Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas
Morning Tea at Work
Shot on my iPod touch, we had a great Christmas morning tea at work the other day in celebration of the season, and closing of year for some staff. My workplace does not actually close down at all, but I’m now off away on leave. Feels like I have not had a break this year.
Image played around with using Photo Toaster on iOS.
Perhaps some colour tomorrow!
Upon the Tree
A big long day – Christmas! Merry Christmas everyone!
Today’s image is of one of the tree-top Angels from the family home tree. Still the same old tree I had when young!
In keeping it short for the day, image was shot on the Ricoh GRD IV and edited in Photoshop CS5. Its been quite some time since I used Photoshop – I have been using Gimp as my main PC editor for some time now…the Photoshop layout and menu was all backwards (If you use Photoshop, just swap the editor names around and it will make more sense to you). I am by no means criticizing it – at the end of the day its the better of the two…just not my usual or chosen editor.
The bad weather is starting to arrive, albeit not as bad as forecast. We will see what tomorrow brings!
Hope your Christmas has gone well!
Franklin Road, Christmas Eve
The forecast weather bomb did not arrive yesterday evening as predicted and I managed to get over to town and walk the Franklin Road Christmas lights show. Celebrating its 20th year now, every Christmas a large number of the residents of this inner city area deck out their houses with a vast array of lights, models and even choreographed music at times! The crowds are generally very busy for the week its on – last night being no exception. Whilst driving up and down is an option, its much quicker to park the car and walk it as traffic is at a standstill – and then if you do manage to get your car on the road, you cant stop to look at houses at your leisure.
I only had my Jupiter-8 with me on my Sony (well, and my phone – but they are not so great for night shots), and found the 75mm equivalent quite tight framing wise with the crowds of people. I think today’s chosen shot was a nice balance of showing the colours of the lights, with the mass of people walking up and down. Hand-held (as usual) I was shooting at 3200iso and 1/50th sec.
Editing wise, in Gimp, I adjusted the levels and colour balance a little, sharpened a notch and resized.
Today of course also marks Christmas Eve! – I think as a child, I always found the 24th to be more exciting than the 25th! – I have fond memories of looking under the lit up Christmas tree at presents and looking forward to the whole extended family coming around the next day. My parents had a fake tree (which will please some and not others) that they still use to this day. <y mother has a blow up Santa from when she was young (although he needs an air top-up a little more now days). Now, with my childhood well behind me, its still an exciting time to head back to the family home and see all the family together. The odd present does not hurt either!
And whilst getting excited and celebrating, I also pay a thought to those for whom this is not the best time of the year. People in hardship or alone can really find this a difficult time. Although not for everyone, it is great to see various community groups putting on events on Christmas day where people can get a nice meal, be around others and have some cheer spread.
Right, time to put out the cookies and milk…
The Motorbike -in film-
As mentioned yesterday, I finished and developed my roll of Kentmere 400asa film in the Ricoh TLS. Today’s shot is a close up of my bike I shot whilst waiting to go out on the Saturday.
Its sometimes hard to show as my film scanner is nothing flash, and I don’t have the right lens on any of my digitals to shoot film, but I was very impressed with the Kentmere 400. I have loaded another roll into my GR1 to shoot in the next week or so.
As we wind into another week I am slowly winding down, ready for a Christmas break for a few weeks. Christmas is a funny one – its traditionally a time to rest, reflect on the year and the year ahead. Its also busy (sometimes very busy) and at times stressful. I already have plans for a dozen extra projects, but think I will need to put things in perspective and acknowledge its just two weeks!
But until Friday afternoon, its business as usual!
Road to the City
With great weather outside, I managed to go for a bit of a ride on the motorbike for an hour after work before heading to the mall to begin Christmas shopping. Up in the Albany area of the North Shore, I dismounted and went for a bit of a walk around some land that is currently green pasture, but just as likely to be shops or industrial in the next decade.
At the edge of the field ran a waist height barbed wire fence – stopping whoever/whatever from passing through and onto the motorway. There is no stock in the area, and even a short person could get over it, so its function is a little questionable. It did serve as part of todays image ‘road to the city’!
Using Gimp I processed a cross-processing filter after applying a lomo effect. I then added ‘film grain’ and resized for the net.
oh, and the Christmas shopping – the shops were already busy and full. Thankfully I got the majority of presents today as its only going to get worse next week!
Sundown Wednesday
Shot on my Sony Nex with the Sigma 30mm lens, Sundown Wednesday is a view from the Bayswater Marina to the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
I am coming to the slow acceptance that Christmas is just around the corner now. One of my work colleagues has put their tree up, some of the local Christmas Tree sales spots are advertising, and the Malls have their Christmas shops opening. This weekend we have the Santa Parade in our local village (as do a number of others). That also means its nearly holiday time!
Image wise, in Gimp I resized and added the black framing, nothing else was edited.
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