I didn’t enjoy this week’s challenge. Humour isn’t really my thing. I like laughing, I enjoy funny things, but I’m not very good at creating it! So, I only have two photos. One is the image I created to send people to my new A Box of Thistles blogsite from my old one. Talking of which – this blog is moving too…please follow me to http://366photos.robeanne.org/
The other is a mural I found amusing in Tirau, a small town in the Waikato.
This week is a technical challenge and we have to consider how lighting can be used to best suit the subject. My sons are unwitting (and unwilling) subjects, so I have to catch them off guard!
This morning we went for breakfast as a special treat and while we were waiting for our meal I spotted son number 1 engrossed in reading on his phone.
When we got home, I caught son number 2 playing his guitar.
I decided to edit both photos and use black and white. Then touched up the exposures to light their faces.
‘Your subject should be facing the frame, walking into the frame, this keeps your subject “in” the frame and engaging with it. Give your subject room to move.’
Not sure what to do with this one. I have been looking at what others have posted and although there are a lot of people or animals literally ‘walking’ into the frame, there are also others which are not so literal. Here are some of my options;
I snapped this wee fellow practising his writing on the school playground a few weeks ago. Such concentration.
This was taken in New Plymouth when we were in Taranaki for the WOMAD festival. Not sure how much space there is for the subject (my ever patient husband, Nigel!) with all the reflections! But I like the effect.
Another one of Nigel out and about. The Boon Street Arts festival hits Hamilton every year and this is one of the offerings from this year.
As we walked along the front in New Plymouth I spotted this dogwalker. It isn’t a great technical photo but I do like the ‘seaside postcard’ effect of the composition.
Week 14 asks us to connect two or three photos together to provoke a thought or to tell a story.
My biggest challenge was finding an app in which I could frame two or three photos. I fell back to ipiccy as this is a photo editing tool I have used before.
I am well behind on my weekly challenges but have had the project titles in my head as I have been out and about. We have recently spent a lot of time in the NZ bush and as it is Autumn, there are heaps of mushrooms about. The other day we found these Slender Parasols up by the trig point in Hamilton Gardens in various stages of development.
A new garden has recently opened at Hamilton Gardens. I was not too impressed with the Tudor Garden but I really like the Concept Garden. The squares of water, and different types of plants reflect the squares on land maps. The Māori whakatauki on the wall and the rusted iron water tank tell contradictory stories of the permanence or fragility of the land and the people.
Whatungarongaro te tangata toituu te whenua
As man disappears from sight, the land remains
He peke tangata, apa he peke titoki’
The human family lives on while the branch of the titoki falls and decays.
My third option is a city scape – I used an app called Tiny Planets which is a bit of fun to create the images in this collage. All the images are from the same photo but one is the original and the other two are edited in Tiny Planet.
Back to nature for the last one. Once again on our wander into Hamilton Gardens on Anzac Day. Autumn is good for seeds as well as mushrooms, and we saw these plants in various stages from fresh green pods to fully blown seeds.
Too many choices again!
Leading Lines: use lines to lead the viewer to your subject
I’m not sure that any of these except the swimmer meets the description above. But I like the lines that these photos have in them. The lines are really the subjects rather than leading the viewer to a subject.
What do you think?
Oh, so many to choose from after a weekend away! I forgot to take my SLR in the rush and ‘busyness’ of packing up, so resorted to the ‘pro’ setting on my Samsung camera app which allows me to manual focus and change ISO etc. It is a bit tricky focusing as you basically need to move physically closer or further away from the subject. And steadying a light camera is not easy either. Nevertheless, I am quite pleased with the results.
We spent Easter weekend exploring some of the Whirinaki landscape. A new area for us made easier now that we have a campervan to pull over in and sleep anywhere! The podocarp forest (ngahere) is a stunning place and especially rich with berries and mushrooms now that Autumn is on its way. We were lucky too, with the weather. It is still warm and the sun provided excellent light through the trees.
Here are a few of my shots. Which do you like best?
This is not a technique I employ often. Most of my photos are full of colour and I tend to focus in or crop my photos. I like the simplicity of isolating a subject and giving it space to stand out. Having said that, I struggled to find opportunities to make it work! Here are a couple, at least.
The first is in Hamilton airport. I waa sitting at the table hacking a coffee and liked the space the table created but also how it connected to the person waiting at the other end of the lounge.
I took this one as we ate lunch on the beach at Foxton. The seagulls were circling waiting for scraps.
I have downloaded an app to help me with this challenge. I really should start editing on my computer using Gimp but I’m intrinsically lazy. To do that I would need to make more of an effort. I am also madly busy at the moment with work and at the end of the day I don’t really want to sit at my computer again!
The challenge here was picking photos that had an interesting focus. Something that drew my eye. I’m still on the lookout as I am out and about but these are the offerings so far. Which is your pick?
Forsaken, forgotten, abandoned. I found this toy car left behind on a table in Hamilton Gardens on my run today. I wonder which wee one left it behind and is missing it?
This week was a technical challenge…bit of a problem as it’s difficult to zoom burst on a phone.
I tried taking a series of shots of a sunflower then overlaying them. It didn’t work.
366photos2016 