So I was updating my profile, looked at my journal and realised that its been a year since I've updated my journal. Oh dear.

I want to do more portrait work. If you enjoy having photos taken of yourself, volunteer, so I can be less rubbish at portrait photography! I'll buy you candy or a Porsche or something as a reward.

For Christmas, I was given a new tripod (cool!) but quickly realised by reading the box that it wasn't going to be anywhere near suitable for my camera (d'oh!). With a maximum weight of 2kg, and a camera that weighs a little over 2 on a good day and up to 2.5 with all bits tacked on, I needed to do the dreaded "heyyy.... can I have the receipt so I can return this?". I managed to essentially white lie to the guys at JB Hi Fi, and went to my favorite camera store in the city and paid the difference to purchase a shiny new Manfrotto 190. It should last me a very long time indeed.

Other stuff I need to grab when I can be bothered shelling out for it:

Remote release switch (If anyone knows where I can get an el-cheapo one for a 350D, please reply to this and let me know! I don't really want to pay $80 for something that costs $2.50 to make). I've seen the schematics, and they're dead simple, but I'm rubbish with a soldering iron.

Polarising filter: I do loads of landscape photography, and I don't have a filter. Very, very slack indeed.

As far as non-photography stuff goes, I finished uni, averaging a distinction. Yippee! Graduation is in a month, and I've ordered my tight threads for the occasion (regalia... I'll look such a tool).

So yes, everything is pretty much dandy. Hopefully I'll post another one of these in less than a year. :-s

Good evening. Two main points:

One;

I have realised that I don't do nearly enough wide angle photography. There is a reason for this, and it's my cheap 18-55 stock lens from my Canon EOS350D. I hate using it, because it is plastic-y and the photos it produces have chromatic aberration and are generally soft.

Solution:

[link]


Two;
I got my Uni results back.
I win at academia :-p


Expect more new stuff soon. I promise. Really.

Hello reader!

Point One: I'm on uni holidays! Hurrah! Now I get to work a lot and not really get a lot of time off (until Christmas, anyway).

Point Two: Because of Point One, working a lot gives me large amounts of disposable income. Instead of spending it all on pyramid schemes, I decided to buy a laptop for uni next year. I perused, browsed and pondered, finally deciding on a MacBook (gasp!). It's tiny, it's really fast, etc... It also looks hot. I swore black and blue once that I'd never own a Mac, so seeing it on my desk every day is like a trip to an alternate bizzaro world where my evil twin killed me and took my place. Using OS X is like taking a holiday to a really pleasant place where everyone is really nice and its sunny all the time, to describe it in non computery terms.

Point Three: I need to take more photos. I promise I will soon. I'm going to try some more rural-rustic-landscape-at-sunset-with-pretty lighting, because I totally dig late afternoon light. I have locations in mind, all i need to do is wait for an afternoon with the right sort of cloud cover, drive there, and take them.

Point Four: Adobe Lightroom is officially made of awesome. If you hate the way you get photos off your camera, play with them in photo shop, save them, etc, Lightroom is for you. Essentially, the idea is non-destructive editing; the original files are imported from a folder that you monitor with Lightroom (automatically, if you wish) and changes are saved non-distructively; Lightroom tags each photo with a 'recipe' - a set of instructions to apply to the photo when it opens it, such as curves, hue, colour temperature etc. Your originals are safe for later editing, and Lighroom handles your workflow. Go. Download it. Free beta. Everything is done for you;

[link]

Point Five:
Very happy non-denominational holiday greetings to you all!

Point Six:
I keep listening to Snow Patrol. Someone suggest something else to listen to, I think iTunes will soon become self aware and attack me if I play "Hands Open" one more time.

So, Uni crunch time is here. Huzzah. :-|
I probably won't be posting a whole heap of new stuff until its all over, unless I have a major procrastination attack and decide I want to go for a walk with my camera. This probably means I will be posting new stuff at some point.

I probably should have written something about it earlier, but I finally got a proper proper flash (Canon Speedlie 430ex) for my SLR for my birhtday (which was, oh, what, 2 months ago now?).

It has been excellent so far! Bounce flash is quite useful, and never having to do red eye removal ever again is a real frustration saver!

Anyway, anyone else out there who is studying, Uni, TEE or otherwise, good luck, and I'll see you on the other side of it all!

After lots of thought and many, many nights of reading reviews and looking at sample pics, I finally settled on the camera lens I wanted. I went into the city and picked up a Canon 70-200 F4 L series. I've had the weekend to play with it, and i've been totally blown away with what it can do. By going for telephoto, I can move away from wide angle (landscape) photography, and do more people, animals, and some of the little details that you just can't zero in on with a walk around or wide angle lens. It's going to be pretty good for portrait work too, you can really isolate facial details if you need to. Although hideously expensive, I'm hoping it will last a good few years. So, in summary, lots more portrait and telephoto stuff coming from me in future!

Also, I've hit only a couple of the spots to photograph in my previous post... here's hoping I can do a few more before Uni is back on...