TammyLynn Blogs

A Late Lunch by the Canal

2012-01-27T22:38:00.000Z

The Lock Keeper's Café in Stroud

Photography information: Above: Canon 5D II, with a Canon 85mm 1.8 prime lens, hand held. 1/1600 of a second exposure at f/1.8. ISO 100. AV (Aperture Priority) mode.

Wow! What a week! I've had several jobs back to back and it's not over yet! I have another lovely job tomorrow and my eldest baby girl is coming for a visit! I feel a shopping and baking frenzy coming on! :-D

This week I finished up a big family shoot and have been working all week on a commercial job in which I had to hire several models for. I've been working all day every day from early morning until the wee hours of the night. It's a good thing I love my job!

As a reward to myself for all the hard work I've been doing this week, I walked down into town for lunch. It was a late lunch as I was working hard to get some images out for the commercial job mentioned above. Where did I go? The Lock Keeper's Café of course! I love this place, and it's right at the bottom of the hill from where we live. People are always asking me where it is so I'll tell you. From town it's the other side of the train station over by the Wallbridge Lock/canal. That's the Hill Paul building behind it in the photo above. Just in front of it is the Cotswold Canal Trust Visitor Centre in the old Bell Hotel.

The Lock Keeper's Café at Wallbridge Lock

Photography information: Above: Canon 5D II with a Canon 50mm 1.4 prime lens. 1/1600 of a second exposure at f/1.4. ISO 100. Hand held. AV (Aperture Priority) mode.

There's no parking so you'll have to make the short walk from town to it. It's well worth the walk though! And soon the foot path along the canal will be open again. I'm so looking forward to that as I love walking along the canal.

Usually on Fridays you'll find the Friday Forum crew here at the Lock Keeper's. This Friday everyone had something else to do, so it was just me, and I was late. But not too late! They did serve me some lunch. I usually have a ham, cheese and tomato panini with a cappuccino coffee. But today I thought I'd treat myself to something different, so I had one of their specials for the day which today was a Tuna Noodle Casserole. Yummy!

Tuna Noodle Casserole

Photography information: Above: Canon 5D II with a Canon 50mm 1.4 prime lens. 1/125 of a second exposure at f/2. ISO 400. Hand held. AV (Aperture Priority) mode.

Today I had lunch alone all by my lonesome. I don't usually like eating alone and avoid it at all cost. But today down at the Lock Keepers it was quite nice. I did't feel all alone. I'm in there so often that the owner and crew know me quite well now. Also several people I knew were in and out and they stopped to say hi which was quite nice.

I give the Lock Keeper's Café 5 out of 5 Stars! I highly recommend them for lunch or for just a coffee break with a friend. The staff are always friendly, the place is super clean, the food and coffee are fantastic, an over all lovely atmosphere. Oh and there's free WiFi and papers on hand to read. What more could you ask for?

While I was there this little girl came for a visit. I couldn't resist asking for permission to take her photograph as she was just too cute! I had a talk with her father the other day and he said he'd be booking a family photo shoot with me soon. I'm looking forward to it. :-)

The low afternoon sunshine coming in through the large window on the right made for some lovely lighting and I waited until she was in this light to take her portrait. The two catch lights in her eyes really bring her eyes to life. The main light source being the large window I just mentioned above and the second catch light being made by the window in the door behind me.

It's a shame about the window directly behind her head as this bright area in the photo is quite distracting. I burned it down some so that it wasn't so bright. I did notice this while I was taking the photo but there wasn't an immediate solution to the problem, not without loosing the lovely light on her face.

Two year old Blue Eyed Beauty

The above photograph has had some extra post processing done to it. I did not exactly invent this look all by myself but the technique I used I developed myself. What I do is after normal processing I create a black and white adjustment layer. I really push the contrast of the B/W image then I lower the opacity of the B/W layer by 50% letting some of the colour of the original image come though. You wind up with a lovely desaturated image. Well I think it's lovely, my husband prefers the original full colour image which is below.

Two year old blue eyed beauty (original)

Photography information: Above: Canon 5D II with a Canon 50mm 1.4 prime lens. 1/800th of a second exposure at f/1.4. ISO 400. Hand held. AV (Aperture Priority) mode.

(Please note: I know who the little girl is in this photo, I just didn't want to say who she was to the world wide web.)

On my walk home I noticed this sign by the canal. It tickled my funny bone so I photographed it.

CAUTION DEEP MUD

It's not every day you see this sign. Actually it's the first time I've ever seen it. If we'd seen a sign like this when we were kids you'd been hard pressed to keep us out of it. :-D In the background you can see the road construction continues up Bath Road in Stroud.

Photography information: Above: Canon 5D II with a Canon 85mm 1.8 prime lens. 1/640th of a second exposure at f/1.8. ISO 100. Hand held. AV (Aperture Priority) mode.

I leave you with a few photographs of flowers that I took on the way home today. All taken with the 85mm prime lens. Well and a camera too of course. ;-)

Early Morning Balloon Ride....almost

2012-01-14T16:52:00.000Z

Farm in Didmarton at Sunrise

My husband and I were up at 5:30am this morning. OK, I fell back to sleep and we didn't actually crawl out of bed until closer to 6am. We were out the door just before 7am defrosting the car to follow my friend Liz out to this field in Didmarton for an early morning Balloon ride with Chris Hathaway of David Hathaway Transport. She was going on the ride, not us, we were watching her munchkin and taking photographs.

What a beautiful sunrise this morning, with red streaks across the sky, was all I could do not to insist we pull over and stop so that I could photograph it all. Lucky we got to the field and I caught the end of it...or the beginning, as it was the sunrise. It wasn't as dramatic as we saw on the trip up, but still a nice sunrise I think. It was also very very cold and frosty! It was -3.5C (25F) outside when we left the house.

The David Hathaway Transport Balloon being filled with air

A peak inside the Balloon

The munchkins got to go inside the Balloon!

It's quite huge inside the Balloon

Turning the burners on to heat up the air inside the Balloon. They let the munchkins out first of course.

The Balloon beginning to rise

Sadly it was warming up quite fast causing lot of mist to rise from the ground., even though the skies above were clear. If they can't see the tree line they can't take the balloon up. They have to be able to see where they are and what's below them when they go up.

The David Hathaway Transport Balloon

Heating up the air inside the Balloon

Balloon with the sun rising behind it

Up Up and Away!

The visibility just wasn't any good, so with the Balloon tethered to the Land Rover, they took the munchkins up for a little ride. Sadly the visibility was getting worse not better so they called it quits.

Preparing the Balloon to bring it down

Frosty Misty Morning

I felt really bad for everyone who were invited to go up and were involved on this flight which was canceled in the end. A bit of a let down but not a total loss. It was a beautiful morning, we got to get up close and personal with the Balloon, the munchkins got to go for a little ride and they got to walk inside the Balloon! Oh and I got to take some exciting photographs of the whole thing! I'd say it was a pretty cool morning all around. Literally!

I think it's nap time now.

Photographic Information: Camera used was a Canon 5D II. Two lenses were used, Canon 24-70 f2.8 L and a Canon 70-200 f2.8 L. A variety of camera settings were used. A Manfrotto monopod was used with the 70-200 lens.

Beyond the Lens - Smoke Gets in My Eyes

2012-01-13T00:41:00.000Z

Smoke or Ghost of Dinosaur?

Tonight, Thursday, was Stroud Camera Club night. It was one of our practical evenings where we bring our cameras and laptops and props and things and have a night of sharing, learning and trying new things. On this evening we had a lot of laptops and post processing going on, including one station doing a bit of HDR. But we also had a little mini studio set up in the kitchen where we were being shown by one club member, Mr Jay Martin, how to photograph smoke. I'd never done this before so I mostly hung out with these guys.

Camera remotely fired flash

We tried two different ways of photographing the smoke. We used black card for the background and against the wall to help control the light. We used a radio trigger to fire an off camera flash gun. And we used a another remote to trigger the camera. We used all manual settings, including the focus. And our cameras were mounted on tripods. (Note: As we were shooting in almost complete darkness the camera's auto focus does not work.) I'm not sure what Jay's settings were on his camera as I was off running my mouth when he was setting it up, but I think it was something like this: ISO 100; F5.6; 1/125th of a second exposure. Not a bad place to start in any case. The flash gun was set to 1/16th power. For the smoke we used an incense stick stuck in a ball of blue tack.

Flash gun manually fired

The second way we photographed the smoke is the way in which I photographed all three of these images. Basically the same set up only I had my camera set up for a 2 second exposure. The flash gun in this case was fired manually, during the 2 second exposure. As we were in the dark the flash from the flashgun froze everything and correctly exposed the smoke.

I really enjoyed this and plan on giving this a another go when I get some free time. All three images on this page were taken tonight by me with a Canon 5D II with a 50mm 1.4 lens. The camera settings were as follows: ISO 100 at F9 with a 2 second exposure. In the top image the smoke has a blueish tent, I added this in post processing.

Do you see the dinosaur in the top photo? Looks like one to me. :-)

My Desk

2012-01-11T15:39:00.000Z

This morning, on twitter, Sean McCormack of Light Room Blog tweeted: "Is it time for a messy desk competition?" I tweeted back: "@lightroomblog I'd win!" He then taunted me with this tweet: "@TammyLynn_17 Are you brave enough?" Well I wasn't brave enough! But I did finally take a photo of my desk with my phone to see what it would look like to others. I was horrified! So instead of working I wound up cleaning up my desk. I must say, I feel like I've cleared my head and I feel more like getting on with my paperwork that I'm always behind on. :-)

A few of the things I found on my desk:

4 empty Tic Tac boxes; 3 pair of glasses; 1 pair of sun glasses; 2 pair of earrings; various fossils; A brand new roll of 120 film, lots of memory cards and USB sticks; various photography and camera gadgets; postage stamps, 3 rubber stamps; a digital thermometer; 2 pieces of welding glass; lots of dust; lip balm; several hair bands; various coins from various different places; several pens that don't write; an old photograph of myself; a pedometer that I can't get to work; various business cards; my WWT membership card; 2 perfume sample vials; lots of batteries; stacks of CDs and DVDs, blank and used; lots of paperwork that needs recording and filed; an old Carl Zeiss lens that I turned into a pen holder; a few toys; 3 bottles of vitamins and supplements; clothes pegs; lego; a ruler; a 'Genuine TUIT', round of course; and various other office type stuff and a few things that went straight to the bin.

Ohhh what the heck, here's a before and after photo of my desk from earlier:

Desk before

And to quickly redeem myself!

Desk after

OK, still a bit junky but it is much better I think. :-)

What is a 'Genuine TUIT'? I hear you ask? Well when I was growing up my dad had this little round wooden disk and on it was painted 'A Round TUIT'. This disk was cracked. My Dad used to tell everyone that his 'Round TUIT' was cracked, and that's why he hadn't 'Gotten around to it' (what ever it was he was suppose to have done). haha Well somewhere I've got a perfectly good tin 'Round TUIT' plate, but I lost it. That's why I've not gotten 'A Round To It' yet. Well that is until I found these cute little coasters. I had a whole set but they've slowly disappeared over the years. Found this one on my desk today. Guess I don't have an excuse anymore.

A Round TUIT

I also found this old photograph of myself, not sure how it wound up on my desk or where the other photographs that go with it are. This is me quite a few years ago. Taken with my Canon AE-1 SLR camera on a tripod using it's timer. Yes I took a photograph of myself. Not sure of the year, must have been around 1985, give or take a year or two.

Me in the 80's

This next photo I did not take today, I dug it out of my archives to show off my Carl Zeiss Lens pen holder, which I made using an old broken Carl Zeiss lens. In this photo you can see the bits left over after I took the lens apart and put it back together. You know there's bits always left over. :-)

Carl Zeiss Lens

Probably the oddest thing on my desk was the welding glass, both pieces. I bought those dark pieces of glass to make a filter for the front of my lenses to give me the ability to do really long exposures during the day light hours. One day I will try this out. When I get 'A Round To It' that is. ;-)

Photography information: The photographs of my desk, before and after, were taken with my htc Wildfire phone. The photographs of the Round TUIT and old photograph were taken with a Canon 5D II with a 85mm 1.8 lens. The Photograph of the Carl Zeis lens was taken with a Canon 5D II with a 50mm 1.4 lens.

Coffee with a Friend

2012-01-10T17:40:00.001Z

There's not much better in life than coffee with a friend. Or lunch as the case may be. Yesterday I had lunch with a friend in Stroud, today it was coffee with another friend. Well I had coffee, he had a Pepsi.

Neither occasion was planed more than a few minutes in advance. It's great to have friends like this, I'm very lucky indeed. Both friends are photographers as well and of course we talked about photography. I was the only one who brought a camera along though, neither friend being surprised, I'm rarely seen without my camera. I don't always take photos, I just like having it around. I feel awkwardly naked without it. We talked about more than photography of course, I'm not that obsessed with photography...much.

Top of discussions lately have been what are we going to do with this year. I've made a few resolutions that so far I'm keeping up with. I'm not usually one for resolutions but this year I really want to make a few changes and figured why not start on the 1st. So far so good! Now if I can just stick with it.

What are these resolutions? All the usual one's I'm afraid. Loose weight, get fit, organize my life. I look back over the past few years and wonder why I didn't do more or better than I did. I'm a bit ashamed really, especially as there is no excuse. I have the time and the resources and I'm not exactly stupid. I can be a bit of a blonde at times, I'll admit to that. And I'm turning into a bit of a grumpy old woman, which I think is funny.

Let me tell you a little story that happened yesterday while I was waiting for my friend to get to town so that we could go have lunch. I had about an hour to kill so I walked around town and visited all of the charity shops. I'd had enough shopping so I decided to sit on a bench outside Oxfam and dare one of the 'Chuggers' to come speak to me. (For those who don't know, 'Chuggers' are those people who hang about town usually with clipboards trying to talk to everyone about what ever charity they are working for that day. Short for Charity Muggers.) They didn't get a chance to because before long here come my friend around the corner. She asked me what I was doing sitting there. I replied "Practicing to be an old lady". We both laughed, but, I was serious.

Lunch was at The Lord John in Stroud and was on me. There must have been a lunch special on as our bill only came to just under £10, and yes that included a drink each. Food was great, company was great, we had a lovely time. Then we went shopping! We went to check out the sale at Pure on King Street. I think it was a closing down sale. They've got a lot of cool stuff in there, including some boots that I just loved. I only looked at them though, I didn't buy them. I don't oven find shoes that I really like, so today I went back and got them! See image below:

My new boots!

I love my new boots! They were a great price too! :-D

Image information: Both images were taken today with a Canon 5D II and 85mm 1.8 prime lens. Yes the first image is crooked, I like it that way. The second image I used a remote control to fire the camera. As I was using such a shallow DOF I manually set the focus in advance.

Cloudy Monday Walk to Town

2012-01-09T18:27:00.003Z

Junction of Rodborough Hill and Bath Road, Stroud

I had an appointment in Stroud today so I walked down into town. It was a bit cloudy and cold but still a nice walk with lots going on. Going to be a lot more going on soon too as there are more road works going to be happening soon. And right at the point where the worst of Stroud's rush hour traffic comes to a stop twice a day during the work/school week. Sometimes over half my travel time to Gloucester from my house is just getting out of Stroud, especially if I go this way. I will be avoiding this way the last half of January.

The canal in front of the old Stroud and Swindon building in Stroud as seen from Wallbridge

Lots of work still going on down at the canal. Today they were working on removing the little damn they made during some major reconstruction of the canal and road. You can't see the damn anymore as they'd let the water back in, so they were busy removing it from under water.

Stroud Canal at Wallbridge

This brings out the kid in me, I love watching these guys. As kids we pretended to do just this sort of thing either with toy dump trucks and cranes or with just our hands.....in the sand...in the mud...in streams...at the sea....and in ditches. I can't help but smile thinking about it. :-)

Stroud Canal looking the other direction

As you can see above the new gates are now in and they are busy cleaning out the other side now. I'm quite sure the guy on the left is not doing what it looks like he's doing.

During all of this resurrection of the canal the path is closed. Looking forward to them opening it back up as I like to walk along there. Hope they finish it soon as come spring time there are lots of babies born along this bit of the canal. Would be a shame if they had to find somewhere else this year.

As I sit here thinking about it all, I guess there won't be so many swans and ducks and other wildlife making their homes along here anymore. Not with the canal all being cleared out. Shame that. :-/

The Lock Keeper's Cafe in Stroud

The Lock Keeper's Cafe is a lovely place to have lunch, I know as I've had lunch there several times now. The last time I had lunch there was with my husband and I was introduced to 'Bubble and Squeak' for the first time! I loved it! Yummy!!

This is also the location of the Friday Forum where a small group of local small business people meet on Fridays for a bit of chatting and a bit of networking and a bit of working. Quite a few bring their laptops and have them open and logged on. I usually just pop by for a quick lunch and a natter. Anyone is welcome to join in, if you're in the area on a Friday drop in and say hello. :-)

Something odd on my walk to and from town today was the number of flowers I saw about. Very odd for January I think. Here are a couple of the flowers that I saw today.

January Daisies

January Roses

After my appointment I had a roam around town and went in a few shops. Mainly the charity shops, those are my favourite in town. I feel like I'm on a treasure hunt of some sort and I never know what I might find. Today I found what I think is a very interesting and I just had to buy it. Here's a photo of it:

Detroit Spinners Smash Hits!

Yes it's a real record! It's a shame it's been melted like this, but I think it's cool. I've seen this sort of thing on the internet before, one of those blog post where they explain how to do this at home. It's got some pretty good songs on it too, shame I can't play it! Not sure what I'm going to do with it. What can you do with a bowl with a hole in the centre? hhmmm I just stuck it on a nail in the wall above the stereo. Looks pretty cool, think I might leave it there...for now.

Photograph information: All of the photos in this blog post were taken with a Canon 5D II with a Canon 85mm 1.8 lens. Settings varied.

Street Portrait

2012-01-07T23:01:00.000Z

Will

Canon 5D II, 85mm 1.8 Lens. Camera settings: f1.8, ISO 200, 1/800th second, AV mode. RAW image processed in Photoshop.

Rarely do I go out without my camera and today was no different. We had some errands to run down in town so I grabbed my camera bags and rummaged through my lenses to decide which one to take. Wasn't a difficult decision, had already decided on one of two lenses before opened up the first bag. I'm in love with prime lenses and I've only got two of them. The Canon 50mm 1.4 and the Canon 85mm 1.8. The 50mm is my favourite, it practically lives on my camera. I love my zooms too, but they are big and heavy and for walking around the 50 is just perfect, small and light weight. Easily fits into a smallish bag.

As you already know from above I decided to take the 85mm for a walk today. I took a few photos on our walk to town and back, but the above photo was by far my favourite. The shot wasn't planned, was just chance that we ran into Will.

Usually I tell people to pay attention to their background when taking portraits. I tell them to steer clear of busy and bold background which mostly over power your subject. But I really loved these red phone boxes and I thought they'd make a great background for Will. While I was taking the photo my husband commented on the red phone boxes and thought they might not make a good background. With a different lens and broader crop I'd probably agree, but I really thought this would work. I was pleasantly surprised when I got home and found that it worked wonderfully. Thanks for posing for me Will!

Beyond the Lens - StroudFM 'Uncovered'

2012-01-06T18:14:00.001Z

This past October I was asked if I'd shoot Stroud FM's 2012 Nude Calendar. How could I say no?! I knew it would be hard work, especially on such short notice. I basically had to cram three months worth of work into three weeks. And I'd have to go a month without any paid work. None the less I took it on and I'm glad to say I did. Working with the Stroud FM presenters was so much fun, they were all terrific and great to work with. What an experience!

I decided quite quickly how I wanted the calendar to look photography wise. Well honestly I didn't have a lot of choice as time was limited. I chose to shoot everyone at my photography studio in Gloucester and to keep it very simple. I talked to each of the presenters who'd volunteered to model for the calendar before their shoots. We discussed props and their shows. I wanted their portraits to show a bit of their individual show's personality. I also decided early on that I'd have one prop that'd be in every shot to pull the images together. This prop wound up being the cover photo....which I shot during the first shoot.

Stroud FM Calendar Cover

The photographs I'm posting here are snapshots of the calendar that I created from a PDF file of the mock-up we used to pull the calendar together. The designer of the calendar itself is Malcolm Jackson of the Nailsworth Design Company.

Before the calendar was launched I released a few teaser photos to give people a taste of what the calendar was like without actually reveling any of the calendar pages. I did this because we'd decided to keep the actual calendar images secret until the 'Unveiling'.

Stroud FM Teaser Photos

My theme for all 12 shoots was high key and keep it simple. 'Less is more' I kept telling myself. I really enjoyed shooting in my studio which is set up for easy high key photography. I've got a lovely infinity corner cove with lights coming down from the ceiling. Having this set up made my job a lot easier. Made everything a lot more fun too.

Stroud FM Calendar pages January - June

High-Key Photography, for those who don't know, is basically over exposing your shot. A bit more than thant though, usually shot in a studio with a white background, your subject not having a lot of contrast and not much if any shadows. No real blacks. As you can see from my photos here, I didn't shoot true high-key. I like my images to be a bit more contrasty. My subjects are a bit 'over exposed' but not so much so that you loose the blacks. I set the lights on the background a full two stops brighter than the lights on my subjects.

Stroud FM Calendar pages July - December

The approach I took with this shoot was casual. All but two persons, as I understand it, had never done anything like this before and I wanted them to feel comfortable. One person had done some life modeling in the past and another person had done some dancing or stripping or something along those lines. I'm not telling you who so don't ask. All but one person is completely nude in their portraits. I'm not telling you who that is either. :-)

How I made them feel comfortable and put them at ease was to just not make a big deal about the whole thing. I kept them in their robes for the start of the shoot and when they were comfortable we lost the robe. I also talked to them and joked around with them during the shoot. I did this because I wanted them to let their guard down, I wanted to engage their attention with the camera, and I wanted to capture natural smiles and expressions. Mostly I was trying to capture a bit of their personalities. I feel this makes for a much better portrait than just sitting there with a fake smile and a blank look in their eyes.

I've been asked by quite a few how much photoshoping have been done on these images. I can tell you not a whole lot really. These are real people, not models, and they were very brave. I did do some light touching up, but not much. The most photoshopped things are just that, things. The newspaper in February, the CDs in May and the ducks in November. Oh and the Mic in a few of the shots. That's it really. I did the usual tweaks of levels and curves and removed a few dirty spots on the floor. That's about it really.

Again I can't tell you how much fun I had doing this and all of the presenters told me that they enjoyed it too. A few told me that it was a real self-esteem booster for them. It was for me too. :-)

These calendars are still for sale and you can buy them direct from Stroud FM or from a number of shops around Stroud. The places that I'm aware of that have them are: Trading Post, Confection Affection, Cornflower & Calico, Music Dynamics, Fandango and The Prince Albert.

By buying the calendar you are helping to keep your local community radio station, Stroud FM, on the air! So please do buy one!

TammyLynn Photography - A surprise for Mum

2012-01-04T16:42:00.000Z

Recently I had the honour of shooting two brothers and a little sister as a surprise Christmas present for their Mum. I love these sorts of shoots where the end portrait is to be a surprise gift for Mum. Here are a few of my favourite photos from this shoot:

This photo shoot was a gift from Dad, but I've also had the kids contact me directly to do a surprise portrait for their Mum! How thoughtful is that? What great kids! Here are a few of my favourite shots from that shoot from last year:

What lucky Mums!

I can honestly say that I truly love my job. :-)

TammyLynn Photography
Email TammyLynn

Let's go for a walk.

2012-01-03T16:37:00.001Z

On Monday 2nd January my husband and I went on a little walk about. We grabbed our cameras and some shopping bags and headed out the door. Just a block over from our house in Stroud, we spotted this beauty:

Vintage Volkswagen Van

We both love these old vans. This one looks in great condition too. I was a bit surprised when I looked at this photo later on the computer....as it looks like a black and white photo! But if you look closely you can see that it is in colour. No, I did not alter the colour or desaturate the photo in any way. The grey overcast day along with the colour of the van gives the impression of a mono image here. I quite like it.

Later when we were walking through Lodgemore we came upon something very unexpected! This was quite out of place:

Of course we had to go investigate. Here's a few more photos of it:

My husband Peter with his camera.

If anyone reading this knows anything about this plane please do share in the comments below. Thank you.

Update on the plane: Tom Radford (@tcr4x4 on twitter) Found the history of this plane here: http://www.fradu-hunters.co.uk/fraduhnt/864xe689.html
How cool is that?!

After we tore ourselves away from the plane we headed towards Sainsbury's, the reason for bringing along some shopping bags. Along the way we came upon one of the biggest, if not the biggest, eyesore in the Stroud area. Tricorn House.

Tricorn House, Cainscross, Stroud

Everyone I've ever spoke to about it wishes they'd just tear it down. Every couple years or so you hear about plans to turn it into something or hear of some company or person buying it and so on. The last thing I heard about it recently was to turn it into a retirement community. I thought this was totally nuts! A retirement community with no gardens and right on a busy loud round-a-bout?! Who'e want to retire there? I sure wouldn't want any of my folks living there.

Before they tear it down or what ever they are going to do with it, I'd like to get permission to roam around inside with my camera. Of course lots of people have already had a roam around inside and some I hear have even taken up residence. Here's a photo showing one of the ways they get in:

Tricorn House, one entrance.

Tricorn house is not the only eyesore in the area, we spotted this burned out building on our walk home:

A closer look at what's on the floor:

We did not go inside this building, I took these photos from outside the door.

I hate to end on a negative note/image, but this was pretty much the end of our walk. After this building we did walk along the bike / foot path, which is always quite lovely. It was getting quite dark by that time and I didn't take any more photos. Maybe next time. :-)

Happy New Year Everybody!

2012-01-03T09:04:00.000Z

What should I blog about this year?

I plan on doing some more 'Beyond the Lens' blog post for sure. Maybe I'll blog about a few of my shoots, to give people an idea of the type of work I do. Also will be blogging about photography fun too. :-)

Mostly right now I'm just testing out this new blogger...been so long since I last blogged that everything's changed!

x

Cotswold TV Presents: TammyLynn Photography :-D

2011-05-29T19:42:00.000+01:00

Over the Easter holidays I was part of the first #GlosBiz (Gloucestershire Business) Easter Expo. During that time Cotswold TV did a little unrehearsed interview with me about TammyLynn Photography. Here's a link to the clip:
http://www.furryfeet.tv/cotswolds/venue_video.php?footprint=287&sms_ss=blogger&at_xt=4ddab9c66eae46ef%2C0

Beyond the Lens - In the Bag

2011-04-25T11:12:00.000+01:00

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 03 February 2011

Photographers, we love to talk about our equipment and the bags we keep them in. To me a camera bag should be like your personal assistant, ready with your gear at your finger tips. We all have our preferences when it comes to bags and what we want them to do, the most important thing being to protect our gear. I’ve bought a lot of bags over the years, and they’ve all done a pretty good job at protecting my gear. I must say though that not all bags are created equal; and you usually get what you pay for. I’ve bought cheap bags that look really cool and that I was excited about only to be let down when it starts coming apart and zippers break. That said I’ve also had an expensive name brand bag come apart on me as well. I tried to contact them about it as the bag was still fairly new and they didn’t want to know about it. Needless to say I’ve not bought any more of their products.

The above bag which I’m holding and showing off my Olympus kit is the Lowepro Fastpack 200. This was my second Lowepro bag. The first one was the first series of their SlingShot bags. I really loved that bag and how I could swing it around and have easy access to my gear without having to set my bag down. Sadly I had a shoulder injury and was advised by the doctor not to use sling bags anymore, but to use backpacks to evenly distribute the weight. That’s why I got the bag above, same sort of system but as a backpack. Love these bags, nice and sturdy with loads of pockets. I especially love the tiny pockets for memory cards and small things you are constantly looking for, all at your fingertips.

As for customer service with Lowepro? Well I’ve never had a problem with their bags so I’ve not contacted them with a problem. I have talked to a few of their representatives and they’ve always been more than helpful. A friend of mine did have a problem with one of their bags though, the zipper broke on it. He contacted them to ask about repairing it as he loved the bag, not expecting them to replace it or anything as it was a well used bag. Well they did replace it and they replaced it with the latest design of the same range. Now that is good customer service!

Recently I reviewed one of their bags for them, the Pro Roller Attaché x50.

I’m in love with this bag; it’s like having my own personal assistant! You can read my review here on my blog: TammyLynn Blogs: The Lowepro Pro Roller Attaché x50. I also had a bit of fun with this bag and made a very short stop motion animation video with it. You can see this on YouTube here: TammyLynnPhotog: Lowepro Pro Roller Attaché x50. My little video was also featured on the Lowepro Blog, you can read about it here: Lowepro>Products> An Animated View.

When you find a good camera bag that’s just right for you, it’s like having a best friend look after your gear. J

Here's the video:

Beyond the Lens - A Simple Portrait

2011-01-28T10:52:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 27 January 2011

You don’t need a lot of fancy equipment or a huge studio to make a nice portrait; just some lovely light and a camera. Having a lovely model doesn’t hurt either. The above photo of Lorca was taken in a local coffee shop with just a hand held camera; with very little post processing done on the image; no extra lighting or equipment was used.

The scene for the above photograph....I’m sitting in a local coffee house enjoying a morning coffee with a friend. It was a cloudy overcast morning down in the Stroud Valley and we were sitting by some nice large windows. This combination acts like a huge soft box for diffusing the light, making it nice and soft. There was sufficient light bouncing around the room to add some fill light on the right side of her face.

The only photographic equipment I used was a DSLR, Canon 30D, with a nifty fifty lens. (50mm f/1.8 prime lens) This is a favourite lens among photographers because it’s small, light and cheap but is very clear, sharp and fast. Not fast as in auto focusing, this can be a bit slow at times. When you hear a photographer refer to a lens as fast what they are actually talking about is how large the maximum aperture is. The larger the aperture, the more light that gets through, the faster your shutter speed can be. So having a fast lens means that you can use faster shutter speeds in lower light situations. It also means that you’ll have a much shallower Depth of Field (DOF) when set to the larger apertures which can make for a pleasing out of focus background.

Now that the scene is set, what camera settings did I use? Well it wasn’t particularly bright in the coffee shop, though in the image it looks lovely and bright. How did I achieve this? This is down to my camera settings. With camera in manual mode, ISO set to 800 (for low light), an exposure of 1/200^th of a second (shutter speed) and an f stop of 2.5. F stop refers to how large the aperture is, as discussed above. The smaller the number the larger the opening, the more light gets in, the shallower the DOF. The larger the number the smaller the opening, lesser light gets in, the greater the DOF. I was using the camera’s internal light meter to help me decide which settings to use for this situation. I could have easily used different settings to achieve pretty much the same photograph.

We mustn’t forget about composition, as that can make or break a photograph. As you can see in the above photograph I positioned most of her face in the upper right third of the images. This is within following the photographer’s golden rule of thirds. Putting your subject on the third makes for a much more pleasing image than placing it smack dab in the centre. Well most of the time it does, there are situations where putting your subject in the dead centre just works.

Another little rule for photographs is the left to right rule. As we read from left to right then most compositions work better if they pull your eye from left to right in the photograph. We do this mostly with lead in lines or with light. My portrait above doesn’t exactly follow that rule, as it is much brighter on the left than the right your eye is pulled right to left. If you have a strong image you can sometimes get away with that. In the case above, her eyes are strong enough to hold your attention.

Speaking of eyes, when taking portraits of people or animals the eyes are the most important part of the photograph. The eyes must be sharp, so make sure you focus on those.

So to recap, what’s making the above a nice portrait? The large natural diffused light source, the composition on the thirds, the shallow DOF with nice out of focus background and the eyes nice and sharp and bright. Oh, and a pretty smile. J

The Lowepro Pro Roller Attaché x50

2011-01-23T23:10:00.006Z

I recently received the new Lowepro Pro Roller Attaché x50. When I first saw it I had my doubts. At first I thought, my word that's small, will I get all my gear in there? It's a lot bigger than it seems, I can tell ya! And if you need a bit more room for gear you can always take the soft bag out of the roller case and either carry it or slip it over the pulling handle of the other bag.

It's nice and sturdy and has lots of pockets, it even has a pocket for a small 14inch laptop. Sadly my laptop is too large for this, but I don't think I'd want to carry a laptop around with my camera gear anyway. Though if I had a small one I probably would.

My Canon 5D II with 24-70mm 2.8L lens attached, wrist strap and a tripod foot attached fit nicely in the bag along with an extra large lens (or two smaller lenses) a flash gun (or two), triggers and remotes, mini reflectors and colour charts and lots of other bits and bobs all fit nicely in the bag. All the stuff I usually take with me on assignment. I can even squeeze in a back up body with no lens attached.

They have really thought of everything with this bag, though a few tiny pockets for cards and batteries wouldn't go amiss. I really love how it opens up like a drawer with instant access to all your gear. You don't have to hunt for a place to put your bag down or try and fiddle with stuff or worry about your gear falling out. Makes quick lens changes a breeze!

Above is a quick photo I took to show the bag in use on a job. I really love how I can quickly attach a flash gun to the handle and use the bag as a light stand. A light stand with built in counter weight and wheels! It was so easy to move the bag and flash gun around to get the shot I wanted, even quickly wheeled it outside no problem! Of course I had to be careful, I didn't want to knock the flashgun and break it off, but it honestly wasn't any trouble at all to move around with all attached. It's like having an assistant along with you!

This bag is perfect for travelling with. Take the inside bag out and use as a lovely top loading shoulder bag for your gear. It's made to slip over the handle of the outer bag if you happen to need more space. It can also be use as a suit case for your clothes and travel needs. It's suppose to be airline approved for carry on luggage, though I've not actually travelled with it myself. I would think that if the roller bag didn't pass you could take the inner bag out and carry that on and let the roller bag go in the hold. I hope to be travelling with it soon, so I'll let you know. :-)

This bag definitely gets my seal of approval. I've been dragging it around with me everywhere. Really saves my back and keeps all my gear right at my finger tips. It's much much more than a camera bag, it's my new personal assistant. :-)

Below is a little stop motion movie I made with the bag down at the studio yesterday. (Saturday 22, January 2011) I was in a bit of a rush but I wanted to see if I could do it, had the idea swimming around in my head awhile now. I put my camera on a tripod, but my bag in the middle of the infinity cove. Turned on 4 flash heads, aimed two at the background, only using the modelling lights. I didn't set off the flash. I took 144 images moving the bag a bit between takes. Then went home and swore at the computer for a while until I finally managed to put this together.

Can you tell I like this camera bag? :-D

All of the images above including the ones in the video, were taken by myself, TammyLynn. With the exception of the photo taken at Morrisons, all of the photos above were taken at The London Road Studio in Gloucester.

UPDATE: Lowepro have seen my little video and have featured it on their blog! Lowepro Blog link

Lowepro said this on their Facebook and Twitter post about the movie:

You've got to spend 56 seconds to watch this animated film made by TammyLynn featuring a Pro Roller Attache x50. It's fun.

Beyond the Lens - Expecting

2011-01-22T17:58:00.002Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Saturday, 22 January 2011

There is nothing like the expected arrival of your first baby, or any baby for that matter. A lot of expecting mums choose to record the beauty of this time in their lives with a professional photo shoot either in a studio like the image I created above or with an environmental shoot like the one I shot below.

In this photo Lorca Simons, American Actress; and Adam Barley, local 5 Rhythms dance teacher.

I think it’s wonderful that they are doing this, not only because I’m a photographer but because I’m a mother. 21 years ago, when I was a first time mother-to-be, I’d never heard of a special photo shoot for expectant mothers, whereas today it’s common place. I think that Annie Leibovitz’s Vanity Fair cover photo of Demi Moore might have something to do with this.

I do often wish I’d taken more photos of myself when I was pregnant now. Photographers have for a long time offered baby packages for young mothers to record the milestones of their babies’ growth. These days these packages start before the baby is born. I like to call it their first family portrait. J

...a moment in time to treasure forever...

TammyLynn Photography:

Portraits, events, commercial, promotional, fantasy and fun. Bump to baby, home to office. Family Portraits, Special Occasions. Create an image or capture a moment to treasure.

For Studio hire - The London Road Studio

For more information:

TammyLynn Photography
email: tammy@tammylynn.co.uk
Tamara (Tammy) Kwan
Mobile: +44 (0) 7983 826508 (preferred)
Phone: +44 (0) 1453 766029

Beyond the Lens - Fun with Alice

2011-01-14T17:45:00.001Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Friday, 14 January 2011

Curious Dream

A couple of years ago I mentioned to my daughter that I’d like to do a fantasy photo shoot with the Alice in Wonderland theme. Next think I know she’s telling me “OK Mom, we have our costumes ready, when’s the shoot?” Her and her friends had got together, decided who was going to be who and made their own costumes! How could I refuse?! Also I couldn’t keep this all to myself so I organized a photographer’s meet and invited a few fellow photographers to join me. We had great fun shooting this crew, they were wonderful!

I hired Rodborough Hall and we started the shoot in there, with studio lighting and backgrounds. Then we moved up onto Rodborough Common with a few props. This was back in September of 2009. In the photo above my daughter Alyssa is playing Alice. From left to right is Gemma as the Dormouse, Rosie as the Queen of Hearts, Steph as the March Hare, Noah as the Mad Hatter, Merry as the Cheshire Cat and Will as the White Rabbit.

You're Late!

The photos above and below were taken at the hall with a green background that I’d brought along. We also had a white background set up but I preferred the green for some reason. Aren’t their costumes fantastic?!

Back in the Teapot!

Check out the Mad Hatter’s Hat. He made that all himself from scratch. I wonder who’s missing two decks of cards now?

Very Tall Alice

This next image, Very Tall Alice, was taken with my Canon 30D and Sigma 10-20 lens at 10mm. There were a number of camera flash guns set up around the tree; the key light here is a flash with soft box on camera left. I got down low for the shot and the distortion from the 10mm lens made her look tall. The tree helps with this perspective as well. The tiny cows in the background probably don’t hurt either. I entered this image in a Photo Competition: Tall on The Telegraph’s website judged and ran by Kate Day. It was one of the winners.

Wonderland

This last image was also taken on the green background with studio lights. It was the right shade of green to work like a green screen and I easily cut the gang out and added them to this card from an old deck of cards I had. Well I didn’t actually add them to the card but to a digital scan of the card.

These kids are awesome and it was a pleasure to get to work with them on this and a few other occasions. I’m truly blessed to know them....and be the Mother of one of them.

Beyond the Lens - Chasing Rainbows

2011-01-07T17:42:00.001Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Friday, 07 January 2011

I woke up to a lovely rainbow over Stroud Wednesday morning. I was out the door with my camera before I’d had my morning coffee, breakfast or had even gotten dressed! It was such a beautiful bright day that the rainbow seemed out of place. The above photo was one of the last images I captured of the rainbow just as the sky was getting dark and just before the rain came. By this time I was upstairs hanging out my bedroom window. That’s Whiteshill near Stroud you see there in the distance.

I really wanted to capture the whole rainbow in one photo but I didn’t have a wide enough lens. So I took several photos and combined them to make one large photo. Not a stitch up but just the images overlapping, like this:

There, now you can see how big the rainbow was. And you can just make out the second rainbow. Yep, it’s a “Double Rainbow all the way across the sky!” ... I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. That’s a reference to a viral video on YouTube that’s been making the rounds. It’s even been turned into a song by the Auto-Tune the News schmoyoho guys. I love their stuff.

These photos were really just quick grab shots. I didn’t set up a tripod and I didn’t put a lot of thought into the settings on my camera. I pushed the dial over to AV priority put the ISO down to 200 and left the aperture set to f7.1 letting the camera do the rest. A lot of the time I take photos just for fun; this was one of those times. J

Beyond the Lens - A White Christmas

2011-01-01T17:34:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Saturday, 01 January 2011

This past Christmas was my first ever White Christmas. It was also my first Christmas without any of my children at home. Well they aren’t exactly children anymore, but they will always be my babies...no matter how old they get. So what do you do when your children aren’t home for Christmas? Well you sleep in, have a long lazy morning, cook a big breakfast with homemade blueberry pancakes, pack a lunch and go for a lovely long walk with your husband.

What is a ‘White Christmas’? For most I think a ‘White Christmas’ means a covering of snow on the ground on Christmas Day. Ideally snowing on the day as well. But if you are placing bets on a ‘White Christmas’ down at the local betting shop, then it means something else. To win a bet on it being a ‘White Christmas’ then a single snowflake has to be officially observed falling in the 24 hour period of the 25^th of December. I’m not a betting person, so I enjoyed my first ‘White Christmas’. J

The above photograph was taken this past Christmas Day and is a view over the frozen Stradford Park Lake in Stroud. The tempature this day was around -3c and had been below freezing for quite some time. Camera used was a Canon 5D II with a 24-70 2.8 L lens. Camera settings were set to Aperture Priority, F/9, ISO 200 with a shutter speed of 1/80^th of a second, hand held.

Here’s another photo taken down by the lake a few minutes later:

Sledging on Christmas Day....It doesn’t get much better than this.

December Snow & Ice in Stroud

2010-12-26T22:53:00.001Z

We've had a lot of snow and ice here in Gloucestershire this December. We don't usually get weather like this until end of January and into February. Well not since I've lived here anyway. I've posted some snow photos already in previous post. Here are a few more from around the area this month.

Frozen lake in Stratford Park, Stroud. 8 December 2010. Sadly this Tesco Trolley ignored the 'Thin Ice' signs and fell through and froze to death.

Cemetery at Rodborough Church, after 11pm at night, 18 December 2010. This is a 30 second exposure. the golden light you see on the left is not the sun rising, it is a street light.

Fields between my house and town. Stroud. 21 December 2010.

Frome River in Stroud. The ruins on the right used to be Capel Mill, which was a dye mill. 21 December 2010.

Path running between the road and the river. 21 December 2010.

Path by the Canal in Stroud. The Canal is on the right. It's a bit over grown but is full of water. They are working on restoring it to working order. It's a bit frozen over at the moment. That's Peter wearing his cow horn hat in the centre. 21 December 2010.

Frozen canal in Stroud. Canal company warehouse on the other side with the Hill Paul building towering above it. A few years ago the Hill Paul building was set for demolition, but the people of Stroud didn't want the historical textile mill building destroyed. So, it was converted into apartment buildings. Photo taken 21 December 2010.

Road closed sign near the centre of Stroud. It was unclear to drivers which road was closed, so they were driving down both ways. It was the road going off to the left that was in fact closed. In the next photo you'll see why the road was closed. (NOTE: Peter says both roads were closed)

Subway's new Drive Through! Sharp steep curve combined with icy roads does not a good combination make. This road was in fact closed but the cars kept driving on it anyway. You can't even see the road for the ice.

A Christmas Walk

2010-12-26T01:46:00.000Z

Note: I'm writing this at 1 o'clock in the morning so when I say today, I mean yesterday.

Today was Christmas. The first Christmas in 20 years that I didn't share with my children. Alyssa now lives in Torquay with her boyfriend and Sarah lives in the States with her dad where she's going to college. I've been a bit depressed about this for awhile now, trying not to think about Christmas and avoiding Christmas type things. I talked to both of them on the phone today and both my parents and I feel a bit better. I do miss them all so very much though.

That said, I did manage to enjoy Christmas with my husband Peter. Last night I made something very similar to a candy I used to make every Christmas back in the States and in Italy and anywhere I've lived. I say similar as I can't get the key ingredient here in the UK. Well not in my neck of the woods anyway. The candy turned out pretty good. I think I'll try again and add a bit of peppermint to the mix next time and see what happens.

Also last night we watched the second in the Narnia series and exchanged gifts. It was a really lovely evening all around. Just the two of us.

Christmas morning we slept in, then I got up and made us some home made blueberry pancakes. We watched a silly Christmas movie about Santa then decided to pack a lunch and go for a walk in the snow. The temperature was around -2c to -3c today. We both took DSLRs with us and took a few photos along the way. Here are a few of mine from today.

Just up the road from our house.

View of Stroud.

Peter, with his cow horn hat.

I saw Peter take this shot then copied him. :-)

Sunlight streaming under the railway bridge down in Stroud.

Frozen bus stop.

Frozen lake in Stratford Park.

Another view of frozen lake in Stratford Park.

Peter sharing his lunch.

Sledging in the park.

Park at your own risk! A very icy car park.

We rounded the day off with the Doctor Who Christmas special. And have spent this evening working on some personal projects. Tomorrow is Boxing Day here in the UK. I'm not sure what we will be doing. We usually go cycling with The Stonehouse Wheelers and have a special tea at a certain club member's house, but it's a bit too icy out there to go cycling. We could show up by car but our road is too icy to drive and I don't fancy walking that distance.

Maybe we'll go for another walk. :-)

Fun with my Facebook profile page.

2010-12-25T22:03:00.000Z

Recently I've seen a few screen shots about of people's new facebook profile pages where they've uploaded sections of photos and tagged them to show up across the top of their profile page to form a bigger picture. Some self portraits, some lovely landscapes, and so on. Well I thought I'd have a go, but with my own twist. I didn't know how others made their pages at the time so I developed my own way. What I did was take a screen shot of my profile page, paste in photoshop, cut out the images where I wanted my photos to show up which made little windows. I then slid my photo behind the windows and arranged how I wanted. Then I cut the images out and uploaded the pieces to facebook, tagging myself so they showed up on my profile page. This is my result:

Yes I know, I did it the hard way. If you'd like some easier ways to do this follow these links which people have since shared with me:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/8206661/How-to-hack-your-Facebook-profile-picture-a-step-by-step-guide-to-refacing-your-profile.html

http://picscatter.com/

If you have a go at this please feel free to share! You can leave a link to your photo in the comment section below or if you have a flickr account you can post it to the Odd Signs group I started here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/oddsigns/ If you are a member of DSLR User Magazine forum you can post your results to this thread: Facebook Photography Fun

Beyond the Lens- Shooting by Moonlight

2010-12-25T12:16:00.001Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Friday, 24 December 2010

A few nights ago, last Saturday, we had a lovely clear bright night. The moon was almost full and the snow was reflecting the moonlight beautifully. Well, it wasn’t quite as bright as the image above of Rodborough Church makes it seem, as you can see from the clock on the tower it’s 11 o’clock at night. This was a 30 Second exposure.

There’s a bit more than a long exposure going on here as well. My husband was running around the image with a flashlight painting the windows, a few of the monuments and one o f the trees with light. As it was a long exposure and he was constantly moving he doesn’t show up in the image. If he’d stood still for a moment you would have clearly seen him as he was wearing a bright yellow jacket.

With any long exposure you need your camera mounted on a tripod or sat down on something nice and solid. On this occasion I used a heavy duty Gorilla Pod (type of small flexible tripod) and a handy stone wall. I put the camera on manual settings as I wanted to use a 30 second exposure. I also set the two second timer for a slight delay after I pressed the shutter to reduce camera shake. My other settings were an ISO of 200 at f4.

I love how the sky turned out purplish and how you can just make out the stars. The yellow in the background behind the church isn’t the sun rising but is actually street lights down below the church on the other side.

I really enjoyed this late night stroll by moonlight with my husband. I think we might do this again soon. Of course I’ll be bringing my camera and a few torches. ;-)

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The above photo was featured in the local weekly paper, Stroud Life, this past Wednesday, 22 December 2010.

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It also made the BBC Radio Gloucestershire website. In Pictures: December snow in Gloucestershire:

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I also have a photo in the January 2011 issue of Cotswold Life this month which has just hit the shelves.

Disgruntled employee? Or Photoshop?

2010-12-16T22:33:00.002Z

I saw a number of tweets about a disgruntled Father Christmas at Harrods department store and I clicked on one. It took me to this web page: Dashperiod where I saw the following image and story:

‘Fuck off Harrods’ done by a disgruntled employee, fired by Harrods from his job as the toy department’s Father Christmas, took revenge last night in spectacular style.
Gaining access to a maintenance control room, Lloyd Hudson, 35, from Ilford, Essex, was able to locate the chart and corresponding switches for Harrods’ 10,000 external lights.
Barracading himself in, Hudson disabled the correct lights until he could spell out his feelings to Harrods bosses and Christmas shoppers alike. He was removed by security guards after an hour-long stand-off, then handed over to police.
“He had drunk the best part of two bottles of whisky,” said a spokesperson for the iconic London store, “and it’s that kind of behaviour that got him the sack in the first place.” Hudson has since been released on police bail.
Knightsbridge visitors were stunned.
“Honestly, I am disgusted, ” said Irene Rider, 59, from Gary, Indiana. “I was with my grandchildren. We had just gotten off the bus. I said ‘look everybody’ and pointed up to the lights – but you know what the lights said? They said f**k off. And that is not an appropriate message for a child. At least not at Christmas time.”

*******************************************************************************
Now this story is making it's way around the internet and everyone is passing it on. But when I saw this story with the above image a number of red flags went up. First off, the web address tag in the upper right hand corner. Second, those look like a strings of Christmas lights, wouldn't be so easy to switch a few off to spell something, especially if you lock yourself into one room. I'm just not getting this. So I did a google search for Harrods green Christmas lights and I found out the following.

Last year Harrods changed their traditional white lights for green lights transforming the building into the Emerald City in honour of The Wizard of Oz's 70th anniversary. X Factor judge Dannii Minigue was on hand to help switch on the lights.

I also came across this image:

Look familiar?

Ps...
I wonder if the Associated Press has seen this.

Beyond the Lens- Super Mom!

2010-12-16T10:22:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 16 December 2010

This is one of my favourite photographs that I’ve taken this year, a portrait of my friend Lorca Simons. She’s an actress from Texas who grew up in theatre and, who like me, now calls Gloucestershire home.

My first title for this image was ‘Come Fly with Me’, but I later thought ‘Super Mom’ a better fit, as she is between 7 and 8 months pregnant in the photo.

Technically I’m breaking a composition rule with this image, but I like it anyway. The rule I’m breaking is the left to right rule. As we read from left to right then images flow better left to right. She’s ‘flying’ from right to left. I could flip the image, and a lot of people do in situations like this, but I don’t like doing that. I think it makes the image look odd. That could be just because I know what it’s supposed to look like though.

I did not have this composition in my head when I took this photo. I saw this image later when the original photograph was coming out of the printer, and I saw it sideways. I thought, wow, it looks like she’s flying! So I did a quick edit to remove the floor, which was mostly black anyway, and rotated the image. I also added a bit more black space on the left and just below to help with the illusion that she was flying and to give her some space to fly into.

Let’s talk about space for a moment. Composition and how much space you have around your subject can greatly effect how the image looks and feels. Sometimes leaving a bit of space can add drama or tension to an image. Sometimes it’s just wasted space and needs to be cropped away. Sometimes cropping in really close and even cropping away some of your subject can add that extra bit of drama to your image. The general rule of thumb is when photographing wildlife or moving objects is to leave a bit of room for them to move into.

Beyond the Lens - Lost in the Fog

2010-12-09T22:15:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 9 December 2010

The other morning when I looked out of my window down towards Stroud’s town centre, this is what I saw. (Image above) Lovely sunshine, clear blue sky....but wait! Where’s Stroud?! The town was nowhere to be seen.

Here’s a bit of a photo to show you what I normally see behind that tall tree on the right:

Hill Paul, Stroud Train Station, The Subscription Rooms and the lovely hill with grazing cows in the distance all hidden under the thick freezing fog down in the valley. Thick fog isn’t unusual, I often can’t see across the valley, but to have such beautiful sunshine and clear blue skies above was truly something to see. I couldn’t find my camera fast enough.

The top image was taken hanging out of a first floor window with a hand held DSLR Camera. (Both images were actually) Not a lot of post processing done on this image, just the usual RAW tweaks like a slight S with the curves and a high pass sharpen. Camera settings were f/11 with an exposure of 1/400^th of a second at ISO-400. Camera was set to AV or Aperture Priority which means I set the aperture value, in this case to f/11, and I let the camera decide the shutter speed.

Beyond the Lens- The Decisive Moment

2010-12-02T09:09:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday 2, December 2010

If you google ‘The Decisive Moment’ you’ll more than likely see Henri Cartier-Bresson’s name at the top of the list along with his photograph titled ‘Behind the Gare St. Lazare’ of a man jumping accross some water and just about to make a splash. My image above reminds me of his image.

What is ‘The Decisive Moment’? Besides being a book by Henri Cartier-Bresson? Well it’s exactly what it sounds like. It’s the moment in which you decide to press the shutter and capture a moment in time. The moment can sometimes make or break a photo, especially when a moment or two before or after a particular moment in time just won’t have the same impact. It’s managing to capture a story or some tension or an expression or an expectation. Like my image above, a moment later and it would have been just another splash photo. A moment before and it wouldn’t have the full impact of what is about to happen.

To me the decisive moment can also be a moment captured in time that you might not have seen other wise.

This photograph was captured hand held with a Canon 5D and 24-70mm 2.8 lens. It was a cloudy rainy day, with ISO set to 100 I still managed to shoot at 1/400^th of a second at f/2.8. I was shooting in Aperture Priority letting the camera choose the shutter speed. As most of my subjects were moving and I was mostly shooting hand held I kept a watch on the shutter speed trying to keep it above 1/200^th of a second. The 2.8 aperture of my lens helped greatly with this. As I was shooting in RAW I didn’t worry much about the white balance, though in hindsight I should have set it to daylight and saved myself a couple of clicks in post processing. But why not cloudy? It was cloudy and there is a cloudy white balance setting. Well I find that the cloudy setting more often than not leaves my images too yellowish.

The Photo above is of my friend’s daughter playing at Slimbridge WWT. No children or ducks were harmed in the making of this image.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2010-11-25T11:17:00.002Z

Wish I was there! **Missing Mom's roast turkey and cornbread stuffing**

Thanksgiving...A time to give thanks for all the past years blessings...A time to reflect...A time to share with family and friends. Thanksgiving is my favourite holiday because that's when our family comes together from across the miles and busy life styles, usually meeting at Mom's house. The house is full of laughter and hugs and the smell of roast turkey with cornbread stuffing.

Since I've moved to England I really miss Thanksgiving back home. I do try to keep up the turkey and cornbread dressing tradition on this side of the pond, but it is proving to be more and more difficult. It's just not the same without the rest of the family. And now that Alyssa has moved out and has a busy life of her own it is quite lonesome this Thanksgiving. Missing Sarah like mad too.... Missing my Mom and Dad as well... I'll be running up a phone bill later!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! May your day be filled with family and friends, hugs and kisses, laughter and happy tears, love and friendship....and most of all, joy and happiness.

Oh and don't forget the chess set! (David, Mark and cousin Stephen know what I'm talking about.) ;-)

XOXOX

With Love,

Tammy

Beyond the Lens - The Crypt

2010-11-25T10:16:00.001Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 25 November

This week I take you for a peak below the Gloucester Cathedral, down into The Crypt. I’ve been to the Cathedral many times but this was the first time I’d been down below. If you haven’t been, I highly recommend it. The architecture is amazing and makes you wonder about what life was like down there 800 or so years ago. Our guide told us about the different architectures and pointed out here and there where the structures had been reinforced. She showed us one room that was a little funeral chapel for the monks. She also pointed out a nice sized cavity in the wall which no one knows for sure what it was used for. Some say it was a safe place to store treasures, some say it might have been a kind of prison for the monks. I learned lots on this visit to the Cathedral; I definitely recommend talking to one of the many guides, they are full of stories and facts about its history.

The above photograph is a long exposure using available light. Carrying tripods around places like this is not ideal and a lot of places and events won’t allow them as they can be tripping hazards. I find that a Gorillapod does the job quite nicely in most situations and this is what I had with me on this day. With camera mounted on heavy duty Gorillapod and set to Aperture Priority with a 2 second delay, I set my camera down on the floor guessing at composition and let the camera do the rest. White balance set to auto (changed to tungsten in post processing), ISO 200, at f/8 this image had an exposure of 15 seconds.

Here's another photo from down in the Crypt:

Beyond the Lens - Yummy Mandazi

2010-11-18T23:09:00.002Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 18 November 2010

There’s a new restaurant in town! C and W’s African Experience in Gloucester. My husband came across their grand opening while out looking for new cycling routes for the Stonehouse Wheelers. I heard about them through I am Gloucestershire 365, Twitter and Foursquare. Next thing I know we are having dinner there one night and soon after that I’m doing some food photography for them. They do a great curry and I highly recommend them. I love family run restaurants. We have guest coming this weekend, can you guess where we are taking them? Yep you guessed it!

The treat in the photo above is Mandazi served with a lovely Kenyan Ginger Chai (Tea). The Mandazi are served warm and are just lovely. I can’t resist photographing my food and I was doing just that when Wanja come walking through with a plate of Mandazi for another customer. I quickly recomposed my shot to include her in the background. I know she’s blurry but the photo isn’t about her, it’s about the yummy pastry, but I feel including her in the background adds to the atmosphere of the photograph and adds interest as well as telling a story. I can almost smell them.

The above photo was taken with a Canon 5D II with a Canon 24-70 2.8 L lens with an ISO setting of 400 for 1/60^th of a second at f/2.8. Camera was hand held with natural light coming in from the windows. Post processed in Photoshop using levels and curves and sharpened using the High Pass filter technique. I also added a slight edge burn to draw your attention into the photo.

The dangers of being a photographer....

2010-11-11T22:10:00.003Z

Today I had a run in with a horse. The horse won.

I was helping my friend Liz cover an event which involved horses with riders. As they were leaving town they rushed by where I was standing and as soon as I realized they were coming my way I pressed myself up against this building/house which was right up next to the road. After they passed I looked around for any more horses or cars, saw the way was clear and took a step away from the building to take a photo of the horses and their riders leaving. Next thing I knew I was flying across the road and landing in the middle of the road/intersection. I'm not a small person and I hit hard. I was hit on the right and landed on my left side. I had my precious 5D II strapped to my right hand which had Damon's precious 70-200 2.8 L lens attached to it. If it hadn't been attached to my hand with a strap it would have no doubt went flying and crashing into the street. I'm happy to say there's not a scratch on the camera or lens, though the lens hood was scratched up. My strap is padded and it also saved the back of my hand from being scraped on the road no doubt. Once I landed I slid a bit, I think that's when the lens hood was scratched, or maybe when I was getting up. I'm not entirely clear.

Besides a heavy camera lens combo in my hand I also had a loaded Lowepro Fastpack 200 on my back. I'm not quite sure but the horse must have hit the camera bag when it hit me. Lucky nothing inside was broke, though it had obviously been knocked around a bit. No damage to the bag either, I'm happy to say. :-)

What I do remember is thinking I have to sit up as quick as I can because if there are any horses behind me they will trample me. I remember trying to sit up but I don't remember sitting up. I remember someone asking me if I was OK and I remember hearing myself say ‘no’. I remember people talking to me but I don't remember who. I remember being helped to the side of the road, I remember saying don't touch my arm. My friend Liz took my camera away from me, I don't remember her doing that. I remember thinking my left arm might be broke and I remember thinking I might pass out. I remember my friend saying she didn’t like my colour.

Some people helped me across the street to the pub where I could sit down, and this lady examined my shoulder and arm. I was feeling much better by then, though still a bit fuzzy. I was told someone captured a video of the whole thing on their camera phone and asked if I wanted to see. Of course I wanted to see! :-D

What I saw was me standing a couple feet from this building, in the street, my back to the camera. I saw this horse come running down the road from my right and knock me out into the middle of the street. I was told a young person was ridding the horse and it might have been out of control. They did hang about to make sure I was OK. I don’t know who they were.

I insisted I was OK and we walked back to Liz's house for a cup of tea. Peter looked through the images he’d taken, turns out he’d taken a photo of me just before the horse hit me. The horses head is in the photo. By this time I’d started noticing my injuries. My whole left side hurts, especially my knee and my upper arm and shoulder. Bit of skin missing from the heal of my left hand. Knee skint and swelling. Ibuprofen takes the edge off the aches and pains.

I’m not looking forward to trying to sleep tonight and I’m really not looking forward to waking up in the morning. I can still walk, though going up or down any hill or stairs is quite a task. I can’t pick up anything heavy or reach for anything with my left arm and hand. I can’t raise my left arm above my head either. All a bit worrying but will heal in time I’ve no doubt.

This isn’t the first time I’ve been injured while out doing some photography type stuff. Probably won’t be the last either. Am I worried? Naaa. Life is good and I love what I do. J

Here's a photo from the day:

Beyond the Lens - Autumn Colours

2010-11-11T20:24:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 11 November 2010

What a beautiful time of year. I just love all the autumn colours. The other day we went walking in the Chalford Valley over by Cowcombe Hill. Over between the railway line and the canal we spotted this little robin. I just managed to change my camera settings and capture this photo of him before he flew away. Well you know robins, he didn’t fly far, but he didn’t pose so nicely out in the open again for me either.

I find wildlife photography quite difficult. I’m just not fast enough and I don’t have a long enough lens. Lucky I’d borrowed a friend’s 70-200 2.8 L lens this day. Also lucky I’d shot in raw. The camera’s auto white balance got it all wrong and the photo came out a bit blue. So I changed it from Auto white balance to Daylight and that made a world of difference.

For those keeping score I shot in Aperture Priority with an ISO of 250; 1/125^th of a second exposure at f2.8. Sadly I had forgotten to change the Exposure compensation from -0.3 back to 0 so my image was a bit under exposed. RAW to the rescue! After I changed the white balance to Daylight I upped the exposure to brighten the image. I also added a little fill light at this time, along with nudging the Clarity and Vibrance bars. A few tweaks of the curves in photoshop, a quick high pass filter to sharpen and I’m done. Well nearly, I decided it looked a bit like a post card and the blank space was crying out for some words. I am missing my family and friends back in the States so I chose to write “Gloucestershire, wish you were here!” I think I just might print a few post cards and send them across the big pond.

Beyond the Lens - A Game of Snooker

2010-11-04T11:46:00.000Z

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 04 November 2010

The other night I went out with my husband and the guys from his office for a few games of snooker and a curry. Taking photos inside at night anywhere is challenging, but most especially in a snooker club. It’s also quite difficult to take photos while playing in a tournament as we were, but of course I had to give it a try.

My advice to anyone taking on this sort of challenge would be to use a monopod to help steady the camera, bump up your ISO as high as you dare, use your largest aperture and have some fun. Why not a tripod you might ask, well they aren’t practical in situations like this and most likely would not be allowed as they are a tripping hazard. You might also ask why not use flash. Flash would disrupt the game and take away the atmosphere of the place. Someone concentrating on a shot wouldn’t appreciate the temporary blindness caused by a sudden flash in a dark room.

I took the above photo using only the light in the room, hand held, (wish I’d had a monopod). I’d set my White Balance to auto, but in hindsight I wish I’d set it to Tungsten. As I shot in RAW I was able to change this later in post processing. ISO turned up to 3200, 1/250^th of a second exposure with an aperture of f2.8. Post processed in photoshop, cleaned up a bit of noise, tweaked curves, slight sharpen with a high pass filter.

In case you are wondering, that is not my husband pictured above. He is in the picture though, far right holding a snooker cue watching his colleague line up his shot.

PS...

I came in 5th in the MRG Snooker Tournament! :-D OK, there were only 6 people in the tournament. OK OK so it was a tie for 5th. :-p

Me, My Husband and Photography

2010-11-02T14:06:00.002Z

I'm a photographer. My dad peaked my interest in photography when I was quite young by showing me photos he took on his travels in the army. Old square black and white images stuck in a black book with thick black pages with these little black paper corners. I was even given little cameras as presents when I got older. Do you remember those little compact cameras that took 110 film? Then Polaroid cameras came out! Those were so cool, instant results! I had a number of cameras, can't remember them all, some took 110 film, some 35mm.

When I was between the ages of 19 and 20 I decided I wanted more control over my photography. So I bought my first slr. Canon AE-1 Program it was. .... is. I say 'is' because I still have it! :-D Actually I have two, because not long after I bought the AE-1 I bought another one! I used to carry around both cameras, with different lens on and different film speeds. Sometimes one had colour and the other black and white film. I was ready for anything! Here's an early photo of me with my first SLR:

Please ignore the monkeys in the background, I'm trying to show you my camera. Here's a couple more photos of my early SLRs.

Me and my Dad down by the San Antonio River Walk in Texas.

My brother David with my other Camera. Yes it was the 80's.

Another photo of me and my camera.

OK, enough about me and my camera.....the early years. Back then, well probably before then, my current husband, Peter, was also a photographer, even had his own dark room! Photography is one of the things that drew us together. Only thing is, he's not as obsessed and serious as I am. It's just a causal hobby for him. I live and breath photography and I've turned it into a little business. Photography, not living and breathing.

I often drag my husband along with me on photo expeditions. He'll take his camera out, take a few pics, but quickly gets bored. Example: We were out walking around this lake, there were these swans and geese and ducks about. I very slowly got down low and slowly crept towards them. When I finally earned their trust and they were getting into interesting posses and I was just getting ready to take my first photograph of them when ....**Thump! Thump! Thump!** Peter decided the mud on his boots needed to come off and starts stamping his feet, scattering the birds. **palm to face** moment. He was totally oblivious to what had just happened. This is the sort of thing I quite often go through when he's out with me. So I don't ask him so often any more.

On the professional side of things I'll often ask his advice or ask him to be my second shooter. It's a bit like asking if I can pull his teeth, but he usually gives in and helps. He's quite good at it, knows what he's doing and can be very helpful. Things were a bit different with this new job I have though, which is a bit of food photography for a new restaurant in Gloucester, C & W's African Experience. They do a lovely Goat Curry. Anyway he jumped at the chance to help and I hadn't even asked for any help! And he keeps telling me not to forget the Tupperware! He's very eager to help out on this shoot as there is food involved. Bless him.

Here's a quick photo I took at C & W's when I went to meet with Wanja to talk about the shoot:

These are Mandazi which Wanja served me with a lovely cup of Kenyan Ginger Chai (Tea). They were yummy! Served warm and reminded me of spicy doughnuts sort of. Yes I brought some home to Peter. ;-)

Beyond the Lens - Shooting Fireworks

2010-10-29T14:03:00.000+01:00

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Friday, 29 October 2010

The annual Ebley Fireworks display was this past Monday. I organized a group of about 20 Stroud Camera Club members to meet up and shoot the fireworks. This was an exercise on night time photography and sharing knowledge on the best way to capture fireworks. The previous week we had another practical evening where we all had a go at capturing moving light displays, this was an extension on that.

The best way I’ve found to capture firework displays is to plan ahead and arrive early. Definitely use a tripod or similar support. Long exposures are a must to capture the trails of light. You don’t need a high ISO as you might think you’d need shooting at night and F-stops aren’t all that important when shooting long distances on long exposures. Also with really long exposures you don’t need to worry with mirror lock ups as the tiny vibration the mirror might cause won’t be noticeable with long exposures. A cable release is handy but not necessary.

The shot above was shot with a Canon 5D II, 24-70 2.8 L lens on a tripod with these settings: ISO 100; f/10; for 8 seconds at focal length of 57mm. I left white balance on its auto setting and shot in raw format. Only a few tweaks in photoshop required. It was originally shot in landscape format, I cropped the sides away getting rid of the dark edges and making the fireworks the centre of attention.

Beyond the Lens - Church with a View

2010-10-21T13:53:00.000+01:00

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 21 October 2010

This week I share with you a photo that I took from the top of Slimbridge Church, St John the Evangelist, in Slimbridge. We just happened to stop by when they were giving a very rare chance to climb the tower. The climb up the tower was quite an experience; you need to be quite agile and fairly fit. It’s more than just a steep climb; it’s like a maze of twist and turns on steep ladders with little space to manoeuvre. How I managed to make the climb I don’t know! But I’m glad I did. Wow what a view. My photograph doesn’t do it justice. I’d really like to have another go at trying to capture the lovely view from up there.

For the photographers out there this was taken with a Canon 5D mark 2 and a 24-70 2.8 L lens at the wide end. ISO 100, f18 for 1/50th of a second, hand held and tweaked in photoshop.

Most people know Slimbridge for its Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust founded by Sir Peter Scott, which is also the first thing I knew it for. I love Slimbridge WWT and I’m a regular member, visiting as often as I can. I’ve since learned a bit more about Slimbridge and have discovered that my ancestors are from the area. One is Laurence Bridger who was Rector of the church from 1577 – 1630. There is a stained glass window in the church dedicated to the Bridger Family. This may not seem like a big deal to most, but you see, I’m not from here. I was born and grew up in America, Georgia to be more precise. I never knew I had ancestors from England, and then to find out that not only do I have British ancestors but that they are also from Gloucestershire! Where I just happen to live! How cool is that? No wonder I feel so at home here. J

Beyond the Lens - A Surreal Portrait

2010-10-14T13:52:00.000+01:00

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 14 October 2010

This week’s photo is a portrait of my daughter Sarah. After a little shopping spree we decided we’d like to do a little fashion shoot with Sarah’s new clothes, so I booked an afternoon down at The London Road Studio in Gloucester. We had a lot of fun coming up with and creating this surreal image. We didn’t really have a plan, we were just having fun. I can’t remember whose idea it was for her to sit in the chair upside down and I didn’t get the idea to flip the photo upside down until later in post processing.

The set up for this image is actually quite a simple set up with very little post processing. I used a black paper background and a simple two light cross lighting technique. Cross lighting is where you arrange your lights facing each other on either side of your subject diagonally. If you look closely at the image you can see that the light on her face is coming from photo left and the light on her legs is coming from photo right. Also the light on her face is quite a bit softer than the light on her legs, this is because a soft box was used to diffuse the light. The light on her legs is harsher because it’s not diffused and was focused using barn doors. It was originally suppose to be a hair light to light up her hair from the back when she was sitting upright in the chair.

Post processing consisted of darkening the areas of the background where light spilled over onto it; removing part of the chair from behind her back; tweaking curves; and flipping the image upside down.

This is the type of photography I really enjoy doing, where I get to be creative and have a little fun. :-)

Beyond the Lens - A Night Time View of Gloucester Docks

2010-10-07T13:36:00.001+01:00

Written by Tamara Kwan of TammyLynn Photography

Featured on I am Gloucestershire 365's website under FYI Daily Blog on Thursday, 07 October 2010.

This week’s photo was taken at Gloucester Docks at night.

This image was really a test shot. I’d recently purchased the new Canon 5D mark II and wanted to test and push its limits. I happened to be attending an evening class with The GMG this night and I thought what better place and time to test my new camera’s abilities than at Gloucester Docks. It was quite dark by the time class had finished and I was thankful I’d thought to bring my tripod. After a little walk around the docks I found this lovely view of a tall ship. I set my tripod up, positioned my camera for the best composition. In this case loosely using the rule of thirds and placing the boats in the photograph accordingly. The lens I used was the Canon 24-70mm 2.8.

I took several shots using several different settings, starting off with an ISO of 200 at f9 for 30 seconds. As it was quite dark I had to turn off the auto focus and manually focus as the auto focus doesn’t function well in really low light. At first glance it was a lovely image with lovely light and colour but on closer inspection the ships and the sky were quite blurry as it was windy. So I increased the shutter speed to 3.2 seconds and the put the ISO up to 3200, leaving the aperture at f9. This gave me a much more pleasing sharper image and I was really amazed at the lack of digital noise in the image. The image above has had no post processing done to it, it’s virtually strait out of the camera. The result is a lovely bright image with fine detail and beautiful colour, amazing as it was quite dark out at the time. I’m thoroughly impressed with my results and with my new camera. J

Pancakes!

2010-06-06T18:37:00.001+01:00

I make pancakes most weekends. Back in the states I used to buy a mix, couldn't find mix here in the UK so started experimenting and making my own from scratch. Don't care much for the mix now! :-D

Here's how I make my pancakes:
First I gather all the ingredients.

These are my ingredients for breakfast for two...three pancakes each.

1 cup all-purpose flour (I like to sift mine, makes fluffier pancakes.)
2 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg (preferably large)
2 tablespoons melted butter (can use vegetable oil as well)
150 - 175 ml milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional)
blueberries (optional)

I mix all the dry ingredients in the bowl and all the wet ingredients in the large measuring cup (or small bowl). Then I pour the wet mix in with the dry mix and blend until all is wet, being careful not to over mix.

Then I use a ladle to spoon mix onto a hot non stick pan sprayed with Pam non stick spray. (Until recently I was using a cast iron pan which was great, but required more oil) I start off at medium high heat then turn down to medium after the first batch is in the pan. You want it hot but you don't want to cook them too fast.

I then quickly poke blueberries into the batter in the pan. If these had been small blueberries I'd added them to the mix, but as these were great big juicy ones I added them in the pan.

When they start to bubble is when it's time to flip them over. You'll have to watch closely to see when they are done. Won't take long after you flip.

They should be a lovely light golden brown underneath when you flip. Mine here are a bit darker than that but are fine. I was too busy trying to photograph them. :-D

After they are done I store them in a pot with a lit on the stove next to the pan I'm cooking in to keep them warm while the others are cooking. When all is done we like to pour a bit of Maple Syrup from Canada on them. Yummy!

I really enjoyed photographing food today, think I might do this again. :-)

Night Shot at Gloucester Docks

2010-04-29T00:29:00.001+01:00

I am so in love with my new camera and lens! I had a GMG Social Media Masterclass tonight out at Gloucester Docs, so I took my new camera along with me. After class I ventured out to the docs for a few night shots. I took this image with my new Canon 5D II and 24-70mm 2.8 L lens on a tripod. 3.2 second exposure at f9 with an ISO of 3200 <--that's not a typo! This is practically straight out of the camera. I reduced the size to post on the web and I ran a slight high pass filter over it, which really doesn't show on this small image. Clicking on image should open it up for a bit larger view.

I'm so amazed at the quality of images I get with this camera lens combo. :-D

Quick Test of Canon 5D II, Canon 30D & Olympus E3

2010-04-28T15:55:00.001+01:00

I did a quick test today comparing the three cameras. It's a cloudy dull day sadly, but I gave it a go anyway. I set all the cameras on AWB, 200 ISO, F9 on the AV setting at 70mm on a tripod...letting the camera do the rest. I zoomed in to 100% on each image and cropped 800 x 600 pixels. Because of the different sensor sizes the images won't be exactly the same. I have done no post processing to any of the images, these crops are from the raw images.

First up the Olympus E3 with the 50-200mm 2.8-3.5 lens set at 70mm. (note: properties says 72mm)

Next is the Canon 30D with the 28-135mm 3.5-5.6 IS lens at 70mm:

Last is the Canon 5D II with 24-70mm 2.8 L lens at 70mm:

In hindsight I probably should have done the maths and shot these all at the same focal length. Might do next time, but I did want to see the difference the different size sensors had as well.

First thing I noticed is that there is a big difference in size with the E3, as expected with a 4/3rds sensor. Next thing I noticed is that the clarity with the 5D II and 24-70 lens was much clearer and quite a bit more detail than the others.

More test to come.

New Baby!

2010-04-27T11:28:00.000+01:00

My new baby has arrived!

This is soooo exciting! Let's open the box!

Well it's definitely packed well. Thanks Dave @ LCE Canon Pro shop in Lincoln! :-D

I also a couple extras.

oohhh sexy, I love how the memory card matches the camera box. :-D Let's look in the big box now!

What I see first is my new lens! YaY! Can't wait to try it out. My friend and business partner Damon has this lens and it's supper fast and supper sharp. :-D

All my new toys! Let's open them! :-D

Camera box first...

Quick, charge that battery!!! Excuse me a minute while I go plug it in. ......

OK, now the lens... Ohhh what's that on top?

oohhh it's a lens case! Cool. :-D

YaY! My new toys! Can't wait for battery to get charged! I want to play!

New baby with lens... Battery still charging. Guess I'd better get some work done while I wait. Maybe it will be fully charged by lunch time. :-D

The London Road Studio Ltd...The Start...

2010-02-22T16:32:00.002Z

It's been an incredibly busy year so far. Actually it started being busy last year. I'm getting more and more work as a photographer which is absolutely fab. Love it! Also been busy building a photography studio with fellow photog Damon. We've started up a limited company in Gloucester on London Road and named it The London Road Studio! :-D Exciting stuff this and can't wait for it to get finished. We ran into a bit of trouble with a supplier which has held up our progression, but we are nearly over that and moving on quite swiftly now.

Here are some then and now pics to show some of our progress so far.

Before view from wall by the side door then:

Now view from Side door now: (not exactly same angle)

Podium now gone, walls of dressing room erected in it's place.

Before view from other side of the room, towards the side door, showing podium and doors to two toilets.

view today, podium gone, dressing room in it's place. Dressing room has private toilet. :-)

Before view of wall that Damon tore down and moved back to make room for corner cove shooting stage.

Now view with wall gone and frame for new wall further back in place.

View of middle room that no longer exist:

Before view of back room/office:

View now of new office to be:

Before view of other side of the room:

View now...not finished:

Coffee with a couple of photog friends. :-)

Link to website: http://www.thelondonroadstudio.co.uk/ Not much there yet, working on it. :-)

Major work to do now is revamp the restrooms and build the stage, then there will be a painting frenzy! :-D

Must write in Blog more....

2009-10-17T11:45:00.000+01:00

Wow, it's been a while since I've written in here. Shame really I've had lots going on that I could be writing about. Funny that, when I've got time to write stuff there's nothing going on I want to write about. C'est La Vie. :-)

12-July-09 Cycling with the Wheelers

2009-07-13T09:20:00.004+01:00

We went cycling with the Stonehouse Wheelers yesterday. It was a picnic ride and not to be missed. I almost did miss it though, as it was a double hilly ride and I wasn't feeling well that morning. I just didn't think I could survive cycling down and then up and out of the valley, but I didn't want to miss the picnic. I went anyway, grumbling all the way to the starting point. To myself mostly, though I do think Peter sensed my desire not to be there.

The ride started strait up hill and I was thinking, oh dear, what have I gotten myself into. I knew this hill, it's a long hard climb up out of the valley then across the windy top. I got off to a great start in the wrong gear! Had to stop and set my gears as the hill was too steep to set them while cycling. I had to get off and walk a couple of times but I made it! At the top was the ice-cream van as expected and Peter treated me to a fruit pop. At this point I noticed what a beautiful day it had turned out to be. I thought for sure we'd be rained upon and I didn't bring my camera. I was really wishing I'd brought it now.

After a short rest we took off again. I think Bill, our leader, was hunting for more hills to climb as he sure was finding them! The downhill bits were fun though. :-D

We finally made it to the picnic spot and everyone got comfy, some pulling out picnic blankets and everyone pulling out food to eat and share. We got our picnic blanket out and set up our little picnic. We brought sandwiches for us and enough fruit to share. We also brought a couple of plastic wine glasses to drink some Pimms in, which amused everyone. Others brought home made cakes and biscuits (cookies) to share. A few brought out flask filled with hot tea, they must have their tea! :-D

After a bite to eat some of us went off to explore an old abandoned church that was near by. I always find places like this fascinating, so much so that I risked the sting of stinging nettles against my legs to get a closer look, both legs taking a hit. Again I wish I'd brought my camera! The grounds were all grown up and the church all boarded up. It was quite an old church and it was a bit in ruin. Around the backside of the church we found a window that wasn't boarded up that we could peak inside. There was no glass in the window and it had bars and wire like stuff across it. Oh and Crime Scene tape! I peaked into the church through the window and waited for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Too bad I hadn't brought a torch (flash light) with me! Couldn't see much, looked like it was being used to store junk. Will definitely have to investigate and see if I can't locate who's got the key to the place, I'd love to go back for further investigation and photo taking. Did I mention the place was for sale? Anyone wanna buy an old church with me? Complete with cemetery?! :-D

Back on the road our leader felt the need to find a few more hills for us to climb. Luckily he couldn't find any huge ones as we were already quite high up. The decent down into the valley was oh so fun! It didn't take us long to get back home. Well for most people that is, we still had a hill to climb! Oh the joys of living up on the side of the Valley, at least the view is worth it. ;-)

How to use the High Pass filter for Sharpening

2009-07-11T09:12:00.008+01:00

As with anything in the photo editing world, there are many different ways to do something. This is how I use the High pass filter for sharpening....

-First open up your image in Photoshop.
File>Open or drag and drop image into PS.
-Make a duplicate background layer.
Layer>Duplicate Layer or right click on background layer>Duplicate Layer.
-With Background Copy selected change layer properties from Normal to Overlay.

Don't panic! You will see a change in your image, ignore that for now, it is only temporary, I promise.

-With Background Copy selected on your layer's pallet open the High Pass filter tool. Filter>Other>High Pass

-Use the slider at the bottom of the High Pass box to adjust the amount of sharpening that you'd like. I can't give you a figure because every image will be different. With the Preview box checked you can see the results on your images, I recommend zooming in to 100% to see the details of the sharpening. (Ctrl plus =+ key zooms in on PC)
-When desired effect is achieved then press OK. Now you can compare your new background copy with the original background. I recommend comparing full resolution as well as full image. (clicking on the eye in the layer pallet next to the desired layer will turn that layer off and on)
-If you feel you've over done it, don't panic! Just change the Opacity of the background copy layer until you get your desired effect. Some people even recommend over doing it and then adjusting the layer Opacity to suit.

Next you can adjust the lighting effect of your sharpening by changing the layer properties from Overlay to Soft Light or Hard Light or what ever you like in the drop down box.

When you are done editing your photo remember to flatten before saving, unless you are saving as a photoshop document for further editing later.

Sharpening with the High Pass filter

2009-07-10T09:19:00.006+01:00

Sharpening with the High Pass filter in Photoshop is so easy, why I haven't been doing this all along I don't know! Well yea I do, I only just now figured out how to use it. I heard about this High Pass filter thing years ago but never tried it. Now that I have I'm like, WOW, why haven't I been doing this all along?

This High Pass sharpening is also really great if you have any noise in your photo, because it doesn't sharpen the noise like using the UnSharp Mask tool does.

I'll knock up some examples...brb

OK, Here is an image that I just played around with. Might not be the best example but it's the one I wanted to play with. :-)

As you can see in these small photos with the amount of processing I did the difference is subtle. On close inspection there is more noise in the Unsharp Mask one. I decided to push the High pass one to see how far I could push it before there was noticeable noise in the image and it looked over sharpened. This is my result:

I couldn't get this sharp an image from the above file with the unsharp mask filter without a lot of noise and a bit of distortion. I'm quite impressed with the High Pass way of sharpening images and will be investigating further.

Next I'll explain how I used the High Pass Filter.

Blogging time Again! :-D

2009-07-09T10:46:00.000+01:00

I'm gearing up to start blogging again. I've started off by discovering how to make the blogging page wider so that I can add larger photos than before. :-D

Now I need to go find some photos to add. How about I start with this photo of my daughter Sarah that I recently took on a trip to the States. I miss my baby.

Hey it worked! Cool beans. :-D

Happy New Year! 2009!

2009-01-01T10:19:00.001Z

I spent New Years day doing a photoshoot with my two beautiful daughters. I can't think of a better way to start off the New Year! :-D Here are some of my favourites from today.

This is absolutely my favourite shot.

Saul Junction Rendezvous

2008-12-28T12:06:00.000Z

Today I rounded up the kids and drove them out to Saul Junction to meet the Stonehouse Wheelers for tea. I would have normally cycled with them but I wanted to spend the day with Sarah, oh and it was freezing out! The kids had fun though, I fed them lunch at the cafe and we chatted with the cycle club then we went out and fed the swans, ducks and geese some bread we had brought for them.

It was much too cold to pose for photos but I managed a couple of shots of the kids having fun on the bridge.

And one of the colourful Sunset.

The Christmas Holidays

2008-12-27T10:02:00.000Z

December 20th - 27th 2008

The Christmas Holidays! YaY! YaY because we got to have my daughter Sarah for two weeks! Sadly we all took turns being sick during her visit...and we are still taking turns! That aside we really enjoyed being around each other and I couldn't get enough of my baby girls. Well I geuss they aren't babies anymore at the ages of 16 and 18, but they always will be to me. The only real bad part was that I didn't take many photos, so unlike me!

Sarah arrived from the States sick, bless her heart she gets sick so easily. She passed it on to me and Alyssa got it towards the end. Sarah spent a lot of her first two days here in bed, bless her heart. Part of that time I took Alyssa Christmas shopping, I so hated leaving Sarah at home but she really only wanted to stay in bed and sleep, and I didn't blame her. Wish now I'd said to heck with Christmas shopping, I'm staying in bed with Sarah! :-D

One day when Alyssa was working and Sarah was feeling good, I took Sarah shopping and to meet some friends of mine in Gloucester. Damon and Jen run an animal rescue and dog walking service and we met them in the park. Sarah absolutely loved playing with the dogs and we all had a good time. Here are a couple of photos from that day that I took of my lovely daughter Sarah.

Not sure if I like the Colour version or the Mono version of this photo, I think I'm leaning more towards the Colour version.
Definately liked the Mono version of the photo below so I only posted the one.
Sarah absolutely loves animals and really enjoyed herself with the dogs. We had lots of shopping planned but Sarah was having such a good time that I just let her have fun. I was really enjoying watching her as well. :-)

Just before Christmas I decided to show off some kick boxing moves that I had learned years and years ago. Unfortunately I'm not as young as I used to be and my body let me know it the next morning! I spent the rest of the Christmas holidays with quite a bit of pain in my shoulder. I didn't let it totally ruin things though and I was determined for everyone to have a good time. I still managed to cook a huge Christmas meal with the girls help and we all still had a lovely time. I just didn't take any photos, which I'm sure everyone was actually happy about! :-D I did manage one batch of Christmas fudge, which didn't last long! But I didn't manage any of my Christmas Divinity this year. I was just too busy enjoying my family. :-)

This year for the Christmas Crackers we got the kind that you filled up yourself, and I had fun finding little gifts to fit inside for everyone. Those were the best crackers we've ever had! We must do this again next year! :-D

My highlights for Christmas day were....watching the girls open their presents. I love making them smile. The presents weren't much, just cheap stuff as I didn't have much to spend on them, but their faces just lit up and they were full of hugs for me. Their best present came from Peter who gave them each an £80 clothes shopping spree! That was just as much a gift for me as well as them as I like nothing better than taking the girls clothes shopping! :-D He did say there was a condition that went along with this shopping spree though, and that was that we didn't make him go with us!! :-D

My Mom and Dad sent us each a lovely sweater and lots of our favourite chocolate treats from the States that we can't get over here. These included Turtles, Butterfingers, Chocolate Covered Cherries and Kisses! Thank You Thank You Mom and Dad!! XOXOXOXOXOX

Peter got a new bike helmet, a Dr. Who poster and a coffee maker from the girls. Lots of lego, a fun new aprin, magnetic spice rack...and I can't remember what else.... a bunch of little stuff from me. :-D

Sarah got me some books from one of my favourite Authors and a lovely new bike helmet and Alyssa got me a much needed tripod bag. I wasn't expecting much from Peter as I thought we had decieded not to spend much on Christmas presents for each other, and we usualy don't anyway. So when I opened my present from him, I started crying before I fully unwrapped it. He got me a new flash gun for my Olympus camera, the FL-50R. He couldn't have gotten me a better gift or suprised me any more. He just totaly blew me away. He's good at doing that. ;-)

We spent the rest of the holidays just enjoying each other, watching movies and playing games at the dinning table. I wish it all didn't have to end.

Sugar Cubes & Spud Guns

2008-12-19T10:24:00.000Z

Yesterday I received a request for a photo of a couple of sugar cubes to be used in an article of some kind. This is a paying job! I was like, 'OH WoW, this is going to be the easiest money I've ever earned!' Oh Boy I was so excited! Oh BOY was I ever wrong!!! You see, the sugar cubes had to be on a white background, and they had to stand out. The sugar cubes are white as well. This was not an easy task and it took me all day to get a shot, and then I had to do some Photoshop trickery on it to make them stand out. I should have done that to begin with I reckon, but I wanted to get it right in the camera. I can be so stubborn sometimes. :-D I tell ya, I learned a lot about lighting today!

My set up was a light cube tent on a small table. I used two different cameras with different lenses, a Canon 30D and an Olympus E-3. Two studio lights on either side at different angles. A Canon 580ex Flashgun inside the tent with a slave eye attached and aimed at the background to make it white. I can't tell you the exact set up of all the lights as I took so many photos and rearanged the lights so much that I don't really know what the set up was on the shot that worked the best. I'm pretty sure that I had one light from direct left and the light on the background from the right and slightly behind the cubes. I gave up on the second studio light as there just wasn't enough contrast and definition in my shots with it. The biggest problem was the light shinning through the cubes making them as bright and white as the background. This has been my most difficult assignment or project to date! But it was fun and I learned a lot.

Here is my final result: (Camera: Canon 30D, Lens: Canon 28-135mm IS macro lens)
Here are my sugar cubes in action, on the Contents page:
And again in an article on page 34:
Now I need to send them an invoice and get paid! :-D

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Tonight was MRG's anual Christmas Dinner. My husband works for MRG and they always treat us to a lovely meal and a bit of fun. We all bring a £5 gift and then later draw numbers to see which gift we get. One year I got my own gift which was funny. I would have been happy with my own gift this year as well as it was chocolates! Everyone loves chocolates. Well except my Mom, and I never understood that. Most people try to bring funny or embaressing gifts for people to open. This year I got a nice keyring, which I don't need so I'll probably give it away. Peter (my husband) and this other guy got a spud gun!! With a potato attached! This lovely pub restraunt will never have us back! These two grown men spent the rest of the evening loading their spud guns with bits of potato and shooting them accross the room! I so wish I'd brought my camera now. I usualy do, don't know what possessed me! Maybe it was shooting sugar cubes all day. hhmm.

Happy Birthday Peter Baby!

2008-12-17T23:12:00.000Z

Today was my husband Peter's birthday. We celebrated by going to a local pub for lunch together. I then surprised him with a card, present and a cake after work. What I got him was a very nice radio controlled helicopter. Yes he's just a big kid at heart. :-)

Wish I'd thought to get my camera out earlier when he was flying it. Well attempting to fly it. It's quite a complicated thing and he's going to have to practice lots and lots. Should keep him out of trouble for a while. :-D Anyway, wish I'd photographed him with it in the air. He's run the battery down now so it's busy charging. I'll try to get a shot of it and him tomorrow and post it.

A good bit of the time that he was practicing with it I was out playing Taxi with Alyssa and two of her friends. They've started up a band and need transportation to and from each other's houses for practice. It's quite difficult with all the instruments and amps and kit they all have. They have their first gig this Saturday and I'm going to miss it!!! They promise to video record it though so I'm looking forward to seeing that. Peter and I will be traveling to London to pick up Sarah from the airport. She doesn't land until o-dark-thirty Sunday morning but we need to travel up the day before to make the trip easier and we thought we'd get some Christmas shopping in along the way.

Mag request & Chirstmas Cheer

2008-12-15T19:18:00.000Z

Today I was asked to write an itsy bitsy teeny little piece for a magazine on my involvement with the BBC Gloucestershire 24 Hour Project. Well first Chris from the BBC contacted me and said that he'd been contacted by this magazine about the project and that they wanted to do a piece on it. He asked if I might be interested in having the magazine contact me. I said sure and then they did. How cool is that?!! :-D So I wrote a little piece and sent them some screen shots and offered the originals. All of this is in relation to a new Camera Club section in the mag. I've not heard back but Should be out first of the year. I'll keep you posted on the publication. ;-)

Here is another screen shot from the BBC Gloucestershire 24 Hour Project

***************************************************************************

I made this Christmas greeting for everyone today, even trying to make cards out of it. I took the photos in a local church in Stroud. I hope everyone has a lovely Holiday with family and friends.

A Christmas Lunch with Cyclist

2008-12-14T20:42:00.000Z

Yesterday, Saturday, we went to visit a friend to collect a couple of free standing book shelves. We wound up staying the afternoon and Peter built three free standing book shelves for her then we collected the two we came to collect. We also came away with a small bedside lamp and a keyboard with stand. We are going to pay her for the keyboard even though she tried to give it to us for all the help with the book shelves. Peter didn't want payment for building the shelves, what else are friends for? :-)

Today was the joint Christmas Lunch with the Stonehouse Wheelers and the Stroud Valleys Cycling Club. I got up a bit late and had so much to do that I missed the start of the ride, so I stayed behind and finished up what I was doing then drove to the Pub for lunch with the clubs. Was best anyway as I had so much to carry. Lots of people were expecting me to show up with the Club Calendars for them to buy. We had a lovely meal and a lovely time. Sadly I didn't take my camera so I have no photos to show. I should have taken it though, there were several others there with cameras, two even had DSLRs. Oh well, next time. :-p

Tomorrow Peter will be off working in London again. I'm so tempted to try and tag along. I'd like a day Christmas shopping in London, but it would cost around £50 for a train ticket for me. Why does everything have to be so expensive?!! Never mind, we will be traveling up to London on Saturday so we can be at the airport early Sunday morning to pick up my daughter Sarah. YaY!!! I can't wait to see her. My baby is 16 now, so hard to believe!

Here is a photo of my two beautiful daughters from last Christmas:

Photo Shoot with Lorca Simons

2008-12-12T23:30:00.000Z

Today I had a fantastic time on a photo shoot with Lorca Simons. She's an actress living here in the Gloucestershire area and she's from Texas! :-D It's nice to have an American friend living near by. Anyway, I went to her house today and took all my studio equipment and we had a photo shoot. We had lots of fun and I think it went pretty well, but of course I thought of lots of ways I wish I'd asked her to pose after I got back home. Oh well, save it for next time. :-) Here are a few of my favourite shots from today of Lorca:

I really enjoyed this photos shoot with Lorca and I hope she will do another one with me again soon. I need more practice talking with and encouraging models in front of my camera. :-)

For the photographers out there this shoot was done with two studio lights, a reflector and natural light through a window. I set one light with a light box in front of her and slightly to my left. The other light, in the back and to my right, I aimed close to the ceiling near the back wall so that the light would bounce onto the back of her head and separate her from the background. I know a snoot would be better but I don't have one and this worked fine I think. There was a large window to my left so I placed a large silver reflector to my right and down low aiming the natural light towards Lorca. The black background is a large piece of black velvet and the white/grayish background is Lorca's bright white walls. I used a light meter to adjust the lighting to around an f stop of around 8. I say around 8 because I changed it a couple of times. With this set up I had to do very little post processing on the photos which saves me loads of time. It's so much better getting it right in the camera. :-)

More Glos 24 & Carols at Teckels

2008-12-11T06:36:00.000Z

This morning I got up and took one last photo for the Gloucestershire 24 project. It ended at 8am this morning. Here is a screen shot of my last image up on the BBC website:

I had the radio on this morning listening to the local radio station, BBC Radio Gloucestershire, and I heard them say that later they were going to talk to Chris about the 24 Gloucestershire Hours project, so I tuned in. What did I hear? Well it started off like this: "Chris Sandy's here from BBC's Gloucestershires website to tell us more, hello Chris." "Yes I am here to tell you more, I'm here to tell you about Tammy from Rodborough in Stroud. Because she was one of our devoted online users yesterday who literally played the game 100% and sent in a picture every hour that she was awake." I was stunned to hear my name! WoW! They talked about the project for a minute then continued talking about the shots I sent in. They talked about every one of them and followed my day. :-D You can listen to it for the next few days on the BBC Gloucestershire's Click of the Day webpage here: Wednesday 10th December and looking for the 'listen: 24 >' link. Here is a screen shot of the page:

How cool is that?! I'm Click of the Day! :-D (Yes that's a photo of me up there!)I have a copy of the radio program that my husband Peter copied while at work. I'll try and put that on the web somewhere to listen to when the link above becomes inactive.

*********************************************************

In the evening was Teckels Animal Sanctuaries Annual Christmas Fair. Damon Cannard Pet Photographer and Jenny Cole both of Noah's Ark Pet Care and Animal Rescue said Teckels were in need of carollers so I volunteered to round up a few carollers for the event again this year. I put the word out but wasn't able to round up many and the people that did say they'd come all backed out at the last minute. So kudos go to my daughter Alyssa and her friend Merry for putting together some songs and music for the event and getting up there and singing for everyone. Way to go girls! I even heard they gave Santa a personal serenade of 'Santa Baby'!! Oh man wish I'd seen that!! Peter also came along and brought his keyboard and played a few Christmas tunes for us. We all had lots of fun, even though we were nearly frozen solid by the end of it! :-D

Above is Alyssa and Merry singing Christmas Carols with Peter in the background on his keyboard.

Above is Jenny and Damon with Noah's Ark Pet Care and Animal Rescue. Beautiful people with big hearts.

BBC Gloucestershire's 24 Project

2008-12-10T06:34:00.000Z

Today I participated in the BBC Gloucestershire's 24 Photos project where the public was asked to take a photograph of what they are doing for ever hour of the day that we were awake and send it in. They divided the photos up by the hour and put them in galleries. I sent in a total of 15 photos for this. Was much harder than I thought it would be! But it was loads of fun and I'm glad I did it. It started at 8am this morning and went until 8am Wednesday morning. It didn't really show what my typical day was like as I was busy most of the time processing and sending the photos in! But it is a random snap shot of my life.

You can see the project here: 24 Gloucestershire Hours

You will see my photographs in the various galleries through out the day. If you like you can view the photos that I sent in along with my comments on my flickr account here: BBC 24 Hour Project

Here are a couple of screen shots of my entries to give you an idea what it is like:

Annual Cycle Carol Service in Cam

2008-12-08T06:21:00.000Z

Today was the annual Cycle Carol Service at St. George's Church in Cam. I didn't take my camera so I don't have any photos from the day. **kicking self** We did have a lovely day though, starting with an early bike ride to the Cam Memorial Hall for hot water and then on to the Church to practice before the Service started. Sue and I cycled with Peter so that we'd get their ahead of our cycle club which was cycling a bit later. It was a freezing cold day and we had to watch out for ice on the roads. It was a lovely bright crisp morning though and I was very tempted to skip out on the service and run away with my camera for the day! But I didn't, I stuck with my husband Peter and the club. :-)

The church was packed full of Cyclist from all over the area. Cycle Clubs that I know were there were The Stonehouse Wheelers, Stroud Valleys CC (CTC), Bristol CTC, Cheltenham CTC, Gloucester City and Swindon CTC. It was a lovely service with our club President Eric Lewis doing a reading on behalf of our club. Also on behalf of our club Peter played the organ for each of the 6 carols and Sue sang a solo. Also there was Nicki on her trumpet from the Stroud Valleys accompanying Peter on the organ. I sat by Peter on his bench at the organ and helped him keep count versus and pulled a few stops for him. It was a lovely service and I enjoyed it.

After the service we all went back to the Cam Memorial Hall for snacks and hot drinks before setting off on our bikes back home. While there I sold a few Stonehouse Wheelers Calendars which we have produced for the past few years. Malcolm Jackson designs the calendars using photos from the club members of the club out cycling. This year, Peter and I were the only ones to submit photos. Here are a few screen shots of the calendar to give you an idea what it's like:

Peter took the above photo, I'm the one in red. :-)

I took the above photo, Peter is the second rider in this shot.

I took the above shot, Peter is second from the left. This was taken at the Clubs 60th Anniversary ride. Inset is a photo that was in the paper from the day.

Andy Rouse Seminar

2008-12-07T06:47:00.000Z

Today was the Andy Rouse 'Visions of Light' Seminar out at Slimbridge WWT from 10am to 5:30pm. I met up with several of my photography friends that I know from the area who went as well. There was Damon the Gloucester Pet Photographer, Stephen founder of the Southern Softies from the DSLR User Forum, Derick (vice Chairman) from the Stroud Camera Club and Liz who is also from the Stroud Camera Club.

What a fantastic day! I thoroughly enjoyed myself and learned loads. Andy Rouse is a great speaker, down to earth and honest. He showed us how he does things and worked on a few of his photos as examples of what he does and explained why he does it. He was a joy and an inspiration to listen too. During the seminar we had a 2 hour break to go out and take photos in the park. Here are a few of my favourite photos from the day that I took:

Stroud Camera Club Christmas Social

2008-12-05T06:27:00.000Z

Tonight was the Stroud Camera Club Christmas Social. I baked a chocolate cake and took in which everyone enjoyed. Well they said they enjoyed it anyway. :-D Wish I took a photo of it as I think it looked better than it actually was. ;-) I really enjoyed the evening and there were two fun contest. The first was a Humour photo comp and I entered this shot:
I didn't win but it got a few chuckles. :-) In the photo above are my Mom and Dad and my daughter Alyssa.

New Year's Resolutions

2008-12-04T10:53:00.001Z

Look at me!!! Typing in my blog for the third day in a row! :-D

Anyone else thinking about next year already? I am. What am I going to do next year? What do I want to do differently next year? What do I want to accomplish? What do I want to change about myself? So many things to think about. Lord knows there's lots to improve upon! So many things to do! Could be an exciting year. :-D <---there I go again, with those dang smiley faces. :-D

New Year's Resolution List....work in progress...

Must not be late any more! I'm always late. I think it's in my genes. :-p
Must loose weight. I really must. Not because I'm vain, but because I want to be healthy and mobile. I'm no spring chicken anymore! :-)
Must finish projects that I start. I've got several in the works now.
Must work on Photography Portfolio. Maybe even make a book of my work. That would be cool to have.
Must work on new Tutorials for my Tutorial pages. I've only made one and from that received several request for more! So I'd really like to do more. I really enjoyed making it.
Must get out with my camera more.
Must get out with both cycle clubs more, would help with number 2 above. :-D
Must do more with my photographs.
Must work on this list later, work to get done today!

Stroud Camera Club Christmas Social tonight, and I'm baking a cake for it. I have some photographs to get ready for the club for upcoming competitions that need to be turned in tonight. I'm sure there is lots of other stuff I need to do as well, better go find out what they are. :-D

Until next time...

Carols and a Photo Competiton

2008-12-03T14:29:00.000Z

Last night was practice for the up coming annual Cycle Carol Service in Cam. Peter is playing the organ this year with Nicki accompanying him on her trumpet and Sue leading the chorus and singing a solo. They came over last night to practice and it was great fun. Mark also came by and stayed for the singing and my daughter couldn't resist joining in as well. She even got her drum kit out and played along. I can't sing so I provided the cakes and mulled wine and coffee for everyone. Was loads of fun, we should do this more often. :-D

This Saturday I'm going to a Visions of Light Seminar with Andy Rouse at Slimbridge WWT. Should be very interesting and loads of fun so I'm looking forward to it. Before the day there is a photo competition we can enter with the winner being announced on the day. Today was the last day to enter and I really struggled with finding an entry. The topic was 'Visions of Light' so the main subject had to be light. It also had to be a photo with very little done to it, no fancy editing in other words. I wanted to take a fresh photo for this but the weather and my spare time did not cooperate, so I wound up trudging through past photos and came up with this one.

You can see it larger on my flickr page by clicking HERE. It was really late last night when I entered it and this morning I'm thinking why?!! I wish I kept looking a bit further. It's a nice photo of a rainbow, but it doesn't say WoW to me. So it most likely won't say WoW to the judge either, especially with all the other great awe inspiring photos that have been entered so far. Oh well, it's just a bit of fun. I'm still looking forward to the seminar. :-)

Hey got our first Christmas Card today!!! All the way from Texas to Stroud England! :-D But now I feel bad because I've not got our Christmas cards sorted yet! I'd better get on that ASAP! But first I've got a bunch of other things to get done today so I'd better get to it. Laterz! :-D

Must Try Harder :-D

2008-12-02T08:45:00.000Z

I'd really like to make a go at this blog thing and have it be apart of my website. I must try harder. :-D

The thing is I have so much on my plate right now, and I make it worse by avoiding things. I guess you could say I'm making it worse now by typing this. Or maybe it's just because I know I do my best work under pressure. Or maybe it's just because I've got Adult Attention Deficit Disorder and I'm easily side tracked. :-D <---I also type way too many of these! I've deleted 3 or 4 since I started typing this. You'd think I was some over enthusiastic teenage cheerleader or something. :-D

What am I up to today? Let's see...

Tonight we have friends from the cycle clubs coming around to sing carols around the organ. It's a warm up for this Sunday's Annual Cycle Club Service where Cycle Clubs from all over the region gather for this event. Peter, my husband, will be playing the organ again this year for this. I usually sit with him and help count verses and pull a few stops for him. Mainly it's an excuse for me not to have to sing. Trust me, you don't want to hear me sing. :-D Anyway, tonight people are coming around so I must tidy up the house and go shopping because they will want tea and coffee and mulled wine and cakes and so on. I actually enjoy all this and love it when people come around. Peter enjoys it too as the house gets cleaned up. :-D
I've got some Wheelers business to take care of. I'm the secretary of the Stonehouse Wheelers Cycle Club, in case you didn't know or didn't remember. I've got to get some stuff in the post for them and errands to run as well.
I've got a deadline to meet for a Photographic Competition. This one is part of Andy Rouse's 'Visions of Light' seminar that I'm attending next Sunday. I'm really excited about it and looking forward to it. I've got one more day to enter something in the competition. Hopefully I'll have something to enter before I go to bed tonight. Wish me luck!
I've also got to get ready for Thursday's Stroud Camera Club meeting. It's their annual Christmas gathering and I've got to bring a cake and get some images ready to enter in a fun competition. Probably some other stuff too that I can't think of right now.
TAXES!!! **deep breaths now** I will do my taxes; I will do my taxes...soon. I promise.
Stonehouse Wheelers Calendars...I must make some more for tonight. Malcolm, our Runs Secretary designs the calendars, using photos submitted to him by the club, and me and Peter produce them. Peter is responsible for printing and I'm responsible for binding them. YaY fun! :-D This year Peter and I were the only ones who turned in any photos. Poor Malcolm.

Well my coffee is cold now, time to nuke it and get some work done. **looks outside** Darn it's another grey day. I was hoping to take a walk down to the river and maybe get some lovely shots of the sunlight coming through the trees and reflecting on the water for my 'Visions of Light' photo. Guess I'll be looking through my archives tonight.

Now, where did I hide the envelopes?

I'm sure I've done this before...

2008-07-03T09:29:00.000+01:00

I'm sure I've done this before....but here we go again. :-D