2013 365-12

This week marked the official beginning of Spring. Since I was completely lost for ideas at the start of the week I thought that I should maybe take shots with a spring feel or theme. Luckily I have a few little plants starting to sprout around the house.

18/03/13

Two little tubs of tomato seedlings growing on the kitchen window. I've just thinned them out and am aiming for maybe 6-8 plants in total to go out into the greenhouse once the risk of frost has passed. Hoping I have a better crop of tomatoes than last year's disappointing performance.

 19/03/13

Outside my kitchen door is a bush which produces lovely yellow flowers. I see it every morning when I have a smoke and let the dog out. This morning was the first time that I noticed that the flowers were starting to return, and here's the proof.

20/03/13

This is a weird plant that was left behind in the house when I moved in. It does strange things, produces strange flowers and I'm just not sure what it is. I don't know where the water came from, but it seemed like a nice picture to try and take.

21/03/13

These are my pepper seedlings which have been slow to sprout but are getting there. I have some sweet peppers (above) and also some chilli seedlings; again I'm aiming for maybe 6 plants in the greenhouse come May.

22/03/13

Friday brought a rather serious dunt to my spring-like feelings. 3-4 inches of snow had fallen overnight, the school I was travelling to had been closed and I nearly went on my arse trying to get to the car. Those are my size 11 foot prints at 7.30 this morning.

23/03/13

Snow continues, effectively knocking my spring ideas on the head. Not be deterred (and still feeling kinda springy) I bought a bunch of flowers when doing some shopping and had a go at photographing them, then adding textures and patterns in post-processing. I'm happy enough with these as a first effort although I suspect there's more possibilities here that I'm not getting just yet.

24/03/13

2013 365-3

Welcome to week three of 2013. I have had an eye infection for most of this week and while it hasn't stopped me taking photos, it's made working on a computer a less pleasant experience than normal.

14/01/13

This is a rather excellent chap called Dave. Dave approached me about doing the photos for a powerlifting competition that he is organising at the end of the month. Naturally I jumped at the chance, in the suspicion that it would provide massive amounts of photo opportunities. Tonight I visited the gym to check out the set-up and lighting and took a few snaps. Hard to decide whether to use ambient light or the speedlights. This was a quick portrait of Dave, which unfortunately gathered some very unflattering comments on-line. Wrong choice of lighting for this shot completely, even if I'd fooled myself into thinking I knew what I was doing.

15/01/13

This was titled "Missing flag found safe and sound - Belfast rejoices." I wish. Protests continue, violence is ongoing and everything now seems to be planned in advance. At times like these a bit of humour goes a long way, if you can find the humour of course. Maybe there isn't actually any in this current situation.

16/01/13

Yet another report in the newspapers this week about a photographer being robbed of his cameras and gear while covering the current street protests - by my count that makes three since this this started. It's hard to tell if this was a couple of opportunist scumbags spotting some expensive looking gear and deciding to take advantage of the situation, or whether it was something more sinister and connected to people not wanting photographs of the disturbances to make it into print on on-line. The "little scumbags" theory is maybe more likely, but who in the name of hell are they going to flog pro-level photo gear to? Don't see them trying to teach themselves the basics of photojournalism with their ill-gotten gains. 

17/01/13

The biggest moral dilemma a photographer can ever face. You're in the middle of a riot (or peaceful street protest to defend your cultural heritage) and you come across a car being burned out. What do you do - shoot on aperture priority or shutter priority? It's an old and well worn joke in photography circles, but worth another outing.

18/01/13

So the snow arrived this afternoon and it was certainly cold. Fairly heavy snow all evening, although in Belfast it wasn't lying that much. In the hills outside Belfast I heard some stories about cars being stuck and snow drifts. By the following morning, it was all but gone but I got one quick snap outside in the front garden while it was still falling.

19/01/13

Just in case you ever wondered where soup mix comes from - it's mined by teams of wee men. It must be some built-in instinct on my part, but as soon as the weather gets really wintry, I make soup and in particular, I make the same vegetable soup that my grandmother and mother made. Quick, easy, tasty - there's half of it in the fridge to be eaten over the weekend and the other half is in the freezer for use later this week.

20/01/13

I was crawling around on the floor this morning with my camera (don't ask why) when my dog Muffin decided to join me. This was a quick point, click and hope for the best shot, and it turned out pretty well all things considered.

367-50 Week 5

Another mixed bag of goodies this week, and this was the first time I nearly forgot to take a shot on one of my days.
Monday brought a chance to go and take a few shots of my eldest daughter's cross stitch workshop at the Black Box in Belfast. Vonnie was taking some cross stitch virgins through the basics and was being extremely patient. Tea was drunk.

12/12/11

Tuesday saw the emergence of the Christmas tree. Trish had been slowly sneaking decorations up around the house for about a week - trying to break me in gently to the idea that Chrsitmas was just around the corner. Any way, after a bit of cutting and sawing accompanied with a spot of swearing, the tree was in its stand and decorated. You can't beat little reflective glass balls with twinkling lights.

13/12/11

On the way to work on Wednesday morning, a blizzard hit around the A26 turn off on the M1. Within five minutes everyone was driving at 30 miles and hour in one lane of the dual carriageway. There was a good 3-4 inches of snow within a couple of hours. I fought my way out to school in Ballymena only to find that half the staff and a similar number of children hadn't made it in; a day's work cancelled but I did get tea and toast. This was the scene outside my office at around 9am.

14/12/11

Schools were open again on Thursday, and I spent the day in a local Primary School which makes a big deal of promoting healthy eating with its pupils. I was standing considering this fact while looking at the table in the staff room. Pot Noodles - Check. Chocolate biscuits - Check. Full Fat Coke - Check. Go on - how many unhealthy things can you spot?

15/12/11

Was pottering about the back of the house on Friday at a wee bit of a loose end when I spotted Muffin poking her nose through the gate. I had been trying to take some pictures of our little Robin at the bird feeder, but everytime I got anywhere near him he buggered off. May have to re-think that one.

16/12/11

I had been contemplating getting a few self-portraits worked into this project and had an idea to try to do a black and white movie-star type thing. Got a few good shots but then Lightroom decided to stop playing with me and I had to resort to post-processing with Photoshop. This made a relatively simple job much longer and more complicated. Anyhooo - here's the net result of it all.

18/12/11

I've chalked up five weeks now and am still enjoying this project. Heading into Christmas week fired up. Here's hoping Santa brings me some kit and a wee bit of inspiration.