Fishing tackle in Co Cork somewhere. Can’t remember where now! Love the texture of this sort of equipment, especially in black and white.
| Aperture | ƒ/5 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/60s |
Author Archives: Donncha
Arson attack on Blarney Garda Station
On Friday morning around 5am the Gardai on duty at Blarney Garda Station were called away on what turned out to be a hoax. Unfortunately while they were out the Garda station was attacked, the front door kicked down and firebombs thrown into the rooms downstairs. The building itself is quite old and burned quickly. Luckily the blaze was seen by a security guard from a nearby hotel or much more damage could have been done.
The building is unusable now of course. A Garda has been posted outside since, and this afternoon forensics were examining the site.
More coverage: Irish Times, Tribune, Herald.
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 72mm |
| ISO | 1000 |
| Shutter speed | 1/100s |
The Green House
The Green House, a small cafe in Blarney near Blarney Castle. It was previously the local Post Office but is now quite nice I’m told. Haven’t been in there yet.
Blarney Garda Station was set alight last night. I half heard something on the radio about it and confirmed it when Gordon replied to my Tweet on the matter. I hope to get some shots later, even with the horrible weather outside!
| Aperture | ƒ/5.6 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 400 |
| Shutter speed | 1/80s |
QE2 Funnel in the Sky
The funnel of the Queen Elizabeth 2 looms over Cobh as seen from near the Commodore Hotel.
| Aperture | ƒ/14 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 88mm |
| ISO | 400 |
| Shutter speed | 1/500s |
Queen Elizabeth 2 in Cobh
The QE2 docked in Cobh last Thursday. This was shot at the bottom of steps down to the water where seaweed made footing precarious. I saw a few people venture down the steps but none went further than half way down. The tide was well out so I was maybe 3m below the quayside, standing in wet and slippery seaweed. The risks I take to get a photo!
Oh yeah, there’s already something gone bust in my new Canon 40D. The pop up flash refuses to pop up unless I prise it open with a fingernail. It tries a few times, gives up and issues an Error 99 and needs to be switched off and on. The same happened to my Canon 20D, but I’m surprised the 40D didn’t last a bit longer ..
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 21mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/125s |
An club agus an cnoc
The club and the hill. This is the North Harbour in Cape Clear Island. The club is familiar to all who visit this part of the world, as are the hills unfortunately. This particular hill overlooks the whole harbour and feels like a 45 degree struggle at times.
I still have memories of climbing it as a youngster on a hot and humid May day while a student at Colaiste Ciaran. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that!
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/160s |
Queen Elizabeth 2
Luxury cruise ship Queen Elizabeth 2 tied up at the quayside in Cobh, Co Cork last Thursday. This was moments before she cast off. You can see a tug in the background of this image.
It was bitterly cold down on the quay, but we were lucky that the evening sun cast a lovely golden glow over everything.
PS. some photography links: The Right Frame of Mind, Design Star, Join a stock photog on a photoshoot.
PPS. Just back from the camera club. This image came second overall in the digital section of tonight’s open photo competition. It drew with another image, on equal points. Chuffed!
| Aperture | ƒ/8 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 200mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
Carvery Lunch
Carvery Lunch, the fast food of “proper food” IMO. Many will be going to pubs today for their Sunday lunch and it’ll be carvery on offer. Nothing wrong with it of course, but some people are snobs about eating out and want food delivered to their table. Considering the price of carvery food, I can see their point. It’s generally the same price as food in a restaurant, so why not eat somewhere else?
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/40s |
Cast Off in Bantry
A small ferry casts off and heads out of Bantry Harbour with lots of hunting dogs and their owners. This was last February and I watched with interest wondering where they were going.
More QE2 photos to come, when I have time to work on them!
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/100s |
Flying the Irish Tricolour on the QE2
The Queen Elizabeth 2 is a British ship, and it’s likely that many of the passengers were British too. I spotted one large Union Jack flag draped over a railing and people on the ship waved mini Union Jack flags too. That sort of gets under the skin of many Irish people.
A huge crowd had gathered on the quayside at Cobh. A band was playing and people cheered and waved as the ship departed. The atmosphere was great but when the Irish Tricolour appeared on the roof of the ship, being waved by a young man, the crowd let out a huge cheer, and whistled and clapped in appreciation.
They were still waving the Irish flag as the ship left the harbour. I spotted them after she turned!
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 88mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/100s |
QE2 Leaving Cork
The Queen Elizabeth 2, or QE2, flagship of the Cunard Line, docked for the last time in Cobh yesterday and left this evening just after 6pm. Here she is after turning in Cork Harbour and seconds before she increased speed and left the harbour for good.
In 2009, she will become a floating hotel in Dubai. A fitting ending for a luxury ship that has plied the waters of the world for the last 39 years.
I took over 300 shots of the Queen Elizabeth 2 today and filled almost 4GB of space with RAW images. In hindsight, many of the images would have been fine as Jpeg files but I had the space, so I used it. I hope to upload a gallery of my favourite images tomorrow.
| Aperture | ƒ/5.6 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 40D |
| Focal length | 18mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/80s |
GIMP 2.6 out and I’m looking for the Ubuntu package
Hot news this afternoon is that GIMP 2.6 is now out. The release notes are the first place to look for a list of what’s new in this image editing software.
From the my perspective, there may not be anything mind blowing, but they have started integrating GEGL and there’s an option to enable it, so it might be possible to edit images in 16bit mode. I’ll have to start dumping my RAW files to gigantic tiff files once that happens. High quality Jpeg is great, but it’s 8bit. Most of the time I don’t notice, but on images with lots of blue sky it’s possible to see ugly banding of the blue that isn’t there in the RAW file.
I’m waiting for the Ubuntu Linux .deb, as are others and hopefully it’ll make it’s way to getdeb.net sooner rather than later. Meanwhile I’ll try my hand at compiling it myself.
PS. Welcome all from People’s Republic of Cork. Your visits are appreciated!