06-06-06

Today is the 6th day of the 6th month of the 6th year or 06-06-06.
People worry about the date’s similarity to 666, “the number of the beast”. Did you do or not do anything today because of the date?
Here’s some more trivia about this once in a century day.

Aperture ƒ/5
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 16mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/2.5s

Digital Journalist: Harper’s Essays

Peter Turnley’s photo essays in the June issue of Digial Journalist are a snapshot of life all over the planet.
The contrast between soldiers and in the next frame, students couldn’t be more striking but the emotion of his “THE BEREAVED, Mourning the Dead, in America and Iraq” is the same no matter where you are or what your job.

Relaxing on Panna

Young and old women relax on St. Patrick Street in the glorious sunshine about a month ago.

Aperture ƒ/9
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 18mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/200s

Smoke Over Cork City

A long trail of smoke was visible over Cork City and surrounding countryside this evening as a fire raged in the scrap metal yard in Dublin Hill.
Jacinta and I had been down in Monkstown at her sister’s house where we enjoyed a great bbq cooked by her husband. We left shortly after 10pm and I noticed a long band of black smoke as we drove through Passage. We turned into the car park for the Line in Rochestown and switched on 96FMto find out what was happening. I never listen to it, honest, but it’s useful for local news!

I sprinted up the path until I got a clear view of the river where I shot the first photo, then on to the metal bridge which crosses the River Lee. The second photo captures the black toxic smoke as it traverses the river. It’s an ugly thing, which was visible from as far away as Carrigaline. Luckily Blarney is in the opposite direction and it’s not visible from there at all, the radio warned that traffic on the north side of the city was bad so we took a detour home through Sunday’s Well.

Damien Mulley photographed the smoke plume from his home in Blackrock. Does anyone else have shots of the fire?
Here’s the RTE coverage of the incident. Thanks Damien for the link!

Was it arson or an accident?

Later.. Thank you Martina on Red FM for giving me a mention! Must have a read of your blog now!

Aperture ƒ/5.6
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 18mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/30s

Press the button

A doorbell on a building on the seafront in Cobh. I can’t remember which building exactly but it was down in the direction of the train station.

It’s scorchio in Ireland now and it’s great! We adopted Oscar yesterday and the poor
dog was upset last night until we brought him for a walk. I think I’m finally going to get that exercise I’ve been promising myself for ages!

Aperture ƒ/3.5
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 18mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/30s

An Modh Scoil

This is the Small Claims Court in Cork. If you have a grievance about a product or service you can bring a case against the provider here for around 15 Euro.

In a past life it was also a primary school. I went to school here in the early 80’s when it was the Model School or “Modh Scoil” in Irish.
If you look carefully you may be able to see the inscription, “Cork District Model National School” over the door.
When it was a school the brickwork needed repair, the grounds were simple cement paths with green areas and the heating was open fires and boilers in several of the classrooms. Teachers had to pile on more coal to keep the fire going.
After the school closed down they couldn’t demolish the building because of it’s age so it was converted into a court.

I visited there last year with Jacinta and we were shown around by a friendly guard. I left my camera in it’s case. It was strange to see that the 6th class classroom was now a small courtroom, that huge rooms with high ceilings had been boxed off into offices, and that the boy’s toilets at the end of the building was now a holding cell for prisoners.

This is my first shot taken with the Sigma 10-20mm lens posted here. I didn’t need the wide angle because this is slightly cropped from the original.

Aperture ƒ/10
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/200s

Travel photography, what to bring

On our honeymoon in Lanzarote all I had was my Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ5, 2 1GB SD cards, a spare battery and charger.

Little did I know that I would wish for a wide angle lens when we visited Cuevo De Los Verde (along with an English gentleman who missed his tripod too) but I still got some stunning photos of that cave. Everyone started copying me after a short while by disabling the flash and shooting long exposure images while balancing their cameras on suitable rocks. The lighting in that cave is drowned out by a flash but with a little care I captured a few beautiful images. Unfortunately my camera case is scratched badly by the volcanic rock so it’s probably a good thing I didn’t have the 20D! I’m taking a bean bag with me next time!

I digress, here are some suggestions for what you should take with you on holidays. Take a look at the rest of Digital Photography School, it’s a fountain of information and I’d be here all day linking to the great articles there!

Going Professional

I consider myself very lucky to be passionate about two subjects – software development and photography. For many years the former paid the bills and allowed me to dabble in influencial projects while the latter came into it’s own in the last few years as a serious hobby.

That’s good because working on WordPress pays better than the average photographer’s pay. It’s very difficult to make much from stock photography too because of the wide availability of cheap stock images.
This is of course only true in general terms. Some photography services such as event photography pay well, and I agree with Arun in the article above, the quality of micro-stock images doesn’t often beat that of the big stock image houses.

Another survey is more positive but I’m not giving up the day job. It’s too much fun 🙂

Coincidentally, they’re looking for a photojournalist in The Beaumont Enterprise, a newspaper in Beaumont, Texas. Mark Hancock works there so I can only imagine it’ll be a tough job!