This is a shot of the northern approach to Preston railway station, shot from a train and, as I'm sure you can tell, it owes as much to Photoshop as it does the original photograph. If you're interested, the image was altered by the addition of a V-shaped Curve; i.e. the highlights are reproduced normally, the mid-tones are converted to shadows and the shadows have become highlights. It's an odd effect, not entirely dissimilar to solarisation, and I'm pleased with how it turned out.

As always, and especially since this is a bit of a departure from the stuff I normally post, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

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3.07pm on 5/3/08 Canon 1Ds Mark II EF 35mm f/1.4L USM f/2.8 1/85 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW RAW Developer 2x1

I had great photographic plans this Christmas, which included taking shots of the kids enjoying themselves, opening their presents, and so on; but I came down with some sort of virus on the 22nd and haven't felt right since. As a result I haven't shot any new material, and don't expect I will for the next couple of days. So I've been archive raiding and constructed this one from a shot of some graffiti I came across in Leeds a while ago. If you're interested, the original is here:

.../iblog/archives/symbolic_gesture.php

As you can see, the version I've posted isn't much like the original, but I'm quite happy with how it turned out, even if it is more Photoshop than photography :-)

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2.51pm on 11/12/07 Canon 5D EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM 52mm f/3.5 1/60 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 200 no RAW C1 Pro absolutely no doubt about it ;-)

The previous two 'little planets' I put up were constructed from 360° panoramas, but this one used the following single shot:

.../archives/little_planet_3.php

When I was researching how to make these, one of the suggestions I came across (though can't find the url now) was that single photographs of islands can make good 'little planets'. So, I decided to look back through my Nassau shots to see if I'd shot any. I had, but I wasn't happy with how they turned out. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I definitely wanted to try using a single image so thought I'd try this one.

With a 360° panorama, the edges meet up as you wrap the image, but with a single shot they don't, so the major work that went into constructing this one was making sure that the joint wasn't too obvious.

captured camera lens focal length aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO flash image quality RAW converter cropped?

5.50pm on 25/8/07 Canon 5D EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM 200mm f/2.8 1/2000 aperture priority -1/3 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 1x1

Yesterday, I said that I wasn't especially happy with the first 'little planet' I put up. I'm much happier with this one :-)

And again, it was constructed using the instructions on daily dose of imagery.

Update: just a quick note to let you know that I won't be posting anything new today (15.10.07). I'll get something up tomorrow.

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around 3.45pm on 23/10/07 Canon 1Ds Mark II EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM 16mm f/8.0 1/1000 (and thereabouts) aperture priority -1/3 to -1 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 5x4

I'm not especially happy with this one, but it's something I've wanted to try for a while, and given that it took me ages to do I thought I'd post it. It was inspired by this shot on daily dose of imagery and was constructed from nine original images, stitched with Stitcher, then converted to a 'little planet' as per the instructions on daily dose.

Let me know what you think.

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around 3.30pm on 23/10/07 Canon 1Ds Mark II EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM 16mm f/8.0 1/1000 (and thereabouts) aperture priority -1/3 to -1 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 5x4

I was going to post this as a single image, and then I thought I'd post it in 2x1 format; i.e. mirrored, and then I tried this version. I also made a 4x4 version, but it did seem a bit over the top. I know this won't be to everyone's taste, but I fancied a change ;-)

captured camera lens focal length aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO flash image quality RAW converter cropped?

11.54am on 5/10/07 Canon 1Ds Mark II EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM 34mm f/8.0 1/160 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 1x1

Ok, so this one's a bit silly, but I don't have any new material, and after playing around with the avatar generator on the Simpsons Movie website I couldn't resist putting this together. I created the avatar of me (which is frighteningly realistic:-)) and Milly did one of her. I did try to convince Libby to do one too, but couldn't persuade her to have a go ;-)

And not that it makes a great deal of difference, but this one looks much better with the black theme.

I'm hoping to shoot some new material over the weekend, which should be a bit less frivolous than this effort, but probably won't be posting much until the week commencing the 23rd (after which I'll have a lot more free time).

In the meanwhile, you might want to check out my Curves tutorial (on tonal range and the Curves tool), which is now finished! Let me know what you think.

If you'd like to be kept informed about what's going on with the tutorials you can subscribe to the tutorials news feed (in RSS 2 format) which is linked from the main online tutorials page. This will be updated each time we release a new tutorial. The next one will be one of the subscription based tutorials, and will be released by mid August.

Anyway, enough of all that, as I'm sure you're itching to head over to the Simpsons Movie website and create some avatars ;-)

Update: I'm away until the 23rd of this month, and won't have access to the internet, so I'm afraid that you'll have to put up with this one for a while longer. When I do get back, I should have a reasonable amount of new material, and will put something else up asap. In the meanwhile, I'll see you all soon.

I'm not entirely convinced I've got this one right, but it is a technique I'll use again. What I do like about it though is way it clearly demonstrates the difference between Rhowan and Harmony's physical competence. Rhowan, who will be six this August, is quite capable, while Harmony (who turned four in February) clearly has some way to go :-)

Update: thanks for all the great comments, they're much appreciated, not least because I wasn't sure that I'd got this one right – so it's good to hear that most of you disagree with me.

On another matter: I probably won't be posting many new entries over the next week or so as I'm concentrating on getting the online tutorials sorted out. If you haven't already seen it, I'm about half way through a basic Curves tutorial. I'm pleased with it so far, but if you do have any constructive comments I'd really like to here them.

Update #2: my apologies for the continuing lack of new material, but things have been a bit hectic here. Libby and I, and our three youngest, have all had colds – which really hasn't helped – and yesterday my new laptop died. Well, it looks like the hard drive has failed, which is bordering on a major catastrophe. I have all my recent images backed up, but haven't run a full back since the start of March; i.e. I've lost lots of emails, some work I was doing that needed to be completed by yesterday, the latest section of the new Curves tutorial, and so on.

So, today I need to go over to Manchester to let an Apple Genius look at my MacBook Pro and I really hope that they can recover some of the data I've lost :-/

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that there won't be any new material in the short-term. I'll keep you posted.

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around 2.27pm on 27/4/07 Canon 5D EF 24-70 f/2.8L USM 40mm f/5.6 mostly 1/1300 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro minor

It's been a long day, so I don't have anything to say about this one other than to let you know that it's a combination of two originals, shot a few seconds apart; taken in the ballroom at Blackpool Tower last weekend.

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2.57pm on 18/11/06 Canon 20D EF 70-200 f/2.8L IS USM 200mm (320mm equiv.) f/4.0 2s aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro minor

For those of you in the "but this isn't a photograph!" camp, my apologies, but I felt like posting something a bit different today.

This one started life as a fireworks shot. Subsequent amendments include motion blurring the original and producing four different colour schemes on a seasonal theme: spring, summer, autumn and winter.

As always, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts, not least because it's rare for me to post something quite this abstract.

Anyway, let me know what you think.

As I mentioned on yesterday's entry it was the start of the International Fireworks competition last night, and Croatia opened the proceedings. Over the next four weeks a different country will produce their own display every Friday evening. Like last year, I took loads of shots, and like last year I wasn't especially happy with any of them when I came to look through them.

This year though I realised something: I don't much like shots of fireworks. I enjoy taking them – they're interesting to watch, and present a range of technical problems that are fun to overcome – but I don't especially enjoy looking at the photographs afterwards. For me, they're all a bit ... I don't know. Maybe it's because I've seen countless hundreds of them that all look much the same.

Anyway, for better or worse, I've decided that I'll photograph all the entries in the competion but I'll attemp to do something creative with the shots; i.e. there won't be any straight "ooh, look, pretty fireworks" shots. It may work out, it may not, but hopefully it will be interesting.

So, bearing that in mind, here's the first one, and I haven't put up the EXIF data but basically this is two merged and inverted shots, both taken at f/16.0 with an exposure of around five seconds each.

At the risk of boring you all, here's another image that combines a portrait and, for want of a better term, an urban texture. As with yesterday's shot the texture was adapted from a shot I put up a while ago – killa bunnies #2.

As I also mentioned yesterday, I've taken my inspiration for this style of image from Mike Regnier, though I've realised today that I'll probably take my attempts in a slightly different direction to Mike. His images begin with a pre-existing photograph, which is then reworked through the application a variety of textures and colours, the aim being to enhance or reinterpret the original image – and if you take a look around his site you'll see that it's a very effective technique.

This one though uses one texture, from a pre-existing scene, and in my opinion has a slightly 'grittier' feel than Mike's – grunge art rather than fine art perhaps – and is more about using the texture to anchor the other image rather than amend it. I didn't put that very well, so don't worry if you don't know what I'm talking about ;-) Anyway, I'm definitely enthusiastic about this approach and will be shooting a range of portraits and textures over the next few weeks.

Personally, I prefer this one to yesterday's, but do let me know what you think.

Update: I've put both original images here:

.../archives/urban_canvas.php

These were combined in a variety of ways including setting the blend mode to the area over her face to 'overlay'. Subsequent work included multiple Curves, changes to the colour balance, and so on.

I mentioned in a comment the other day that when I edit a shot I don't add in anything that isn't there; i.e. I wouldn't add a dramatic sky from one shot to a striking foreground from another. However, there are occasions when I've blended two (or more) shots, and this is an example of the same technique. The original included a few people to the right of the girl, and despite numerous attempts to process this shot they remained a distraction. So, rather than black out the background altogether I borrowed a section of the wall from this shot.

The inspiration for this style of image comes from Mike Regnier, a fine art photographer that I've long admired. If you're even vaguely interested in this shot, then you should take a good look around Mike's site (there are various sections, including a blog) as he's produced some wonderful images that truly put this one to shame.

So, to forestall the inevitable, this isn't a straight photograph, but, in my opinion at least, it works a lot better this way; mostly, I suppose, because of the story in my head as I took the shot - my reaction to her expression, and the sense I had that she seemed rather lost. This is a style that I'm going to explore in the future, so I'd be definitely interested to hear your thoughts.

Oh, and if you're interested, the original is here:

.../archives/the_absence_of_dreams.php

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8.59pm on 20/5/06 Canon 20D EF 70-200 f/4L USM 168mm (269mm equiv.) f/5.6 1/400 aperture priority -1/3 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 1x1

I'll give anyone who can correctly identify this image (in terms of content and location) a free 9x6" print. Three clues: the high res' version is a 32.74 megapixel file (so would make a great H U G E print), it was shot with my 20D, and the green isn't really green ;-)

Oh, and John Washington and Mark Power are both banned from taking part as they were with me when this was taken :-)

Update: Ok, we have a winner, and it's not JD with his monkey hypothesis (though he was right that it's the decking on the north pier, as were a few more of you); but the outright winner is Dave who said:

"Is it decking on Blackpool's north pier with a section of tram track?"

Strictly speaking I suppose I could argue that it's a train track rather than a tram track, but I suspect that that might be a little pedantic of me ;-)

Oh, and in case you're interested, there's a correctly coloured version of the original here:

.../archives/the_portal.php

And finally, my apologies if you thought the title was a clue. It wasn't ;-)

Update #2: I've just had a quick conversation with Dave and he feels as though he had an unfair advantage over the rest of you in that he also lives in Blackpool (only about half a mile from me, though we've not met up), so the closest comments prior to his (there were two of them a few seconds apart) are from Terry and Chris. I'll send both of them a print.

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12.20pm on 7/4/06 Canon 20D EF 17-40 f/4L USM 23mm (37mm equiv.) f/5.6 1/1000 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro minor

Well, here's one that will irritate two groups of you: those of you in the "it's just other people's art" camp, AND the "that's not photography it's digital art" brigade ;-)

This one is a composite image: the left side is one image, the right side another, and they're merged using a gradient mask to gradually obscure one as the other is revealed. If you're interested I've put the originals up here:

.../archives/killa_bunnies.php

Oh, and the title refers to the Moloko track by the same name, from the album Do You Like My Tight Sweater?

Killa Bunnies #2, which I prefer to this one, will go up tomorrow.

You wont be surprised to hear that this shot started out looking a little different to this version. Here's the original:

.../archives/things_evolve.php

As you can see, it's a reasonable shot, and I did intend to post it: admittedly, more for its architectural interest than its worth as a piece of art, but I did think it was ok.

But I was looking at John's shot from yesterday, where he'd used Photoshop's Wave filter to create an abstract shot from a series of CD covers, and really liked the result. It has a beautifully organic feel to it, it's vibrant, and so on.

So, I wondered how it would turn out on a shot that was inherently more geometric; i.e. one with strong clear lines in the first place (I'm assuming that John's original was a less clearly defined shot than mine). Anyway, the net result is this one.

And yep, I am jumping on the bandwagon; yep, it's not a photograph despite me calling this a photoblog; and yep, you're quite free not to like it ;-) Personally, I think it works (as an abstract image) and especially like the way the venetian blinds swirl around the bottom of the image. Oh, and I probably should mention that I inverted the original after applying the wave filter.

Anyway, as always, let me know what you think.

Wife: "Is that Adolf Hitler through a prism?"

Me: "No, it's a reflection in a train window that I've been playing around with."

Wife: "I like it."

Over to you ;-)

To which I could add: telephoto zooms are not especially useful for train window reflection shots as you end up with a totally unrecognisable background. In future I'll probably stick to my 17-40 for this type of image.

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12.18pm on 8/2/06 Canon 20D EF 70-200 f/4L USM 118mm (189mm equiv.) f/4.0 1/250 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro that's the least of it

First: thanks for all the great comments on my last two shots, they're much appreciated.

As for today's shot: it's another re-examination of something I took a while ago and decided not to put up, though in this case the manipulation is a little different. Rather than explain what you're looking at it's probably easier to show you the (partly post-processed) original:

.../archives/blind_alley.php

As you can probably work out from the original, this is a diptych, of sorts, but both images come from the same original: the image on the left is the leftmost two-thirds of the original, and the image on the right is the rightmost two-thirds, horizontally reversed. I guess my reasoning with this one is that I was trying to capture the vaguely enclosed, leading nowhere feeling of this alleyway, and I didn't think the original did this, nor was I particularly happy with the shot as a whole (a shadowy figure would probably have helped). This version, on the other hand (for me at least), accentuates the dead-end feel of this location and does a much better job of getting the mood of the scene across.

Anyway, it remains to be seen as to whether you think it's effective (and I bet that some of you will prefer the original), but it's something that I may well use more intentionally in the future. And no, it's not as good as the previous two shots, but I did think it was sufficiently interesting to put up.

And now it's probably about time that I shot some new material rather than trawling through the stuff I've previously rejected ;-)

captured camera lens focal length aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO flash image quality RAW converter cropped?

1.37pm on 17/1/06 Canon 20D EF 70-200 f/4L USM 94mm (150mm equiv.) f/4.5 1/60 aperture priority +0.0 evaluative 100 no RAW C1 Pro 2x1/reversed

In light of not having anything to put up tonight I thought I'd have a go at a technique that John has been experimenting with; i.e. using Photoshop's motion blur to alter a shot during post-processing (see his shot from today and this one for a couple of examples).

I expected it would be relatively easy, but it wasn't, at least not with any of the shots that I tried it on. This was my third attempt to come up with anything even tolerably decent, and while I guess it's interesting, as an idea, I'm not sure that I've made all that good a job of it. What I was aiming for was a series of blended layers that used the motion blur to complement the existing lines in the shot, rather than just blurring the shot in one direction, but I've worked on this one for so long that I've lost the ability to evaluate it. I guess the bottom line is that this is a potentially interesting technique, that could complement some of my shots, but I probably need to think more about how to apply it, and when.

As always, your thoughts are appreciated.

Oh, and I've skipped the EXIF data for this one given the nature of the post-processing.

Update: If your're interested, I've put up a different version of this shot here:

../archives/motion_blur_experiment.php

This is the blurred image prior to me adding back in the original detail.

On the way back from China I took at least 100 shots of the clouds as we flew over the vast expanse of the Western Syberian Lowland, the Ural mountains, and on through Russia and northern Europe; but much to my dissapointment none of them captured anything remotely like the near sublime magic of flying many miles above the earth in a crystal clear sky. So here's an admittedly photoshopped compilation (/double exposure) of two shots, that, for me at least, goes some way towards capturing something of that experience. Let me know what you think. Oh, and both shots were taken at f8.0, at roughly 1/200s, ISO 100, with my 17-40mm lens.

Sorry I'm so late putting this up but I've had problems with my ADSL connection this evening as a result of having some defective cabling somewhere behind the mess that's my desk. Anyway, it's sorted now so here's what's technically yesterday's entry. This was taken at the Festival of Light fireworks display on Sunday evening. This was the second display in two days to celebrate the turning on of Blackpool's illuminations. As for this shot, I can't say that I'm particularly pleased with it, not least because it's a hybrid of two shots taken a few seconds apart. Though I took about 55 shots, I wasn't really happy with any of them and guess that I need a bit more practice with fireworks. All the shots were taken at f/11 and ranged from one to four, maybe five seconds, and the difficulty I had was knowing how much to allow on each frame before closing the shutter. In quite a lot of the shots the exposure was a bit too long which lead to quite a lot of blown out areas, while in others it was too short. This one, or these ones, are probably a little too minimal – and I really should have used portrait rather than landscape format – but I'm reasonably happy with the result even if it isn't a straight shot. Oh, and in case you were wondering what was wrong with the two original shots: the burst at the top of the shot that accompanies the bottom half of this one was rather too small for the shot (about two thirds the size of this one but much the same other than that), and the fireworks at the bottom of the other shot appeared to be overly erratic and were slightly burnt out. Anyway, call me a Photoshop cheat, but I prefer this to either of the originals. And if you think about it, a four second exposure isn't entirely 'natural' anyway so, especially since I confessed, I'm not too bothered about amalgamating the two. And just so there's no confusion, I've added a new category – digital art – that I'll use for any shots that are photoshopped beyond simply adjusting a pre-existing shot.

In some ways this shot, or collage, was an accident. As with my previous shot of one of Company Fierce's dancers, I had intended that at least one of these would be a standalone shot. But, for one reason or another – composition, focus, pose, etc – I wasn't entirely happy with any of them. So, this is the result, and in many ways I definitely think that the sum is greater than the parts. And as far as post-processing goes this was relatively straightforward. I added each image as a new layer and set the opacity of the top three to around 50%. I also repositioned the woman in a couple of them to fit them all in the frame. There was also some minor blurring here and there as some of the overlaps were a bit too distracting. As there are four shots combined I haven't put up the EXIF data but they were all pretty similar: 1/400 shutter speed (or thereabouts), f/5.6, approx. 200mm focal length, and fill flash.

update: I got up this morning, read Richard’s comment below, looked at this image again, and realised that i) it’s about time that I took some more photographs and stopped playing around with Photoshop, and ii) the shot I originally posted wasn’t really worth bothering with ;-) So, the version you can now see is just a straight duplication of yesterday’s image, with a b/w version tacked on one side. So just ignore most of what follows … ;-)

After the comments on yesterday’s entry I had decided I would post the black and white version of this image, but I ended up constructing this hybrid version instead. Normally, when I work on a black and white image I usually just use an adjustment layer to desaturate the image, and make any Curves (or other) adjustments ‘below’ this layer. But while I was working on this version I noticed that the resulting colour image was (in my opinion) better than yesterday’s entry.

So that left me with a bit of a dilemma as I didn’t think that I could post versions of the same image three days in a row, so I decided to combine the two. Compared to yesterday’s entry this one is i) less diffuse (e.g. there’s more detail in my wife’s face), ii) slightly lower key (I wanted to retain a bit more detail in this one), and iii) the colour version is less saturated. What it loses of course is the negative space, which I think was one of the things that definitely helped yesterday’s shot, but I like this one nonetheless.

As always, I’d be grateful for your thoughts. And on a related note, while I really do appreciate all the wonderful comments I’ve been getting lately I wouldn’t mind a bit more constructive criticism too. All of my images could be better – as could anyone’s – so if you do have a suggestion, or comment as to how I could do things better in the future, then I’d definitely like to hear it.

camera capture date aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO focal length image quality white balance optical filter

Canon G5 10.22pm on 8/3/04 f3.2 1/60 aperture priority +1 2/3 evaluative 50 14.4mm RAW auto B+W UV 010

Strictly speaking I don’t suppose that these images should be included here as my intention for this blog was to just include images based on photographs that I’ve taken. These images, on the other hand, were created from various bits and pieces that I’ve come across over the years (but have since deleted). As much as anything else these are really an excercise in playing around with Photoshop, particulary the various texture filters.

The versions of the images included here are based on two sections of what was a rather flat and uninspiring montage. As art, I don’t think that they’re all that impressive but I did enjoy putting them together.

Actually, it wasn’t so much the mechanics of constructing these images that I enjoyed, rather it was being able to reinvent them in a way that gives me some contemporary pleasure – if that makes any sense. Anyway, the end result is something that I’m reasonably pleased with.

I took this picture in my hotel room when I visited Southend-on-Sea earlier this year. The original was in landscape format because I had to balance the camera on top of the television (and it wouldn’t stand on its side) but there was too much clutter in that version so it was quite tightly cropped.

As with a number of shots that I took with this camera the colour balance of this image is a consequence of forgetting to change the white balance from the daylight setting. In this case though, I think it works quite well and emphasises the natural colours of the room.

I think the only thing I’d change, if I were to do it again, would be the subtely (or lack of it) of the post-processing. Quite a lot of changes were made within Photoshop that I think could have been done better. For example, the area within the mirror was altered with a ‘radial blur’ (other than the flower on the table) and I think this could have been done a little less obviously. Also, the ‘shadow’ in the mirror could have been blended a little more unobtrusively. All that said, I do like the image and it does capture some of what I was after.

(This picture was entered in the Photo Friday Night challenge).

camera capture date aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO focal length image quality white balance optical filter

Fujifilm FinePix 40i 9.56pm on 9/7/03 f2.8 1/4 n/a +0.0 evaluative 200 7.2mm jpeg/normal daylight none

Over the years I’ve made numerous attempts to take a decent picture of a rainbow and, without fail, they’ve all been fairly poor; to say the least. This picture started out as yet another attempt – this time of a double rainbow – but as with my previous efforts this one was rather hopeless too. Obviously it is possible to photograph rainbows, but I’ve not managed to get it right thus far.

So, more as an excercise in exploring Photoshop than anything else, this picture is the end result. I can’t remember exactly what I did with this image (other than the final step, which was to apply a ‘plastic wrap’ filter) but it involved using the Channel Mixer to alter the colours, the Lens Flare filter, and some increase in both contrast and brightness.

Overall I quite like the end result, though, in this instance, it’s more down to protracted experimentation than creative vision; i.e. I had no idea as to how it would turn out when I started.

I did think about including the original shooting data but, given the massive changes to this image, there really didn’t seem much point ;-)

This image started out as a not so interesting photograph of my wet footprints on the sandstone path in my back garden and was taken to accompany an entry in my main blog. The entry was concerned with the question of ‘where we stand’, particularly in terms of what grounds we may or may not have for claiming that one knowledge claim is better than another.

The image is the result of using Photoshop’s Stained Glass filter – once in the center of the image and again, using a smaller cell size, around the edge. While many of my recent Photoshop creations are the result of almost random experimentation (I suppose I’ll get the hang of using it at some point) I’m pleased with this image because it’s reasonably close to how I envisioned it.

The only problem with this image, at least as it’s presented here, is that the lines between the cells in the center of the image aren’t as sharp as they are in the original. Clearly there’s always some degredation of an image when it’s resized, but it’s particularly noticeable in this case.

camera capture date aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO focal length image quality white balance optical filter

Fujifilm FinePix 40i 7.18pm on 26/7/03 f2.8 1/21; n/a +0.0 evaluative 200 8.7mm jpeg/normal daylight none