McMahon Serenity
Just a sneaky little long exposure while at Maroubra, this one was 3 exposures taken each at 238seconds and merged into a panorama, I really wanted the bigstopper filter to remove the ocean craziness and leave me with that beautiful rocky coast line, whic h it has to an extent and even the little old fisheramn was kind enough to hang 5 for a few minutes 🙂
This was a super low tide and barely any swell, the rocks you can see in the centre of the frame are usually being smashed by each wave set.
3 shot panorama
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Nikkor 17-55mm f2.8 @17mm Aperture: f/13 and Shutter Speed: 238.2s
out front – LEE graduated filter 0.9, LEE bigstopper and screw in circular polariser
Icing can hide a multitude of sins!
Well it still tasted damn good!
I make two cakes every year and I have made a total of 10 cakes in my entire life and I have to say, its actually somewhat enjoyable, therapeutic even!
This year, the theme was fairies, and of course, fairies need a toadstool to hide in – this and the obligatory number cake were on the cards 🙂
FYI, no cake mix here, everything from scratch, not that its really that hard, lots of butter and sugar 🙂
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 17-55mm f2.8 @ 55mm – Aperture: f/3.3, ISO 800 and Shutter Speed: 1/60 seconds
SB600 Speedlite up top
out front – sugar, butter, flour, egg and lotsa lollies
Chaos and Mayhem
Happy 5th Birthday Chaos, you have brought happiness, joy and an insightful perspective into our lives and its a privilege 🙂
Mayhem (aka tickles), is yet to have a birthday, but is well and truly living up to expectation and terrorising everyone around – but we still love ya 🙂
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 85mm f1.4 @ 85mm – Aperture: f/2 and Shutter Speed: 1/500 seconds
out front – beautiful girls!
Spoiled
view large to see the pain only those who do not live in the blues point tower have to suffer
I wonder if anyone asked…"so whats this highrise gonna look like? will it spoil the view of anything in the harbour?……………..like the operahouse or bridge?" 🙂
I will welcome the day that this piece of building (Blues Point Tower) is gutted and filled explosive ready to be brought back down to the earth, then I will come back here take a much much nicer picture 😉
That is unless someone who lives there offers me a spot for New Years Eve 2015 😉 then I might consider retracting my opinion. 😉
In the meantime, when I get a bit more time and my photochop sklills are a bit better, I am gonna clone that building out and see what the view would really look like.
It will also be very interesting to see the view in a few years when the Barangaroo site is complete.
This was the last of only a couple of sneaky shots i managed to fit in before dinner, I would have loved to get a few more images as the blue hour really developed, however reality and kids bath time takes priority 🙂
Pretty easy going image, 6 landscape orientation images stitched together, its one of the few times I have used the LEE 0.6 graduated filter, normally I opt for the stronger 0.9 filter.
6 shot Panorama
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 17-55mm f2.8 @ 55mm – Aperture: f/9.5 and Shutter Speed: 15 seconds
out front – LEE 0.6 Graduated Filter
Out to the right – sunset 🙂
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
Bongo-tastic and glamping
After hauling all our luggage down to the safari tent/lodge/bungalow we were quite amazed with the accommodation at the Western Plains (Dubbo) Zoo Safari, (+Taronga Western Plains Zoo ) hence there was only one thing to do – hold back the family and grab a few quick snaps before we settled in 🙂 ….
gee.. doesn't everyone think like that? 😉 anyway.. i got the usual 'is this gonna take long?' but with the Savannah right on the door step, Chaos, Mayhem and wifey were suitably entertained by the buffalo's, giraffes, zebras and other things with multiple legs cruising around the very large paddock/savannah, which, by the way is pretty cool to have a giraffe come within metres of your porch!
So I managed to get a few interior shots and a few panos at sunset and as you can see, this place it pretty spanky and great for a romantic weekend away, well that is what the couple in the next bungalow were having, we had chaos and mayhem 🙂 I also think that couple next door certainly thought twice about having children 😉
ANyway.. check out that bath, very cool, very deep and that shower, no water saving head there! I was also very pleased to see the omission of a TV.
So in a nut shell, I definitely recommend this place, it is actually quite good value when you factor in the dinner (which was awesome by the way +Taronga Western Plains Zoo) breaky, bike hire, zoo entry and night/morning tours, on which we saw and fed a Bongo, Chaos thought that was very neat, getting to feed a Bongo then going back to sleep in the Bongo Bungalow!
We are also Zoo friends of +Taronga Zoo which is also great value, just go a couple of times a year and you are well ahead and it is valid for Western Plains zoo.. if only it was not 5 hours away we would be there more often.
So, onto the imagery, all the images are processed using the PS +Nik Collection by Google plugin and this is where the software really shines in my opinion, makes the process very quick and with nice punchy results – which was the intention for these.
The panoramas were done a bit different to my normal process, rather than stitching and merging, I merged in then stitched in +Adobe Photoshop, thus automating the blend process.
The other neat thing with the Panos, particularly the one looking out over the savannah, +Adobe Photoshop adaptive wideangle filter worked wonders, I am still amazed at the software's ability to take UWA panos and remove the distortion and return them to a nice perspective, top stuff chaps.
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with a sand filled Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @11mm Aperture: f/8 (typically) ISO 100 and Shutter Speed: 1.5s, 1/6s and 3 s (typically)
out front – fancy tents, two zebras a few giraffes, dwarf buffalos (i think) and other animals that escape my memory 🙂
Lovely jubbly and thanks for looking – I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment
Burning Galaxy
Probably the last of the images of the 'gerry tree' which I will post, however similarly to Rodneys version I did take a partial liking to the vertical composition and also the option for a milkway background to the wool spin. This image was taken from a recent trip with +Rodney Campbell and +Suren J to the Stockton Dunes, by the way chaps, it is quite possible to walk to the ship wreck too, keen? 😉
Two frames manually blended together, one for the milkway and one for the steel wool spinnage.
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with a sand filled Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @11mm Aperture: f/6.7 ISO 100 and Shutter Speed: 169s (steel wool)
Aperture: f/2.8 ISO 3200 and Shutter Speed: 25s (milkyway)
out front – nada,
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
Cosmic Rays
Light speed down the railroad 😉
I always wanted to try this technique, its pretty simple, just zoom the lens whilst the shutter is open – a couple of tips, which i will use next time (i learnt the hard way) to hopefully improve it.
– carefully zoom so not to move the camera/lens, otherwise you get non-straight zooming stars 🙂
– time the zoom sequence to fill up the shutter speed, also try starting slow and speeding up to create a ramp down effect.
– slightly defocus the lens to get more prominent zoomage
you basically need 3 shots for this , one with the zooming star trails, one for the foreground and one for the sky (under the zoomage), simply stack and mask out the zoomage where it kits the foreground, otherwise it looks like gamma rays.. you know the ones that past thru everything…or is that alpha rays? anyway, you get the idea.
3 shots
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @ 11mm
Shot 1 (foreground, twilight ) Aperture: f/9.5 and Shutter Speed: 1/3 seconds
ISO: 100
Shot 2 (background) Aperture: f/2.8 and Shutter Speed: 45.5 seconds
ISO: 3200
Shot 3 (zoomage) Aperture: f/2.8 and Shutter Speed: 45.5 seconds
ISO: 3200 with lens zooming
Lovely jubbly and thanks for looking – I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment.
Snowballs at Mount Canobolas
When my mate +David Brodrick tells me there is gonna be snow down to 600 metres I am inclined to believe him, since he has some experience in weather forecast stuff 😉 Dave runs a very successful weather information service out of sunny Narrabri and is much more than a bunch of data mined from government BOM site. +Oz Forecast(http://www.ozforecast.com.au/) is great site with a clean simple interface, i recommend adding this one to your bookmarks, there is also some very useful webcams from various weather stations(not on the BOM site).
We had planned to try and get up Mount Canobolas, however with quite a significant amount of snow falling over night meant access was closed, hence the local park at the base of the mountain had to suffice, needless to say there was still no shortage of snow (for australia anyway).
Chaos had a ball playing in the snow (for the first time), but soon realised that whilst snow may appear very fun, it is also very cold and in this case wet – nonetheless this did not deter the snowball making exercise, note the lack of gloves to start with 😉
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 85mm f1.4 @ 85 mm- Aperture: f/4 and Shutter Speed: 1/1500s
ISO 400
out front – lots of snow and a bit of drizzle.
The Rainbow vs the Tree
I have big plans for this hill at those trees, its only a matter of time 😉
D7000 coupled with Nikkor 105mm f2.5 @ 105mm Aperture: f/5.6 and Shutter Speed: 1/350 of a second
ISO: 100
Candyfloss
A conveniently placed cloud at sunset on the dunes of Stockton beach made for which my daughter now refers to as the fairyfloss picture 😉
Single frame
D7000 with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @ 11mm- Aperture: f/13 and Shutter Speed: 1/3 seconds
out front – LEE graduated filter 0.9
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
Zenith Beach
It was certainly a bit of a struggle this morning, harsh dynamic range in the light and a significant lack of clouds, I can usually deal with this but the light did not even develop any nice pastels 🙁 anyway, enough whinging 🙂 the saving grace was the location!
Blended shot
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @11mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: various
out front – LEE graduated filter 0.9 and screw in circular polariser
Camp
We have all seen it, most togs have been here at one stage or another and today… +Rodney Campbell and I went there 😉
First shot off the rank, just as the sun disappeared over Manly or somewhere thereabouts!
Standy by for the triptych, 3 images of this little shed looks much better than one 🙂
Anyone know what the hell this shed is actually used for? sewerage pump ? nav station, shark net storage, drug running? 😉
Single frame
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @11mm Aperture: f/9.5 and Shutter Speed: 238s
out front – LEE graduated filter 0.9, LEE bigstopper and screw in circular polariser
out to the right – Rodney Campbell
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed
Its not until you view from afar, do you realise that even when surrounded by many you are still very small
Its a bit like a molecule lotsa space between stuff 🙂 view large
I have been reading a photography book (a fairly recently published one) which was a recent gift and was filled with very nice images and lots of very interesting information (most of which I have forgotten already 😉 ) however the images within reminded me of a saying which a few peeps who know me are probably sick of me saying.. but anyway, basically its simply that I reckon its pretty easy to take a nice picture of a stunning location – take iceland for instance (and not knocking anyone who has been there, i would love to go) but I reckon I could give my 4 yro bundle of chaos a point and shoot camera and she would come back with some fairly nice keepers.
Now one aspect I have always tried to aspire to and I seen a few photographers over the years, mainly ones who just ooze talent so much that you hate them 😉 who can make stunning images from nothing, from regular scenes, from walking down the road, a unspectacular sunset, they always come away with something dynamic, different and soemthing I would call art and go 'wow'. That is a goal that strive for.
Anyway all that waffle has a point, and you guessed it, its related to this image 😉
Trying to make something from nothing. This image was a bit tricky, it is several images stitched to make a pano, however large expanses of water and very little fixed items makes the old +Adobe Photoshop struggle a bit, however, after some bashing over the head it did my wishes and squeezed out the desired pano, with a few errors (not too shabby tho)
D7000 coupled with Nikkor 105mm f2.5 @ , yep yo guess it 105mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: 1/500 of a second
ISO: 100
out front – a cliff.
Thanks for looking – I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment.
Cosmic Railway
Its a dizzy ride to the centre of the galaxy
I learnt a few lessons from the last star trail session at the sandy side of Anna Bay, firstly.. go somewhere where there is no sand, tick. secondly set the timer correctly, tick
(note the malfunction from last time was actually due to the fact that I set the camera mode to single shot, this meant I missed an interval every shot and hence the 40 second gap between shots in my last one. It needs to be set to continuous low or high.
I still have a slight gap in the extreme view of the frame, but still better than the other attempt.
So with those key points addressed – for the next star trail session I think i need the following.. warmer location :), set the white balance to something consistent 😉 and take care of local wildlife or farm animals 😉 There was a cow terrorising this railway the following morning 🙂
This was a set of images from a fairly short time period, just over 2 hours, I do have another set at over 5 hours, however the moon rose within that period and there was some pretty funky autoWB changes throughout that set, thats for a rainy day processing session!
techie stuff
192 images stacked together using the statistics method in Adobe PS CC
(see here https://plus.google.com/100975265940134223422/posts/VnN5muFSypj)
The foreground image included a bit more on the bottom which gave me the ability to get a slight vertical pano shot happening.
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @ 11mm- Aperture: f/2.8 and Shutter Speed: 45.5 seconds
ISO: 3200
out front – long metal things commonly referred to as railway tracks.
Lovely jubbly and thanks for looking – I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment.