Findingviews

KY Reveries, No.3 (via Lady Vervaine)

Its worth reading the notes on this one at Flickr as the photograph was taken through a home made filter. The result is spooky and rare. Sometimes the best resuls come from the simplest of ideas

Kuwait City (via AdeL AbdeeN «KWS»)

A great city at night shot. The dark of night enhances the city colours and the I like way we get a foreground of tall buidlings that falls away to flattended distance. Its also very 21st century in an 80’s cyberpunk kind of way

I’ve recently produced an abstract pattern and thought it might be interesting to run through the flow of events and processes that led to this particular piece being created.

It all started in on a Sunday afternoon on the Monmouthshire and Brecon canal when I spotted some catkins above my head. The weather was beautiful that day – with a clear blue sky, I took a

photograph using my mobile phone – sadly I didn’t have a good camera available (the battery was in need of a charge). However the final picture I felt was full of potential. So I took a little time to study it. That photograph is on the right. A favourite theme of mine is how the outstretched branches of trees can really look like the system blood vessels and veins in an animal.

Those thoughts got me thinking in sort of laterally fractally kind of way.

If trees can be like veins, and veins when abstracted can look like neurons and these patterns can sort of look like a map.

So plants can be like animals, can be like vascular systems can be like guides to the things we make.

How to show that in an image?

The Connects Pattern

My first step was to put the focus on the shape. That meant getting rid of the sky and simplifyingthings, taking everything right down to its minimum in Photoshop. That looked interesting but wasn’t enough of an image to capture the feeling I wanted. It was a start. I look the pattern I’d created and took a section from it and twisted its orientation onto a new layer in Photoshop. That looked better but was not complete. It was time for a bit of experimentation. Now I was painting with the the shapes in the photograph and I felt an abstract pattern starting to come together. The next step was to take a look at the colours. Taking my map thoughts as an inspiration; I took memories of the colours in the London underground map and started to apply these to the pattern. Things were going the way that  I wanted. It looked bit flat so I rendered in little bits of  lighting on odd parts of the picture.

The final result looked like a map that was bit off its head, a bit like prints of branches, a bit like paint splatter and a bit like something organic and living with odd bits of colour and detail that sort of stand out and make you raise an eyebrow. To me that says complex pattern and I think on reflection I’ve achieved that as I keep finding new shapes hiding in it.

I’ve also marked it up as a T shirt. There’s something slightly retro about this pattern as a T Shirt.

My remote workspace for the day (via jim_moore)

Apples new small tablet.

A photo of a pencil - sketch  a great idea in capturing the concept of a user Interface

Neviges (via falkenlust)

There’s something about these concrete structures that reminds me of a 70’s science fiction story. The worlds we have imagined live in our world, the things we may imagine may live in our world

Wasp (via Coder)

An excellent macro view of the a wasps head. Is it me or does the wasp seem to be asking a question? (lets hope it’s not which is my best side)

small rain (via zen [禅])

It’s that I have a weakness for tilt-shift effects.

This one has good tones and colours. Almost certainly due to taking the shot during rain.

Combining the rain, and tilt - shift is a great idea and the eye gets drawn in to examine an ordinary scene.

Making reality more observable

It was like ‘Alice in Wonderland’ (via Hameem Shakhawat Photography)

A picture from the Himalayas that seems unreal. If you can spot one of these scenes and capture it with the right light you are going to get something special

Foggy Golden Seattle Sunrise (via Cap’n Surly)

The golden tone to the fog and cityscape really make this one. It gives Seattle a strange look of something futuristic and otherwordly

Image via Wikipedia

I run regular community education photography and the two most common problems I see are not understanding what the camera can do, and not understanding what makes a good photograph. The problem with the camera is normally caused by camera handbooks being just impossible to understand for most people. The problem with understanding photographic composition is one of experience and vision.

The problem with learning how your camera works can be fixed surprisingly effectively by working with the person involved, and whilst learning composition is harder you can teach someone to observe and that is the basis of good camera work.

I also know that not everyone can make it to a formal class and that something a little more flexible can be the solution.

To me that looks like a hole to fill in.

That is why I have decided to offer private photography tuition. The concept here is not to put someone into a large class but to work with them and their camera to solve the problems they are facing. Think of it as a small scale workshop, designed specifically to give some one a sense of fun and achievement whilst they are picking up a set of skills that will be useful. Since it is all about practical skills, and all about practice these personal tuition sessions can be be teach more in short time than a course which has a larger syllabus and a class to defer to.

That is why I am doing this – to offer something that is more than a manual, and different to a class. It is a form of focussed coaching designed around the individual.

Should you be interested in this contact me via my photography web site at http://originalrobart.co.uk/default.aspx

If you’re not interested just think for a moment about why I’ve decided to offer this service this way. Perhaps just using this idea as a way of thinking and practicing your photography will help you.