Thursday, November 29, 2012
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
What a job!
This young lady's job was to sit out in the cold and convince the thousands of people walking past to come in and organise their photo sessions. It very much appeared she was not to move or interact with anyone.
I am not sure how the cost compared to dressing a mannequin to put out there... but that was definitely what she was.
I am not sure how the cost compared to dressing a mannequin to put out there... but that was definitely what she was.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Masked De-Grafittier
Quietly, and without warning...
from the darkness......
comes a masked, Hi-Vis warrior, conducting his lone vigilante quest to remove the world of yellow lines...
from the darkness......
comes a masked, Hi-Vis warrior, conducting his lone vigilante quest to remove the world of yellow lines...
Bear with me.
I have been back home for a few weeks and then back here in China again.
Updates have been... well, non existent... I think I need to do something about that...
In the mean time..... here is a bear riding a motor bike.
Updates have been... well, non existent... I think I need to do something about that...
In the mean time..... here is a bear riding a motor bike.
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Dinner time
Dinner with friends on Monday night.
YY, Emma, Peng and me...
Peng and I had ingested a "pi jiu" or two by this stage... but it was a good night with lots of very interesting conversation.
YY, Emma, Peng and me...
Peng and I had ingested a "pi jiu" or two by this stage... but it was a good night with lots of very interesting conversation.
Limited access....
Here in China again... this time for a longish stint.
Access to the blog is a little limited, but hopefully should be able to get some shots up every so often.
For the first week, while there were some other westerners around, we took to sitting in the foyer of the hotel and having a quiet beer and a talk....
But because we are so different we attract some attention... These kids were teaching me words for different parts of the body... and the word for nose gave a great excuse to touch a nose bigger than they had ever seen before!!!
Access to the blog is a little limited, but hopefully should be able to get some shots up every so often.
For the first week, while there were some other westerners around, we took to sitting in the foyer of the hotel and having a quiet beer and a talk....
But because we are so different we attract some attention... These kids were teaching me words for different parts of the body... and the word for nose gave a great excuse to touch a nose bigger than they had ever seen before!!!
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Too many Japanese cartoons
Xan has been watching too many Japanese cartoons...
this is how he has started to look.....
He is an oversized pair of boots away from being part of an elite robot controlling fighting squad destined to save the world in a quasi spiritual battle!
this is how he has started to look.....
He is an oversized pair of boots away from being part of an elite robot controlling fighting squad destined to save the world in a quasi spiritual battle!
Down side of an older car...
So, there are all these things you take for granted when you have them....
and when you make a decision to go back to an older model, they are no longer there....
In this case, in every car I have owned for the last 2 decades I have had a little thing that tells me "distance to empty". I no longer have that - and it turns out that I use that a lot...
My car decided to stop working on the highway on the way home.
I pulled off to the side, called Ruth, who soon arrived, (laughing the whole way) with a fuel can.
Luckily I had a camera to record the whole experience...
and when you make a decision to go back to an older model, they are no longer there....
In this case, in every car I have owned for the last 2 decades I have had a little thing that tells me "distance to empty". I no longer have that - and it turns out that I use that a lot...
My car decided to stop working on the highway on the way home.
I pulled off to the side, called Ruth, who soon arrived, (laughing the whole way) with a fuel can.
Luckily I had a camera to record the whole experience...
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Mini Swim meet this morning.
A tiny little swim meet this morning, just for fun at the Gail Walker Swim School.
In an indoor pool of course, cause doing any swimming outside today would be a little silly!
One of the nice things about this pool, apart from the fact that it is heated... is the big window at one end of the building, it makes an awesome spotlight as people get to that spot.
Here is Zak.
Photogeeking: this is basically straight out of the camera, spot metering on Zak. A tiny tiny bit of contrast adjustment afterwards.
In an indoor pool of course, cause doing any swimming outside today would be a little silly!
One of the nice things about this pool, apart from the fact that it is heated... is the big window at one end of the building, it makes an awesome spotlight as people get to that spot.
Here is Zak.
Photogeeking: this is basically straight out of the camera, spot metering on Zak. A tiny tiny bit of contrast adjustment afterwards.
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Clothesline Star Trails Of Unusual (size)
Ok weird title, I admit it....
but it goes with the weird photo.
Shot with the camera open for about half an hour under the clothes line... a tiny bit of playing with the colour and out comes this....
(oh and the title was attempting to be ROUSs, but it just missed hopelessly... {and if you are the person who the title was really directed at, then I know that you already know what an ROUS is... [and if you do not, you need to read / watch one of the all time classics.....]} maybe I should stop trying to do multiple messages in my titles.....)
but it goes with the weird photo.
Shot with the camera open for about half an hour under the clothes line... a tiny bit of playing with the colour and out comes this....
(oh and the title was attempting to be ROUSs, but it just missed hopelessly... {and if you are the person who the title was really directed at, then I know that you already know what an ROUS is... [and if you do not, you need to read / watch one of the all time classics.....]} maybe I should stop trying to do multiple messages in my titles.....)
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
...and sometimes you cannot get it right...
The boys had a sick day yesterday... and I was not sure if I was well or not... so I used it as an excuse to take a couple of photos at training instead of doing any real work.
So I wander in with three quarters of a metric tonne of gear (two flashes, a couple of flash stands - even an umbrella) and set up to take some photos of one of the black belts while he trains for his second dan grading....
Yeah...
did not work so well.
So I wander in with three quarters of a metric tonne of gear (two flashes, a couple of flash stands - even an umbrella) and set up to take some photos of one of the black belts while he trains for his second dan grading....
Yeah...
did not work so well.
The question now is... after such and incredibly spectacular failure... will I be brave enough to ask people if I can do it again?
Saturday, July 14, 2012
My hands
Couple of photos from this week.
One - playing with a couple of flashes and a punching bag (and Xander - whose timing was impeccable on these shots!)
Some of the outtakes from the bag punching shots will never see the light of day.... lets just say that skin is not meant to be seen at highspeed under impact.
Photogeeking: punching the bag. A flash well behind the bag as a rim light (also gets my face), another at the bottom of the back pointing up where my arm will hit.... then I dipped my hand in some flour to get the dust.
Second one - flash on the table raking across my hands to get all sorts of texture, and a much less powerful one above spotlighting down on it...
One - playing with a couple of flashes and a punching bag (and Xander - whose timing was impeccable on these shots!)
Some of the outtakes from the bag punching shots will never see the light of day.... lets just say that skin is not meant to be seen at highspeed under impact.
Photogeeking: punching the bag. A flash well behind the bag as a rim light (also gets my face), another at the bottom of the back pointing up where my arm will hit.... then I dipped my hand in some flour to get the dust.
Second one - flash on the table raking across my hands to get all sorts of texture, and a much less powerful one above spotlighting down on it...
Weekend play
Last weekend, we went to a couple of parks and the boys and one of their cousins had a good, fun old fashioned play...There was swinging... and then there was flying....
Sometimes it is so hard to keep kids under control!
I try to let them know that it is impolite to fly in public, but sometimes they just do not listen!
Photogeeking: first photos all taken with off camera flash on high speed sync, at about 1000 of a second so that I could get the background a little dark. Then I played with some Nik software with them. I am still trying to work out if I can afford to buy the Nik software - it does some nice things - but am I just being lazy when I could eventually get most of the results in photoshop?
The flying ones involved walking around with a step ladder and a tripod... taking a photo of the background and then of the flying... going into photoshop, putting the background and the people in the same document and then masking out anything that was not meant to be there.
Sometimes it is so hard to keep kids under control!
I try to let them know that it is impolite to fly in public, but sometimes they just do not listen!
Photogeeking: first photos all taken with off camera flash on high speed sync, at about 1000 of a second so that I could get the background a little dark. Then I played with some Nik software with them. I am still trying to work out if I can afford to buy the Nik software - it does some nice things - but am I just being lazy when I could eventually get most of the results in photoshop?
The flying ones involved walking around with a step ladder and a tripod... taking a photo of the background and then of the flying... going into photoshop, putting the background and the people in the same document and then masking out anything that was not meant to be there.
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