OK, so I thought my photography needs some improvement. This PAD discipline should be fun, although I am not 100% sure I will be able to maintain a picture a day, but I will aim for at least several per week.
All feedback welcome, particularly constructive criticism.
The box on the right is the Linux server - it's sold as a NAS storage device (Linksys NSLU2) that all you need to do is attach a USB disk and away you go. But, there is an active community out there who have figured out how to load a full Linux distribution onto it, checkout http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/Main/HomePage . This is all I have done, and then configured a few services so I can use it as an install server for Solaris.
The box in the middle is just a USB attached disk.
(Behind the phone can be seen another NSLU2 being used for it's intended purpose)
Oliver, my 7 year old, has taken a recent interest in photography after reading some of my phtotography and photoshop books. I have been letting him use my old and damaged D70. This is him wielding a camera taking a picture of me wielding my camera with SBR200 flash system - I like the way the flash has reflected.
Male scorpion fly, apparently so named because the male has enlarged genitals giving the appearance of a scorpions sting - which is how I conclude that this specimen is a male.
I have been playing with my new Nikkor 105mm f/2.8G VR Macro lens and SU800, SBR200 combination. Went to the sea shore and found this little sea anenome in a rock pool. It was a bit fiddly to photograph because of the strong wind blowing ripples across the water that made it difficult to focus but there were short breaks in the wind when the surface of the water would smooth
At the same time as photogrphing the sea anenome I found this tiny jellyfish (about 3cm across) in another rock pool. This creature was particularly difficult to photograph because of it's transparency... There are lots of specks of sand floating around in the water making the image look very noisy and dirty, but this was the best I got
I have wanted to take some photos of this water cascade at Frankfurt Welle. The edges of the cascade are a stainless stell comb structure which caused the water to flow in interesting patterns. It was a windy day when I took these photos so the water was being whipped into even more interesting patterns.
Didn't touch a camera today but did spend quite a lot of time sorting through the pictures from yesterday. This is one from the Palmengarten, in Frankfurt.
Cropped to show eye detail, which I am quite pleased with :-), although I do think the image is a bit cluttered with too much of the flower in shot ...
Decided to try some flowers from the florist so I could control things more, but probably the best element to control was the wind, with still air indoors I could happily set some long exposures
Well I am not finding this PAD discipline easy, I haven't taken any photos today... I have spent some time though sorting through some other pictures and generally shuffling things around in some of my galleries here at pbase
I sat in some long grass in a park this afternoon waiting for any insects to land within photographic reach. Camera was fitted with my tamron 180mm macro lens plus an extension tube, and the new Nikon Macro Flash. Once an insect landed I tried to creep up on it without casting any shadow from the big lump of camera and at the same time planting the monopod in the ground at a suitable location. It was all a bit fiddly and I would almost always only get one shot at the fly because they would take off as soon as the flash went but I did have some success and managed to get a few shots. This fly in particular stayed still for three or four shots which meant I actually managed to get a usable focus. I still have a lot to learn with my macro experiments, and also a lot of respect for all those great macro photographers out there.
Tried to take the same sort of shot as yesterday in a different location. This time there were lots of yellow buttercups to provide a splash of colour and a very obliging bug who pulled several poses for me on the top of the grass seed head, shame that the grass seed head is a bit cluttered with other stalks of grass
Found this gold (plated) sculpture in a shop window and thought the reflections interesting. I had to fiddle the colours a bit to get it back to looking 'gold' - should have set the WB manually... It's also a pity that the shop window wasn't a bit cleaner.
My first macro photo of a spider. I don't think this picture is very good, but the spider was only about 4mm long so I was quite pleased that I even managed to get an approximate focus on it.
I know it looks as if todays photo is the same as yesterdays, but I went back to try and photograph the aphid family again today. Took my monopod instead of the tripod because I knew the tripod was unusable but I hoped that I would be able to get a bit of stability with the monopod. I think I got some better pictures but they are still soft, although I used a longer extension tube today (36mm, 20mm yesterday) so I haven't had to crop so they look a bit sharper.
More macro today. Went out to photograph some flowers and found this aphid on a rose bush and thought I'd try and get a pic of it since I know they don't move that fast so I figured I was in with a chance. Previewed the first shot and then saw the 4 baby aphids so took a few more shots to try and improve it... The image is a bit soft - I had to handhold because there was nowhere to put the tripod - but apart from that I am reasonably pleased with this.
Just playing with coloured filters on two lights ...
A bowl with coins in water, leave for a while so that bubbles form on the coins, then positioned two flashes (one with a blue filter, one with red) on either side and then shoot away playing with the balance between the two lights - in the end this one is about 4:1 to the blue.
After my unsuccessful attempts to photograph some insects yesterday (and again early this morning) I thought I would try some macro of something that doesn't move so fast...
But then I found that the Dandelion seed head I was photographing had a fly trapped inside it, so with some careful aperture setting for shallow DOF (and a lot of luck) I managed to focus (approximately enough) through the seeds on the fly within.
This is the shot I wanted to get - and in this you can make out the trapped fly.
Went for a walk along the river Main in Frankfurt where I found a family of Greylag geese with 3 goslings.
The image is a little soft due to camera shake - I hadn't taken my Image Stabilising lens and instead had my old Sigma 70-300 which I haven't used for a while, and I allowed the shutter speed to drop too much...
I can't resist this type of shot of some regular structure shot with a telephoto lens, although I don't usually like long exposures of running water. I don't think I have quite managed to acheive what I wanted with this so will probably go back another time and try it again.
Playing with Macro again and following on from yesterdays theme, this time a 500 Euro note which is deceptively similar in overall colour to a 20 Pound Sterling note.
Detail of the hologram which has sparkled nicely under the flash (more).
Took my youngest son Louis (age 5) to London Zoo and the first animals he wanted to see were the reptiles and snakes. This Gaboon Viper was conventiently posing in it's tank.
I had the lens up close to the wire cage and after a couple of more normal shots this Toucan started looking at me, I think this is the best shot I got
Went with my eldest son Oliver (age 7). He was taking photos for the first time ever (see Oliver's first photos) with my D70 while I was playing with my new Macro flash bracket. This is one of my efforts - because of the attention span of a 7 year old I was not using a tripod and hence my pictures suffered from framing problems, this one has just missed the full circle of thid dandelion flower.
and in this 
you can make out the trapped fly.
