract. Not just an offer, but a contract.

We rented a storage building and started to move out. Then we got the phone call that our sale was off. The buyers couldn’t get their loan. Still ain’t sure how they came to us pre-approved and then changed to un-approved, but it happened. So that’s what I mean when I say so much has happened but yet nothing happened.

Now we don’t know whether to move our stuff back in and then have to move out again when/if our house sells, or just move it back in and forget the whole thing. Really weird but it seems par for the course for me.

There’s another point in time when the phrase “so much has happened and yet nothing happened” could have been uttered by people concerning the life and death of Jesus. The crowds seen Him heal the sick, bring sight to the blind and restore walking to the lame, yet when the time came, they all turned their back on Him and cried “Crucify Him’”. Even his disciples who had followed his every move lost sight of who He truly was and is today. I wonder if maybe one of them, possibly Thomas, could have looked at the cross that day and uttered those words “so much has happened and yet nothing happened” as he thought back over the weeks and months of following Jesus, seeing all the miracles and then watching as Jesus was beaten, and then crucified. I wonder if Thomas was left trying to figure out how Jesus seemed to have so much power, yet was subject to death. No doubt he walked away from the cross that day with his life having been changed by what he had seen both of the miracles and the death of Jesus. He had to have been trying to piece it all together. So much power, and yet they crucified Him on a cross.

For Thomas the wondering ended when Jesus appeared to them after His resurrection. According to John chapter 20, the disciples were inside with the doors locked when Jesus appeared to them and said “Peace to you” and He showed them his hands and the wound in his side. But Thomas wasn’t with them. They told him about this but he said he would not believe unless he seen it him self. So the next day Jesus appeared to them again. Same way because they were inside, doors locked and Jesus appeared to them. But this time Thomas was there. And Jesus invited Him to “put your finger here and observe my hands, put your hand in my side.” Thomas knew then that he was the one that was wrong. So much had happened, including the greatest victory that the world had ever seen. Jesus had defeated death. HE alone had wiped out the strong hold that sin had placed on this world.

Many people today do and think the same thing. They don’t know how to balance the power of God with the death of Jesus on the cross. If only they would look into the purpose and the power of Jesus’ death. They know that Jesus was crucified. They’ve heard all about that. It’s not that big a deal. But can you imagine how Thomas felt when he got the invitation to put his finger here and to place his hand inside Jesus’ side and he experienced the sudden realization that Jesus had defeated death? The invitation is still there today. Seek Him and ask Him and experience Him. It’s your choice.

that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; ¹⁰ for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. Romans 10:9-10

It is Finished. (all4ryan.wordpress.com)
For He Has Risen, as He Said! (christianitymatters.com)

WOW…What a winter!

Dale — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:19:44 +0000

Friday, February 24, 2012. 6:45 am and it’s 65 degrees outside. That wouldn’t sound too farfetched fo someone living way down south in the tropics. But here in Tennessee that’s a little strange. Especially the mountains of East Tennessee. As I look out at the back yard it won’t be long till it’s going to need mowing. This isn’t a real problem and I’m not really complaining, but it’s different. Usually in February we have to hunker down and get through some cold weather. But not this year. This year has been a short sleeve winter. It’s been cold for a while and then just warms right back up. The last two days we have seen strong winds, lightening and lots of thunder. Actually we didn’t see the thunder, but we heard it. And the lightening was the all the way to the ground type. I remember when I was growing up that according to all the old wives tales, if it stormed during the winter months, it meant something would happen in the next 30 days. Can’t remember what, but as I recall, it’s not good. I think it means that there will be a big snow or frost or cold spell, which with it being winter, is not really that bad of a bet. It’s kind of like predicting that the wind will blow strong during the hurricane season in the Gulf region. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

I hope everyone is having a good winter and has been safe and warm or cool if you live where it’s warm. One blessing for us during this mild winter is that this is the winter that the heat pump decided to break. So that was a blessing for us, not because it broke, but because it broke during a warm season in a mild winter. Sometimes God works in small ways to bless us. We just need to look. For those who may think that a heat pump breaking is not a blessing, remember that heat pumps break from time to time. They are mechanical and as such will break down and need repairs. The fact that it happened during a warm spell is the blessing.

Now, here’s a which came first type question. Did God make the heat pump run till the weather warmed up or did he warm the weather up when the heat pump broke? I honestly don’t know, but somehow He worked it out and it broke at a good time and now it’s repaired ready for cold weather again. I just choose to look for the little blessings that God provides.

Have a great day and God bless you!

Android Camera Video

Dale — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 19:09:03 +0000

Still amazed at what I can do with the Samsung Infuse. Last Saturday, I attended a rally at our local high school of people who are beginning to rally together and call upon God through prayer to help deal with drugs, alcoholism, and other problems in our area. While I was listening, I thought someone needs to be making a video. So, I got out my phone and it was set for HD (if you can believe that) and started capturing video. I was trying to anticipate the speaker and looking for points to cut it off figuring I would later edit the clips and see what I could make of it. My video editing skills aren’t that great, but overall I was pleased with the outcome of this video.

While I don’t get the killer shots that come from the big glass lens that I use with the Nikon D300S, I am impressed that I could get a video of this quality with my phone. Still find that hard to believe for reasons I stated earlier. (See Post below) It’s just amazing what we have the ability to do today with our phones.

Android Camera

Dale — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:30:50 +0000

Higher Ground Sanctuary

I am still having problems believing that my android phone has a camera that takes photos like these. I have the Samsung Infuse and it does do a great job. Of course, the photo of the inside of the church was taken with an additional camera app that gives it that special effect. It’s called Camera360 and it has several effects that I really like. The shot of the outside of the church shown below was taken using the phones regular camera. No special effects were used on that shot. Still it’s a good looking shot just “straight from the camera.” So far, the camera hasn’t figured out a way to let me add all the wonderful glass that a big lens brings to the table, but having a camera that can do this hanging on my side is pretty cool. Another cool thing this phone does it post these pics to wordpress. Still blows my mind what we can do with a phone now days. I still remember as I was growing up that the only “mobile” phone we ever saw was the one that the phone company repairman used. And he had to climb a pole and hook it up before it worked. Have a great day and God bless.

Now to our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen. Phillippians 4:9

Higher Ground Baptist Church

Groundhog Day 2012

Dale — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 20:31:53 +0000

Hard to believe but it’s already February 2, 2012. Groundhog day. I’m looking out the window and it’s sunny, close to 60 degrees and the report is that Phil seen his shadow. That means that we are in for 6 more weeks of this absolutely beautiful, wonderful mild weather. I used to like the cold weather and remember the old folks that would say we needed some cold weather to kill the bugs. Most people seemed to think that as it got really cold in the winter, it cut down on the bug population in spring and summer. I’m not sure that was the case because some say the bugs only went deeper to avoid the cold.

That reminds me of another time at work. I was going outside for a break and there were a few of the guys sitting there trying to “read the signs” and determine if we were going to get some snow. They were going over all the signs and someone mentioned smoke rising from a chimney. They couldn’t remember what it meant when the smoke was rising straight up, snow or not. It was about this time that I walked up and one of them said “we’re trying to figure out if it’s going to snow. What’s it mean when the smoke rises straight up out of the chimney?”. I told them I wasn’t too sure about the snow, but I did know how to read the smoke. It got quiet and I said, “If the smoke rises straight up out of the chimney, it means for sure that the wind ain’t blowing.” This made a couple of them laugh out loud and made a couple more mad. Funny how things like that can do that. Bless some and curse some.

Come to think of it, that’s the way it is with Jesus. To some, He is the door that opens to heaven. To others, He is the door that closes and keeps them from entering. Which one is Jesus for you? The open door or the shut door? It is your choice.

Revelation 3:20
Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.

Christmas Shopping 2011

Dale — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 20:02:37 +0000

Well, it’s almost Christmas and if you are like me, you have a ways to go before you are ready. I tried asking friends and family to postpone Christmas this year, but they didn’t want no part of that. Then I suggested that maybe we could just exclude me. For some strange reason they didn’t like that either. So it looks like, ready or not, I will be having Christmas this weekend beginning Saturday and continuing through Sunday. I remember all the great plans I had back in June and July, just don’t know what went wrong. This was the year that I was going to be ready before anyone else got started. That was even one of my new years resolutions. No wait a minute, that was from a few years ago. Anyway, I wanted to be ready. Right now it does not look like I’m gonna make it and my wife says it because of a personality trait that I have called….procrastination. I think it’s more of a medical condition that I need treatment for, but she disagrees.

What happens is I make good plans, then get sidetracked. Probably because of my ADD which won’t let me keep focused on anything for very long. Like when I go downstairs to get the check book and then check my facebook and then go back upstairs without the check book. Then later, I realize that I need the check book and I’ll be in town and of course it’s at home. So whatever bill I was going to pay or whatever item I was going to buy gets put off because I don’t have the check book. Not because I wanted to put it off, but because I can’t stay focused. And then the other side of that is that I think of something and for some reason, my brain “thinks” I actually did the something I thought of. For instance, I’ll think of a bill that needs to be paid. Then I’ll get sidetracked and a few days later, my wife will ask if I paid the bill and I’ll say “Yes” when I didn’t. This isn’t lying, because my mind thinks it did. Then we find out, usually just in time to pay it before it’s late, and she’ll say I put it off. In reality, my mind is the culprit. So, it’s not really procrastination. I suffer from a disease that is so rare, it’s not been discovered yet. It can’t be “willful procrastination”. There must be some other thing happening that is way beyond my control.

Now that I have made my case for the late preparations for Christmas, I must leave here and go shopping. (and I will as soon as I finish _________). I only have this evening and half of tomorrow to find this years presents. I know they are out there somewhere, I just need to find them. Have a great day and…………

M E R R Y C H R I S T M A S ! ! ! !

Redskins Football

Dale — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 20:41:17 +0000

As I type this the Redskins are leading the Giants in the fourth quarter. I am pleasantly surprised about this game. Its been a while since they have looked this good. Makes me wonder why they couldn’t have been playing like this all year. It’s really strange. A touchdown was just reversed, then the Giants scored and that was wiped out by a penalty. Haven’t seen any Redskins look this good in a while.

If this works there should be a photo here of our weird Christmas Village. If not, I’ll fix it later.

Good job Redskins. And, Merry Christmas!!!

Posted from WordPress for Android

Christmas Decorations

Dale — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 13:39:20 +0000

Just got off the phone with my wife who is headed to work. She is a cosmetology instructor and as such has to work on Saturdays. Anyway, she was talking about our Christmas decorations or to be more precise, our lack of them. It seems that as we get older, we don’t decorate as much as we used to. If it’s just me and her here at the house, we tend to just do what we do. She plays puzzles or here lately some new game on her iPhone and i usually am on the computer. Just two people being normal in our own way.

But let the grand-kids come down, and then it’s a different story. Like a couple of weeks ago. They were here and in a matter of a couple of hours the tree was up, the Christmas Village was started and the Lionel Christmas Train was making it’s rounds. Much to the amazement of the grand-kids. And to me. I was surprised that it still ran.

Today, I am going to try to finish the village as best as I can. It’s a temporary setup that we are trying and I can’t be sure how it’s going to work, but we’ll give it a try. Who knows, may even have some photos here later if all goes well.

How about you? Do you decorate less now that you are older?

I’m Back

Dale — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 16:40:34 +0000

Just in time for Christmas. Been lazy about posting here and don’t have any excuses but lazy. That’s a great excuse though because it fits lots of different occasions. I’ve used it several times during my life.

Last Sunday night the children’s ministry at Higher Ground Church gave their Christmas presentation “The Great Christmas Giveaway”. The kids all did a wonderful job singing and telling the story of the birth of Christ. You can view the play here and it’s about 50 minutes long. There are also other videos from Higher Ground there also.

Gotta go for now. Hopefully I’ll be back soon. At least I want to………