A model walks down a catwalk in Union Square, San Francisco, July 27th 2007.

I was in the city with Automattic and we stayed in a nearby hotel so Union Square was a good spot to get photos. Can’t remember what occasion this fashion show was on for. I think it may have been some fashion school or something!

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/5.6
Camera	Canon EOS 20D
Focal length	162mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/250s

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Red Heart originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

Here’s Lenny, Kevin and Eoin (l-r) of Polldaddy fame riding on camels in Marrakesh, Morocco a few weeks ago.

The ride was through wasteland adjoining a rich neighbourhood of Marrakesh where celebrities have their homes. When you hear that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are in town they’re not staying in the Medina, that’s for sure!
The wasteland was surreal. Dusty rubble strewn ground dotted with palm trees and you may see a tractor pulling a water tank for the trees. The houses for the most part are surrounded by tall walls and are gated but from the back of a camel you can look over (and see more palm trees, I guess they like their privacy!)

The camels move at walking pace, and the 3km journey took almost an hour, about twice as long as I’d like it to be but our balloon journey that morning had to be cut short so maybe they were trying to make up for that. No injuries from biting but Chris’s camel did try to take a chunk out of Lenny’s camel a couple of times.

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/8
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	21mm
ISO	200
Shutter speed	1/125s

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The Camel Riders originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

A view of some nearby rooftops and a stunning sunset over Marrakesh, Morocco. In black and white I know, but I have a few more shots of the same sky coming! This was shot from Riad O2 in the city where Polldaddy recently stayed.

In the Medina many (most?) of the houses are jam packed in next to each other. We had to take a winding alley way from the main road to the building, going left, right, left, right, left (and maybe 2 more turns?) to get there. Like nothing I’ve ever experienced before.

What’s Marrakesh like? The medina is the old fortified town which is where we were staying. You’ll be woken each morning by the Muslim call to prayers as there are loud speakers dotted around the city. Currently the first one starts around 5:30am so I hope you can get back to sleep afterwards! I wasn’t too fond of heading out in the city. It’s very busy, vehicles of all sorts zoom up and down the streets. Everything from motorbikes to carts pulled by donkeys will pass you by. There are no traffic lights in the medina either and footpaths disappear without warning, if they existed at all.

The food we ate there was excellent, both in the riad and outside. Well, except for the one night we decided to sample what was on offer in the plaza. What a mistake! For the same price you’ll get a top quality meal in a fancy restaurant elsewhere!

The hot air balloon guys were super friendly and I can recommend them, the locals taking care of us in the riad were too but out on the street was another matter. Talk to anyone and they’ll either lead you to a particular area of the souk or demand a tip for “showing” you the way.

If only we could get a bit of their sun here in Ireland right now. Go on clouds, let the sun through!

Oh yes, I may have to change the tagline on this blog. This photo was processed by Adobe Lightroom. It’s not Photoshop but it’s close. I used this preset on this photo but Lightroom is really impressing me. It’s ability to recover blown out detail is amazing, the noise reduction and sharpening tools are easy and effective. The one area it really falls down in is not being able to reassign keys. I fixed that by installing Paddy which let me assign hotkeys to my two main export presets.
I imported over 23k photos into a catalogue and it’s running nice and fast. The next thing to do is write a preset and assign a hotkey to import images from my CF card.

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/4
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	21mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/30s

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Marrakesh Rooftop City originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

I’m here in Marrakesh, Morocco with the rest of Polldaddy for a week. This photo of a man on a donkey and cart was taken on the streets of the medina during a lull in traffic. After driving here I’m quite certain you could handle driving anywhere as buses, cars, vans, motorbikes and bicycles jostle for the same space in often narrow streets!

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/14
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	21mm
ISO	400
Shutter speed	1/400s

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Four legged Traffic in Marrakesh originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

Detail from the wheel of a VW Beetle parked in an iron smith’s yard in Oracle, Arizona. This was taken in 2008 when Automattic visited there and I have quite a few other photos from that visit to show you, if I ever get around to working on them that is!

This was taken with my ancient Canon 20D. I’m half thinking of replacing my now-ageing Canon 40D (the shutter button misfires, it’s not as responsive as it once was, the body is creaking a bit) so I took a quick look at Ebay to see how much a Canon 7D body would cost. Ouch.
Other than the camera body my Sigma 18-200 lens has seen better days too. I had this lens back when I took this photo and it’s the main lens I keep on my camera. It shows too. The zoom extends if the lens is held upside down, bits of shiny plastic have rubbed off, there’s dirt stuck between the rings. Some would say it has character! I say I want a new lens!

Best start saving.

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/7.1
Camera	Canon EOS 20D
Focal length	10mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/125s

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Roadster Wheel originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

Not an old car but ye olde styled as was the fashion a couple of years ago. Stands out against more modern vehicles of course.

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/16
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	48mm
ISO	400
Shutter speed	1/400s

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A mural in an alleyway in Reykjavik, Iceland.

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/5.6
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	18mm
ISO	400
Shutter speed	1/25s

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The lady and her dog originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

A tree wrapped in a woven covering with the peace sign on it in Reykjavik. Anyone know the story behind it?

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/10
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	10mm
ISO	400
Shutter speed	1/200s

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A Peaceful Tree in Iceland originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

The Blue Lagoon, Iceland. The water is lovely warm, even quite hot in places and is full of silica and sulphur. There’s usually a smell of bad eggs in the air from the sulphur but when we visited it was definitely bacon we smelled. Really weird. A great experience except when hailstone started to fall. Those things can really sting your ears and face. The rest of you will be safely and warmly under water.

Check out John’s great photo at the Lagoon too.

If you visit Iceland you have to visit here!

The warm waters are rich in minerals like silica and sulphur and bathing in the Blue Lagoon is reputed to help some people suffering from skin diseases such as psoriasis.[1] The water temperature in the bathing and swimming area of the lagoon averages 37–39 °C (98–102 °F). (via)

PS. This was edited in Aftershot Pro as well. I used cloning layers to hide some blemishes, and an adjustment layer with and exposure of -1 to darken the sky. I figured out how to use the polygon tool in the layers menu to select only the sky and mask off the rest of the photo. I think it worked rather well!

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/9
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	18mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/200s

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The Blue Lagoon originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.

The Truman Show was filmed in the town of Seaside in Florida way back in 1998. Feeling old now? This is the house where they filmed interior shots of Truman’s home. You’ll recognise scenes from the film if you visit the town, but trees and bushes are a bit more overgrown now.

Anyway, Automattic went to Seaside last September for our annual meetup. While the location is beautiful, the humidity and temperature even in September were unbearable for this Irishman. Some of my colleagues who are used to those conditions had no such problems but I was desperately glad to get into air conditioned buildings whenever I could! A few of us went for a photowalk late in the week. We set out at 7.30am before it got too warm and had a good time exploring the area. Yes, 7.30 in the morning!

Definitely worth a visit there, just go in the middle of winter when the temperatures are likely to be more manageable!

Photo Info

Aperture	ƒ/5.6
Camera	Canon EOS 40D
Focal length	18mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/80s

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The Truman House originally appeared on In Photos dot Org.