Phun Phriday

I have decided to join in on Scott’s Phun Phriday Photography Challenge. This challenge is all about doing something different or experimental with your photography. In my general photography Aperture is usually the most important aspect for me. I only really switch my thinking to Shutter Speed when I want to capture movement. This image was taken on a fast shutter speed of 1/3200 of a second exposure. Fast shutter speeds allow you to freeze time and movement.

If you are interested in what a slow shutter speed can do to your photography please pay a visit to Scott’s blog. He has a great post which explains simply along with some amazing images to highlight the effects of slow shutter speeds.

Lets Go to the Zoo

Mali is the latest edition to the Royal Melbourne Zoo. Born in January 2010 and weighing in at110 kilos, she has captivated my city. She is only on display at certain times of the day and the queues are long. We waited an hour and 15 minutes but they only let 150 people in at a time allowing everybody plenty of room to get a glimpse of her. She was deciding to stay close to mum when we visited.

I love going to the zoo, and this year we got a friends of the zoo membership. Which allows us entry to Melbourne’s 3 main zoo’s (Royal Melbourne Zoo, Werribee Open Range Zoo and Healesville Sanctuary) for a 12 month period. The membership is great value and pays for it’s self after 3 visits.

There is so much to more to see than just Mali. To see all of the Melbourne Zoo you really need the whole day. At least 6 hours. Heres only a glimpse of what you’ll find here.

The Seals and Fairy Penguins - the new upgraded enclosure so good that even the seagulls like it here.

Orangatangs - you can get up close and watch them through the glass. The kids love it here.

Giant Tortoise – an old favourite who was having his shell waxed.

Giraffe – he was in his home when we visited as the keeper was doing some house cleaning.

The Meerkats – well no one can resist the charm of these little critters. Just look at those eyes!

And last but not least here is a very rare and precious species I found sitting in the Japanese Garden.

I haven’t even scratched the surface of showing you around but I will be back at the zoo shortly and I hope to show you a lot more than animals next time.

Cactus

STUFFED, broken, busted, kaput, deaded, defective, faulty, fried, in disrepair, in need of repair, in the shop, inoperable, kaput, not functioning, on the blink, on the fritz, out of commission, out of kilter, out of order, out of whack, ruined, run-down, screwed up, shot, snafued, spent, wrecked.

What ever you want to call it that is what my car is!!

I just had my radiator replaced because it was corroded but fixing the radiator is like putting a band aid on the symptoms and not attending to the cause.

My car has Electrolysis, a stray electrical current running through the cooling system causing corrosion on anything metal.

To fix the problem properly I need a lot of time and money. An auto electrician needs to check every wire in my car and ensure they are all earthed. But there is no guarantee they will find or can fix the problem.

This car has been cattywombus since day one and I’m now wiping my hands of it. Maybe my luck will change when I drive my new Mazda 3 off the show room floor.

Mr Bank Manager, hurry up with my finance.

Have you had back luck with something?

On Automatic Settings

Some time I seriously underestimate the capabilities of an instant pocket camera and those of my daughter.

(this is my bother's dog Bingo, his tongue is permanently in this position. This image was taken by me on the instant camera)

All the photos in this post were taken with my daughter’s Canon Ixus80IS 8 mega pixel instant camera on total automatic settings and taken by Miss Mikaela herself.

I did some quick level and curve adjustments on these images in photoshop to help with the brightness, added a little extra punch to the contrast and finished off with some sharpening and slight vignette around the edges. For those who don’t know much about photography these changes are minor standard processes that should be undertaken on all digital images. (except for the vignetting, that’s just done because I like the effect.)

I generally let Mikaela do her own thing when taking photos. I give her very little advice. I might reminder her to use her zoom at times and when I remember I switch the auto flash off when she is shooting images through glass to stop reflections. I think it is important for her to express what she seeing rather than what I tell her to see. Besides she doesn’t need a nagging mum telling her what to do, photography is about having fun.

Here are the best 2 images I took of the duck and the swan with my DSLR.

Now do you see why I need to improve my photography? As I have this beautiful 10 year old hot on my tail.

I said I wouldn’t but I just might.

I have had some car troubles over the last year

I said I wouldn’t by a new car

I’ve spent $5000 fixing issues over the last 12 months

I said I can’t afford a new car (that’s still true)

I hate my car

I’d like a new car

I’d love a new car

But I can afford a new car

Fixing problems, constantly fixing problems

Still, I’m not buying a new car

I want to do other things with the money I have saved

Like build a pergola, go on a family holiday, go on a personal holiday

I’ll need a new car in the next few years,

But I’ll think about it then, not now.

I have stood firm on my "No New Car" policy

More problems have occurred and now

I find I'm eating my words for breakfast 

As I seriously see no other option than a new car.

Have you eaten your words today?

The Bunny is on his way

I hope You have been good because tonight you know who is hopping around town.  He may just hide you a little egg or too.

  Wishing you all a Happy and safe Easter regardless of  how you may celebrate it. 

By tomorrow morning EB would have left eggs scattered around our house for the kids to find. The Easter egg hunt will then be followed by a chocolate breakfast feast.

 PS: Easter Bunny if you read this I'd really love it if you leave me a Lindt Bunny tonight.

Improving My Photography

Over the last 6 months especially I have been working hard on evolving the style of my work. I have been studding the work of other photographers I admire and discovered images I found one elements to  powerful and striking  image was sharpness. I started to change the way I shoot so I could obtain sharpness of my images while maintaining suitable depth of field.

A mother and baby- photoshoot

Sharpness is not the only element to a great photo. I’m now turning my attention to some other areas that I believe will improve my work

· Posing people – catching people naturally can work really well but knowing how to pose someone or a group of people in a natural was can produce even more stunning results as you have time to get the technical aspects of your camera and light setting correct.

I tent to feel a little bit uncomfortable when posing people, more so knowing how to pose groups of people. It’s not a strong point of mine. I want to work on understanding how to pose people gaining more confidents in my choice of poses for people.

A freind of Mikaela's enjoy Chocolate

· LIGHT, LIGHT, LIGHT either, natural or studio controlled, light is often what given an image a WOW factor. Knowing how to manipulate light is extremely important in great photography.

I have a reflector but find I don’t use it much. I would like to by a cheap second hand flash and some radio triggers so I can do some more interesting work with off camera flash.

The best 3 photo buddies anyone could have

· Emotion, a good image especially one of people has emotion running through it. Being able to extract emotion out of your subject is what separates the good portrait photographs from the great ones.

Extracting emotion has nothing to do with your ability to take a photo and everything to do with how you connect with people.

My niece hanging from a tree

I have no personal projects set yet but now I have defined the elements I feel are important to improve I am a step closer to setting a more meaningful project for myself.

I will look back through my 2010 in December and I hope to see improved results and consistency in my images. If I find the majority of my photos are better then they are today abandoning project 365 was the right choice.

you can view more wedding photos here at my flickr page