Orbis Eggs

Ha ha, well I couldn't resist this one, I said I was going to tets the Orbis and what better way than to take a picture of something young, smooth with great curves....
Our young Chickens have started to lay eggs, so I shot them! The eggs... not the chickens.






Not the best use of an Orbis I guess, but I don't have any models around at my place right now, so these seemed as good as any.

Enjoy the New Year celebrations where ever you are!
Prosit.

The End is Nigh!

Hi there, yes I'm still alive (just! after all the food over Christmas) it's been a long Year and I'm pleased to say I'm looking forward to next year and hopefully more time to do the things I enjoy like photography!
I received an Orbis ring flash from my wife for Christmas, so I'm going to be doing a few shots with that over the break and will see bhow it compares to the Profoto that I once used, my first concern looking at it is that the fact that I have to hole the flash and the ring flash could be pain in the butt, but I shot a couple of "test" shots yesterday and it's no more cumbersome than some other equipment that I have.

Meanwhile I've been upating the main site, you won't notice any changes yet as I'm still testing it and haven't published, but watch this space! Or that space... you know what I mean.

There's been some cool stuff on the net over the Year, David Hobby over at Stobist.com sums up some of his personal faves throught the year, he's a cool bloke you does a terrible fake Lundon accent init, but he sure has opended a few doors for me with his various techniques, so thanks geez!
Then there's Chase like David he never seems to sleep and just keeps putting stuff out there, a great source of inspiration... and then there was the fun and games of Vincent Laforet he's a pretty good photographer, but since the launch of the Canon 5D MkII (I want!) (You can't afford it "Wife") he's gone all video on us, I can understand this move, in fact as I commented on his website I always found it funny that so many photogs want to shoot video, and when I was shooting (and still occasionally shoot) moving footage, I always hated all the hub bub that you seem to need in order to shoot, but maybe he is right, maybe these kind of cameras will truly change the way things are shot, I sure would have liked to have one during the 2001 May Day riots in London.

Photojournalism

Although I've been aware of James Nachtwey's photos for as long as I can remember I always seemed to have skimmed over them in the past, not just his, but most of the ones that I have seen to to do with war etc. A lot of this I believe has to do with oversaturation of said events, we are bombarded by the media with these images to the point that we just switch off.

However I recently came across the TED speech he made, and was gob smacked by this guy, and the last week I have become more and more interested in this aspect of photography, yesterday he released this via the XDRTB.org website,





Once again I was speechless and had no idea this was going on, this touched a nerve with me as members of my own family suffered the effects if TB during WWII.
I hope that people will sit up and take notice of this problem.

Canon G9 Handheld with Flash

Coming back to my previous post about Strobist I am really starting to love "playing" around with flash and my cameras, in fact I went into my home studio the other day and found myself slightly annoyed at how far I had to dim my Bowens kit down to try and get a "cool" effect.

So I took the G9 out the other day, not intending to do anythig special (just walking the dog actually). I started snapping away at some of the patterns in the water, and kept going slower and slower with the shutter, eventually the inevitble happened and it got blurry, that's when I switched on the flash and hey presto, got the smooth action of water I wanted but maintained the sharpness on the rocks, it was the onboard flash so didn't work all the time, but some of them came out OK.

I've also done a bit of reading, and came across this site, it's great! I love the images and the links posted, it's my favourite blog right now.

I'm also really digging Ellen von Unwerths which I tripped over on this site, (which is a cool site too!), also found this which is talking about a 50 page spread of Raquel Zimmerman in the New Vogue Nippon, dunno if I'll be able to get hold of that here, but I'm gonna try!

Strobist Stuff

So a guy at work very kindly lent me the DVD's from the strobist website, I highly recommend them, they are a great source of information and just by mucking around with stuff I never knew I had access too, a whole new chapter opened for me.


Here's an image I took while lounging, using one of the techniques, shooting through the glass and changing the White Balance on the camera, also cranking up the shutter and firing high speed.
Silly image really but I thought it was fun and entitled it "Evolution".... make of that what you will!



I've also been intrigued by this young Ladies work, she has something of Floria Sigismondis early work about her, but also mixed in with a bit of Cindy Sherman.

Anyway toodle pip... oh and what about that Canon!

Busy, busy, busy

So here's the deal, if your a Pro photographer then I guess you'll be busy (hopefully) shooting, organising jobs and drumming up business, but what if your an aspiring Pro, but you have a day job that keeps you working for anything up to 15-17 hours a day, when you get home are you still "Yeah! Get up and Go" or are you just pleased to see your bed?


Anyway it's raining again here (surprise) so here's a link to some good photo's around the theme of rain, (some are a bit cheesy, others are outright stunning).


Someone mentioned the Dunedin Photo Salon to me the other day, it seems they have a section for experimental so I think I might enter in one category or the other, I'll keep you posted.
Later....

Dreary Saturday here

Well here in the Southern Hemisphere it's pretty dreary where I am right now, but my day was brightened by this: http://little-people.blogspot.com/ which made me kind of homesick especially reading about the Vibe Bar in London's Brick Lane, a great source of inspiration on the weekends.
Still I have had to come to work today anyhow, so it's probably the best weather for this anyway.

So what's been going on recently, well I've been working, and working... and work.... you get the picture, butI did have the chance last Saturday to shoot some stills from the Windy Lindy, Pin-Ups and Poster Boys party here in Wellington, which was cool.
I'll try to post an image or two later (our server doesn't permit uploads) but if you want to see some stuff go here.
I also found some interesting stuff about Beauty dishes, something I've wanted to play around with for a while, I tried making one which I found on a web Site, but it just doesn't seem to have the same quality so I may have to bite the bullet and buy one.

Looking forward to the update from Canon about the 5D Mk II or is it something else... who knows!

Later

What's all this about then

There are a lot of blogs out there, some offering opinions, others help, others are just diaries about the people that set them up.
I came to work today and have already read so many things that make me shudder that it's just not funny, and then someone posted this: dark-knight.html and I couldn't help thinking of something Andy Warhol came up with "15 minutes of fame", these days you'd be hard pushed to get 15 minutes and certainly if you are a photographer you'd be hard pushed to get 10 minutes with Andy if he were alive today.
So what's my point, there isn't one (wah, wah, wah!) The World is moving fast do we even care what anyone is doing/thinking anymore, 15 seconds is a long time on the net, people are fighting to be seen, exposing themselves at every opportunity (facebook) their only portal and defence at the same time, is the monitor and keyboard in front of them.

I work in Visual effects and I'm a keen Photogrpaher, I read articles everyday about people having their cameras taken off them, their laptops confiscated, harrassed because they took a picture of a child, we have all this (mis) information at our fingertips, and yet we are unable to discern the fundamentals of what is right and wrong, so is this a rant blog, nah far from it, it's just an opinion on the things around me, with a photographic bias.

If you happen to stumble over this, then feel free to comment, if you want to be abusive then feel free, but do it properly make sure you tell us who you really are, otherwise you'll just join the ranks of the cowards, and you post will be deleted!