HARBOURING COLOUR - SKYWATCH

Set camera phasers to stun

All to easy to grab the pretty sunsets and sun ups when you live coastal to glean those "ooh ah stunning" comments. Well my poor little harbour has been neglected lately because of this laziness on my part. Ramsey Harbour is a wealth of colour, textures, layers and of course cranes. Am I the only one who likes a crane looming over the skyline? Possibly. A little slice of working dockside life then but how come the colours are so vivid for an industrial scene. It's all to do with your helpful little camera and it's setting, one's you may not even be aware you have. Shut up as tell us then you ask.



Obviously not all cameras from point and shoot to the big guns all singing dancing many lens ones have the same features but you might find yours has. Firstly you will need a manual setting mode switched on. Be brave try it. Next look around for these thing in your menu- sharp, vivid, saturate, etc or variations on those themes. These are different to your weather setting - cloudy, sunny, shade, etc.For this image I wanted to pick up the orange green and yellow bits and still keep the blue/lilac of the sky. For this I set the camera to vivid. This meant that the white stays white not bleaches so the clouds are white and not bleed into the colour part of the sky. The sky colour reflected in the water remains and doesn't lose out either. The hints of yellow, green and orange are picked up by the vivid mode without over egging them, just retaining the colour. As there was a slight haze I decided against using the sharp which can give harsh lines to retain the natural hazy feel to the building rooftops and the lighthouse far left keeping the sharp natural focus on the foreground. Ok there is slightly more to it than this. Seeing the scene in the first place and of course no amount of "magic buttons" on your camera can compensate for you if you know naff all about composition and chop the heads off (figuratively speaking) your nearest and dearest or can't keep a camera straight. That one's down to you.



Hoe you got all that.

SIDECAR AT THE TT - ABC

Note the dragon logo

Well if nothing else goes right at least I'm on the right letter of the alphabet this week after the fiasco of r's and q's being all at sea. Sea! Now there is an image I could have had for S but as you'll all probably at little sick(should that be seasick?) of my meandering along the beach scenes I've dragged out a timely S

S for soon will on my fair isle(no not that Fair Isle that's the knitting one ) will be welcoming bikers to our humble shores here, spying the sidecar above . This particular image is from the 2nd lap. Don't try this at home unless you have a decent camera, lens, right equipment, quick fingers, steady hand(tripod for the inexperienced advisable) and years of know how. You know how I always advocate a point and shoot can do a great job, well not here due to the speed. You will need the big guns camera( to handle the top flight speeds) and you will need to be 100% accurate, ie complete focus, no drop out etc if you are selling. Magazines need enormous file sizes too, which are totally unforgiving if you are out in anyway. All shows when you blow up the image. So if you just want a few snapshots and keepsakes carry on with what you have and have fun. If you want to jump into my shoes take 5 years out to play at being a photographer, a lottery win to support you and buy the equipment, starve for your art, practice become, have innate natural ability be zen perfect then... find out that someone like me has already nabbed the best bookings.

Bank holiday laptop blues -

Grey Day

Monochrome Weekly

My World

I know I skipped a few days again. Friday night. So why the delay in posting? My psycho laptop( yes the relatively new laptop) has suddenly lost/mislaid/dumped wireless broadband connection. Very annoying. Means choices are sitting in the hall plugged into the the laptop( the Internet plugged in not me obviously) or borrow G's when he is not on it. So a long wait then. Like er two whole days. So today you have the first image I came across in black and white because I really don't won't to spend Bank Holiday Weekend wading through images. guess


Did you say the beach? Well it is an island I live on and we do sort of have er a lot of them. This would be the Mooragh beach. Remember the week on the beach we had. Remember how it pis... er persisted down with precipitation. Well here is one of those rainy grainy images, taken with the tiny point and shoot and not the big all singing dancing Nikon. Nikon is far too sensitive and isn't allowed out in the rain, little point and shoot is. Looks like I wasn't the only one out and about at least one man and his dog braving the elements. For the colour, sunny, stages of the beach clickety click the colours below.


Beach 1
Beach 2
Beach3
Beach 4
Rocks

Going to get some soothing ice cream and scream at my laptop until it complies. I may be a while. . Now pass me a very big spoon and a bottomless pit of the cold stuff. My needs are greater I cannot share today.

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.

CANNES YOU BELIEVE BABOOSHKA WAS NOT INVITED!

Click image it's huge.

Well now I hope that title got your attention. A scandal has befallen these shores. I will be seeking solace in a strong black coffee and trying to stay calm. Why you ask well read on.



You all know how I just love the South of France, the Riviera. You have read of my wish to be that away. Well I am hyperventilating at the scandalous news. A yacht was hired and certain people to represent the Isle of Man film industry at the Cannes Film Festival...... paid for by the tax payer to the tune of... a helluva lot of pennies. Now this has caused lots of letters of disgust to the papers and mumblings of "waste of money" etc. Surely though this is not the burning issue? Surely the burning issue is the fact that I was not invited on said yacht to jolly there. Hello look at the blog you idiots, just how many images do you want to show you what a splendiferous film location this is and your cinematographer is here waiting for you. Tour guide at your service! Besides all that.... I missed out on no.

As you can see I have taken the news well. Not a yacht but a boat bobbing on the water, Sorry folks. We don't get many of those luxury yachts here.

RAMSEY RUGBY RELOADED - ABC LETTER R

Another balls up!

As I inadvertently posted a r for a q last week I thought I'd play it safe with a reliable R, boys swinging into action. We have had lots of boys keep swinging recently haven't we on the blog? Just the way the cookie has crumbled. They are the blue shirts, black shorts, and stripey socks by the way. Ssh! Not allowed to name the other team, the away team. Let's just say people on Douglas may know them. I'm actually more of a Football( it's not soccer it's football) but I do think Rugby is a fabulous contact sport to photograph. I can also tell you at least one of those blue shirts went to see Star Trek. How do I know, ah well my sweeties I was with him and G. at that very Star Trek showing.

If you want to see my close up Rugby images and play guess the famous statue pose see links below.


Hand's off it's my ball
Grab
Statue
Run for it
Flags

Bottoms up

Soft Focus

Wonder if anyone else saw the this game?

MY WORLD...... IS A LOAD OF RUBBISH!

Welcome to My world of Rubbish!

Cone Alone!

Trolleycide!

Outboard Motors do not belong in a Nature Reserve!


Now this is real photography!

This is how some idiots choose to treat the island, and these are the images others haven't the guts to show. Get your act together everyone. Let's not have the usual clean of the areas that are only visible to the tourists, but all of it. All I have to say today. You have seen how good the island can look on my blog, but this crap is really p*****g me off when I walk through the nature reserve, a haven for wildlife. This is not the worst. You wouldn't want to see some of the crap and I mean that literally there. Isle of Man Government - it's not just the visable bits that needs a makeover.


I know it looks like an arty social study in the urban landscape staged images, but no for real archive and new and a disgrace don't you think?

I hope your area is a lot cleaner than this.