Beginning Photography

Bokeh, the name given to the blur created when using shallow depth of field in a photograph. When I awoke this morning I looked out of the window to see the sun shining on a garden covered in dew, the perfect opportunity to make use of this great effect. Here are a couple of my favourites.

One new subject here, plus another of the swan from winterset. No processing going on here at all on the tulip, that’s how it came out of the camera, white balance and all. The swan has had the white balance adjusted to match the scene.

Another from my trip to the lake the other day. I spotted a guy preparing for an evenings fishing, he was sat in his bivvy making himself a nice fry up, and I tootled over to say hi. I used to do a bit of carp angling myself so I had a bit of a chat with him and then asked if I could photo his gear silhouetted against the sky. This was the result.

As you know I had a bit of an absense from photography when I hosed my hard drive. I’m now back and togging and the 52 is back on track. I have a few missed weeks to catch up on though, I’ll do so gradually over the coming weeks. But for now, single.

First, I’m including the image from the post below of the solitary swan. in addition, this one

Lightroom 300 preset applied and then a couple of minor tweaks.

Or so I thought. With the volcano erupting in Iceland pouring out enough ash to close UK airspace I thought the sunset might be spectacular. As it turned out it was very nice, but on it’s own not quite the earth shattering spectacle I thought it could be. My subject matter changed, then, to use the sunset as a backdrop. Some of the results seen in the following four images. I’ve given a couple a slight crop but no massive editing has been done here, I’d rather be a photographer than a photoshop artist.

First, simplicity itself, a swan almost in silhouette against a fiery lake

This second image is probably my favourite image of the set, it’s the epitomy of peace and tranquility

Here I have taken a “landscape” shot in portrait as I like the way it frames the reflection of the sun.

And finally two swans feeding.

Funny one this. I took a photo of a wire fence (exciting), and I can’t decide if I like the image that follows the rule of thirds, or the one that breaks it. Two slightly different takes on the same theme presented below. Comments pls

Out at the grandparents for the day and decided that I’d take a couple of photos of them. I’m considering printing up the best of them in at maybe 12 * 8 or maybe 18 *12, getting it framed and giving it as a birthday or anniversary present, whichever comes first (I can say that here as they don’t have access to the internet, or even to a computer for that matter).

I’ve narrowed it down to a selection of four, these are right out of the camera pretty much, tiny bit of editing. When I choose one I’ll spend some time sorting out the background, probably add a touch of blur and remove the pole.

It would seem to be that time of year, the garden is coming into bloom so I’m taking piccies of flowers. Lots of them infact. Here’s a small sample, and I have no idea what any of them are.

I can’t help myself, I love the look of black and white or sepia and had to share this image.

I’ve now got everything sorted. All my files backed up, though I could do with organising them a little better, a task for the next day or two. Windows is now running inside a virtual machine under linux which means it’s going to struggle to hose my system.

Anyway, to the photos. Just a couple of new ones to share from a trip away last week. I had the chance to take a quick walk through a village near where I was staying with the hope of finding something nice to photograph. The goal was for some old and quirky building, but that’s not what I ended up with.

I tried to learn the lessons from my snowdrop shots and apply it to a few of daffodils. This is the first I’ve worked on.

I stumbled across this car and had to photograph it, I love the XK for it’s pleasing lines. It would have been preferable to capture it in motion, but even stationary it looks awesome.