The Hidden Cove

Waking up at 5am, I jumped in the car and headed to Auckland’s West Coast to catch some early morning images. With a host of beaches to choose from, I settled on my favorite – Piha Beach.

39km west of Auckland’s CBD, its a long windy road to get to Piha. From the direction I came, I took a road called Scenic Drive. Scenic drive itself was built in the 1930’s depression by those on unemployment at the time. Often crossing ridge lines, when an opening in the trees becomes available, it offers a magnificent view of various parts of Auckland.

Unfortunately for me, the sky was very overcast at Piha the whole morning I was there, only clearing in the afternoon, on my home journey. I did take a number of shots however, and will look to edit through them and share a little later in the week, along with some more information on the local area.

Today’s shot was taken just around the corner from the southern end of Piha. The image does not show it, but it was blowing fairly strong winds! (I had to retrieve my hat which blew off the cliff!).

Image/Editing wise, the same as the last few days. Shot on the Samsung Galaxy S2 using Vignette with a digital Polaroid setting. Writing added in Photoshop CS5.

January 7, 2013 0

Balmain Reserve and the Beach

As the days rapidly count down to the end of Holiday time, I have decided to continue on with my ‘digital Polaroid’ theme for the last few days. Hitting 25 degrees in Auckland today, we headed down to Cheltnham beach for a swim (I have written about the beach numerous times in the past so wont spend time on it today)

As with the last few days, image was shot on the Samsung Galaxy S2 using the vignette app. I made some minor tweaks to the film type and exposure today, giving it mostly an overexposed quality – as a comment pointed out in the past, this almost gives more of a feeling of bright, hot summer. Photoshop CS5 provided the written content and resizing.

I have used CS5 these last few days simply out of convenience in that its on the laptop in front of me, rather than my usual desktop unit with Gimp 2.8. Its been, lets say refreshing to use CS5 these last few days – more just so I don’t totally forget how to use it (just almost).

With two days left on my break I am hoping to get to the West Coast – Piha. Fingers crossed for tomorrow or the day after. I will take a combination of mobile, digital and film shots all going well.

Until tomorrow!

January 6, 2013 0

Looking out at Whitford

What was to be a few hours in the morning trip to view a car, turned into a full day out at the south eastern beaches of Auckland. On our way there I stopped at a high point, looking down at an area called Whitford and out into the harbour.

In hand I had mobile phone and Pentax 35mm SLR – of which both took some shots, but I have yet to finish the 35mm film off.

Aside from mentioning it was a fairly hot, and beautiful day, not much else to add for today’s image.

Shot on the Samsung Galaxy S2 using Vignette on Polaroid mode. Wording added in post processing with Photoshop CS5.

Hmm…looks like I forgot the year also…

January 5, 2013 4

Out to Sea

A busy day today, so one from recent archives. Shot at one of our local beaches on the Sony Nex and Sigma 30mm lens.

In Gimp I adjusted the colour levels and added simulated film grain.

Tomorrow afternoon work has a bit of a team afternoon/outing, so all going well I will have something to show a little different than usual…all going well.

November 29, 2012 2

Waiting for the Tide

I headed out with an Olympus E-500, older model Four Thirds DSLR today with a lens of a 35mm equivalent of 140-600mm. Its been a while since I played with such a long focal length, and coupled with not being used to the E-500 had a mixed bag of success. I thought I had captured some great bird images, but upon getting home and looking at full screen, it look like I needed to up the iso to get the frozen images I was looking for. Never mind. I will borrow it again some time.

Mixed success aside, and being several years discontinued now, I did enjoy the operation of the Olympus. I have owned in the past a few of their compact range for pocket shooters, but never one of their DSLR or Micro Four Third units. I think if I had not made some lens investment in my Nex, I would have looked at the likes of a EP-3 or E-M5. The sensor size is great for getting a big zoom.

Today’s image ‘waiting for the tide’, after some cropping, was one of the ones I liked from today’s Olympus experiment. As well as cropping I also pushed the contrast a few notches and applied a bit of sharpening.

Back to a camera I am more familiar with tomorrow!

October 7, 2012 0

Rope by the Shore

My last day of work before breaking for my holiday ended up being two hours longer than usual, and by the time I got home it was dark and cold (almost like winter again!) I took a stroll down to the jetty after dinner, Nex 5N and tripod in hand.

If one shoots cameras as a form of relaxation, shooting night images must be the ultimate in unwind. A single exposure might run into the minutes. All you can do is sit and wait, or count, breathing slow and relaxed as you take in the surrounding environment. I also like how you are gathering not just a split second of time into one image, but minutes of time, all frozen into one picture…a time capsule in a photographic sense.

Today’s image, ‘Rope by the Shore’ also happened to be my quickest exposure of the night at 52seconds @ 100iso. Breaking my usual practice of capturing the appealing light of the night, I converted today’s image to B&W with Gimp, pushing the contrast slightly, as I often do with my images. I cropped it, giving a wider aspect, and resized for the net.

September 13, 2012 0

Sky, Earth and Sea

Today is the first day in some time that I have be dissatisfied with all the shots I took when out on a walk. I thinks its something that happens to all of us at times. I had taken out an older digital camera, and with the light being a bit challenging, it struggled to get focus on some of the more interesting shots I threw at it. Coming home I selected about five for post editing, but just couldn’t get any to work.

Feeling a bit stuck, I pulled out a shot I took earlier in the week of Motutapu Island. Cropping heavily and pushing contrast and saturations beyond usual limits, I have tried to give the image more of a ‘painted feel’ than a photographed image. I’m not sure if I pulled it off, but tomorrow is another day and will bring us another image!

August 30, 2012 0

Land Ahoy

Making the conscious decision to take the Nex and Jupiter 8 out for some after work shooting today, I found myself struggling to get anywhere before dusk set in (I thought I had said summer was coming). Coupled with a blistery cold wind and temperature I cast my eye out to the ocean, which looked/felt to have a storm brewing.

Snapping some images I tried to capture the cold isolation the ocean can arouse, and imagined the relief of early discoverers as they sighted land in the distance.

Taken from North Head, on the North Shore of Auckland – its a great spot (but dress warm on cold windy days) to get a panoramic view around Auckland and its harbour.

August 29, 2012 0

Island’s End

Todays post ‘Island’s End’ was taken on Waiheke Island – a larger populated island a ferry’s ride out of Auckland. Armed with my Ricoh and an external viewfinder I turned off the display and went shooting. Although not film, shooting with an external viewfinder and the display turned off does give you the ‘modern feeling’ of not knowing what your image will look like until later (or until you cheat and push the play button). Being a wide open round viewfinder without markings yet I shot the horizon crooked – usually a bad thing, but I don’t mind it in the balance of this image of land, sea and sky.

Post shooting I cropped the image to a wider view, upped the contrast one notch and reduced for the web.

June 19, 2012 0

Path to the Sea

Another photo from the files today. I intended to head out after work to take some images, but the wet weather hit hard late in the afternoon, and neither I or my camera was prepared to venture out. Todays image was taken just outside a penguin colony at Oamaru in the South Island New Zealand. A great little place worth visiting for its historic nature, we had to make a stop rather then drive through. Again on my Ricoh, straight from the camera with its bleach bypass setting. Prior to owning the GRD IV, I was never a fan of built in effects on cameras – I always shot in standard RAW or Jpg. Ricoh however have really put some thought and a huge amount of control into its menu’s and process options on many of its cameras. I still shoot unedited on all my other cameras. I think I just like it because I can fine tune its on-board editing and then share the pictures without spending any length of time in editing – after all, why spend hours in post production when you can be out shooting?

May 8, 2012 2