El MundoEl Mundo Loteria

El BarrilEl Barril Loteria

El ApcheEl Apache Loteria

LadybugFocus stacked at f 9, 1/160 sec; ISO 125 at 50 microns - 50 images total

I still have not finished.  I figure I have a month of free time in the evenings and weekends before life somewhat normalizes.  So dug up files i did not finish.   I have El Barril (9); La Garza (19); El Mundo (37); and El Venado (45).  So i only have five more to go.  I have all the props and now older boys for El Diablito (2) and El Apache (38).  The most difficult will still be La Chalupa (48) because El Arpa (53) has been located but the dam virus is keeping me from shooting it!  Leo (1)  rooster is easy

My first objective was to draw diagrams of how to build my supports and those are here, with enough details to replicate if needed:

In this next image you can see the stern support or cradle:

Here is another view of it:

Next you can see the front cradle and it was rather simple to build and it's not in my diagram above.  Showing two views of it:

Once both of these were build, the next step was to put both under the boat.  I did not do this by myself and had help from my friend.  I did not feel comfortable doing it along as I have seen some do.  We used a 3 ton floor jack with wood blocks to raise the boat high enough to get my supports under the boat. I jacked up at places that were solid on the hull and did it careful so as to not damage the hull.  The aft was raised first.  It was done slowly.  Once the height was reach, we rested the aft of the boat on the rear cradle.  I don't recall the exact height, but it was between 25"-26".  Once the aft was in place, it was secured to the rear cradle with a ratcheting strap to prevent movement of the boat as we would have to get into the deck for replacing the keep bolt, winch, and cable.  In these next two images you can see how the aft looks like when it was placed on the rear cradle:

In this side view you can see how the boat is secured to the rear cradle with a ratcheting strap:

Now it was time to raise the front of the boat.  This was the second time help is important because the boat tended to move to one side as it was being raised.   My friend raised the boat with the floor jack, again placing wood under the front and raising the boat until I could get my front cradle under the front keep of the boat.    In these next images you can see how it looked:

At this point it was time to see if I had enough clearance to remove the swing keel. And this image is looking aft and it shows the clearance:

The following images show how the boat is off the bunks and has enough safe clearance to remove the swing keep.  I also used 4" x 4" blocks as a safety measure between the trailer bunks and hull. 

Next an image to show how all of it looks.  I needed to feel safe and this really made me safe if I was going to replace the keel by myself.  

I researched various methods to remove the keel and decided that a sled was the best way.  Some sleds that I looked at were truly Egyptian in style, in that they were a big hunk of a sled that would be placed on top of plastic PVC pipe to roll backwards.  I did not want to do that.  I wanted to roll back and to the side as I had a fence that prevented me from rolling it.  And I wanted to pull it and not use and pulling device like a pulley to get it out.  I then bought two furniture dolly's at Harbor Freight and placed wood on top of them and think this is a simple solution.  The following images show the design of my sled.  But I decided to really reinforce the rear of my sled that would receive my keel so that it would not move on the sled.  Plus, I literally was going to roll it about a block down the side walk from this yard and into my backyard, so it had to withstand that.

Then it was a matter of removing the keel bolt and lowering the keel on the sled.  Again, I did this alone as my cradle were very solid.  I used a small floor jack and scissor jack to lower the keel and the following pictures illustrate these steps.

Now I just had to push and pull my sled one block to my yard and with this solid sled it was possible. Once the keel was in my yard, I used an engine hoist and the two remaining images show that.  I decided to use POR 15 and it works for me, because this is a trail sailboat and not in a slip.  When I am done sailing, I have the ability to go into my local car was on my way home and rinse all saltwater off, as I sail in San Francisco Bay.

Producing Las Jaras was more involved.  It required for me to make a arrows.  I made the arrows several months with this theme involved but had to add red and green colored feathers to the first set of black feathers I had on them.  The I had to arrange these in my studio to look like the original image.  I was able to do this by using many fishing lines to suspend the bows in Las Jaras.  The final image is my version of Las Jaras.

Fue una imagen simple de reproducir.  La tome en mi estudio usando un respaldo blanco y la rosa en una meseta.  Simple imagen y possiblemente la mas economica de todas las imagenes de Loteria que estoy reproduciendo.

The shot was done in my studio using an Alien Bees ring flash on white paper and three Alien Bees 800s to get rid of any shadows.  I used the Canon 5D MKII and a Canon 50 mm Macro lens for this image.  However, in the process of getting the scorpion in the position like the original Loteria image, I was stung.  And the true price I paid for this image, which felt like a bee sting.  After I kept it for about 5 months and it ate nothing, gave birth to its young and then ate them, soon thereafter it died. 

La Dama

For example, El Paragus was a technically difficult image to produce.  The umbrella is under simulated rain using real water drops.  The planning took several weeks.  The 14 foot 1/2" copper pipe was drilled with over 200 hotles and had water running in it.  The shot used 7 strobes and a complex set up to hang the backdrop and umbrella.  It took me over four hours to set this shot up.  And I shot from late afternoon until dusk, to get the perfect image.   Here is the set up:

And the final image after some work in Photoshop:

El Paraguas

Please visit my blog to see my progress.