2013 365-22

Some week of taking photos that was. The more I did, the more I got asked to do and I'm loving it. The slow morphing into a sports togger continues. I'm writing this on a very sunny Tuesday evening in Belfast. So sunny that I took myself off to Tesco and bought a nice little table and chairs for the back garden, and that's where I am right now.

27/05/13

I was on the road to Bangor on a mission of sorts and realised that I would pass Rihanna's tree. Everyone in Northern Ireland knows the story of how the farmer who owned this field came out and ordered Rihanna to cover herself up. The tree looks much more bleak in winter but it had decided to sprout some leaves. I juked into the field, took my t-shirt off and took a couple of photos. I didn't get shouted at by a fundamentalist farmer.

28/05/13

At the weekend I invested in a e-cigarette and began to try it out. It's not bad and (touch wood) I hadn't touched a real smoke for three days when I took this self-portrait. The glowing blue tip is a wee bit weird, but I'm going to give it a try and see how it works out.

29/05/13

I was doing the psychology thing today, and assessing a simply charming boy who had been home schooled. At the end of the assessment, he presented me with 6 free range eggs from his own chickens in the back yard of the family home. This was quite simply the best thing ever. The eggs are amazing.

30/05/13

BMX jump track at Mary Peters complex in Dunmurray. I've been asked to shoot a big BMX event (or Jam as the kids like to say) at the end of June and wanted to check it out beforehand. The new bike trails here are out of this world and the jump track is breathtaking. I ran across Shaggy who was working on the dirt jumps and John (pictured). This was taken with no lights and with the ISO ramped up. I think with my full lighting kit in place, this is going to produce some awesome shots. Roll on the 29th and 30th June and the Monster Jam.

31/05/13

I arrived home to a rather nice surprise today. I had entered this shot in the Belfast City Council photo competition many months ago and had frankly forgotten about it. Today I received a letter telling me that it had won first place in the buildings and art section and I have been invited to attend a prize ceremony in two week's time to pick up a (small) cheque. Chuffed to bits.

1/06/13

This weekend I managed to blag myself shooting privileges at T13 skate park for the Flatland Jam. Essentially, this involves riders doing tricks on the flat, or dancing on bikes as it was described to me. The organisers went out of the way to help me and allowed me to get on with what I wanted t do. I used a slightly modified version of my roller derby set-up with three lights set up, two to cross light the stage and one to provide a bit of fill light. Again, slow(ish) shutter speeds and low ISO produced some really punchy shots. My only gripe is that its hard to get a feel for the speed that these tricks were being performed at. 8 riders, all of whom were really talented and who approached the competition in very different ways.

2/06/13

This is the winner of the Flatland Jam, Aran. This guy and a spanish rider called Alex really set the place on fire, and produced a close-fought final, Aran took away a nice cheque and an all-expenses trip and entry into the world championships later this year.

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.

2013 365-4

Winter still here. Flag protests still here. Thought one might cancel the other out but I was wrong.

21/01/13

Snow fails to affect the flag protests. Protesters and snow managed to bring Belfast to near total gridlock this evening. Glad I got home a wee bit earlier today and was sitting with feet up and a cuppa in my hands while chaos ensued outside.

22/01/13

I'd been thinking about doing something in Belmont Park with the three carved wooden statues, one of which is now on it's side. Thought I'd give the wire wool a bash and since there was still snow on the ground, I knew I wasn't going to set anything on fire. It was an eventful evening. As I was setting up, four people arrived in the dark with torches and started sprinting up and down the hill just to the right of where this shot was taken. After a brief chat which went along the lines of "are we going to be in your way mate?" - "No, but I'm about to set fire to stuff" I started shooting. Four burns into my evening's fun, I found myself surrounded by a bright light. Turned out it wasn't the rapture, but a police helicopter with a very bright searchlight. Seems burning wire wool in east Belfast while flag protests are happening about a mile away isn't that good an idea. I waved and shone my torch on the camera and tripod. God knows what they made of that.

23/01/13

My favourite little model again. Went to walk the dog and grabbed the camera bag on the way out the door. I ended up armed with my camera, a 10-24mm lens and a flashgun. Not the best lens for portrait stuff but it gave me an excuse to try using some fill-in flash while also trying to use the lovely winter afternoon sky as a backdrop.

24/01/13

Finally, after a few aborted efforts, I made it to the Queens Films Theatre to see McCullin, the documentary about Don McCullin (no surprise there then). McCullin's photos made a real impact on he in my early-mid teens and were one of the biggest reasons why I picked up a camera, film in those days, and started trying to learn photography. My admiration for Don McCullin's photography has never waned although after reading his autobiography I was left with the impression of a very cold, unemotional and damaged man. This film changed my mind about this and left me quite awestruck at the man's humanity and compassion. He was the most reckless, impulsive and irresponsible of photographers; I've still not figured this out completely but guess a lot of it came from his upbringing in a fairly tough part of London and the gangs he ran with as a teenager. Even his first shots of these gangs were masterful in their composition. I realise this could turn into an essay - that's a shot of my cinema ticket, a postcard courtesy of the QFT and the two photos featured in the film that left the biggest impact on me - both taken in Biafra and on adjoining pages of one of my books of McCullin's photographs.

25/01/13

"They were madly in love but friends knew that it would end in tears"

Those are shallots, not onions, in case you were getting worked up.

26/01/13

Mentioned on Facebook that I was having a dearth of ideas for the wee men. A suggestion flooded in. Get them doing a photoshoot. How I made the leap from "photoshoot" to "photoshoot involving woman removing her knickers" is anyone's guess. Suppose I'll have to bring that up with my therapist.

27/01/13

All day photoshoot at Asylum Gym in Newtownards today for a deadlift party organised by Dave (see last week's post). Great bunch of guys and a very competitive but supportive atmosphere with guys lifting personal bests. Picked this shot because of the effort in the face and the amount of bend on the bar - I couldn't do too many reps with just the bar, never mind with a bunch of weights on it. I'm slowly morphing into a photographer of obscure sports. And I'm enjoying it.

2013 365-1

Titling this post made me think for some reason of George Lucas's debut film THX 1138. A wee bit expressionless and cold.

I stopped my picture-a-day project on my birthday in November 2012 and took 6 weeks away from the commitment of taking a shot every day and posting updates every week. It felt weird and I really didn't like it - I missed the demands, the discipline and the commitment. It was a chore sometimes but it gave more back to me that it took. So, take a 6 week break and then kick off again, this time with a year long 365 project to document 2013 in all it's ups and downs. Lets rock and roll.

01/01/13

Not a tremendous shot to start off with, but I found myself standing at the top of Victoria Square with a hangover and a camera. Tried to frame the H&W cranes through the triangular windows of the viewing gallery and sort of succeeded. Pity about the dirty glass.

2/01/13

I was tidying up the junk room in my house and came across this old telephone handset. It sparked off a few ideas for the wee men and this was maybe the pick of the bunch. I entitled it "Ralph had a tough decision to make" but when I posted it on my Facebook page i inadvertently typed "touch" instead of "tough." No one corrected me - I'll assume anyone who saw it was either too polite or thought I was being cleverer than I actually am.

03/01/13

By day three I was getting into the habit of carrying a camera with me when i went out. This was a late afternoon walk through Stormont, taken at around 4.30pm. I was trying to capture the shadow here but the dogs add something.

 04/01/13

First wire wool burn of the year at the Twelve Arches bridge near Newcastle. It's OK but there's a lot wrong with it. It's way too soft for one thing and I'd have liked to have seen more the bridge/arches. A return visit at a later date; different lens maybe and a few more attempts at it may be in order.

05/01/13

Thanks to the ever-so-inventive Debbie, I ended up shooting at the Belfry indoor skate park in Newcastle this afternoon. Two off-camera flashes working remotely from my camera and some very impressive skaters and boarders made this a really fun session. The two skaters were fantastic and I think I might have pushed them a wee bit to get the shots I wanted. Plenty of interest from the people and kids present.
This is part of me continuing to try to figure out using off-camera flash to freeze action with the ultimate aim of starting shooting roller derby with strobes. I've now got three flashes that can all be triggered and adjusted from my camera, so may visit roller derby training some time soon and start working out the practical aspects of lighting for bouts.

06/01/13

More flag protest in Belfast yesterday, two days of violence and unrest, shots fired at the police, police using baton rounds and water canons. Everyone blaming everyone else. It saddens me to see how little has changed in Northern Ireland when an issue like this crops up and how polarised this society can still be. I'll let this one speak for itself.

367-50 A Reflection

367 shots. One a day for just over a year. This project just became part of my life. It slipped in there, became part of the daily routine, without actually taking over my life. As I reached the end of this I spent a fair amount of time thinking about the project and the photos I've taken over the last year. Here's what I came up with.

My photography has improved. Overall, there's good shots, average shots and poor shots but the ratio of good to bad has improved over the year. I'm shooting in raw nearly all the time and my preference has become to shoot on manual much more often than I ever would have.

There were big changes in my life across the period of time of this project. My marriage breaking up was the biggest by a long way and keeping on taking photos helped me through. Having something to concentrate on each day, even if it was only for a short time, was useful for me. I want to keep this post about the photography; the relationship stuff would need a blog of it's own.

I changed my camera. Out went the old reliable D90 and in came the kick-ass D800. I miss the D90 but the capability of the D800 is incredible. I'm still coming to terms with it and it could be a little better for sports and live music stuff, but it simply is an amazing piece of kit.

I was bemoaning the fact that I've never developed a "style" in terms of photography. My eldest daughter described my approach to photography as being like Pokemon - I collect style and techniques and then move on to something different and it can seem like I'm trying to bag as many techniques as I can. That is true - I see something I like and I want to try it/replicate it/ find out how it was done. But I also run with it too, I push the techniques when and where I can and see what else is possible. It was also pointed out to me that constantly changing and experimenting may actually be my style. Trying different styles and approaches has been great fun. I think I had been getting into a bland rut and was relying too much on the views and opinions of a small number of people.

For a while I forgot about what other people thought and just did what I wanted to do, exposed myself to areas of photography I'd never tried (landscapes, long exposure, light painting, boudoir) and generally tried to branch out. I also made the effort to express myself through my photography on at least a couple of occasions - I actually tried to use pictures to communicate how I was feeling at a particular time.

Leaving the camera club I had been in and not joining another was also the correct move for me. I feel that there's a certain narrow view of photography that exists within the camera club setup here in Northern Ireland and I think I had become too tuned into that rather than focusing on what I what I wanted to do. Seeing pictures that do well in competitions made me feel two things; firstly, they were generally all great shots if a bit over-processed. Secondly they just weren't the sort of shots I wanted to take.

I think, looking back, that I've also been forced to push myself more in terms of getting to grips with the technical aspects of shooting. I've also had the opportunity to do some "semi-pro" shoots where someone has been relying on me to produce the goods. I guess this started with Belfast Roller Derby who adopted me as their official photographer but there have been plenty of others, and the opportunities have increased across the year, mainly due to positive word of mouth and also simply getting in touch with people and asking if they needed a photographer. Some say yes, some say no, but there's no point in getting put off by the odd knock-back. If you're serious, you keep asking. Eventually people will ask you.

Keeping the blog has been a positive experience for me as well. Posting weekly rather than daily updates worked well for me and pulling in anything up to 1300 views a month meant that people were at least having a look. I'd have liked to have generated more comments on the blog about the photos I was posting. There were a few good ones, a few bad ones and a couple of quite nasty and hurtful ones. I have to admit that the nastier ones hurt when I read them, and I did have a wee rant about one in particular but it never stopped me pushing forward and keeping going. I guess you don't write a blog and put yourself "out there" unless you can't put up with someone having a go at you or your content.

There were a couple of comments I decided not to publish that were spiteful, and were either left as "anonymous" or (I'm pretty cure) were left under a false name. I was fairly sure I knew where they had come from and as such, hoped that I was able to see them for what they were. It certainly wasn't about the photography. There were times over the last year when I was less robust mentally and emotionally than I wanted to be but again, having a purpose and a direction kept me on track.

Anyhow, I'm taking a break from the picture-a-day thing for a while. I may kick off again in the new year with something a bit more focussed on some of the areas of photography I want to develop a bit more. I'm going to keep on burning stuff and the orbs will still be spinning. Here's one from the weekend, just in case you've read this far and wondered where the photos on a photoblog were.

Uncle Colin burns some wire wool. Marble Hill, November 2012

367-50 Week 42

Lets hope for a rant free week this week. In contrast to last week, I received a comment this week from a lady who is interested in buying one of my shots from the blog. That is a little bit of a contrast from last weeks comment. The print was duly ordered and looks really good, so it's heading off on a journey to Canada.

Here goes with week 42.

27/08/12

A romantic scene, or a warning on the perils and evils of drink? Make your own mind up on that one my friend.

28/08/12

I'm not sure what draws me to taking pictures in old graveyards. I always pass this very old one going to and from my house, but have never (in many many years) actually noticed it being open. It's very small and very overgrown with headstones dating back to the early 1800's. Everything seems broken and at some kind of a slant. Having ventured in today, there is really nothing much of great interest, but at least I've managed to get inside.

29/08/12

This is last night's shopping from B&Q (DIY/Hardware Store). These rather fine items are for a photo project which I was hoping to do tonight, but have been stymied by the rain and general bad weather. The metal whisk, chain and caribiners were made by my own fair hands. I'm not saying too much right now, but stay tuned for the results. As soon as I get the right weather, I'm out there.

30/08/12

Took my own advice and got on my feet and went walkabout in Ballyhackamore with my camera at lunchtime for half and hour. Snapped away and found that I quickly switched on in terms of my concentration. I was looking specifically for detail shots and this one presented itself pretty easily (and pretty early in my walk). A single untouched strawberry sitting on a bare table outside a cafe in the sunshine? I couldn't resist. And then I had lunch with my eldest, her treat. A pretty good afternoon all round.

31/08/12

First experiment with burning wire wool as per the photo posted earlier in the week. That's if you don't count trying it in the back garden and setting fire to the neighbour's hedge. I chose this stone bridge because I knew there was nothing that would catch fire and there was water on each side. I set up my camera on a tripod, manually focused on a torch at the spot I was going to stand on and used a ten second self-timer to trigger the camera. Settings were 30" exposure, f11 and 100 ISO. I got around four burns completed before I started attracting attention and had to quit. Either that or I had stumbled into a dogging hotspot, given the cars that started appearing out of nowhere on a dark and previously deserted country road.

1/09/12

Chanced upon the opening of the Art in the Garden sculpture exhibition in the grounds of the Culloden hotel this afternoon. I'd heard about this on Radio Ulster's Arts Extra programme a couple of nights ago and made a mental note that it might be worth checking out. And worth it it was. Some lovely pieces (around 150) set within beautiful gardens. A huge range of sculptures which I had great fun photographing. The exhibition runs until the 23rd of September and I'd recommend a visit for anyone who is looking to spend an enjoyable hour or two. I've posted a few more pictures and a short write up on the Demotix news site and you can check them out here:

Art in the Garden on Demotix

2/09/12

"The Blue Orb" was a result of an expedition last night. I wanted to try out some of the wire wool shots from earlier in the week in a tunnel or somewhere closed in. This was taken in a set of cycle underpasses in East Belfast late at night. The orb was made by swinging a set or battery-operated fairy lights (£4 from Ikea). Settings were the same for the wire wool shots (30" exposure, f11, ISO 100) and the focus was set on a torch placed where I was going to spin the lights. A 50p coin on the ground was sued to centre the swings and give a relatively consistent orb shape. I used a 10-24 wide zoom here to get as much of the underpass in, particularly the graffiti on the walls. Slight cropping in Lightroom and an adjustment to the white balance, setting it to tungsten to get the blue tone to the picture.