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Camera: Leica M9
Lens: Voigtlander 50mm f1.1 Nokton
A tourist at a famous London spot, gets down low in the glow of advertising billboards to frame a loved one on location
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Before the AA Company moved into the Gloucester Valley after 1826 it would have been covered in dense stands of Eucalypt Forest with riparian vegetation and dry and subtropical rainforest along some of the creeks and south and east facing slopes.
The hard working immigrants from the UK and other European countries who settled the area soon discovered the potential income from timber getting that these forests could generate.
They cleared the land with no concern for other species or the original aboriginal inhabitants of the area. Life was tough so any income they gained was indeed hard earned especially prior to the arrival of the railway in Gloucester in 1913.
Gradually the forest cover was denuded and prime beef and dairy land evolved across most of the arable lowland flood plains.
These days when you drive down the Bucketts way from Nabiac dodging the potholes it is impossible not to wonder what diversity has been lost. Nevertheless it was a different time and hopefully in time some of the now unused land can be revegetated even if we have lost many species as a result of the indiscriminate clearing practices of the past.
Large areas of higher altitude swamp lands, warm temperate and cool temperate rainforest have been conserved in the World Heritage listed Barrington and Gloucester Tops National Parks and to a lesser extent in conservation reserves such as at Copeland. Various State Forests in the area are still managed for commercial logging including Barrington State Forest.
In the early days logs were hauled out of the forests using bullock teams and in many cases the logs were taken via river on droughers to mills and ports on the coast at Tuncurry, Bulahdelah or Tea Gardens. Later in 1913 with the coming of the North Coast Railway logs could be hauled off to the city markets on steam trains and from the late 1930's logging trucks became the preferred method of haulage to the railhead at Gloucester.
22 mosaics are located around the town of Gloucester in NSW depicting stories of
the area from the earliest days to the present.time. A further 6 mosaics are located on the wall across the road from the Visitors Centre in Denison Street. I have photographed those 6 mosaics and the images are here on Flickr.
A walking tour following pavement mosaics can be undertaken starting on the corner outside Channell’s newsagency and walking north down Ravenshaw St. to the Queen St.roundabout returning on the other side of Ravenshaw St crossing over at Hume Street to complete the circuit at the Tourist Information Centre in Denison St.
I’ve been wanting to take a city break in summer, rather than in the cold months for a while, so rather than heading for the Lake District for a week of toil on the fells when Jayne could get a week off, we took off from Liverpool for Paris. Flight times were nice and sociable but it meant we were on the M62 car park at a busy time in both directions – it’s a shambles! I’ve stopped over in Paris a dozen times – on my way to cycling in the Etape du Tour in the Alps or Pyrenees – and had a few nights out there. Come to think about it and we’ve spent the day on the Champs Elysees watching the final day of the Tour de France with Mark Cavendish winning. We hadn’t been for a holiday there though and it was a bit of a spur of the moment decision. Six nights gave us five and a half days to explore Paris on foot. I had a good selection of (heavy) kit with me, not wanting to make the usual mistake of leaving something behind and regretting it. In the end I carried the kit in my backpack – an ordinary rucksack – to keep the weight down, for 103 miles, all recorded on the cycling Garmin – and took 3500 photos. The little Garmin is light and will do about 15 hours, it expired towards the end of a couple of 16 hour days but I had the info I wanted by then. This also keeps the phone battery free for research and route finding – I managed to flatten that once though.
What can I say – Paris was fantastic! The weather varied from OK to fantastic, windy for a few days, the dreaded grey white dullness for a while but I couldn’t complain really. We were out around 8.30 in shorts and tee shirt, which I would swap for a vest when it warmed up, hitting 30 degrees at times, we stayed out until around midnight most nights. It was a pretty full on trip. The security at some destinations could have been a problem as there is a bag size limit to save room in the lifts etc. I found the French to be very pragmatic about it, a bag search was a cursory glance, accepting that I was lugging camera gear, not bombs around, and they weren’t going to stop a paying customer from passing because his bag was a bit over size.
We didn’t have a plan, as usual we made it up as we went along, a loose itinerary for the day would always end up changing owing to discoveries along the way. Many times we would visit something a few times, weighing the crowds and light etc. up and deciding to come back later. I waited patiently to go up the Eiffel Tower, we arrived on Tuesday and finally went up on Friday evening. It was a late decision but the weather was good, the light was good and importantly I reckoned that we would get a sunset. Previous evenings the sun had just slid behind distant westerly clouds without any golden glory. It was a good choice. We went up the steps at 7.30 pm, short queue and cheaper – and just to say that we had. The steps are at an easy angle and were nowhere near as bad as expected, even with the heavy pack. We stayed up there, on a mad and busy Friday night, until 11.30, the light changed a lot and once we had stayed a couple of hours we decided to wait for the lights to come on. This was a downside to travelling at this time of year, to do any night photography we had to stay out late as it was light until 10.30. The Eiffel Tower is incredible and very well run, they are quite efficient at moving people around it from level to level. It was still buzzing at midnight with thousands of people around. The sunset on Saturday was probably better but we spent the evening around the base of the Tower, watching the light change, people watching and soaking the party atmosphere up.
Some days our first destination was five miles away, this is a lot of road junctions in a city, the roads in Paris are wide so you generally have to wait for the green man to cross. This made progress steady but when you are on holiday it doesn’t matter too much. Needless to say we walked through some dodgy places, with graffiti on anything that stays still long enough. We were ultra-cautious with our belongings having heard the pickpocket horror stories. At every Café/bar stop the bags were clipped to the table leg out of sight and never left alone. I carried the camera in my hand all day and everywhere I went, I only popped it in my bag to eat. I would guess that there were easier people to rob than us, some people were openly careless with phones and wallets.
We didn’t enter the big attractions, it was too nice to be in a museum or church and quite a few have a photography ban. These bans make me laugh, they are totally ignored by many ( Japanese particularly) people. Having travelled around the world to see something, no one is going to stop them getting their selfies. Selfies? Everywhere people pointed their cameras at their own face, walking around videoing – their self! I do like to have a few photos of us for posterity but these people are self-obsessed.
Paris has obviously got a problem with homeless (mostly) migrants. Walk a distance along the River Seine and you will find tented villages, there is a powerful smell of urine in every corner, with the no alcohol restrictions ignored, empty cans and bottles stacked around the bins as evidence. There are families, woman living on mattresses with as many as four small children, on the main boulevards. They beg by day and at midnight they are all huddled asleep on the pavement. The men in the tents seem to be selling plastic Eiffel Tower models to the tourists or bottled water – even bottles of wine. Love locks and selfy sticks were also top sellers. There must be millions of locks fastened to railings around the city, mostly brass, so removing them will be self-funding as brass is £2.20 a kilo.
As for the sights we saw, well if it was on the map we tried to walk to it. We crossed the Periphique ring road to get to the outer reaches of Paris. La Defense – the financial area with dozens of modern office blocks – was impressive, and still expanding. The Bois de Boulogne park, with the horse racing track and the Louis Vuitton Centre was part of a 20 mile loop that day. Another day saw us in the north east. We had the dome of the Sacre Couer to ourselves, with thousands of tourists wandering below us oblivious of the entrance and ticket office under the church. Again the light was fantastic for us. We read that Pere Lachaise Cemetery or Cimitiere du Pere Lachaise was one of the most visited destinations, a five mile walk but we went. It is massive, you need a map, but for me one massive tomb is much the same as another, it does have highlights but we didn’t stay long. Fortunately we were now closer to the Canal St Martin which would lead us to Parc de la Villette. This was a Sunday and everywhere was both buzzing and chilled at the same time. Where ever we went people were sat watching the world go by, socializing and picnicking, soaking the sun up. As ever I wanted to go up on the roof of anything I could as I love taking cityscapes. Most of these were expensive compared with many places we’ve been to before but up we went. The Tour Montparnasse, a single tower block with 59 floors, 690 foot high and extremely fast lifts has incredible views although it was a touch hazy on our ascent. The Arc de Triomphe was just up the road from our hotel, we went up it within hours of arriving, well worth the visit.
At the time of writing I have no idea how many images will make the cut but it will be a lot. If I have ten subtly different shots of something, I find it hard to consign nine to the dark depths of my hard drive never to be seen again – and I’m not very good at ruthless selection – so if the photo is OK it will get uploaded. My view is that it’s my photostream, I like to be able to browse my own work at my leisure at a later date, it’s more or less free and stats tell me these images will get looked at. I’m not aiming for single stunning shots, more of a comprehensive overview of an interesting place, presented to the best of my current capabilities. I am my own biggest critic, another reason for looking at my older stuff is to critique it and look to improve on previous mistakes. I do get regular requests from both individuals and organisations to use images and I’m obliging unless someone is taking the piss. I’m not bothered about work being published (with my permission) but it is reassuringly nice to be asked. The manipulation of Flickr favourites and views through adding thousands of contacts doesn’t interest me and I do sometimes question the whole point of the Flickr exercise. I do like having access to my own back catalogue though and it gives family and friends the chance to read about the trip and view the photos at their leisure so for the time being I’m sticking with it. I do have over 15 million views at the moment which is a far cry from showing a few people an album, let’s face it, there’s an oversupply of images, many of them superb but all being devalued by the sheer quantity available.
Don’t think that it was all walking and photography, we had a great break and spent plenty of time in pavement bistros having a glass of wine and people watching. I can certainly understand why Paris is top of the travellers list of destinations
20190728 Get Active Singapore Pesta Sukan 2019 Beach Volleyball - Men’s and Women’s Open competition. Highlights from matches played @ Yio Chu Kang. Group B Round Robin match between PQ and CHA. (photo by Ben Cho)
Valentine's Day Series 1 Pt2
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Looks like Saiph and Altair are getting along already. Altair just needs to learn how to share her toys.
"Bitch get in my car (Bitch get in)
I got my 64, ridin' on Dayton spokes
And when I open that do'
Bitch get in my car"
-50 Cent
hopefully this doesn't offend anyone. i'm pretty sure it will. just be glad i didn't list the rest of the lyrics. :) it just had to go w/ the shot.
I was out of ideas trying to find titles for my flowers..seeing that a fellow photographer is feeling under the weather today, thought I'll dedicate this photo to my fellow shooter, whose photos have been a source of inspiration!
Get well soon !
Getting ready for my trip to Barcelona at the end of the month.
Thanks to SNUB23 for printing these beauties.
GTD tools of the trade.
Close-up of my custom made GTD tickler file. Basically a bunch of transparent folders with tabs stapled together. I'm using 31 folded sheets of A4 paper (colored) to represent the folder for each day in a month. I usually store the whole tickler in a leather folder and carry it with me.
I was asked to shoot the boys getting ready for the wedding by a work mate. I had a ball laughing at them as they got ready . They are a lovely family which made me feel like one of them . Always helps when the boys love working the camera as well . I also went into the reception for some shots trying to keep out of the way from the professional photographer ( as u can see she didnt do the same for me bllllahahahahahhahha ) . I did a lot of candid shots rather then the set up look .
Getting ready to be out and about in the warm sunshine!! Next Thursday, we are all off to Tenerife in the Canary Islands for a couple of weeks!
Five grandchildren, their mums and dads and my good wife and myself .... think I'll be out and about walking! Plenty adults to look after the little ones! 😉
Flickr Lounge ~ Weekly Theme (Week 24) ~ Vibrant Colours ...
Stay Safe and Healthy Everyone!
Thanks to everyone who views this photo, adds a note, leaves a comment and of course BIG thanks to anyone who chooses to favourite my photo .... Thanks to you all!
Definitely getting there now :) He's got his hair (tiny rolled out logs of brown clay), and one ear (the other ear will be poking through his little white hat with the red pompom). I've made up his arms using the same technique as the top (wrapping a thin sheet of the stripy cane around his arm), and his walking stick is also finished - I used wire in the end, rather than a cocktails stick, and covered it with brown clay I've part-fired it by using a heat gun (good trick if you need little things baked quickly), so it's sturdy enough to be joined to his paw :) And of course, he is smiling now - makes a difference :)
One of my favorite places to go and get away from whatever. Although it's much better in the summer, you don't freeze to death.
Great Western 823 sits at Llanfair getting coal and watered to work the last train to Welshpool on the 12.04.2014
From behind various boulders, thousands of Cybermen appear one by one! The Cyber Leader reaches for the Doctor!
Doctor: "Get back!'
Foot/bike bridge connecting Wasena Park with the new Vic Thomas park on the other side of the Roanoke River. Vic Thomas Park used to be a mobile home site that was constantly getting flooded, so the city bought out the owners.
Road map of our trip and some info: www.southernscenicroute.co.nz/
Photos from our road trip down the South Island of New Zealand in January.
After such a beautiful day yesterday today is overcast and mild and by the afternoon the rain came down. January 26, 2015 New Zealand.
Queenstown (Māori: Tahuna) is a resort town in Otago in the south-west of New Zealand's South Island.
It is built around an inlet called Queenstown Bay on Lake Wakatipu, a long thin Z-shaped lake formed by glacial processes, and has spectacular views of nearby mountains such as The Remarkables, Cecil Peak, Walter Peak and just above the town; Ben Lomond and Queenstown Hill.
The area was known to Māori before Europeans arrived. The first European to see Lake Wakatipu was Nathanael Chalmers who was guided by Reko, the chief of the Tuturau, over the Waimea Plains and up the Mataura River in September 1853. Evidence of stake nets, baskets for catching eels, spears and ashes indicated the Glenorchy area was visited by Māori. It is likely Ngāi Tahu Māori visited Queenstown en route to collect Pounamu (greenstone), although no evidence of permanent settlement is known.
There are various apocryphal accounts of how the town was named, the most popular suggesting that a local gold digger exclaimed that the town was "fit for Queen Victoria". Many Queenstown streets bear names from the gold mining era (such as Camp Street) and some historic buildings remain. William's Cottage, the Lake Lodge of Ophir, Queenstown Police Station, and St Peter's Anglican Church lie close together in a designated historic precinct.
A resort town, Queenstown boasted 220 adventure tourism activities in 2012. Skiing and snowboarding, jet boating, whitewater rafting, bungy jumping, mountain biking, skateboarding, tramping, paragliding, sky diving and fly fishing are all popular.
For More Info: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queenstown,_New_Zealand
I watched a webcast with Matt Klosnowski from NAPP, on making composite portraits, and this is my first attempt. There is lots of room for improvement, but I gave it a try. I need to shot more backgrounds and get my grandsons to get into their role and play the part.
I only caught the last race at Wilberfoss Motocross last month, and even then it started raining. Sorry about the backward text, I flipped the photo because I just thought it looked better going left to right...
This was the tenth annual race held by Mick White from York who organises the event every year in memory of his son Louis who sadly died of meningococcal septicaemia in July 2002, shortly before his second birthday. All profits from the event are being donated to the Meningitis Research Foundation.