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 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.

This is one of the last afterdark shots from South County Dublin this evening. I haven’t really done anything like this before. I don’t think I’ve even tried. I’d given some of my filter gear to one of my friends so was looking around for stuff to play with. All I really had was his [...]]]>

This is one of the last afterdark shots from South County Dublin this evening. I haven’t really done anything like this before. I don’t think I’ve even tried. I’d given some of my filter gear to one of my friends so was looking around for stuff to play with. All I really had was his coffee and my mobile phone, plus the flash and the ledge we left everything on. Initially I did the phone on its own, and then I did the coffee and then I decided to see if they went together. I wound up getting all sorts of things wrong, like, you know, if the phone is black, make sure some light falls on it if you can’t get a flash around to one side (there was a sheer drop…). I guess all that’s missing is a magazine

Mostly when I think of people doing product type photography, it seems to involve light boxes. I keep meaning to do something about it but I can never think of what to actually photograph…I’m done with jewellery for a while, and other stuff…it never really seems to talk to me. I could, I suppose, take a jar of jam and throw it in the lightbox but it’d never tell a story…I think this does in a way.

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.

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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.

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.

This was from the first filter session way back. It’s still one of my favourite photographs.

The photograph consists of three stacked filters, two ND grads and a tobacco grad which is a worrying fetish which I developed overtime. It was, at the time, an impulse purchase so really I am surprised that I got stuff [...]]]>

This was from the first filter session way back. It’s still one of my favourite photographs.

The photograph consists of three stacked filters, two ND grads and a tobacco grad which is a worrying fetish which I developed overtime. It was, at the time, an impulse purchase so really I am surprised that I got stuff I liked as soon as I did.

I’ve a feeling the jpg convert has murdered this a little.

I owe thanks to Richard for lending me the filters. I was on the beach to take action shots, not moon shots. This is from a fullmoon night….beautiful evening on Dollymount.

In fact, I’d done a photo walk there myself a few days earlier, and had shot it slightly differently on that occasion.

This is actually a piece of public art which I was not aware of until that first photowalk. I do not do a lot [...]]]> This is from Kyle Tunney’s Evening photowalk a few weeks ago.

In fact, I’d done a photo walk there myself a few days earlier, and had shot it slightly differently on that occasion.

This is actually a piece of public art which I was not aware of until that first photowalk. I do not do a lot of flash photography although strangely enough I do own more than one flash, so most of these things tend to be somewhat experimental.

Anyway, Kyle has some photographs from some of the other participants there on this page here if you’re interested in having a look.

Also, if you’re interested, occasionally I organise photowalks via twitter and via the Photobuddies thread on boards.ie/photography.