Springfield's First Night is an evening of family friendly entertainment on New Year's Eve. 2011 celebrates 25 years of First Night in Springfield. I checked it out for the first time on New Year's Eve 2011. [More]

A GoPro video I took riding down the Sangamon Valley Trail in Springfield, IL in December of 2011. [More]

My stop-motion video experiment on the Sangamon Valley bike trail in Springfield, Ill. This trail uses over 400 images captured one cold winter morning to form a small movie a little over a minute long. [More]

Tuesday, Aug. 30, was the final flag retreat ceremony of 2011 for the 114th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry at Lincoln Tomb in Springfield. The 114th is a local group of Civil War-era reenactors who perform at many ceremonies at historical sites in central Illinois and surrounding states. The flag is lowered with pomp and ceremony by the men of the 114th in their dress uniforms. After the lowering, the flag is folded and presented to a spectator. If you wish to be one of those lucky spectators, pre-registration is required so your name can be drawn at random. For 2011, the ceremony occurred at 7 p.m. every Tuesday night from June 1 to Aug. 30 and lasted around 45 minutes. My wife and I attended the last ceremony this year and photographed it. Many spectators attended as it was a nice, cool evening. Please check out the photos below and visit the 114th at their Facebook page if you would like to keep up with their activities.

Photos from the Springfield Illinois Old Capitol Blues & BBQ festival, 2011. [More]

Yes, the Illinois State Fair was two months ago, but I recently posted some new photos to the photo site that I wanted to share with the world. By world, I mean both of you who read this blog (thanks!). Each year at the fair, entertainment companies and performing artists are featured in the area just beyond the main gate. The shows are free. You just have to show up when they're scheduled to start. This year, I photographed two that I really enjoyed. The first of the set is a performance by the BMX Pros Trick Team. Their high-flying, gravity-defying tricks took me back to my bike-riding days around the neighborhood, building ramps with my friends out of 2-by-4s and plywood. OK, I never came anything close to what these guys do, but you get the nostalgia. Their show really was top-notch. I didn't know what to expect before they started, but it's much more than guys jumping bikes off ramps. The tricks they do in the air and on the ground clearly require dedication, professionalism and nerves of steel. If yo... [More]