The indoor clothesline

WHAT
This shot was taken in my lounge room and is a close up view of the pegs and washing on the clothes rack we've been forced to set up in an attempt to dry the ever- increasing piles of washing.

This shot was day 8 of my 365 project (see link at the top of this blog for more info)


WHY
The immense ammount of rain we've had lately is still heavily making its impact felt on my life - it's nearly impossible to get any clothes dry!

Originally I had intended to use a photograph of my friends and their baby who were coming over to visit that night as my shot of the day. But when I walked past this now common-place sight in my lounge, the bright multi-coloured pegs were just begging me to photograph them.

I figured it was a fitting shot for my 365 photo as it told some more of the story of my life lately :) ie. a frustrated woman with limited clean underwear remaining!


HOW
I used a large aperture (f/4.5 - as low as my lens would go) in order to get a shallow depth of field. I focused on the yellow peg right of centre. Shot on a tripod in aperture priority mode, with a 1.0s shutter, ISO 250.

POST PRODUCTION
I played with it a bit in photoshop to get the grainy/slightly 'hipstamatic' look :) (increased black point, upped the exposure level, reduced contrast, increased clarity, increased highlights then added a noise filter to get the grainy look.)

365 Project update

So far so good with the 365 Project! I've only missed one day (January 3rd) and my excuse is that I hadn't decided to do the project until the 4th of Jan and alas, I hadn't taken a photo on the 3rd.

(To see the progress thus far, click the link at the top of the blog page entitled "365 Project-A photo a day")

I've decided that I'm going to try and either make each photo like a little story of what a particular day entailed for me, or what was the most interesting/significant/annoying thing I experienced about that day.

For example on day 7, it rained extremely heavily for about an hour this morning causing flash flooding across the city. But in the afternoon, the sun came out. I was therefore able to take my dog walking for the first time in days. Therefore the photo for January 7 shows my dog, Nelson, on our walk looking at a flooded creek near my house.

I used a shallow depth of field (5/f) to make Nelson the main focus of this image, resulting in the slightly blurred bridge/water. I shot in Aperture priority mode which resulted in the camera selecting a shutter speed of 1/500s. ISO was 200.

Because it was quite dull, the sky unfortunately isn't all that interesting and the brown muddy water is a bit yuck too. But, the whole point of this photo wasn't to take a landscape masterpiece, it was to document my day.

In photoshop, I increased the clarity, black point and upped the luminance/saturation of the red lead/collar to make it stand out and bring a splash of colour.

After publishing today's shot, I've also learnt that I will have to keep in mind the previous photos I've taken in this project - it's only day 7 and already I've included two of Nelson! I don't want one particular person/animal/type of shot to dominate my project. I realise there will be some recurring themes throughout the year but I will try and mix it up.

Colourful City Abstract

WHAT

This is a detailed look at the side of the colourful 'Santos' building on Tank Street, Brisbane City. The grey/blue squares are the windows and the pink/red/orange colours mark each floor of the building.

WHY

On this particular day, I'd been searching for some 'abstract' style shots around Brisbane City. This building caught my eye because of the contrasting bright colours. I thought it was a perfect candidate image to add to one of the groups of which I'm a member on 'Redbubble' called "Abstract Lines".

It wasn't until I took at look at this shot on my computer that I realised I'd managed to capture 2 office ceiling lights on the right hand side of my image, which I quite liked.

HOW

For this shot, I was standing on the footpath a block over from the Santos building and at about a 45 degree angle to the side of the Santos building. I used a tripod and attached my 70-300m lens so I could sufficiently zoom in to the colourful features of the building and exclude the sky or any other nearby structures. I set the camera to manual mode and zoomed to 180mm.

Taken at aperture f/10 and 1/200s shutter speed

POST PRODUCTION

I used photoshop to slightly increase the vibrance of the building's colours

Time out before the rains

WHAT:
This is the pier at Shorncliffe, north of Brisbane City. Taken at about 3:30pm before a heavy downpouring of rain.

WHY
The Shorncliffe pier is a favourite hang-out of mine for both relaxing and for photography. It's always crawling with fishermen, walkers, joggers, cyclists and people like me.

This shot was one of my last for the day before I went home - I only took it on a whim and I'm glad I listened to my instincts as it was about the only one worth printing from the outing! I loved how the fading light was hitting parts of the white railings.

HOW
I hand-held my camera at eye-level to take 3 images at exposure values of (-2,0,+2). I stood in the centre of the pier. The man on the left was just walking into my frame and I swung the camera slightly to the left to include him in the image.

Captured using aperture priority, f8, shutter speed 1/640, ISO 200.

POST PRODUCTION
I used Photomatix to combine and tonemap the three images taken at the pier. Because the man on the left was walking as I took my three shots, he initially had a pretty awful 'ghosting' effect. I decided to re-create my HDR image and selected the 'attempt to reduce ghosting artifacts' option. This resulted in the man being nicely frozen in time without any noticeable ghosting effect.

After I'd played around with the various levels in Photomatix, I then opened the image in photoshop. I then increased the vibrance, contrast and clarity levels to really bring out the clouds and subtle differences in the grain of the wood in the pier.

Graffiti man

WHAT
This piece of street art was located on one of the walls of the Fortitude Valley Firestation, Brisbane City. I'm not sure, but it looks like something done by the notorious street artist, Banksy.

WHY
I liked the idea that the 'simpleton' holding the camera up to his face (most likely to photograph the nearby landmark Storey Bridge) is likely to get smacked in the face if the fire door suddenly opens.

This piece of artwork amused me because it reminded me of myself when I'm taking photos - a bit of a 'simpleton' and oblivious to what's going on around me :)

HOW
I used a tripod as this image was taken at about 8pm. I used an aperture setting of 8 and a shutter speed of about 2.5 seconds. ISO setting was 200.

POST PRODUCTION
This HDR image was created using a single shot which was then converted into 3 exposures of -2,0,+2 using photoshop. At the time of taking the photo, I'd been taking three shots at the previously mentioned exposures, however when I tonemapped the 3 images in photomatix I wasn't happy with the results, hence why I ended up using a single original image to create three exposures.

After creating the HDR image (which was originally in colour) I used photoshop to produce the black and white version and increased contrast and clarity.

The tree at Brighton

WHAT
This tree is located at the southern end of the Hornibrook bridge, Brighton. (About 40mins north of Brisbane). I took this photo at low tide and about 45 mins before sunset.

WHY
My husband took a beautiful photograph of this same tree about 4 years ago and I have always loved the image of the lone tree with the rocks in front of it. At the time, I'd just started getting into HDR and I wanted to try it out on this tree.

HOW
I set up my tripod in the soft sand directly in front of the tree at eyelevel. There were a few other mangrove type plants very close to my location, so I was careful to exclude them from my frame. I set the camera to 'bracket' and took three shots - one at each of the following exposures: -2, 0, +2.

If I had my time over with this shot, I probably would have moved the tripod and myself closer to the tree so that it fills the frame more.


POST PRODUCTION
Once home (and after cleaning the legs of my tripod!), I uploaded the images into Photomatix and tonemapped them to this result.

I like the colours of the sunset reflected in the water and the way the tree itself seems to glow.

Shorncliffe kids

WHAT

Shorncliffe pier taken at approximately 3pm. Approximately 40 mins north of Brisbane City.

The wooden pylons at the upper right of the shot are the same as those in Shorncliffe sunrise.

WHY

I love the whole beachfront area at Shorncliffe, particularly around this pier which is popular with locals for fishing and sea-gazing. This shot was originally going to be of the pier only- the kids (not mine!) ran into the shot just as I was about to take it. I prefer the scene with them in it as it gives interest to what otherwise would be a large empty space on the right.

HOW

I used aperture priority mode and because it was very sunny on this day, the camera automatically used a fast shutter speed to prevent over-exposure. The high speed of the shutter can be seen by the mid-air suspension of the water being splashed by the children, as well as their 'unblurred' movement.

POST PRODUCTION

Contrast was increased using photoshop.