2013 365-23

Jesus, but summer seems to arrived in Belfast. Scorching hot weather all week and a trip to Donegal with the lads at the weekend? Yes please.

3/06/13

Taken and processed on my iphone 4. This scooter has been sitting in the street all week. Kinda spooky. Why? What happened to it's owner? Why has no-one stolen it (given that this is East Belfast)?

4/06/13

Bright sunshine isn't always the best weather for photos. Luckily I got my hands on a couple of sets of wee men from a tiny (and very weird) model shop near where I was working today. This is titled "Bob didn't know if it was the drink or the heat, but he knew he had to get Anges home."

5/06/13

"Jim's neighbours were a wee bit precious about their bins." I have on occasion taken the wrong bin, with far from hilarious results.

6/06/13

Travelling down the Ards peninsula this evening, armed with only my little Sony Nex-3 camera which I was getting re-acquainted with prior to heading off to Donegal. Had to stop and take this shot as the sun went down at Kircubbin pier and a few kids jumped into the water off the pier. The wee Sony coped well with the shot, although I did nearly cry when I realised that I didn't have my big camera with me. Thanks also to Maxie, another togger who'd stopped to take the same shot and ended up talking with me for so long, I was well late for dinner. It was great yakking about photography to someone whose eyes didn't glaze over when you mentioned white balance and ISO.

7/06/13

Colin, enjoying himself in Donegal. This was taken after he'd done his usual mugging for the camera and actually just relaxed. The sun was setting and the light was just as golden as I've ever seen.

8/06/13

Martin's mussels. I'm not sure I'd have taken this shot if I hadn't had a few pints and a wee whiskey, but I climbed up on a chair and zoomed my 18-55mm lens all the way out. This was the rather fetching  result.

9/06/13

When this is the sight that greets you when you walk out of the door, it doesn't half put a spring in your step and a bit of lead in your pencil. Taken before Alec went swimming and lost a tooth, but that's another story entirely. Donegal and the beach were not to blame.

Another Gents Weekend

Yet another of the thrice-yearly trips to Donegal with my oldest and best friends. There's a rhythm and groove to these weekends that defies definition or explanation - it just happens and it's all good. Drinking, telling stories, playing music, walking and then more drinking. And bad talk - lots of bad talk, none of which I would ever be prepared to repeat.

2013 365-10

This week started off with a day off work and a trip north to Mussenden Temple and Downhill Strand, complete with a return journey down the Antrim Coast Road. I would like to point out that that was not me driving my car at 60 mph along the beach with the roof down and the Foo Fighters blasting out at top volume. Just someone who looked like me.

4/03/13

This is an HDR shot of Mussenden Temple taken from Downhill. Everyone has taken this shot, and I was trying to do something a little different. The reflection in the water seemed to provide a bit of foreground interest and the grey sky really looked like it would lend itself to HDR processing. This was produced from 5 shots with +/- 1 exposure steps using Photomatix Essentials then tweaked a little in Photoshop to darken the sky and add some contrast.

5/03/13

The aim to take more concert shots plugs on. I'd contacted Foy Vance's management team about the possibility of getting a photo pass for his concert in Belfast this evening and they were very accommodating  Standard three shots and you're out rules and no written release to sign. So, I ended up getting to photograph an artist who I like - and it was a great show. Support acts were very good too. I am drifting towards black and white for concert stuff - I just think it works really well under the lighting conditions.

6/03/13

You may recognise this fine little chap from an earlier photo. This afternoon I was lacking in inspiration and decided to stick my finger in a photography book and attempt whatever I selected. The project was "50 shots of the same object" and this is what I ended up with. It was fun and more demanding than I thought.

7/03/13

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a shot of Belfast's first "ghost bike." This is the second one, at the junction of North Road and the Upper Newtownards Road. The bike appeared in late August/early September 2011 and commemorates the death of a 31 year-old local Polish woman Iwona Zakierska who was killed at 7.45am on August 3^rd 2011 after a collision with a lorry.

8/03/13

Another gentlemen psychologist's weekend in Donegal, and another five star weekend. Up to Damien's house in Teelin. This was Friday night (drink had been taken) and I had brought a comic relief red nose for everyone. This is uncle Colin demonstrating yet again how his ability to point in a photograph improves it immensely.

9/03/13

 Didn't take the big Nikon with me on our walk today, from Glencollumcille to the signal tower and over the headlands. I did have the little Sony Nex-3 with me and it did a pretty good job and was a hell of a lot easier to carry. It also takes fair enough panoramas "in camera" but doesn't handle high contrat scenes that well - hence my blown out sky on the right.

10/03/13

This is what happens when you try to get a drunk home owner to spin some wire wool with a drunk photographer working the camera. Only usable shot from the whole sorry escapade.

367-50 Week 39

 Week 39 sees me spending the week in Donegal with family. Although the weather started off wet and grey, by the middle of the week the sun was shining and the beach was being visited nearly every day. I was lucky to be there with a great bunch of individuals, most of whom (but not all) are my children ranging from 9 to 23. The week was stress-free, enjoyable and actually quite relaxing. I got to cook for big numbers every evening and most of the meals went down well. Having acces to wifi in a little local coffee shop was always going to be a bonus.

5/08/11

As noted, the weather wasn't shaping up well when we arrived although it didn't prevent a trip to Marble Hill Strand for a spot of paddling on our first full day there. there's nothing like seeing small children enjoy getting their feet into the ocean, even if it is the generally freezing cold North Atlantic. Big kids like me tend to enjoy it too and look forward to it.

6/08/12

This was a little men project that I'd planned for a few weeks before we went. I set up nine installations totalling 15 wee men around the garden of the house we were staying in. These ranged from the odds and ends box of figures (above) to nude sunbathers and nuns. I put these out in the evening with the intention of photographing them the next morning. Heavy overnight rain had me worried, but only one of the set-ups suffered and eight were left intact. This isn't the best of them, but this is where I retreated to for a smoke in the evenings. 

7/08/12

This kinda summed up the week - in the morning it rained, then around lunchtime it suddenly brightened up and the sum came out, and stayed out for the rest of the week. Colin's house is surrounded by these lovely big daisies and I took a few shots of them with raindrops in place. This is my favourite and I think the crop works really well on this shot.

8/08/12

Climbing Muckish today - one of my favourite walks in Donegal. The miner's path is simply gorgeous and well worth the trip, even without the views from the very top of Muckish. We took a big squad, led by the redoubtable Colin McClelland and everyone had a ball.

9/08/12

Horse riding in Dunfanaghy - three of my daughters (Siobhan, Ellen and Sarah) were going out for an hour long lesson. As you can see, Sarah was more than a little excited by the thought of getting to not only ride a horse for real (she'd only ever been on lead-outs before) but to trot as well. They all enjoyed it and I even had the sense to dose the super-allergenic Ellen with anti-histamines before she went near a horse.

10/08/12

This is the little cat who appeared to be living wild around the house were we were staying. She was very wary of people and it took a full five days before she would come anywhere close to anyone. By Friday night I had her taking food from my hand and she allowed me to pet her. By Saturday she was sitting on my knee and coming when she was called. She was more than a little underweight, but got two square meals a day for the week we were there. There was considerable discussion and disagreement about whether we should bring her home with us. We didn't in the end but only after extracting a promise from Colin that he would feed her while he was there.

11/08/12

The Ulster Museum to see the Da Vinci drawings in exhibition there. I had planned this shot for months - a view down into the atrium and a bit of tilt-shift processing for that miniature effect. Except I hadn't figured on the buggers hanging two massive pterodactyls from the ceiling. I took the shot anyway and this is the tilt-shift effect built into the Nikon D800. Probably not as good as doing it the harder way in Photoshop, but the pterodactyls had knocked the stuffing out me.

Had a grand old day today getting out and about and am now roasting the arse off some peppers for dinner later. Actually came back from Donegal more relaxed than I went. Can't complain about that.

367-50 Week 38

And we're off on week 38, although I'll be hard pushed to come up with the shots I did last week. Off on holidays to Donegal with the kids this weekend, so I'll maybe give my old nemesis, the landscape shot, another try up round the coast.

30/07/12

I did a model shoot last night with the newbies in the camera club I've been involved with over the last few weeks. The members got some really nice shots, which I hope will encourage them to take more photos. It was tricky getting the lighting right for all the different shapes and sizes of cameras involved, but we got there in the end. Our model, Holly was a really lovely girl who was also extremely patient. That came in handy given the amount of messing about with settings that was needed. I was very taken with her eyes and took this hot when she was wearing a large hat to cover one side of her face. It's heavily cropped, but I think it looks pretty well and does her justice.

31/07/12

Another in the recurring series entitled "things I see when standing smoking at the back door." You may recall other favourites such as "blackbird on the greenhouse," "leaves," "snail on the bin" and so on. This is, I suspect, a weed, but it was rather lovely nonetheless - a single yellow flower (god but I love yellow in photos) among green leaves. Narrow depth of focus and Bob's your uncle.

1/08/12

Tonight was wet and there was nothing but very dull Olympic coverage on TV and not much else on besides. I made a rather nice salad for dinner and that made me think of the lightbox in my back bedroom. I sharpened a knife and very thinly sliced some cucumber, tomatoes and the little spring onions (or scallions here in N.I.) shown above. These cam out quite well and there was something mildly therapeutic about pushing pieces of food around a sheet of perspex. I'm quite pleased with the amount of detail on these, even when zoomed in quite close and also cropped.

2/08/12

I've made a decision to get more intimately acquainted with my Lensbaby Composer and the accessories kit that came with it. I've had this piece of kit since March and haven't really got to grips with using it, never mind the assortment of wide angle lenses, macro lens, telephoto lenses etc. I'm going to try to take a few more shots with it and am planning on taking it on holiday to Donegal at the weekend. This was taken with the Composer and a x10 macro lens attachment which seems to allow very close working and as always a nice bit of blur round the edges. The watch is my great-grandfather's half hunter pocket watch which was passed on to me by my own grandfather shortly before he passed away in late 1999. The watch still runs, although it needs a bit if a clean. One day, when I own a waistcoat, I will get a chain and wear this watch like a real dandy.

3/08/12

Another picture of the Northern Irish summer. Saw these while bringing in the washing from the line before it started chucking it down again and dashed inside to get the camera. This was taken with the Lensbaby Composer with a macro lens attached. It's one of the few shots taken with the Lensbaby that is really sharp where it needs to be and the nice fall-off in depth of field towards the corners is pretty pleasing.

4/08/12

First day in Donegal, sun shining and time for a walk on Marble Hill Strand. This is a grab shot of my son Conor and I just love it. Lensbaby Composer again but sharp on the face and lovely colours. It has rained pretty much since this.

5/08/12

Couldn't resist this - Mark's little wind up skeleton toy was sitting like this on his bed this morning as I wandered past on the way to the shower. I took loads of other shots, but this was the one that stuck in my head.

367-50 Week 31

Boredom, ennui and lethargy are my enemies as I start this week. Routines are what's keeping me going but days are starting to feel the same - I need to find something to lift me a bit; something to get lost in for a while. Gotta keep looking for it - I'm sure it'll turn up eventually.

I'm supposed to be going to Donegal at the weekend and am not really feeling like it but have been being bullied mercilessly by my friends to go, regardless of how I'm feeling. Damien and Colin, my two closest friends have been very good with me over the last month and I guess I feel that I owe them something. Still not looking forward to it.

On a different note, I've added a button on the page (lower down and on the right hand side) that allows anyone reading this to share the blog via Facebook. If you like what you see, please share it - you'll be making an old man very happy.

11/06/12

 More by luck than design I had booked a place on a workshop at Townhouse Gallery in Belfast - my first time shooting with a "real" model. Met some really nice people at the session and it was pretty good fun although I'm still not convinced that I can't get the same lighting effects with two speedlights, wireless triggers, stands and umbrellas all within the confines of my back bedroom. Anyway, Sandra was a fantastic model and George was an excellent host. This is my favourite shot of the evening; mainly because I did a sneaky bit of homework beforehand on the model and on different poses.

12/06/12

So, Sister Mary Agnes - is the hereafter what you'd imagined it to be?

No, Sister Assumpta, I hadn't thought it would be so feckin' dull

Ok - it was late (10pm by the time I got round to taking a shot today). I have just come into possession of an ex-hospital lightbox (Ta, Coly - you're a star) and started playing with it tonight. A box of miniature nuns was at hand - it's complicated - and voila. Sister Mary Agnes and Sr Assumpta in the afterlife. Again, apologies to any of my religious readers, but it's not as bad as the wee nuns entering a beach volleyball tournament.

13/06/12

This my daughter Ellen doing the same pose as my picture from Monday. The only difference was that this was taken in my spare bedroom. I set up a pop-up studio in exactly 15 minutes. The gear was as follows:

Backdrop: 1 Tesco double bed sheet, white - £4.97
Lights: 2 cheap flashguns with manual settings (total cost £100)
2 light stands and umbrellas - £20 from Amazon
1 set of Yongnuo wireless triggers - £45 from Amazon

Total = £169.97

14/06/12

This is one of the pair of cucumber plants I've grown from seed in the greenhouse. It looks like they're starting to flower, so I'm hopeful we might get to see some cucumbers in a month or two. Having never grown cucumbers, I'm not sure what I should or shouldn't be doing with them.

15/06/12

Friday night, the Lobster Bar in Burtonport. Alex attempts to lift my spirits by strangling Colin. Having spent four hours travelling with Colin, I wasn't sure if I wanted to kill myself or just give him a hug. This is turning out to be the wettest gentlemen's weekend ever. I have to return to Belfast tomorrow for what can best be described as "personal reasons" and the guys were very understanding. Even to the point of two of them offering to break my legs if I didn't go.

16/06/12

9.30 on a very rainy Donegal morning. Packed and ready to head back to Belfast, stomach in knots and nerves jangling. Three hours in the car like that isn't going to be fun. Colin surfaced just as I was getting ready to leave. There's some thing quite surreal about your best friend hugging you while he's wearing blue stripy pyjamas as the rain pours down.

17/06/12

Woke this morning (4.30am) feeling wasted and drained. Getting out of bed was an achievement and even a fag and cup of coffee didn't perk me up. After wandering round the house aimlessly, I went back to the lightbox. I bought a bag of fruit yesterday and got stuck in this morning. I found that it was tricky getting sharp shots, but the colours are really nice. I also forgot to set my white balance for the fluorescent lights but was able to correct it later in Lightroom. Might play some more with this later. There's a watermelon and a grapefruit that might be pressed into service.

367-50 Week 16

Into week number 16. Nearly forgot to take at least one shot this week and ended up coming up with something in something of a hurry - can you guess which one it is?

27/02/12

So, I put my camera on the floor near my feet, pulled it put to a nice wide angle (24mm) and used a cable release to takes pictures of my socks. This should confirm two things for everyone; I have big feet and I have terrible taste in socks.

28/02/12

I had read about camera tossing a while back and tonight I decided to give it a try. After some experimentation, I found that setting the camera on shutter priority and using a shutter speed of 0.5" gave me some nice shapes. The camera was set on a 10" self timer and the trick seemed to be getting the camera in the air and spinning just as the shutter opened. I would like to point out that I wasn't using my big camera and the really expensive lens. Instead I was throwing my daughter's second-hand D-60 in the air. Over a tiled floor. With no safety.

29/02/12

Shadows round at the City of Belfast Photographic Society. This is the one that I didn't produce during my week of table-top shots with my desk lamp. Taken in the holiday chalets at Cloughglass in Donegal, this was a grab shot of my friend Damien sitting inside the house, with the sun sinking and his shadow projected onto the white wall of the fireplace. Damien's face is sharp, as is the shadow. His nose is really that shape.

1/03/12

Welcome to March! Busy day today and I ended up at Aikido training without having taken my photo for the day. I took my camera into the dojo (it's actually a scout hall) in the hope that an opportunity might present itself. At the end of the class, I grabbed Shihan Millar for a quick portrait. I love taking Davy's picture as his face has fantastic character. It's also worth noting that 14 years ago when I started out on my own Aiki journey, Davy was the man who had patience with my inability to learn anything. Many a Saturday morning was spent with Davy trying to teach me how to stand, never mind move or do a technique. 74 years young and still has it on the Aikido mats.

2/03/12

This would be the empties after Friday night's debauchery. Two bottles of Whiskey (the Crested Ten was superb) and a bottle of wine each. I have a serious blank in my memory between the hours of midnight and 3am.

3/03/12

I think I made Colin look almost angelic this shot. After our walk and couple of pints in an empty bar in Glen we repaired to The Rusty pub in Teelin. The sun was going down and was shining through the windows of the bar. The light was lovely.

4/03/12

Sunday morning - up early to fall on my arse at Muckross and return with no photo's worth talking about. I took this out the back of Damien's house, looking towards Slieve League. The right-of-way along the side of the house has recently been cleared and the removal of the old trees and bushes has improved the view immensely.