calibration time!

i've been worried about my calibration!

i use two monitors, home and work, and work tends to render the images a bit too yellow. i don't do much to the colour, the cameras should perform well and as they look fine on the home one, odds are it's the work one that's duff.

but how do you know for sure?

i found this visual test which is easy to follow; calibration test

so i tried it at work first and, as predicted, it was well out! i made adjustments to correct it but now i'm looking at the home one and it complies far better without any adjustment and even after the modifications on the work one!

castle combe

eggs

thought i'd better catch up on the walks book i got for christmas; three months since i did the last one, which was the first - so this is the second. castle combe!

i took the eos, a mistake because i haven't got it sussed out and it's a brick to carry around. also there wasn't too much to photograph compared to minster lovell. i must get the manual out and read it... ;o)

links to post

junk rust barrel

maybe what's left after a couple of trinidadian steel drums :o/

stiff upper lip

a bit more eos stuff

guinness brewery tour - strictly for tourists

guinness brewery tour - strictly for the birds

so, better with tourists or without tourists? i can't make up my mind - probably with.

apple blossom (i'm guessing)

the red portion of the castle compliments the blossom, no? yes? no?
taken on the curved steps down to dubh linn garden.

eos takes on the swirls

different camera, different day, different light, better definition on the grille. i could tweak it but - i don't know... you decide. :o)

eos in eire

guinness critters.

in dublin, enjoying the new zoom lens! first time actually out and about and, boy, it's like having a brick around your neck. it takes me time to get used to the feel of new stuff; just on basic auto for these few shots.

duhb linn garden

at least i think it was called that. opposite the castle anyway.

pool art

street art

phone garry 5 lines.

sign writing is a dying trade. he had FIVE whole lines when he had his name painted on the wall. i expect he's got broadband now...

hey you!

the ixus is a fine camera but the delay when the shutter's released is a tad slow. these buskers on busy grafton street drew the crowds but many more passed by! it's a case of one eye on the subject and one eye casing the street, looking for potential gaps in the traffic... but nothing's perfect! this bloke caught me out.

i just lurve clone brush though. cropping as much as desirable, i'm still left with a bit of toe and most of his hand - but clone brush paints over the offending parts other brushes don't reach and it only takes a minute.

i turned it black and white because i thought it suited - but i'm not sure now. it's a subjective thing... :o/

busking grafton street

well now...

... just got back from a short break in Dublin - only 45 minutes in the air which makes the usual shenanigans of the airline's insistence of booking in 2 hours before departure even more ludicruous, especially as the no-expense-spent airline don't seem to bother to clear away the detritus of the previous flight anymore.

my god, how i dislike flying - is it supposed to be the best way to travel? it has speed in its favour but little else.

Dublin is...a city. (This may come as no surprise to many of you). i come from a city and i left when i could so i'm slightly prejudiced against cities. As cities go, Dublin is all right - more like a dirty big town really - two days just about does it.

it has trams! - not many trams though but travelling on trams makes me wonder why all cities don't have them.

it has traffic! despite the (stereotypical) irish temperament, impatience is prevalent on Dublin roads - the horn being the expression of choice!

the best bits of Dublin is the food, drink and the diddle-dee-dee music, normally going on in the same establishment. (having said that, take my advice and avoid the guinness brewery tour. for one thing it's not a brewery tour, it's a tour of a museum - the brewery is next door! being no stranger to brewery tours, i was rather disappointed by this...)

mocha 'n' flicks

mostly i used the eos, but here's a few quick pics from the auld ixus - are they called rushes like in the films? possibly not.

i pushed the iso again, i don't know why it is but i dislike using flash - totally against the advice of michael winner who says you should always use it whether you need it or not. he's in films - have you seen any of his? maybe one or two are on this pillar - er, nope!

hmmm - oh yeah, i had a mocha... i dislike funny coffees but this one was surprisingly okay.

dublin castle swirls

it's the most colourful castle wall i've ever seen - as viewed through a grating in the wall of the park opposite - the irish have a sense of fun with their monuments!

i took this again the next day with the eos and i've yet to compare them. (the eos can quite literally be a pain in the neck on long walks! i hope it proves worth it)

in the name of the law

it was a week of firsts: first time in ireland, first funny mocha and, believe it or not, first irish stew! ever since as a lad faced with mum's stew, stew has been synonymous with gruel...not that mum was a bad cook - she wasn't - it was those glistening lumps of boiled-out fatty meat and...carrots!

so what, i was a fussy eater. now i'm up for anything - i've turned adventurivore! except for tripe... and maybe testicles. the stew was gorgeous though a bit more meat would have been nice, a fact corroborated by our guest house hosts. the dumplings superb, as was the colcannon (mash and cabbage).

the murphys were complimentary!

not shown is the gallagher's rhubarb crumble and custard which is to-die-for!

in ireland, baldness is unheard of

any colour you like

combined the earlier images, muted the too white central portion, blurred the edges with feathered selection.

picture of lilies

who? now, now, no smirking at the back there... i'm married and these are the wife's.

behind blue eyes

if i was made to choose between knowing how to take good photographs and knowing how to create good art, i wonder which i would go for. there are so many people taking photos now and tweaking them on the old photosoftware... and yet...

i'm glad i don't have to consider such a ludicruous hypothetical dichotomy so i can pursue both equally bad.

before i could afford a camera i had to draw really fast...

i spent most of the first day just wandering around snapping odds and sods, sort of aimlessly really - i was entranced by the lovely ker-lunk of the eos; the ixus is relatively shy in the noise department.

socket sets.

arranged on a sheet of cartridge paper, low side lighting from a basic halogen reading lamp - even then i had to push the iso - greyscaled and colorised (any colour you like) and flipped/mirrored about. some of the annoying jpeg artifacts is actually strange reflections off the chrome! nothing to do with me squire. the shadows look cleaner viewed full size but i like this arrangement - you can't have everything, the limitations of the page size...

universal soldier

up against the window on a sheet of A1 cartridge paper. the shadow at the back and the one cast by the UJ were the same boring density, so i cheated with layers and selections - brought down the background and increased the foreground.

oh i'm getting fed up with this tools project!

the chisels.

okay, i'm just getting used to the weight and feel of the EOS 20D - which i shall refer to as eos (pron. ee-oss) which sounds like something asinine and fits it well...

there are 10 differences in these two pictures, can you spot them?

it's good to go back and look at your pics with a refreshed pair of eyes - or a second pair of eyes. my good friend anne suggests i put a little more contrast on - and here she is playing with my curves. ;o)

although, if you start from a different place you'll probably end up in a different place; it's like the old irishman being asked by two lost tourists how to get to kilkenny - well now, you wouldn't be wanting to start from here!

btw, stop looking, it's only the contrast that's been changed... you're right, anne. :o)

tools - my chisels - i love their little wooden handles.

if i bought a pair of shoes today, i might start wearing them in july. (coincidently, i did buy a new pair of shoes today!) as with shoes so it is with most things...

so here is the ixus still - but, yes, i did use the new camera in earnest today but... later. i'm half-heartedly going for the image thursday - or is it friday? - topic which this week is tools. (i feel like marvin, the paranoid android should be narrating...) okay, march was a bit lazy on the photog front and i've been hooked on the IF stuff which can be seen on my other blog. so, tools! yeah, i cherish these chisels, bought individually from a bricolage in france. the french don't seem to have the passion for diy like the brits which may explain why their bricolages are so much better than ours.