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i don't really like taking flower pictures, but this one came out quite nicely, especially with a little post processing colour boost. i wonder if i over cooked it a bit ?
i used this flower on the label of some home made CDs last week and it worked quite nicely.
here's the unedited original so you can compare
i'm doing an open university photo course this term, and it's jolly good fun. i've submitted my weekly assignment photos, and here are a couple of spares i didn't use. we're encouraged not to publish our course assignments until the end in case anyone nicks them, but i might share some along the way !
as jane said, one more and it would have been a hat trick.
jane took the great photo of me missing head. i love those kinds of shots.
to p or not to p ? (tuppence or not?)
esther spotted that one of rascle's toys was lacking any upper clothing. luckily her necklass saved our blushes
you are being watched
graffiti at vauxhall station spotted as my train headed in the opposite direction.
this sign was on drinks machine, which may be broken. or it might be mended, in which case remove the sign.
a car with a bed on the roof is technically a caravan. probably.
we went round to regular commenter rascle's house for sunday lunch yesterday. we had a lovely time with top notch food and conversation.
here is his front room, although i think he and his lovely wife managed to avoid being in the picture (they were out playing chicken i think). rascle's mum is the picture though.
we went back to portsmouth historic dockyard yesterday to do more things from our yearly season ticket. it was excellent. this time we went on a harbour tour where our guide helpfully announced military secrets to visiting tourists
sniper on an aircraft carrier
it was a sniper what killed nelson, but i don't think it was this chap
military people are often friendly if you wave at them. perhaps this is where the phrase 'friendly fire' comes from
and this boat had a cow statue on board
what a brilliant idea for outside a flourist shop. they'd decorated their scaffolding to make it in to a feature. excellent stuff.
the museum in the palace of culture and science is a very strange place. totally bonkers.
it's mostly an old school exhibits-at-arms-length in glass cages types of place, but there was one hands on area.
unfortunately it was a demonstration of radioactivity which i thought i'd like to avoid. (it's worth noting chenobyl isn't too far from poland)
still, they had some bonkers exhibits like this type writer which used piano keys for the letters.
and an exhibit which banned the use of thumbs
and an ancient walkman
and some old mobile phones which were surrounded by pennies, seemingly for no other reason than the glass case they were in wasn't done up properly so there was space to drop pennies in (so people did)
and this thing is a pilot training simulator thing (with penny farthings for authenticity)
here is an early apple mac
and the fantastic trolley computer
and i thought this sign was particularly telling. it was in the space section and announced that this rocket was a genuine exhibit (unlike all the others i assume).
the music had a really weird atmosphere and was quite fantastic - you must go next time you are in warsaw (although i wouldn't make the trip just to go).
there are signs along the M4 motorway on the way in to london which inform drivers they are entering a Foot and Mouth control zone. i always pull over my car and let the cows out.
there are enough biological hazards in the UK without people risking further infection by putting pigeons on their heads in the name of tourism. i can't be doing with pigeons.
there was a lomography convention in trafalgar square this week, with 100,000 (i think) photos stuck up on boards. i can relate to their 10 rules of photography !
signs for modern life. there's always a new sexy model available
probably looking for some chopper parking
an excellent thing. trafalgar square is such a great place in the modern era.
part of my new office routine is breaking for elevensies at 8am (i get to the office at 6.30 if i drive) by walking to tesco.
as i get there they are usually opening up and i often see the kiddy tantrum generator machines being dragged out to their posts. sometimes they are still in the doorway.
someone had decided to strangle these poor beasts.
still, if i had the choice of any of these three rides, i'd go for the one on the right as it's goes further.
photo is from the plane on the way back from poland
(update: the cryptic thing i mentioned before has now finished)
is it normally this colour ?
update: looks like his hat isn't the only preference he's changed. i wonder if it's an imposter ?
funkypancake - leading the news as usual !
(in the museum in the palace of culture and science)
like other polish mannequins, this chap had a blatantly green tinge
it's been a while since i've done a cola drinks on railing shot.
as i came out of a meeting at a company head office last week i saw ellen macarthur being professionally photographed. i only realised it was her once she'd walked past me and out the door though, so apologies for the lack of picture !
she's quite small and was carrying her own bags.
and the next day i saw chris eubank in his almost-invisible-on-london-roads lorry cabs. his lorry cab pulled up (on a red route) and he jumped out the passenger seat and ran in to a chemist shop.
see, my celebrity knowledge extends beyond comedians, and includes (at least 2) sports people !
i didn't even spot bt tower in the background of this photo when i took it.
i did spot the strange shadow though
on a sunny evening after a hard day's work there is no nicer diversion than an english pub
this was in a shop window. if this is how far they take their back pain treatment, i'm not sure i'm interested. i assume the flower power references must refer to their sedation methods ?
plumbing disasters and visitors inside, but outside there was much balloon fun
(using this technique)
our house is full of daddy long legs at the moment. and mosquitos and midges. it's the like the battle at the end of Star Wars here.
here is kezia doing her first ever homework. it was spelling, and she walked it. although to be honest they were quite easy. not that i'd get them all wright.
how fantastic is this ? it's a pocket sundial, about the size of a small compact camera. it's got a little pointer to produce the shadow, a compass and a complicated ready-reconner on the lid.
everything the modern man could ever need in one tiny tin.
i had a good flight to warsaw (what seems like weeks ago now - in fact it was!).
at heathrow the pilot came on the intercom and said "well, we're all on board, all the bags are loaded and we have a take off slot all confirmed, so we should be away on time. although, me saying that is usually the kiss of death. i'll let you know if anything changes"
kiss of death !!! not what you want to hear from a pilot
a few minutes later he was back on "apologies, but one passenger has failed to turn up so we've got to unload his baggage. i told you it would be the kiss of death"
kiss of death !!! again !
the flight was fine, but just as we were in the last few seconds before touching down in Warsaw and everyone was in the 'try not to look too worried' mode, we suddenly accelerated like mad anf flew up in to the sky again. it was a bit of a shock.
apparently we had to abort our landing as a helicopter was in the way. fair enough, but a bit worrying at the time.
i accidentally took kezia's emergency cuddling label thing with me to Poland. so i thought i'd show it a good time.
my favourite thing about this thing is how it says 'tesco' as large as the 'i love you' letters.
at last, somewhere to park your raleigh chopper
i went through the wrong door in a museum and ended up in an office. it was a bit of a time-warp so i grabbed a shot
i went to a sunday morning camera fair in warsaw before flying home. no one really spoke english making discussion on the finer points of photography tricky. i got the shop keepers to right prices down on a piece of paper for me, then i'd convert to pounds and check what things were selling on my favourite online camera shops (and ebay) via my mobile.
in the end i convinced myself to buy nothing, but i had fun wandering around looking at Germand and Russian antique cameras (alongside all your modern stuff).
this made me chuckle. i think it's a travel agents shop which does holidays and tours of different places. but the little toy train track in the sparse window display has broken track and the whole thing has seen better days.
didn't really install much confidence
you might have to click on this to admire it properly !
i take a lot of photos from a low angle. and here's a good example showing the difference between an above picture of a lost broken key and a low angle version of the same thing.
to get the low angle picture i set my little compact camera to macro mode and centre point focussing, place it against the ground, and point it in the general direction of thing i'm photoing.
i usually end up taking 4 or 5 shots to get the thing i want to be in focus, with a fair bit of chimping at the time to check.
the worst bit is standing up again as i'm usually wearing my heavy backpack with laptop and various heavy documents.
the crouch is usually worth it though.
so there you go. you probably knew all that already.
i stayed on the 38th floor of the marriot hotel. that was quite high.
it had a terrific view of the sunset. pity about the window reflections seemed unbeatable due to the double glazing.
i spotted this book in a polish kiosk window and i thought i provided a nice link between our recent holiday in scotland and my few days in warsaw. i like links like that.
these mannequins really were this colour
words look so much less intimidating if you add an 'i' or 'y' at the end. and changing a 'c' to a 'k' is good fun too.
i took this photo of an old house in poland as it looked good, but when i looked at the photo i noticed the table in the bottom right of the photo (click for big)
that was a bit weird as i'd just walked past this table which was doing duty as a bollard.
it's a small world, and full of tables.
there were someone's trousers.
this is the warsaw palace of culture and science. it was a present from stalin which was nice of him
it looks a lot like it's from ghostbusters
there were english power sockets in my polish hotel room. that saddened me as i wanted to feel proper foreign.
i say that, but during my few days in poland i managed to visit McDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut and the London Steak restaurant. very blending in i was.
i went in search of genuine communist era Poland when i was in Warsaw. most of it is being rebuilt like it was hundreds of years ago, so finding something obviously from the last 50 years (other than the stuff which has been build in the last 10 years) is tricky.
these statues are by a square which was built to house political rallies. you can see the scale of them in the top picture (there's a chap walking by). nowadays they are just ignored. they probably were back in the day too though !
i was in poland for this conference. here's a classic techno-slide. i can't get enough of these things.
actually, i can
according to the polish taxi driver who picked me up from heathrow to take me back home after my warsaw trip, people in Poland have their wedding photos on a different day to their actual wedding. As a result they are a lot more relaxed and can be more 'set up'. He knew this as he was going back to Poland to get married (today in fact i think)
when i was in poland last week i got to explore Park Lazienkowski which was lovely
there were lots of people having their wedding photos which made for a great spectator sport.
you can see what this place looks like from the sky on google maps
even as i left there were more pouring in !
can anyone identify this red toadstalling mushroom thing ? we saw quite a few in scotland. also, which picture do you prefer ?
we also saw loads of these ones:
there is nothing cooperative about chocolate sponge sandwiches. in my experience it's every man/woman/child for themselves
these were the holiday cottages / bungalows that we stayed in whilst in scotland. excellently large with three bedrooms and three bathrooms ! their website even has a nice floor plan.
passing place being a place for passing being a place to die ? there are worse final views.
a chair with a telephone and glove and a dead mannequin. these are just some of things we saw on sticks in scotland
why the long space between 7 and days ?
Kezia really got in to balloon modelling when we were away.
jane packed various crafting activities, in anticipation of rain in Scotland. And balloon modelling went down really well.
kezia made these fancy hats for both herself and her dolly. quite fantastic stuff.
loop da loop
is this chap throwing a hoop on to the dogs head ?
i like this sign. obviously huge amount of work has gone in to writing it with letter stencils, but you would have thought they would have made sure they had enough space for the last word !
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