2013 365-19

I'm kinda pleased with this week's shots and there's not even a roller derby picture in sight. A nice mix of stuff and plenty to go to and see this week courtesy of the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival.

6/05/13

Here's my eldest daughter and my youngest daughter doing some crafty stuff. I like this shot. My eldest girl is very talented and had been asked to put on a workshop in the R-Space Gallery Lisburn. Sadly very few people turned up, but I did get to see pictures of chickens and penguins wearing hand-knitted jumpers

7/05/13

Second photoshoot for our long-term bump shoot and a visit to Belfast's Titanic Quarter this evening just as the sun was setting. I'm pretty sure this won't make the final cut, but I do like it. A real grab shot, with the sun directly behind my unsuspecting model.

8/05/13

I was both surprised and excited to be taken along to take part in the Fawlty Towers Dinner Experience at the Northern Whig. A great interactive show with a fair amount of improvisation all done by three very talented performers, and cunningly stealing loads of good bits from the TV series. Sadly the dinner was pretty poor, but the craic was 90.

9/05/13

Went along to see Amadou and Mariam in the big marquee in Custom House Square. No takers for my extra ticket, so I was bill no mates this evening. The music was awesome, although there was a real lack of stage presence, but that's not surprising given that both Amadou and Mariam are blind. Very talented singers and musicians and they were kind enough to bring along two of the loveliest backing singers I've ever had the pleasure of photographing. Here's one of them.

10/05/13

I went to see Mary Gauthier (supported by Ben Glover) in the marvellous surroundings of St George's Church this evening. This lady is one of the best songwriters currently working and I was delighted to have this chance to see her in Belfast for the second time. Ben Glover was, as always, great to listen to but I noted that the fiddle player had changed sex and grown a beard since she was last in Belfast.

11/05/13

I joking posted about this image on Facebook, saying it was a great example of how not to take a night-time landscape shot. No tripod, no wide-angle lens, no long shutter speed. I shot it handheld with a 70-200mm lens at f2.8, 1/200 shutter speed and ISO 6400. I did however smack out around 40 shots in quick succession to stitch together to make this panorama. It's Ok, but has to be filed under "could do better."

12/05/13

Faded bunch of flowers tied to bridge over Holywood bypass at Holywood Exchange. The number of plastic ties would suggest that other bunches of flowers have been placed here. The memorial is in memory of Karen Cromie aged 31. Karen jumped to her death on the 28/01/11, one week after she had threatened to jump from the same bridge. Karen was a talented Paralympic athlete who had been selected to complete in the 2012 London Paralympics and died near the Decathlon store at Holywood Exchange which had sponsored her.

2013 365-14

 Week 14 and things are picking up. An offer of a new long term project starting this week, a spot of good old roller derby and a lot of getting out and about - for that, read more landscapes. I also ended up getting my eyes re-tested this week and now need reading glasses. I apologise for any photos that have not met acceptable levels of sharpness over the last couple of years.

1/04/13

Sunday night brought a visit to Belfast Roller Derby training to get some shots of two visiting coaches from London Roller Girls. This is one of my favourite shots of the night, Jack Attack, who was leading training for the squad.

2/04/13

It might be snowy and bloody cold, but I experienced a real "golden hour" this evening while driving near Greyabbey, Co Down. The sun was just setting and I saw (as I drove past) the light hitting the trees on the far side of this little lake. A quick u-turn later and a dozen shots yielded this; the colour of the trees is really nice, but the reflection of a really well-defined sky in the water of the lake really made this stand out.

3/04/13

This was a very interesting evening for me. I had been approached a couple of weeks back by a couple who I had met through concert photography to document their pregnancy with their first child. This was (as most of my favourite photo projects tend to be) simultaneously fascinating and intimidating. Could I actually do this? What if I messed it up? This was something very important to these genuinely lovely people and they were asking me to photograph it? I did some research, shared some ideas and began the process with an "at home" photoshoot this evening. One of the long term plans is a montage of the bump across the next 5-6 months an we made a really good start with that end of things. We also got a few nice couple shots and planned out a few more ideas for the coming months. The end results of the shoot were 7-8 really nice images. The one above is a simple detail shot; I'm not planning on posting anything identifiable during the project as that feels like some sort of invasion of the couple's privacy. Next shoot will hopefully be in one month's time.

4/04/13

Working in Newcastle this morning and although a bit of thaw has set in, the Mournes looked beautiful still covered in snow. This was taken from a bridge in Dundrum on the Keel Road with the wrong lens and probably the wrong camera settings and no tripod. Turned out pretty well, all things considered.

5/04/13

I'm still working away very slowly on another longer term project on road side memorials to people who have been killed in road accidents. Today was a productive day on that front, and I was able to bag three different shots, although I also missed another two because I wasn't able to get turned or stopped in time to get ut of the car with the camera. I've logged them for future reference, and also have another two logged from different locations over the past week.

6/04/13

Saturday brought the last-minute opportunity to go and take some shots of small boys playing football. I packed my photographer's rights guide in my bag just to be on the safe side. I suffer from mild paranoia about taking photos of children. It certainly was a lovely morning, great light and a rare chance to photograph sports that happen outdoors.

7/04/13

Here's a funny thing. I sometimes take pictures of flowers. Sometimes I take pictures of landscapes. Niether of which I particularly have an interest in. This shot took me an hour of fiddling about to get right and when I posted it to my Facebook page it got exactly zero likes. However, earlier in the week (see above) I posted a landscape shot of the Mournes covered in snow taken hurriedly as I drove back from Newcastle to Belfast. By hurriedly I mean I jumped out the car with the wrong lens and snapped two shots from a bridge in Dundrum. Post that to Facebook and what happens? Loads of likes and comments. There's no pleasing the punters I tell you, no pleasing them.