Yesterday a mate called in and after reading this series of blogs had only one comment to make,’ Mate this is all about photos, not words.’
Of course he is quite right. From now on I promise to be less verbose.
The following images should fit todays challenge and therefore can speak for themselves.
All of the images needing attention were straightened using Photoshop CC’c image rotation tool.
Two days to go, see you tomorrow.
Hoo roo till then.
I remember reading somewhere that it’s fun to photograph soap bubbles in the sink before you do the washing up. I made a couple of images looking down on the bubbles but the result was just so so. Then I got a bright Idea.
Why not take the image from underneath the bubbles.
I set the self timer on my Olympus Tough 8010 to 12 seconds, set the camera to P, pressed the shutter button and carefully slid the camera to the centre of the sink base. The flash eventually popped, I retrieved the camera and after giving it a rinse and dry, downloaded the image. Here is the result:
Every year around the same time, Sydney hosts an event known as ‘Sculptures by the Sea’ along the cliff tops from Bondi Beach to Tamaramma Beach.
As the name suggests, sculptures of all shapes and sizes are displayed along the walk. Here are two sculptures which nicely fit our days theme,’Interact with a Surface.’
That’s yours truly in blue with the camera. This little group people were standing about 20 metres from the sculpture.
The following clever sculpture captured the reflection of passers in various places around its body.
At Canberra’s annual spring Floriade garden festival visitors can expect the unexpected and 2015 was no exception. The following two images show people physically interacting with a surface and the resultant image showing up on an almost vertical screen.
This next image shows my own reflection in the highly polished front wheel of a Harley Davidson Fat Boy as I made the shot.
Now along the lines of selfies, here I am in riding regalia with She Who Must Be Obeyed, aboard a ferry when we were en route to a motor cycle rally in Victoria. The highly polished windows made for a great reflection. Our Harley’s were safely stowed below on the car deck.
Just recently whilst driving to a nearby town, we came across a farmer herding a mob of sheep along the road. We pulled over to let them pass and some of the sheep were nicely showing in the rear vision mirror. Thankfully the iPhone was handy and here is the result.
As nude selfies are all the rage, why should I miss out. The other morning as I emerged from the shower I thought I saw a ghost in the bathroom mirror.
Dripping wet, I rushed to my office, grabbed a camera and here is the result. Fortunately modesty was not an issue. After all, I’m no Paris Hilton.
On a recent shoot of motorcycles and bike paraphernalia, I saw, though the lens that I was reflected in a helmet. I grabbed the shot and find the result quite interesting after cropping out other bike related bits and pieces.
The following image is one of my favourites. We were happy to have ‘Robert’, an American Staffy as a house guest for a while not so long ago. One morning Robert was giving me the eye, reminding me that it was walk time.
As usual, with dog and camera we wandered off to the river for some exercise and in Robert’s case a swim and a play. I had the camera ready for his return and as he sat to say thank you, looking up at me with his paws on my feet I saw my reflection in his eye and here it is.
I went a bit overboard with Photoshop but I like the result and that’s the way its going to stay.
So there we are, another day down and only three to go. What fun.
Hoo roo, see you tomorrow.
Cropping can be an essential component in the post processing stage of image presentation. For example, a specific element of an image may emerge as the most salient point and needs to be displayed as an individual image. This is where cropping is essential.
However, as we are learning in Developing Your Eye, it is necessary to not only look at what we are photographing but also to really see it.
This is where we all need to develop our skills in composition.
The following images illustrate that point.
The full frame image doesn’t have the impact of the cropped version.
The following full frame landscape view of Chambers Pillar and its companion outcrops is an interesting image.
However in cropped form, the Pillar looks even more enticing.
The following landscape shows the ruins of the historic Pommeroy Flour Mill not far from where I live. I made this image for a competition where ‘leading lines’ was the subject. 
However, the historic mill itself is really the dominant feature of the image as demonstrated in the following crop.
The following image shows how infrastructure development in residential areas makes for interesting photography. At the same time, the telegraph pole, conveniently situate in the middle of the frame presents a perfect point from which to crop the image to emphasise the size of the machinery being used.
Of the two options, the copse of trees on the left side could be a distraction where the background hillside on the right has no distractions and that was my choice.
This ‘tired and emotional’ spectator chose to relax in the arena during a gymkhana.
In the cropped version the spectator looks even more relaxed.
The arena just happened to be in the dry bed of the Todd River in Alice Springs, Central Australia. The Control Tower signage is a classic example Territorian humour.
Now just in case the sign’s nomenclature offends, a judicious crop has saved the day.
In closing it’s important to note that the higher the resolution of the original image, the more detail and greater size you can obtain in most crops.
Thanks for looking and till tomorrow, hoo roo.
Die hard 35mm film photographers will happily tell you that capturing movement on 35mm film was always a test of skill, technical know how and lots of practise.
Nothing has changed with modern digital cameras and post processing programs, skill and technical know how are still a prerequisite for successful images of movement.
Cycling is a popular sport in my home town I thought local cyclists would be a great chance to capture some of them in motion.
Motor vehicles make great subjects for movement images and I made the following images of motor vehicles as they passed by our house. By emphasising the cars’ movement their speed appears greater than it really was.
Flocks of native birds regularly visit our yard and provide many photographic opportunities. Here are two images of the birds in flight showing different methods of capturing movement.
The first image was made using a Lens Baby Composer lens. This lens enables your selected image point to be clear with the balance of the image blurred.
The following image is one of my favourites showing movement. I was sitting having coffee in the Queen Victoria Building over Town Hall railway station in Sydney. In the stainless steel plating under an adjacent escalator I noticed reflections of pedestrians moving through the underground entrance to the railway station.
I made the following image by photographing a reflection in the stainless steel.
I hand held the camera for all of these images.
Hoo roo till tomorrow.
The more we seek, the more we generally find, particularly with leading lines.
Many man made leading lines often lead into the natural world and sometimes create a question or two in the viewer’s mind. Here’s an example in the Abercrombie National Park, Southern New South Wales.
Then there are leading lines made by the passing of human feet over thousands of years.
From time to time, it’s necessary to follow a man made leading line, complete with stone pile markers in order to get safely to your destination.
Sometimes, the leading lines are just tyre tracks. She Who Must Be Obeyed took the following shot during one moment of my motorcycle mania.
In the image below, there are two distinct leading lines. The faint one in the left foreground is the foot pad leading to the rim of the Wolf Creek Meteorite site IN West Australia. The distinct one leading towards the horizon is the vehicular track leading out of the area. The small dot to the right of the tree in the middle of the image is our Landrover.
Fences make great leading lines, as do roads. When they appear to merge their combined effect really concentrates the eye.
The walls, floor and ceiling of tunnels make multiple leading lines and the effect of parallax makes for interesting image making.
Be patient now, only three more man made images of leading lines to go.
Well, another challenge completed.
Hoo roo until tomorrow.
Today’s challenge was great as it meant there was no need to venture outside into the atrocious weather we are experiencing as winter takes its grip on our southern highlands town.
In our garage sit our two long wheel base Landrovers. Inside the house sits our collection of Landrover scale models.
Firstly, here are three scale model Landrovers. Looking from left to right,their dimensions are:
1 6 and 1/2″ x 2 and 1/2″
2 4″ x 1 and 1 and 1/2″
3 2″ x 3/4″
Now, the two long wheel base Landrovers in the garage each measure 181″ long by 70.5″ wide.
One is green, the other is brown. As the smallest of the model Landrovers is also green, it was the logical choice for an experiment with size and scale.
Here is the visual result of the 3/4 inch front width model Landy, sitting on the what we call the bull bar on the Landrover Defender’s 70.5″ front width.
I think the scale ratio is about 94 to 1.
Apart from the colour, I chose the smallest model in order to make the real Landrover look absolutely enormous by comparison. I think I was quite successful.
For the curious, the greyish tapering cylinder on the right of the image is the base of our HF radio transceiver. This radio with its long range capacity is a vital piece of safety equipment when we travel into the isolated and basically trackless areas in Australia’s vast, largely unpopulated arid interior.
Our Australian Communications and Media Authority issues us with a Radiocommunications Apparatus Licence and lists our licence type as an Outpost non assigned appliance. I believe the non assigned tag means that our outpost is mobile. Sounds great don’t you reckon.
Hoo roo until tomorrow.
My approach to today’s activity has been to divide my images into two groups. Firstly, images where artificial night light has illuminated the subject and secondly where the beauty of natural light takes centre stage.
Here goes with group one, all taken in and from our town’s central park.
THE ROTUNDA
Now for the natural light illumination of the subjects.
Hoo roo until tomorrow.
Natural light is my favourite source for illuminating the subject to be photographed, be it portrait, architecture, landscape or sport.
In today’s series of images I thought I’d add some of the settings I used for those of you interested in the technical side of things.
Sometimes sunlight creates extraordinary effects and if you are fortunate enough to have your camera at hand when this takes place, interesting images are possible.
I saw from my office window that the afternoon sum was creating a soft glow surrounding the house across the road. I grabbed my camera, fitted the appropriate lens and stepped out onto our front veranda to make an image. Talk about being ‘Johnny on the spot’ as the saying goes. In the few minutes since seeing the soft glow, a magnificent rainbow had suddenly appeared across the road and the light was extraordinary. Here is the shot made with my zoom set at 12mm, 1/80 sec, f4, ISO 100. Notice that the two steel poles in the right side of the foreground are not perpendicular. This is caused by lens aberration in the optics of an extremely wide angle lens. I chose not to correct this using Photoshop. 
The next image was taken just as the sun set on the Sculpture Garden situate on a hill side just out of Broken Hill in outback New South Wales. With the camera on a tripod and my zoom lens set at 24mm, I made the shot at 1/20th sec at f16, ISO 100.
The sculptures are bathed in natural light , particularly at dawn and sunset.
The main display area in the Goulburn Regional Art Gallery is bathed in natural light courtesy of large skylights situate at salient points in the roof.
The following image, which speaks for itself, was illuminated purely by the light from the skylights that flooded across it. I made this shot using my zooms set at 24mm, 1/80th second at f4, ISO 100.
This final image shows the afternoon light pouring in through the stained glass windows of the ‘Nurses Chapel’ of the old Prince Henry Hospital, perched on the cliffs overlooking Little Bay and the Pacific Ocean in one of Sydney’s southern suburbs.
In this image I’m particularly attracted to the fact that through the lower section of the window, one can see the surf breaking on the rocks at the base of the cliff.
In making this image I again used the zoom set at 24mm , 1/160th sec at f6.3, ISO 100
It will be fun to see what tomorrow’s challenge brings.
Hoo roo for now.
Monochrome photography has always fascinated me, right from the days when I first started to use a camera. I still make monochrome images, either using film ( rarely these days) or by switching my DSLR to record in monochrome. Conversion using Photoshop is also often used.
Some years ago, I sent a Nikon DSLR to Life Pixel Infrared in Mukilteo, USA and had it converted to only record images in infra red. It’s a fascinating alternative to pure monochrome, particularly for landscapes and architecture.
My home town is blessed with two magnificent cathedrals. Because of its location St Saviours Cathedral is favoured by photographers as it is surrounded by open space. Here is an example in infra red. Note that IR renders greens as white.
St Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney is another favoured photographic capture, this one again in infra red.
My Harley Davidson made a great subject for a monochrome capture and although not strictly architecture its form shows structured curves, angles and shapes.
Bridges too make great subjects for monochrome like this bridge over the Parramatta River in, Parramatta. Not IR this time. A capture in colour and converted to Monochrome thanks to Photoshop CC.
Similarly, this image of the High Court of Australia,located in Canberra, our Nation’s Capital is a colour capture converted to mono thanks to Photoshop CC.
The Man in the Moon makes a great fun monochrome image, again thanks to Photoshop CC’s conversion from colour.
Finally, I made this image during a hunting trip a little over 50 years ago.
Sitting in front of this primitive wattle and daub hut, a good example of primitive early Australian architecture, the thought that many years later I would be using the image could not have been further from my mind, let alone comprehension.
I scanned the negative and created a JPEG copy. As an aside, I’m always amazed when I review my old negative and slide files and see how they have not deteriorated with the passing of time. I wonder if our digital images will last the distance.
By the way, I was a youth of tender years when my camera on the tripod recorded me and my rifles, both of different calibre, one a point 22 and the other point 222 for longer range shots.
The skin on the wall is that of a male red kangaroo. The property owner had a National Parks and Wildlife permit to shoot 800 kangaroos that year and I was his principal marksman.
Well now, ten days of developing our eyes has come to an end. I enjoyed the challenge and I think I’ll sign up for the second phase. I hope you do to.
Hoo roo till next time
Today is a bleak, cold and rainy day so I determined not to venture outside seeking a colourful door or something similar to photograph for todays challenge.
Here at Casa Creaking Bones, our colour choices revolve around autumn tones. However in the sewing room of She Who Must Be Obeyed I thought I may find some fabric hidden away that was bright enough to meet the criteria of ‘A Pop of Colour.’
Imagine my delight when I finally located almost a whole bolt of striking, multi colour, in your face fabric which I immediately snuck out into my Man Cave.
Then, woe is me, I read all of today’s instructions and discovered that I should,’ Keep it simple, experiment with only one colour.’
Back to the drawing board as the saying goes.
The sock drawer was my salvation. Only one colour. Red.
Looking around for another popping colour I found this cap which also fits the bill, including my head.
Harley Davidson also care for a rider’s posterior, not only on the bike but also when relaxing in a favoured armchair. Here is a colour popping Harley logo from one of my favourite cushions.
Now that I’ve strayed from the ‘One Colour’ instruction, I reckon I can safely show you the fabric I sneaked from the sewing room.
The fabric is now safely back where it belongs and it will be interesting to find out to what use it will be put by SWMBO.
Now there is only one more day to go with this fun assignment so, see you tomorrow.
Hoo roo.
CREAKINGBONES 