Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Scrimshaw



Scrimshaw is the art of carving ivory with pictures. Commonly, the "ivory" used was whale bone. The bone was made into knife handles and other utility items of the day. Thankfully, plastics have replaced the art form, much to the whales' relief. Modern knives like the spyderco endura have wooden handles or form fitting ones.

One does wonder if using plastics and the form fitting foams on the handles really are an improvement on the environment. First us humans destroy most of the whale population for oil and other "products" that could be found in other forms. Then we use fossil fuels to make plastics that take eons to biodegrade. Do we make any sense at all?

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Getting artsy

When it comes to water I love it. Cool blues and shimmering water are a turn on for me. It should not surprise me when I come across a beautiful work of art that I am attracted to it. Here is my attraction for today -


It is a mural of sealife made out of glass tiles. It is next to a swimming pool which shows off the work of art beautifully.

Saturday, January 15, 2011

The intertide area

The area between the high tide and the low tide is called the intertidal zone. There are numerous species of wildlife that can only exist in that zone or area. You can see why something as dangerous as an oil spill or chemical spill can drastically affect the animals that live there.

Exploring the intertidal area is fascinating. I have traveled to many of them that were accessible by steep trails. Yet the one I enjoyed the most was across some sand dunes that we rode ATV's to. We carried our equipment in the ATV Accessories rack to the zone.

I have video of that fun trip but like I said in my previous post, I need to get it off of the VHS format to upload it to this blog.

Underwater videos

I am so glad that videos no longer include tapes or even CDs. The digital revolution has made it so much easier to record events that take place underwater. The cameras are lighter and smaller than ever before. It also makes it easier to make them water tight.

When I get the time I need to transfer my old videos on VHS to purely digital. I need to gather up the HDMI cables, the converting software and make sure the VCR still works to obtain the videos. It sounds harder than it really is and it is not that hard. It just takes time.

Monday, January 3, 2011

Seal fur is still bing used for clothing

I thought that gone were the days of baby seals being beaten to death on the ice flows for their skins, but apparently not. A friend of mine was doing some online shopping just before Christmas and she found a website that featured the apple bottoms (jeans) she was looking for. On the same page was a model showing off a full length seal fur coat. I just about gagged!!

So what happened? Did people forget the ghastly movies and photos of dead baby seals and blood covered ice?