Birds, bridges, and blue skies - Skywatch

Can you tell what it is yet?


Ramsey Swing Bridge 22 in view

You know what day it is on the blog circuit. Yep! the one where we all crane our necks to get that particular image of the sky above and beyond, lost horizon, or in the clouds. For those in the elusive club though that grace my ever so 'umble blog with your presence we have the other special day. Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more and don't forget the secret handshake. All I can reveal is we are up to number 22(or in the terms of bingo speak two little ducks, whatever that means) of the game we know as 100 images, 1 subject. Or how I am slowly going mad photographing the same metal structure over, and over, and over again from many (so, so, many) different... wait for it perspectives, angles, compositions and of course juxtaposition just to prove a point. The point being it can be done, they can all be individual unique images and you can stay sane. Not actually sure about the last one. So here it is 22, oh so blue, with a bird atop the bridge girders too.



I'm sure the other bridge photos will pop up at bottom of the post for you to compare eventually. If it's skies you're after click here to take you on a mini tour of Skywatch.

August Theme Day - Night

Moonlighting

We are at that time of the month again when a bunch of us select an image to interpret a given theme. This first day of this month the challenge was simply "night." Good for me to experiment with a little midnight moonlighting as opposed to the safer daytime images.Well not quite midnight. I'm not that dedicated. Die hard that I am photographing the extreme, not even I would want to be hanging around an empty harbour quite so late in the evening. I've done this before shooting through the masts early evening with golden sunlight and I find it works well at most hours of the day. I could give you the technical reasons that there is no such thing as moonlight but simply the brightness of the sun hitting the moon to reflect the light but why get bogged down on the science bit. Let's just view the image for what it is, my take on a moonbeam dancing over the river. Would that be a moon river then or a moon dance? Apologises for the low res small image but I have to ward off those that take what does not belong to them. Hope you can still enjoy.

Click here to view thumbnails for all participants


Many more from fellow bloggers participating today. Do pay them a visit if you can, and maybe leave a comment for someone you have never visited before or simply an image that just grabs you. As always I can guarantee you the array of photos will be as individual as the bloggers themselves.


Thanks as always for stopping by.

B is for - boats bobbing along on the beautiful briony sea

Not a toy boat, just cute

It's all the fun of the letter B for abc I'm not knocking myself out to be find another bountiful image, when I simply have to show you one of the very things I am surrounded by here. Blue, blue water and of course and bouncing buoyant boats bobbing along. Actually it wasn't so much bobbing than static due to the fact it was tightly moored. The temptation of course to cut the boats fixings, jump aboard and sail away were overcome by the sensible side. Pity. Such a cute little boat, a sunny day and an island coastline to discover. Not so much anchors aweigh for life on the ocean wave as not today I'm got some work to do. It'll keep.

Are you tempted to set sail in maybe something a little bigger or waters of a different kind? Then dive into the sea of letters of and see how others interpreted the sea and land this week here. I know you think I must have taken off on the boat with the short post, but sadly no just doing stuff as you do and moored to the laptop.

Not virgin territory but mine

A river runs through it

Yes cryptic titles and cloak and dagger shenanigans greet you here for this weeks peek at the sky. It's not the Atlantic of course, just the little biddy Sulby river meandering gently. All we be revealed soon, but not just yet. Before I wade in headlong into unknown waters, or shall we say Virgin territory like the uncharted waters and previously not captured angle above. I need to be as clear and calm as this image. You know a bit of(shall we throw in some annoying corporate speak) blue sky thinking, and bottom fishing for those thinking outside the box. Now if we just add water, get our ducks in a row, behind the curve we may be able to float that balloon and land that plane on the right track.


Relax and wander up the little path on the right into the nature reserve or into town. Up to you which way you go. For me the only way is up, up and away in well possibly a beautiful balloon would be nice, but that is maybe verging on the ridiculous along the still waters of the river. No planes, trains and automobiles for me just plain sailing upstream on a sailboat or maybe a yacht would be nice, destination my own private island at the peak of this image. Now that would be real Virgin territory and not at all original, erm unlike this photo shall we say.



Check out this link here about the blog. It's totally mad and it's not me.

Free again

Free to do as I please

"Where is our blogger" refers to the post below. One of our Bloggers stopped blogging. This was of great concern to the community at the CDP. He is the Tehran Daily Blogger, A of Iran. You see why we were concerned. Our worst fears were confirmed, he had been arrested and detained. We hosted a special day called yesterday. Green images and similar text Last night we had the news confirmed A, had been released, he was free again.


I took this image last week on the beach. Mooragh Promenade just behind me. I sat for about an hour, contemplating how much the light and sea looked just like my favourite place the Cote d'Azur and wishing I was there in the South of France. I laughed at the little dog quicker than it's owner, spotting me. I smiled as the mother and excited child found their perfect spot. It was a glorious day and I was free to do as I please. A blogger in Tehran was not so lucky that day. He did not revel in the sunshine, enjoy a peaceful city, he was not free to do as he pleased. Today we are both free, but I will still have a quiet town, a beautiful beach, the sunshine, and freedom. A in Tehran will have a very different world to mine, his fight goes on but at least today he is free.

Thank you for reading this.

View from a bridge

Never wasting time at the dock of the bay

Yes the blog bandits have been at it again, so if you are viewing on an address that is not the above url, stop . Stop it now. Very naughty. Feel free to contact me and pass on the details of the naughty site whose fingers need to me severely smacked. To calm down I had a walk along the harbour on what had to be the best day of the year so far. The light this week has been incredible. I really do mean pretty damn near bloomin' spectacular, as you can see by the above image. The closest I have ever seen the sea and light to the Cote'd Azur, and you know how much I just lurrrrrrrrrrrrrrve the French Riviera. Just wait 'til you see the beach ones next week. By the way, that strip of land you can see on the horizon is England. It was so clear with a slight heat haze that the blue of the sky and the blue of the sea just melded together perfectly. No post production, manipulation whatsoever which is just how I like it. I am the world's laziest photographer. Give me the light, I'll give you the image, then I can waste more time on the beach contemplating how I get a job in the South of France.

Rebuilding

Under construction

Do you have this in your world. You probably do, or maybe you have never heard of this idea.

See older posts below which explain what Social Housing is see older posts.

THE FULL MONTY SWINGING BRIDGE - SKYWATCH

Twenty Twenty Vision

Ramsey Swing Bridge 20/100

Has it been a whole week and a day since we had "The Cult of Babooshka's Ramsey Swing Bridge"as well? Yes it has and it's about time we had the full monty bridge in all it's natural glory shot. Ooh er, can you handle it. Well as it's obviously not as big as The Golden Gate then I think you can. Good things small packages remember. Gone for a full on view, a frontal peek of the whole arc from the dockside quay. I know a risky angle but I think you can cope. As you can see this is the bridge's blue period and the low light really highlights the glass like shimmer of the water. Not exactly hindered those glistening reflections either. I make that 80 left. Make it stop someone perleeeeeeeasse. For those that know what's going on I will of course continue. For those that don't, how lucky you are.




The water is very blue today isn't it? The light was low which added to the scene.

Black, blue, bare, branches

I love it when a plan comes together

Continuing the experiment of the week. Back to the dreamy images. It's Mooragh Lake as the chosen subject. That ball of white light is actually the sun and this is a day image, late afternoon where the light is fading at this time of year to dusk. Always manual settings. This would not have worked on auto, but a small point and shoot on manual would do a fairly good job. You need to employ manual setting for fading light images as light travels as we know. Auto would just create possibly a blackened image all over or a harsh white on black with no nod to the subtle blue of the lake and no definition of the black silhouetted bare trees branches

Notice the small object just off centre? It's clear to see on the large file that it's a large pebble peeking through. This then is the quandary. The image is as I planned, seamless colours drifting into each other with no harsh lines, but the pebble is clearly defined. If an artist painted this scene they have the option to paint it in or paint it out. I too have that choice with digital wizardry to erase and clone the water creating the overall smooth image. It would be the only alteration. I choose not to thus keeping the image pure as it was taken, what I saw, what was there. That is the way photography is for me. It's what I enjoy best taking the mundane and making in surreal. I like the pebble today, for tomorrow the same scene it may have been displaced and a new fresh unique image can be created. It also gives me a chance to have twice of many photos to sell, pebble in, pebble out. Twice as many names to come with though.

B's today, black, branches, blues, bare, ball(of light) and for me bewitching. You may have your own.

So when I put this for sale what would you title it? Any letter you like. I have the title already.

Just curious to see how others see things and for marketing purposes and would this be best, matt or gloss.