Category Archives: Photography

This is a good article covering some of the issues the b/w photographer will come across when using digital “film”. There’s so much here I need to have another read of this later to digest it and experiment with photos at home. The site also has several other good photography how-to documents, and is well worth a visit.

Regular readers may notice the slight change in the site design here. That photos above is a panorama of 6 photographs stitched together. It covers a major portion of Cork City, and the North Side of the city. I’m not 100% happy with it yet and it may be pruned slightly as I crop and compose it for the best effect.
Now, does anyone know a shop that’ll print a very large copy of that picture on photo paper?

So, after Spanish class last night, I wandered up Patrick’s Hill (in the car, walking up there is a burden I can do without!) to take some photos of the North Side. I snapped a few shots before running back to the car out of the cold, cursing myself for not bringing a scarf or a warmer coat!
Later when I examined the photos I noticed a trail of what looks like smoke in one of the shots just behind the Cathedral. In the next shot taken a few seconds later it’s missing. What could it be? Conspiracy theories and outragous comments welcome! 🙂
Photo information: Pictures taken 2-3 seconds apart, 2 second exposure, F2.0, ISO 100, Exposure Value 0.0

This image is made up of 4 photographs stitched together in the GIMP. I was playing around with Hugen, and Panorama tools but couldn’t get it to work at all well on any of the photos I tried. Back to the GIMP and I managed rather well IMO! It’s not perfect but at this low res it’s not that bad!
Click on the image for a larger version! And original .xcf file is available for any that ask!

Via PhotographyBLOG comes 2 interesting sites:

• ePHOTOzine has 4 tutorials in their latest issue, on ND filters, fireworks, silhouettes and darkrooms. I have a Neutral Density filter in my camera bag and it rarely gets used.
• Digital Panoramics from about.com is pretty self explanatory and I’ll be reading it as I’ve failed spectacularly in the past to do panoramas!
• And it’s Mac Vs PC in a shoot out to find the best computer for digital photo manipulation!

You might want to take a look at photographyBLOG too, as he’s listed lots of newly announced cameras, gadgets and equipment including a 0.85 inch HDD with expected capacities of between 2GB and 4GB! There’s a picture and the drive fits on the end of a finger!

The Cybershot Club looks like a reasonably good Sony digital camera site. It’s got tips and techniques for photo editing too, making it useful for others besides the aforementioned camera owners.

In a break with tradition, I was the subject of a photographer yesterday as I browsed the shelves of a local hi-fi store. This guy popped a camera up, off went the flash and I was captured on digital media!
I asked him what the photo was for, and he replied that my photo could be in the Evening Echo some night this week, so I’ll have to go buy that esteemed publication for a few days, just in case. I showed him my “measly” Sony F717, but I don’t think he was impressed.
Bah! Bloody professionals!
Update! Buy tonight’s Echo! I’m on page 17! My one consolation is that only people in Cork will likely see the photo. *grin*

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After that lovely comment below from Owen, I thought I should post some of the photos from last night.. Click on the thumbnail to view the larger image!
I like the first image, even though it was the first I took, and a test shot. The original was a bit dark and had to be lightened in the GIMP. The other two were taken without flash, and at a distance of about 5m. That’s very tough to do with stage lighting – conditions go from excellent (bright/yellow/white light) to bad (red/blue light) to downright difficult (performer walks into a shadow) within seconds of each other!
More photos to follow!

Just spent the last 2 hours taking well over 200 photos of the band “King of Hearts” “Pleasure Dome” playing in Silver Springs. Great party, atmosphere, talent(!!) and I’m wrecked tired! Good thing I had extra batteries for my flash as lighting conditions for photography were as you might expect – difficult and contstantly changing strobes and stage lighting! A tripod was invaluable tonight!
Expect a few of the photos to make it online here in the next few days!

Hmm, smugmug.com has a nice gallery layout. Hawker’s photo galleries is an example I came across on STF. Drill down into each gallery – thumbnails are printed alongside a larger image. Click on any thumbnail and the page reloads with the large image visible to the right of the thumbnails. Cool.

Seems that some members of STF are having problems with their new F828 cameras. 🙁 It appears that not everyone is having those problems, but the camera firmware is user upgradeable so that may fix the problems!