Rain and Earthquakes

After what seemed like (and can’t be far off) all of 2013 to date being sun, and then drought, Auckland finally got its first reasonable drop of rain today. Unfortunately for the Volunteers at the Devonport Fire Station, it occurred on our open day – but all went well all the same.

Some of our other big cities in the country have a total outdoor water ban at the moment, so planning ahead, and doing my bit to conserve water, I laid out buckets in the ‘common drip areas’ around the property to collect the rainfall to use later in the week.

Just after the rain calmed, we were hit by a relatively rare, for Auckland, earthquake! a 4.0 on the scale and 5km deep, it was felt widely around the area, with mixed reactions from those I listened to calling in on the radio. One lady thought the washing machine was on, another thought the building was going to fall over…just image somewhere in the middle, lower it a bit, and you are about right.

Image wise for today – shot on the Nex with 210mm lens. Using Gimp I added contrast and resized.

March 17, 2013 6

The Still Lakeside

Silence is a source of great strength.
Lao Tzu

March 14, 2013 2

Overgrown Quarry

I revisited an old quarry on the way home this evening. I’m sure I have featured an image of it before, but for the life of me (well, for a fairly quick image search) I can’t find it.

Closed a bit over a year ago I think, the quarry has sat unused and fenced off. Gradually the gravel paths have become overgrown with weeds, and areas perhaps once maintained have started to flourish in relative lack of human day to day activity. At the bottom of the quarry is a small lake. It was almost totally calm, and I snapped a few shots of the far bank with the reflection in the water.

Shot on the Sony Nex with a legacy Jupiter-8 lens. Whilst it looked quite nice in colour, I think it also lends itself nice in black and white. Converted in Gimp with a faint colour tint, otherwise as from camera.

March 13, 2013 0

Take Flight

‘Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding’.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Shot on Sony Nex 5n. Cropped and desaturated in Gimp.

March 11, 2013 2

Field of Long Grass

Another image shot from yesterdays walk. Not much word content to add today – but shot on the Ricoh GRD IV in cross-processed mode. In post I reduced and added rounded corner boarder.

Weekend time!

March 8, 2013 2

Logs sitting, waiting

Another hot day in Auckland. Out and about doing chores and similar, I have not yet had a chance to take any images today, so will post another from yesterdays visit to Long Bay.

Wandering through the park, there are a number of overflow car parks. At its peak in summer this year, Long Bay had about 25000 visitors (!) and a 2 hour car jam waiting to get in. Fridays visit, with schools and work back, was substantially less, and I wandered through the closed off car park with only the sound of the birds and wind through the tree. The ranger must have been chopping up a few trees recently, and I took a few shots of the pile of logs left. With a total fire ban at present due to dry conditions, these logs were unlikely to be used for a BBQ or similar any tie soon.

Shot on the GRD IV. Using Gimp I rounded the corners and resized. Otherwise as is from camera.

March 2, 2013 0

Swallows Take Flight

Today celebrated my workplaces annual Big Day Out. Held at the beautiful Long Bay beach, the sun was beating down by early afternoon, and those of whom had not brought our togs, wished we had.

Taking a moment for a stroll, armed with my Ricoh GRD IV, I captured a number of images, both showing the beautiful beach, and also the drought like conditions that have been sweeping the country (Luckily for Auckland, no where near as bad as farmers North of Auckland). Walking under a selection of trees, I was amazed to see literally multiple tens (lets estimate 30) of Swallows darting in and out of the trees. All the other animals I had seen were sheltering under trees out of the heat.

Now looking to capture any close up action of a small bird with a 28mm lens is never going to happen, so I framed up the trees and sky and looked to capture a silhouette of several birds as they flew overhead. Todays image being my pick of the bunch for today.

Using Gimp, I slightly cropped the image in post processing.

Weekend time!

March 1, 2013 0

Road on the Hill

A shot from the Summit of North Head in Devonport, taken yesterday during a bike road. Shot on the Galaxy s2 using the pro hdr app and edited in post with afterfocus.

Still having internet issues at home, which is very annoying. Im quite surprised and unimpressed its taking so long to rectify…maybe tomorrow!?!?…

February 27, 2013 0

Sails on the Harbour

An old archive shot for today. Not quite sure where the day has gone, but gone it has.

Shot on one of my old cameras, the Canon G12, from North Head, looking into the city. I dont recall if it was any specific regatta day, but I liked how the low sun desaturates all but the sails of the boats.

Resized in Gimp, but otherwise as is from camera.

Sort and sweet again today – we are STILL having internet issues. Its a shame – I have been completely happy with our provider until 3 weeks ago… not so much now based on very slow and non communicative service.

February 24, 2013 0

Looking to the West

For the last few days I have been shooting with my Ricoh GRD IV set to a custom setting ‘positive film’. I have written before about the great menu system on this little fixed focal length compact, with full manual controls.Positive film is a setting I have not, until this last week, used. I must say I like the colour settings it provides. Of course, one can just shoot straight raw/jpeg and adjust in post processing, but sometimes its fun just to customise it in the camera (as the Ricoh does very well) and shoot. Hence aside from resizing and signature, today’s image is from camera.

With an overall busy weekend, I got up early and took the opportunity to take a walk around the Bayswater area on the North Shore. Stopping at a cliff top, looking out west, we can see the Bayswater Marina, and then further in the distance, to the right, the Auckland Harbour Bridge.

As the sun slowly sinks towards the horizon, we see the end of another weekend. Im not quite sure where the weekend has gone!

February 17, 2013 3