I didn’t have any real plan in mind but wound up as far south as Brittas Bay. I kept hearing about Brittas Bay but really and truly, all [...]]]> After a rather trying time with a composite work, I was advised by Richard to go out in the sunshine. So I did. All the way to Wicklow.

I didn’t have any real plan in mind but wound up as far south as Brittas Bay. I kept hearing about Brittas Bay but really and truly, all it is is a huge beach and today it didn’t do Beach for me. So after looking at it for about 5 minutes and idly wishing the wind turbines were a touch closer, I got back in the car and drove to Wicklow. Where I passed this.

According to my reading of the map, this is Wicklow Head Lighthouse. You can walk a good part of the way to it past some sheep (and little lambs – some of which were black and very cute but very running away) and some cattle. You might be able to get closer but I was playing chicken with the sun which was on its way down behind an inconveniently located Wicklow mountain. So I went for the lighthouse.

Anyone who knows me at all well knows that Philippe Plisson is probably my favourite photographer in the world and he is particularly well known for some superlative shots of the lighthouses in Brittany. There is also some really hot stuff by Jean Guichard but what both of them have in common is a lot of photographs of lighthouses. I like lighthouses. I like them a lot. There’s something lonely sentinel about them. This one is a bit like that. I’d like to have a go off it at dawn when the sun is arriving rather than when it’s disappearing, and also from a bit closer with a 10-20. But I like this; there’s something warm about it.

A little while later, after I’d played with a castle and some filters, I had a look at the harbour light and this is what I got.

I think there might have been one filter left on – it was getting dark enough to stretch the exposures without using the filters anyway.

I quite like both of them to be honest; they might be the nicest lighthouse shots I’ve done. While I was in the harbour area in Wicklow a man told me I should have been there 2 weeks ago, the sky was an amazing pink. Que faire?

Anyway, this is from my big day out today. I wound up in Wicklow with the objective of adding to the Abandoned Boats collection but that just didn’t happen because I was distracted with ruins and lighthouses.

While I was recceing possible photography locations earlier during the day, I discovered there were places where water broke quite heavily against the rocks near the sea wall to the port end of the Bay of Angels in Nice, so when the sun came out this evening, I decided to go in search of some [...]]]>

While I was recceing possible photography locations earlier during the day, I discovered there were places where water broke quite heavily against the rocks near the sea wall to the port end of the Bay of Angels in Nice, so when the sun came out this evening, I decided to go in search of some long exposures. It was an informative experience.

For one thing, I learned that some people are just not afraid of being swept away off rocks. You’ll see about 5 of them in the photograph above – it was, I think, a 30 second exposure, hence their ghostly aspect.

The second thing is I suck at sunsets.

The best fun I had came later, after dark. I’m starting to think I’m sometimes happier shooting in the near dark than in the light.

I’ve plans for some things like this in Dublin.

Yesterday I came across a book in FNAC for 52 weekend projects or some such. The book was originally published in America so I was reluctant enough to purchase it in French since it’s probably on amazon for half the price and in English. Not that I’m afraid of French, oh no. But it had some nice lightpainting stuff and how to build lightboxes. I’m going to look into it.

Couple of links today.

1) John Williams and the Hill of Tara.

2) Galloping Green – Spring.

3) Dannie O’Brien – Knot

Okay. I’m off to amazon to see about the cost of a 765B tripod in Amazon. If it’s more than 89E, then I’m going to buy one in FNAC. Maybe.

This is the 10007th photo taking with this camera which I have about a year. This is actually quite low by my standards; prior to 2009, I’d normally make 15000-20000 photos a year; it’s the price of sport. I’m finding that quite hard work now, and [...]]]> A new photograph by way of a change, taken today.

This is the 10007th photo taking with this camera which I have about a year. This is actually quite low by my standards; prior to 2009, I’d normally make 15000-20000 photos a year; it’s the price of sport. I’m finding that quite hard work now, and having reviewed an awful lot of them lately…it’s really hard work.

Anyway, I was wondering what sort of a photograph I’d like to make this evening. The weather never really gave me the light I was hoping for although one of my mates reckoned the sky was a stunning colour this morning; truth is not where I was. The clouds didn’t clear enough for a sunset either so I went and played with the reflections off the cumulo-nimbus. I still can’t focus for a a lottery win in the dark, particularly when the camera is on a tripod 3 feet below my eye level. ;-( Anyway while I was wandering around town, it occurred to me the tides might be nice for a long exposure without filters – given the grey sky and the fact that it was late and I was stuck in traffic – if I had some sort of a focal point. I chose the green beacon on Bull Island because I know it and feel safer there than I would were I to give Poolbeg Lighthouse a similar shot.

Exposure was basically guess work – camera reckons I over exposed about 4 stops but I’m not sure what it was metering off because frankly….yes, I think I got it more right than the camera did. It was post processed in Adobe RAW – the blackslider took a hit and that was about it. I may have upped the exposure another stop. I like it a lot. I’d like to give it a shot with a really clear star light sky some evening also – not going to happen today because there were too many clouds.

A few minutes later I took this also:

Those towers are ubiquitous. I have a lot of photographs of them now, and a couple of striking ones. I may push them together into a little ickle gallery page later on this evening. I like this though because – surprising as it may seem, no filters went near this either. I own a pile of NDs, a blue and green and a tobacco grad and I use them variously to create space age images or to really mess around with photos for post processing. Normally I’d swear that there most have been at least a light ND on this but no, nothing. Didn’t even have to consider it. Put simply, it’s worth going out shooting in the dark sometimes. But man, focussing in the dark is a hassle.

Only one link today and if you are interested in photography and lighting, you really should take the time to click on it. Yesterday evening, Mark Wallace did a lighting web seminar for Pocket Wizard. I thought it would be all about pocket wizard but it wasn’t. It was all about all your options with lighting and dealt with on and off camera flash. As a round up of lighting techniques it is by some distance the most useful link I have come across on the web. It was flagged to me by Strobist who is without any question the best known off camera lighting expert on the web.

So here it is. Mark Wallace’s lighting seminar for Pocket Wizard.

EDIT after the fact:

In the comments, Tommie suggested that I cut it slightly differently. I agree with him, so here’s the newer version.

This is one of the older shots, done with a lot of automatic buttons pushed on a brief – very brief – trip to Rome a few years ago. I didn’t really have the freedom to do what I wanted while I was there and set up time was very limited. Very much a case [...]]]>

This is one of the older shots, done with a lot of automatic buttons pushed on a brief – very brief – trip to Rome a few years ago. I didn’t really have the freedom to do what I wanted while I was there and set up time was very limited. Very much a case of suck it and see what came out of the camera when I got home.

Rome is one of those places that a) you want to take photographs but b) want to take photographs that 100 million people haven’t taken before. It’s very hard.

I haven’t been out much taking photographs of late, so there haven’t been very many updates here. This is from the archive to remind me how to press the publish button on this blog from time to time.

There tends to be arguments about the white balance in this shot. This – for what it is worth – is a near exact reflection of what it looked like when I was there. I’ve been advised on occasion to tone down the orange glow, or get rid of it altogether. I’m reluctant to do so because a) I like it and b) it was there anyway. I have other shots of cities by night – like this one – with different shades:

That looked pretty much like that too. You’ll also find Dun Laoighaire by night here.

What gets me about the shot from Rome is that while it looks lovely and all that, what would really make it shiny is if there were clearly identifiable landmarkes in it. I’m not asking for much. Just a Colosseum or two.

Most of the product photography that I see done through the various photography groups I am involved in tend to involve lightboxes. I don’t own one and I’m not hugely enthused about buying more gear to [...]]]> One of the things I was interested in giving a shot at was sort of product glossy magazine type photographs.

Most of the product photography that I see done through the various photography groups I am involved in tend to involve lightboxes. I don’t own one and I’m not hugely enthused about buying more gear to set up photographs that I might not do too much with. Also, I spend a lot of time in in the outdoors and am slightly more interested in decontextualising products and doing something different with them. This came out of a discussion I had with a marketing guy from Quiksilver at some stage when we were talking about kite photography. He had visions of me getting a kitesurfer into Blackrock Baths I think; something which is unworkable because of the DART lines. But I put the idea away and decided to use it some other time.

Because it’s dark in the evenings, and the weather is generally miserable when it’s not dark, most of the photographs I’ve been taking lately have been in doors, and occasionally in the dark. I’ve been playing with toys and tricks either via the iPhone or the camera itself. Last week I got an intervalometre – the Canon one – for my 40D and had visions of things involving stars, gel light off camera flash. So on Friday evening I packed all the gear up and went to Dun Laoghaire to do a little more exploring.

Dun Laoghaire is starting to be my favourite place to take photographs lately. I only went out a while ago to recce a left of centre photography shoot that’s being stymied by the weather and tide so I have a lot to learn before I’ve exhausted my options. It’s more, much more to me, than Howth is and I never thought I’d say that.

Friday evening, in addition to all the camera gear, I also packed a bottle of nail varnish and a small little ickle bottle of perfume. I used to have loads of these; wish I had more. They sell them in gift sets so I’m going to look at getting a few more for experiments of this nature. The nail polish I chose because of the strong colour and I also liked the shape of the bottle.

One of the comments on this suggested that it wouldn’t look out of place on a glossy magazine. This was either shot with the 2.8 100mm macro or the 1.8mm 50. The interest in this type of shot was born out of the coffee and phone shot a few weeks ago (Modern Life is a Mobile Phone and Coffee on the Run). It’s not perfect – I can see one or two imperfections and also, if I had a choice again, I’d shoot it against a vertical array of lights rather than the single line. there was a little ickle bit of colour temperature work done on which had a negative impact on the shade in the traffic light which is the vaguely green light you can see left of centre.

I’ve other plans for this little bottle except every time I touch it I get covered in perfume. I finished that photography shoot smelling like downstairs in Brown Thomas. I need it to stop raining first however.

This is the nail polish shot. For my money, it’s slightly better technically speaking than the perfume bottle. It’s got a slightly strong colour but also that reflective top which is a bags to shoot. The next time I do this, I’d try to use a bottle of nail polish with a black or white cap. It’d be easier.

I’m eying up all sorts of stuff around the house though, including the iron, bits of crockery and idling wondering what I could do to totally decontextualise them and do something to make them catch people’s attention.

Danny has a truly great macro shot here.

Tommie has a fantastic comment on current life in Ireland right here.

I would never have seen either of those two photographs without someone else taking them.

Richard has a beauty here that – in my opinion – belongs on a greetings card. It is just such a classy shot.

ETA: [...]]]>

Danny has a truly great macro shot here.

Tommie has a fantastic comment on current life in Ireland right here.

I would never have seen either of those two photographs without someone else taking them.

Richard has a beauty here that – in my opinion – belongs on a greetings card. It is just such a classy shot.

ETA: Kevin Murphy makes me cry sometimes. This is wonderful.

________________________________________

The shot above is part of a series I took in Dun Laoghaire this evening. I was out recceing a particular portrait shoot that I want to do, and this was what i got up to after the recceing was done. We had fun.

Last night, suffering from a little “I spend too much time inside in front of my computer”, [...]]]> I live in North Dublin. Apparently it’s the sticks but frankly, it has a postcode, the buses are pretty frequent and on average take around 15 minutes to get to town so it qualifies as the city for me.

Last night, suffering from a little “I spend too much time inside in front of my computer”, I decided to go and shoot the sunset. The fact that the sun was around to set was an added incentive, but I’ve done Clontarf to death, done Portmarnock to death, done Skerries to death and done Balbriggan to death. I wanted to go somewhere new seascapy, and the choice was north or south.

As it happens, a few weeks/months ago (time goes by so fast), one of my friends had taken me around parts of Dalkey because I was interested in where you might go climbing in Dublin, and amongst the places I was taken that day was Bullock Harbour. I can’t ever remember being there before although I know I attempted to explore Dalkey before many years ago. Anyway, absent any better offers, last night I went to back to Bullock Harbour having not found anything to attract me in Blackrock or Dun Laoghaire, and much standing around ensued. There was a gorgeous sunset. I am a lousy sunset photographer.

I’m starting to think I should perhaps learn more about enhancing these things with flashes rather than filters.

Unfortunately, yon towers are a bit too far away to light up with a Speedlite.

I’m a little bit lost photography wise, and for some reason I find Dublin very limiting when it comes to photography, don’t know why. I’m looking for ideas for different things to do which currently do not include HDR (doesn’t really hugely talk to me) but I haven’t found yet what I want to try.

Of the two places I have been lately – Bullock Harbour and White Rock Beach, I would be more inclined to go back to White Rock Beach despite it being too much like hard work – there are lots of steps. It is, however, beautiful.

I’m toying with another dawn raid in the morning; just haven’t decided if I can manage a second 5am start in a row, and, more importantly, where to go. Very hard.

Useful links are thin on the ground today but there’s just this

50 actions some of which I might actually use at some point in the future.

Late last night, Darragh Sherwin contacted me and suggested I join him and Paula Banks for a sunrise shoot in Killiney. Despite the fact that it was around 11pm when [...]]]> I’ve come to the conclusion that Dalkey is a vortex out of which it’s hard to find your way, particularly if you are looking for Killiney.

Late last night, Darragh Sherwin contacted me and suggested I join him and Paula Banks for a sunrise shoot in Killiney. Despite the fact that it was around 11pm when I found out, and that I’d have to be in Killiney by 6, I somehow said yes, because it’s fun to go taking photographs with other photographers, even if you don’t talk to them while they, like you, are waiting out 30 second exposures.

I was there armed with “too many” filters. I have a problem with filter addiction and may need to learn to leave tobacco grad at home in a box. I don’t know if I really need it.

Here is the sunrise. I was shooting off wide angle lenses, switching variously between the 10-20mm Sigma and the 17-85mm Canon which came with my last 40D.

I’ve mixed feelings about this morning’s lot of photographs. I had never been to White Rock Beach before, and got lost looking for it – in fact, was lucky to turn up in the right place.

Mostly when I wind up with rocky beaches and a tide, I tend to want to play with long exposures and see what happens.

One of my favourite photographers is David Baker who does quite a lot of this stuff although I envy him because I think he probably lives somewhere a bit more scenic than Dublin. He’s also much better at this lark than I am although that might be because I was just too tired.

Anyway, Darragh has one of his here already and I think you’ll agree it’s gorgeous.

Let’s skip the details. The picture depicts Dublin’s twin towers, from Clontarf coastal walk. Very nice walk it is too. You get to look at Dublin Port through the mask of boats connected to Clontarf Yacht Club.

Anyway.

Some useful stuff:

Via boards.ie: Useful info for photographers. I like [...]]]> I think this made it onto dsl before dsl died.

Let’s skip the details. The picture depicts Dublin’s twin towers, from Clontarf coastal walk. Very nice walk it is too. You get to look at Dublin Port through the mask of boats connected to Clontarf Yacht Club.

Anyway.

Some useful stuff:

Via boards.ie: Useful info for photographers. I like this. Someone suggested laminating it and putting it in your camera bag, or some of it at least. It’s got all sorts of handy info, plus a cheat sheet if you use Canon Speedlites.

via glasseyalley: a nice picture of Inchydoney, one of my favourite places in the world

via Bob Christ: Burning man and photography rights.

via Kyle Tunney: timelapse of People’s Photography.

In other news, I was in Cork taking photographs yesterday so there will be a new photograph sometime this week.

This is from a couple of weeks ago on the beach during full moon.

Somewhere in the vaults of my mind is a plot for a book which involved following the path of light cast by the moon out of an enclosed bay to adventure. I got as far as mapping the enclosed bay, and doing [...]]]>

This is from a couple of weeks ago on the beach during full moon.

Somewhere in the vaults of my mind is a plot for a book which involved following the path of light cast by the moon out of an enclosed bay to adventure. I got as far as mapping the enclosed bay, and doing some notes on the society in there, plus some plot lines, but to be honest, if you strip out all the decoration, the plot wasn’t dissimilar to what Neil Gaiman wrote in Stardust, one of the standard “boy goes to seek his fortune, meets girl, winds up in love” type things. Somehow, when boys are the main characters, they don’t count as romances….Anyway, somehow,  after that, I somehow left the book aside and started taking photographs instead. Maybe for the winter I’ll have a go at it again. When I used to live in Portmarnock, any time there was any bit of moonlight at all, I used to go out, just to have a look at the line of light on the water.

For a long time I’ve spent time figuring out how to take photographs of the moon that are…a little different from the normal. I mean, there are only so many different places you can position a ball of light in a dark sky, let’s be honest:

I must have a few dozen variations on this theme taken with different lenses etc etc. About my favourite of all the moon shots is this one:

which was from a partial eclipse a while ago. The picture was taken when I knew a lot less about photography than I do now.I tend to wind up with a far darker sky than I desire.

Anyway, every so often (like, every day) someone else goes and takes a picture where I think “I wish I’d seen that”. Here’s Richard’s from the same night the top photograph was taken.