2013 365-9

And they're off, racing into week nine of this 365 project like there's no tomorrow. Ok - maybe not. It's been a bit slow this week. although I am still in remarkably good form.

25/02/13

200m lens, tripod and cable release set up in the back garden today to see what I could get in terms of the birds coming to visit my bird feeder. Just the usual suspects I'm afraid but nice to look at anyway.

26/02/13

Bunch of flowers, window, moon rising behind. A reminder of a very pleasant evening with some truly nice people.

27/02/13

When I picked Sarah up from school this afternoon, I found that the school playground hand been ringed by thousands of pennies arranged in a neat line. The P7 pupils were doing this as a charity fundraising event. Small but mighty. 

28/02/13

This was taken tonight using a maglite torch suspended from the cross piece of a backdrop stand. The room was blacked out and the camera was set on the ground with a wide angle lens (about 24mm) attached. I used bulb mode, f22, ISO 100 and shutter speeds of around 60-90 seconds. The light trails produced by this were then layered in photoshop with a coloured gradient to produce the final picture. Very spirograph, for those old enough to remember spirographs.

1/03/13

Spring is in the air. Longer days, warmer weather and the first of March. This was a little snowdrop from Stormont estate this afternoon.

2/03/13

Simply Sarah, hanging upside down from monkey bars in the park. Turned upside down of course.

3/03/13

Sunday morning routine. Ironing my shirts while listening to Sunday Sequence on Radio Ulster with William Crawley. I enjoy the strange combination of repetitive activity and philosophical discussion coupled with coffee and smokes. Please don't judge me on the basis of my shirts - they cheer me up when I'm feeling down.

Boredom, String and a Maglite

As the title suggests, the three elements above came together tonight in an explosion of silliness. My daughter and I suspended a maglite torch (with the head removed - just the bare bulb) from the cross piece of a backdrop stand by some string. We set the camera on the floor looking straight up, put it on bulb mode (f22 and ISO 100) and then swung the torch in as close to an arc as we could. We used exposures in and around 1 minute for these. The plain light trials were then exported into photoshop and layered with a rainbow gradient layer (using multiply mode) to produce the final effect.

The first one is mine, the second is the work of a rather precocious 10 year old.

367-50 The Final Round Up

Only four shots left to see me through to the end of this year long project, finishing with my 50th birthday on the 15th of November.

12/11/12

Don't mess with me when I'm doing the washing up. That's all. I'll cook all day and all night but I really hate doing the feckin' dishes.

13/11/12

Old-looking hands. These hands have now taken 365 shots for this project, plus a few thousand others across the last year. This is my hand doing something it does too often. I had thought of having my other hand holding a glass of wine.

14/11/12

A final light trails shot, taken with the assistance of my daughter Sarah. Set the camera and tripod up in the back of my car and set the camera for a series of self-timed 8" exposures as I drove along a busy road. This was the best of the batch, although I'm not totally happy with it and might give this another go at some stage soon.

15/11/12

And there it is - the last of 367 shots. That's me, on my 50th birthday. The beard is back and the hair needs a trim, but I'm saving my next haircut for a special, photographic purpose. I'm taking a bit of a risk wearing a white shirt to go out tonight as there's a pretty good chance that things will get messy. Very messy.

Thanks for taking the time to have a look at the blog and thanks to everyone who got their picture taken at some time over the last year. To quote the Beatles, "some are gone, but some remain."