The Grid. A digital frontier. I tried to picture clusters of information as they traveled through the computer. What did the look like? Ships, motorcycles. With the circuits like freeways.
Kevin Flynn
Panda’s in a Nightclub
Celebrating the first full moon of the Chinese New Year!
Learning the Jumping Flea
The Ukulele. We always had one in the house when I grew up. I never learnt to play it. I did learn other instruments, but the little Uke never tickled my fancy.
More recently a few people from work expressed the desire to start up a social ukulele group. It sounded like a fun enough work related thing to do, so I jumped online and purchased this little number pictured today.
Ive learnt four chords, but ain’t no singing cowboy yet…The cat dosen’t run away if I feed her first, so thats a start!
Three Shots of Nature
I have not gone looking for any statistics, but was thinking today that we have more prime/fixed lens photos being made than ever before in history.
Back in the early days of photography, everything was prime lens. Early 1900’s saw the zoom gradually introduce itself, and work into mainstream from the 50’s to current day. In general (but not always) the prime lens has offered superior optics and faster lenses – yet the usability and all-rounded-ness of the zoom makes it the amazing all in one package!
Yet, with the massive growth of smartphones this last decade, we have seen again the popularised mass use of the prime lens. I don’t think this is so much to do with supplying a quality prime lens matched to the sensor as it is technology limitations. Likely its only time until this changes and the zoom again regains the crown, but for now the prime is here, and possibly making individuals better photographers whilst its at it!
I say better because a fixed focal length makes you think. You need to move with you feet for the better angle or closer/wider shot. That makes you (ok, it ‘could’ make one) think more about your framing of composition.
I could go on, but perhaps another day…
Todays images shot on the Sony Nex with 50mm Jupiter-8 Lens (which makes it 75mm).
Approaching the Match – with different processing
Im lucky enough to live next to a nice sized park and bush walk. The above image being one I have shown at some angle or another int he past. As with all parks, often various social and club games are played. Here its generally Football/Soccer in one season and Cricket in the other. At the moment, cricket.
Armed with my Sony Nex and Jupiter 8, I grabbed several shots whilst out for a small walk. After arriving home, I processed the three all a little differently. For the head image in B&W I pushed it quite hard to get some heavy light contrasts. The second image, just above had a minor yellow tone applied to give a slightly dryer look than the rain all night may suggest. For the final image below, I didnt really do anything other than a slight straightening before framing and resizing.
Catch you tomorrow!
Boy in the Birds
Minolta Hi-matic 7s
In the Shade
I like trees because they seem more resigned to the way they have to live than other things do. Willa Cather, 1913
Hot Sun, Beach Weather
A beautiful hot and sunny day in Auckland, We dropped all chores and headed off to the beach (truth be told, we finished all chores…). The last few times I have been to the beach recently the tide has been low. We choose beaches where that does not matter too much, but I always enjoy full tide more – today was pretty close to it!. Also, the beach was blessed with west coast like surf waves (not that todays images show) on their own holiday on our east coast. A bit of body surfing and wave jumping is always fun.
Drying off I grabbed the Ricoh GRD IV and walked to one end of the beach and back. As shown in images below. That guy setting up his tent must have absolutely cooked inside once done! – wont get sun burnt at least!
The Tail End
Today we were lucky enough to have a team afternoon with work at the Auckland Zoo. My boss, who somehow fits the time in to also work there gave us an afternoon guided tour full of interesting and fun facts. I brought my Sony Nex along with both the kit lens and the 55-210mm zoom. The 210 stayed on for the day after the first 2 or 3 images. I captured a good range of images I will look through and show at some stage, but, for now, here is the tail end of it all…
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