Shadows

Recently I entered Photomania 2, which is displayed at the Port Adelaide Civic Centre as part of the SALA.  My favourite photo that I took for this is a shadow of a mail box on the pavement, which looks like a witches head.

Rubbish in a new light

Out walking, on a block cleared for building, there was some dumped rubbish.  One item was a crushed wing mirror from a car.  The sun was reflecting off it, so I switched my camera to macro auto focus setting (1 area) and set it down next to the pieces.  Aperture Priority f/2.8, 100 ISO, white balance on daylight, and I had this interesting shot that looks like a blue glass mountain.

Port Adelaide

Several weeks ago I took a workshop by David Baker at Port Adelaide, to extend my photography skills, reinvigorate my photo practice and stimulate my style.  David Baker is an excellent tutor for all these things and after some time discussing technical aspects and approaches to camera work we took a group walk around the Port, discussing subjects that presented themselves.  After a lovely lunch at a pub we went off on our own to shoot what appealed to us individually, reassembling to discuss our results the next day.  One of the things I found intriguing was the sheer amount of rope used in the boats along the wharf – the volume, different types, the strength it must take to haul on that thick rope in cold wet conditions, and the textures of the rope itself.

Photo Editing

I am continuing to learn how to edit my photos with Picasa.  I am amazed at how much I can do with this free download.  The new version is here.  Today I learnt about watermarks and then looked at some more of the Tuning features.  One feature is using Fill Light.  This is used where the background e.g. the sky is bright, making the subject, in this case a koala, too much like a silhouette.  I know that if he had been closer, a flash would have lit him up, but looking at the photo retrospectively I decided to try the Fill Light - you can see how well it worked, bringing out colour in the tree and texture in the koala's fur.  Quite possibly I could have played with it for longer to get it better but was pleased with this.

The original photo

Cropped and Fill Light in Picasa

Multiple Exposures

One of the things I am looking at now is photo editing.  I don't have Photoshop or a similar program, just the free downloads of Irfanview and Picasa.  With these two programs, I have discovered how to work on multiple exposures.  First of all I tried to get complicated, putting four photos into this one of Rundle Mall.

Rundle Mall, with the bronze pig, the fountain, tree and the "Malls Balls", all layered together.  A bit too much.

So then I simplified for this, showing my cat overlaying the marine aquarium - just 2 photos.

More at the Port

The City of Adelaide has been brought back here by a dedicated group.  I haven't had time to go on the tour yet.  When I was reviewing these photos on my computer, I realised that a shot of this window opening, had something on it.  When I enlarged it, I found the plastic covering had reflected a house right across the bitumised area in front of the ship.  Because of the distortion in the plastic, the reflection is also distorted and looks like something from a Grimms Fairy Tale.

Look at the reflection in the plastic covering the window opening - you can see a house some distance away.

Photography at the Port

Recently I did a photography workshop at Port Adelaide, which gave fresh life to my photo shooting.  One of the sights that interested me most was all the rope - along the wharf where the City of Adelaide was moored, plus the working boats - they represent hard work, and strength.

So many different ropes, all with their own reason for being

I tried a black and white image here

Texture in the ropes