Tie a white ribbon

I went to newtown cemetery on Wednesday with my friend B.

I have a bit of a thing about cemeteries, I think they're really pretty. I got some nice shots so here they are.

I like reading how people die on their headstones. It's really interesting!

For reasons unknown to me, someone had tied white ribbons on one of the trees.

-m xx

Straight 'A's

Yes.

Three more assignments, three more 'A's.

I am officially a nerd.

These assignments were a lot less specific as well so I didn't even need to pick up my camera. I just rifled through my files and found something to fit the criteria. The upcoming ones may not be so easy.

My course is now half way finished! Hoorah!

-m

Easy A

I submitted my first assignment for my correspondence course the other day.

For the first time in I can't remember how long I got an A! Yes an A! How funny. I don't think I've gotten an A since year 11... If that. They sort of stopped giving us letter grades when we started the HSC.

Anyway, the task was to take a fast shutter shot of a water droplet, with a shallow depth of field and I fit the brief well enough to get an A. So here it is, for your enjoyment.

The water drop itself isn't quite in focus but it was pretty difficult considering I was using my fixed lens.

I'm actually half way through my course now. I read two more lessons today and submitted the next three assignments so I've just got four assignments left! Mucho Excitamundo! The assignments should be getting a bit more involved soon. The three I just submitted were fairly general so I just went through my archives and found suitable photos.

Soon I'll actually have a qualification. It's pretty exciting stuff.

-m xx

Marlow & Others @ The Sando, April 2 2011

OK, so a few things to talk about today in addition to a veritable orgy of visual amazement (modesty is a strong point of mine). Firstly, I have a new signature/watermark for my photos. The old "mb" in the corner was way too easy to crop out, which is something my friends have been known to do, and really it could have meant anything so I've bitten the bullet and plastered them with the full name. It's actually great to see, particularly when people set one of my shots as their fb profile pic and there it is!

 My name! I used grey because I think it's the perfect neutral- it shows up on light and dark backgrounds, as well as being a subtle shade, so as not to distract too much from the shot. It gives the appearance of being somewhat transparent when it's really opaque.

Minus House

Secondly, we had a substitute for the last class of the short course I was doing- Camera Skills at Sydney Community College. Long story short, I showed some of my gig shots and he suggested that I change my white balance to tungsten (incandescent for us Nikon users) instead of leaving it on auto.

Basically, the camera will do a great job compensating for the light source on auto, unless it doesn't know what the source is. In the case of stage lighting, where the colours are constantly changing and you never really see the light as it is, the camera doesn't know how to compensate. By changing the white balance to tungsten, which is what stage lights are, the tone can be greatly affected.

Saturday night was my first chance to try it and I really noticed the difference. I'm sure those who have seen my work will see that it's somehow better but may not be able to pinpoint exactly where the improvement is. Mostly, it's in the skin tones. There's less tonal distortion there. Anyway I'm really happy with the result and the lights at this gig were AH-mazing so the shots turned out really well, IMO.

Ashes


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Marlow



 Marlow are a great band to shoot, because they're extremely visual in their set. I always get shots that I love from their gigs.

Fixation

The Crowd. Ft. Ramshackle

I went back to the Sando on Wednesday night for Ramshackle's set in the Inner West Band Comp semi final. For reasons I don't understand, the light guy appeared to be having a night off, so the lights were completely unchanghing through their set. I got a few decent shots but as a whole I felt dissapointed. I can't shoot well if I'm not inspired, that's just the way it is. I'll upload the ones I'm happy with next week.

You'll also notice I introduced a second page to the blog. Because this is the closest I have to my own website right now, people need to be able to contact me and know a few things about my charges. I plan to start advertising in Drummedia soon so hopefully I'll get some paying gigs from that.

Fingers crossed.

Ramshackle at The Sando, March 23

Finally! It's been like 7 months but finally I've gotten to see my boys play. And the best bit is, this gig was for a band comp (The Inner West Festival- despite the fact none of them live there) and they got through to the semi finals which means there'll be more in about two weeks! *cheers*

As much as i like the effect of the occassional under exposed shot I really need a brighter lens. The noise when theres not enough light is killing me! Of course, a better camera would be ideal but I'm not in the financial position to buy... well anything right now so lenses seem a much more realistic aspiration. Something with f1:1.2 would make my life.

And if the DoF is this narrow with a 1.8, just imagine a 1.2!

I used my wide angle for a few shots, to save from changing lenses between filming. I really like the length of it, because I'm not used to getting full body shots but of course it was a challenge getting my shutter fast enough. I don't mind the odd blurred shot.

The final band of the night, the Ravenous Rabbits, had all of their fans wearing bunny ears. It was actually a little bit creepy to walk into that room.

Expect more pics soon! I'm shooting a gig for Marlow, and probably a few other bands, on Saturday and the Ramshackle again the Wednesday after so there's plenty on it's way!

-mb

Night.

Last Wednesday we had a night excursion with my short course. We went into Circular Quay, because it's one of the few places that a bunch of photographers with tripods don't look out of place. Unfortunately, it rained, which made for some interesting shots but my shoes didn't dry for days.

Playing with sparklers

Panning was something I hadn't tried before. Put simply, it's a method of photography that gives the illusion that the background is moving, rather than the subject. All you need to do is take the shot on a reasonably slow shutter speed, while panning the camera along with the moving subject. If the camera moves at the same speed as the subject, the subject will appear still, but the background will blur. The shots below are all examples of panning and I'm really happy with how they worked.

Lots of shots coming up soon. Gigs,gigs and more gigs. So stay tuned.