267-50 Week 51

Penultimate week of the project and Monday ended up being one of those last-minute "shit I have to take a shot" days. More Roller Derby head shots to do this week on Thursday; already pretty pleased with Sunday's set of shots and the high key approach seemed to have worked well. Anyhow, on with this week's update.

29/10/12

Peas. Hand-shelled garden peas to be precise that were on their way into a pea and porcini mushroom risotto I was concocting for dinner with my eldest daughter. As always, I had to buy a bottle of white wine for cooking risotto. Half a glass into the dinner, the rest into Vonnie and me.

30/10/12

Time to use that word "autumnal" again. Dog walking in Stormont again and took the Lensbaby with me. Completely the wrong lens when I was confronted with a huge leaf blower in the estate and children running through the clouds of leaves. The shots were crap. Got this though, which is a typical Lensbaby shot - sharp point of interest, lots of blurring. I had the f8 aperture disc in and found that I had to crank the ISO up to around 800 in the poor afternoon light.

31/10/12

Hallowe'en night and it was off with the girls to Mount Stewart for their Enchanted Garden and other stuff. Tour of the house, walk round the lake. Performers were in abundance, plenty of food stalls. It was a nice evening, if a little cold. Parking was in a muddy field a couple of miles away, and I guess that would be my only gripe. That and a lack of fireworks.

1/11/12

One thing begats another and my Roller Derby stuff led to me being asked to do a shoot for a local charity. The NI Cancer Fund for Children were launching their magic reindeer dust appeal and I had the honour of getting to take the pics. This involved some formal shots of the sponsors and some rather fun shots with this delightful young lady, Ellie. Much reindeer dust was thrown and blown around W5 and even after two changes of clothes and two showers, I'm still finding bits of glitter stuck to me. I have to say, I really enjoyed this shoot.

2/11/12

And speaking of Roller Derby, I did the second big batch of head shots last night. This is the wonderful Pusicfer who insisted on pumping iron. This shot probably won't make the final selection for the website but I like it and wouldn't want to leave it sitting on a hard drive somewhere. Sad to report that after this shot was taken, Pus managed to break her collarbone during evening practice. I'm sure she'll be back on skates soon.

3/11/12

When was the last time I posted something from the iphone? Was in Belfast city centre this afternoon - I must learn to stay out of the photography section at Waterstones bookshop. I went in looking for a book on a particular photographer and ended up with three books, none of which were what I'd gone in for. On the way back to the car I bumped into the Master Chief from the Halo computer games. Very convincing suit/uniform and he was quick to stop handing out promo leaflets and strike a pose.

4/11/12

My visit to Waterstones yielded two rather excellent books on lighting for portraits. I was itching to try some out and got stuck into them this morning with my ever willing model Sarah. The outfit was her choice. This is a shot straight out of the camera with no adjustments made to it other than a slight crop and a white balance tweak to the background. I have a bucket-load to process using a basic clam-shell lighting set up and some more like this with a ring flash. Felt like I was getting somewhere with this - now for the step by step processing advice. Lets see what that brings.

367-50 Week 25

This should be an interesting week. Delivering the training on dull psychometrics this week as well as (in one's role as el presidente) MC'ing the City of Belfast Photographic Society annual exhibition. The weekend brings the Festival of Fools in Belfast City Centre and there's talk of a potential photoshoot with the Belfast Roller Derby ladies on Sunday morning.

30/04/12

This is my big son Conor in the back of my car, shot with a 10-24 zoom at it's widest. It makes for an interesting shot. It also makes my car look like a bloody limo rather than the small sporty convertible it actually is.

1/05/12

I discovered this religious comic sitting on a table in a school staff room today. It tells the story of the amazing Mr Harper who was apparently on the Titanic. It's pretty turgid stuff and comes complete with a range of incredible puzzles. However, what caught my eye was Mr Harper's declaration to his daughter. What exactly was the good news he was giving out about Jesus? I suspect it was either that Jesus wasn't on the Titanic or that if he was, he could walk home when the boat sank. I apologise to any of my readers who are religious, but I find this type of thing moderately disturbing. And vaguely amusing.

2/05/12

After all of last week's complaining, I got to deliver my training on psychometrics to a small group of SENCO's this afternoon in the Antrim Board Centre. Nice bunch of people, and not one of them fell asleep. The old joke about the Rorschach Inkblots went down well. Everyone went home armed with a big box of test gear. Good help those children.

3/05/12

This is Milly - living proof that when one door closes, another one opens. Or as my grandmother used to say, when one door closes, another slams in your face.

4/05/12

The Festival of Fools opened in Belfast with two big shows yesterday and today in St Anne's Square. Apart from being good craic, there's millions of photo opportunities to be had for the keen togger. This the lady who was conducting the band and singing for the show tonight. Shot with the big beast of a 70-200 f2.8 Tamron lens in case you're interested.

5/05/12

More Festival of Fools today. This isn't the best shot of the day but this was one of the better juggling acts at the festival - Haggis and Charlie. Lively and funny - I would have liked to have seen a bit more variety and a bit more juggling with fire but hey - you can't have everything.

6/05/12

8am Sunday morning, Belfast City centre. 4 hours of shooting the Belfast Roller Derby girls in action during the making of a promo video. This tired me out, even if I was already knackered after a poor night's sleep. It was an amazing morning and we were able to get some excellent shots. Several re-takes were needed due to my exceptional ability to stray into the shot when filming. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product.