Signs

I have a strange obsession with photographing signs, be they funny, odd, battered and bruised, moving, beautiful or just quite normal.

Somebody doesn't think much of South Yorkshire Police












NaBloPoMo

RedBubble

I have only been using RedBubble for a few months, and wanted to post about it here because it's just lovely! You can upload and sell your own art and t-shirt designs, and buy your own and others' work.

I actually joined because I wanted to create and wear this t-shirt, which I made by editing and inverting the colours on this photo of some stencil art of children playing. But once a redbubble member I really liked the great sense of positivity in the community, and I loved sharing my work, and seeing others' work there.

I need to make my profile page prettier, and aim to do so soon with the help of this fab tutorial.

When you sell your work on there you can choose whether you want to make a profit, and if so, how much. If you buy your own work you just pay the basic RedBubble price. I have bought, and frequently wear, two of my own t-shirt designs - the children playing stencil art on dark background t-shirt, and the Think outside the Box t-shirt. At the same time as making those purchases, I also bought some greetings cards from other members, and two other t-shirts from other members.

One of the immense joys of this is the immense joy that the other members of the site get when you buy their work. And I can back this up from the couple of items of mine that others have bought. When you get that mail, saying one of your items has sold, the feeling is incomparable. Someone wanted a print of your photo, or one of your t-shirts, or an image as a greeting card or canvas, and the feel-good factor is huge!

If you are already a member there, or if you join, do friend me (add me to your watchlist) and I will be happy to do the same back. It all seems to be about the effort you put into your contacts there, and putting the effort in isn't hard work at all! It's about looking at incredible creations by others, and expressing your appreciation. What could be better?!




NaBloPoMo

Children Playing: Stencil Art

Taken just off Division Street in Sheffield. The wall is regularly painted over to get rid of graffiti, but they paint around the good bits :)

Park Benches

In No Particular Order.

Gosh it's been a while. Thought I'd update with some new 'fames at last'.

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Luca published this photo on the Un titled to see! blog.

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NowPublic.com requested use of this image to illustrate their Marijuana use shrinks brain article.

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Trusted Places blog used this image of a subverted traffic sign in Sheffield city centre to illustrate their article about National Vegetarian Week.

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Nowpublic.com again, requested use of these 4 playing cards images to illustrate their article, Ohio man could go to jail for cheating in a church BlackJack game.

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Ava used this photo, The Cat's Whiskers, on her cat photoblog.

More to follow...

More Orton Effect

I've been doing some more playing with the Orton Effect, and the picture above in particular has had some really good feedback. I like the effect and want to try it on different types of photos, as well as floral and pretty ones.

Classical Art Colour Match

This colour-match tutorial states,

Adjusting your photographs to get the color 'just right' can be a chore. Think about this: The Old Masters of painting spent years of their lives learning about color. Why let all their effort go to waste on the walls of some museum when it could be used to give you a hand with color correction?

I used 'Garrotte' by Santiago Bose to really alter, and improve, the colouring of this photograph of the church in Edale, Derbyshire.



With the tutorial and the Bose image, I created this:



I then used the same technique on this portrait:


and, using the colours from this floral painting, created this quite different mood.

Photo To Drawing - Photoshop

Roughly based on this tutorial from Planet Photoshop, I turned this photo:


into this, where the image is the photograph on the left, graduating to a line drawing on the right.



The photograph is of a 'Nicaragua Must Survive' poster. The manipulation could certainly be improved, but am sharing my first attempt at a new technique.

Wind Turbines

Rob Walker from NowPublic.com requested use of these two images for an article about wind turbines.

They were taken at the aforementioned Heeley City Farm and were taken at different shutter speeds, the first one to freeze the motion, the second to capture it.

I approved the use of the photos, as even though it is a negative report about harnessing wind power for energy, it is reporting what the Ministry of Defence have said, rather than necessarily agreeing with those criticisms. Indeed, the two comments so far on the article seem to agree that the Ministry of Defence's supposed concerns are nonsensical.

More from Heeley City Farm

Ninety Smokers by Dan Donovan

Dan Donovan undertook an interesting project. To create a photographic documentary of smoking in the run-up to the smoking ban. He photographed smokers, smoking in places where it would soon become illegal.

I undertook this project with the aim of taking a series of portraits of smokers in locations that will be affected by the smoking ban; to archive the final moments of their freedom to smoke publicly.
This collection of work isn’t about either promoting or vilifying the act of smoking; it’s intended to capture an honest representation of smoking culture in Britain pre-July 2007.
The act of smoking has been increasingly demonised over the last number of years and these portraits take in individuals from all over England, from every walk of life, who were prepared to make a visual statement of their objection to being represented in this negative way.
The people here are law-abiding citizens who would be committing a criminal offence if they posed for a photograph in the same location today.

Interesting extra:

On my travels I met up with two people who work in the field of mental health, Kate Parry in Oxfordshire and Steve Thompson in Derbyshire. Steve says Nicotine has been shown to reduce the side-effects of psychoactive medication – more than 90 per cent of people with schizophrenia smoke, and nicotine is being used by self-medicating sufferers. Steve has been challenging attempts to try and outlaw smoking for patients.

You can see his collection of ninety smokers, and read the story behind it on his website.

NPR - Think Pink

America's National Public Radio blog has used one of my photos :-)



They used it in an interesting entry about the commercialisation of breast cancer research 'products' which is a concern I have shared. I'm wary of the 'spend, spend, spend' and branding issues when we often don't know how much money from any given 'pink' product goes to cancer research, and there are usually better ways to help. Not to mention many of the 'pink' beauty etc. products which contain untold numbers of chemicals, some of which have possible links to causing cancer!

So, very glad they chose my photo in the first place, extra glad that it's accompanying an interesting article!

What is NPR?
NPR (National Public Radio) is an internationally acclaimed producer and distributor of noncommercial news, talk, and entertainment programming. A privately supported, not-for-profit membership organization, NPR serves a growing audience of 26 million Americans each week in partnership with more than 860 independently operated, noncommercial public radio stations. Each NPR Member Station serves local listeners with a distinctive combination of national and local programming. With original online content and audio streaming, NPR.org offers hourly newscasts, special features and ten years of archived audio and information.

Dreams. Edited in Photoshop CS3

Dreams, originally uploaded by incurable_hippie.

Original image:

1. Select the statue using the magnetic lasso tool
2. Select > Modify > Feather > 5
   
3. Image > Adjustments > Black and White
   
4. Adjust the colours until the angel is how you want it.
   
5. Select > Inverse
   
6. Filter > Blur > Radial Blur
   
7. Adjust the settings until the background is how you want it to be.
   
8. Image > Adjustments > Hue & Saturation.
   
9. Adjust the 'hue' until the background is how you want it.
   
10. Select > Deselect
    
11. Filter > Render > Lens Flare
    
12. Move the lens flare to behind the statue's head.
    
13. Filter > Render > Lighting Effects > Light Type > Omni
    
14. Adjust all settings until it looks right. I moved the light to the statue's hands and adjusted the over / under exposure settings.
    

Burma

There are amazing people in Burma risking their lives to take, and spread, word, photographs and film of what is really happening there at the moment.

Two of these people are gmhembree and NaingKo on flickr.

Looking at these photos, direct from the people witnessing these events is powerful, and brings to mind the huge risks being taken for truth and democracy.

Cats

Some work I've done in the digital darkroom today.

Look What Happened Last Night.

Amazing!



Not at all edited (yet!).

T189 Submissions B.

I have recently completed the Open University's T189 Digital Photography course.

As part of the final assignment, we had to submit 10 images. The ones I submitted are below (6 - 10)



Manor Lodge under a Moody Sky


Angled Red Brick Building and Clock on a Sunny Day


Capturing the Parenting of a New Chick


Brightly Coloured Market in a Park


The Bride Was a Vision in Scarlet

T189 Submissions A.

I have recently completed the Open University's T189 Digital Photography course.

As part of the final assignment, we had to submit 10 images. The ones I submitted are below (1 - 5)


Birds of Paradise in the Winter Gardens


Flower Standing Out from the Crowd


The Golden Glow of Tulips


Julia's Arrangement of Flowers


Two Gravestones and Their Overgrown Companion