Work and Play

Work and Play, originally uploaded by North Light.

A photograph from about 18 months ago, Cromarty harbour, Cromarty is a beautiful small town in Ross-shire on the Cromarty Firth.
A place we do not get to very often, but always worth a visit. The use of HDR on this image has worked well allowing me to pull a bit more information out of the shadows in the pier, where masking and using curves in photoshop would have been difficult.
Right, that's the play bit finished, now for work, time for a RANT!
Why is it that British tourists, particularly those at the lower end of the budget can be such a pain in the a***. We have a group of central belt Scots in for the New Year, and there are one or two who are going to make it painful. I was told when I started in this occupation, that other than our colonial cousins, the Americans, for whom a different set of rules apply, that the amount of hassle from the guest is the inverse to the amount they are paying!!! We were cold last night, there's a draft in the room, yup, the window was open! Probably because they had been smoking in a non-smoking room!

Megapixels

Winter Beach 3, originally uploaded by North Light.

Some reflections on cameras, very likely controversial!

The eagle eyed of you will have noticed that there is a subtle change in the photographs that have been taken since the 2nd of December, see "Taken On" or "Taken In" in "additional Information" on Images individual pages. They have a slightly different "feel" to them. I have decided to change the cameras I am using, so I have sold my beloved Canon 5D, and my back-up camera, a Nikon D80 and in the process of selling the vast majority of my lenses!
At the beginning of December I purchased a Nikon D300 and will slowly concentrate on building a new set of Nikon lenses. Why you might ask? the Nikon is a much more intuitive camera to use, it makes sense for both the main and the back-up camera to be identical, or very similar in operation, the mechanical use of the camera becomes automatic, and hence does not distract from the creative side.
So I have gone from a full frame sensor to a cropped sensor, a backwards step? No, the Nikon seems to be able to record a wider dynamic range, and with care is producing images of the same quality as the 5D. Will I not miss the 5D MkII, maybe, but I prefer the Nikon to use,If Ican produce prints up to A2 size I don't need more detail.
The image above was taken with a Canon D60, a 6 Mexapixel camera, it consistently produced high quality images as long as the exposure was well controlled, and I liked it much better than the Canon 20D, so much so that I kept the D60 as my back-up camera for about 2 years. The 5D as I have said produced stunning pictures, this was not that it produced more detail than other 12 mp cameras, but there was a different feel to its images.
So where is this ramble leading? What I am trying to say is that once a certain amount of image information is recorded, the real differences come down to the quality of information recorded, and the tools we use to produce the resulting image. I have used RAW files virtually from the start of using a DSLR, and now am enjoying the benefit of better image processing programmes to produce images such as the one above, it prints to A4 with no problems, with care and some up-sizing, I will be able to get a A3 print, which when viewed from "Normal" distances is perfectly acceptable.
So I look forward to 2008, learning how to get the best from the Nikon, and concentrating on the Image, not the camera.

Now for the toys!
What I have not found is a compact camera that I enjoy using, or like the results from, Sigma DP1 perhaps?

A Breaking Wave of Sand

A Breaking Wave of Sand, originally uploaded by North Light.

The day after Boxing Day, I am sat at Reception in the Hotel, its 8:30 am, my reception area is full of cases, yes the Christmas guests are going home! Peace for a few days. Then we are full again at New Year!
During the quieter moments over Christmas the eagle eyed of you will notice that I have been playing with Photomatix Pro 3.0 Beta, I have to say that I am impressed, although the user interface is not as polished as most programmes I normally use, it seems much easier to produce images that are less obviously HDR.
I hope to work with this a lot more over the next few months, and spend more time producing taking photographs to work with HDR.

Inspiration

Winter Beach 1, originally uploaded by North Light.

Photography is a funny thing! An odd statement?
For the last few weeks I have had no problem seeing photographs, working though my image archive has been equally productive, but I got home last night, cup of tea, and in front of my monitor started going through photographs taken in 2005 with the intention of creating a few new images for my flickr photostream, found four potential images, created bracketed exposures using Camera Raw, processed with Photomatix, and started to do the final work in Photoshop. I rejected all four!
Lack of inspiration, not seeing images, its not a new phenomenon, but why does it happen?
I was motivated, had no problems picking the images to work on, but the results were not in any way inspirational.
Yet 24 hours before I produced the photograph above, to me its the most satisfying image I have produced al month, yet in its original format I probably got very close to deleting it!
Thoughts to ponder on over the Christmas Season.

Night on the Pots?

Night on the Pots?, originally uploaded by North Light.

Another bright and frosty morning, we have now had a few days of good winter weather, I was able to take advantage of this yesterday, and spent some time out with the camera, but the days are very short now, sunrise was at 9.00 am, and sunset at 3.14 pm, just over six hours of full daylight! Still the shortest day is nearly here, and we then have spring to look forward to.

Weather Forecast

Golden Sand, originally uploaded by North Light.

Thinking about taking photographs, the weather this week has been pretty good, but have been in the hotel office during daylight hours, frustrating!
The forecast for Sunday looks good though, so subject to the accuracy of the forecast it's a photography day tomorrow. Something to keep me motivated for the rest of the day?

Castlehill harbour...2

Castlehill harbour...2, originally uploaded by North Light.

Published. I am pleased that this and one other photograph were published in "amateur Photographer" magazine this week. The email from the publishers asking permission to use the two images came as a total surprise as these were part of a portfolio submitted nearly two years ago, the cynical side of me thinks that they were obviously short of suitable photos, so had to resort to the filing system!
On a more positive note, the portfolio was submitted to three publications, two of which have published, the third, which will of course remain nameless rejected the portfolio, two out of three is not bad!
I guess that this indicates that I really should do more with my photographs, a "New Years Resolution" perhaps?