2025 – In Photos dot Org

A colourful sunrise

It was one of those mornings where the sun shone on the clouds from below the horizon and filled the sky with fiery colours!

I’ve been working on a WordPress plugin called Cloud Cover Forecast. It will show you the low, mid, and high clouds for a particular location in a block on your site. It’s inspired by Clear Outside. If you have a blog, take it for a whirl and let me know if it works for you! It’s not on WordPress.org yet, so you’ll have to install it manually by uploading the zip file.

Aperture	ƒ/8
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	41mm
ISO	200
Shutter speed	1/100s

The Working End of Gardening

Weathered orange metal storage cabinet or locker with chrome handle standing among coiled black hoses and red plastic chairs at Ballincollig Regional Park allotments, showing rust and wear from outdoor use.

The allotments next to Ballincollig Regional Park need storage for various things, but I doubt the cabinet in the photo above is used for much any more.

Videos I watched recently

Aperture	ƒ/9
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	62mm
ISO	500
Shutter speed	1/160s

Window on the City

From the car park on North Main Street, Cork, you can Bruce College and St Mary’s Dominican Priory. I liked how the stark lifeless concrete frame of the multi-story car park contrasted with the variety of materials and colours in the world outside.

Aperture	ƒ/6.3
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	201mm
ISO	1000
Shutter speed	1/1000s

Another One Bites the Crust

Meet London’s most successful entrepreneur. This seagull has cornered the market on prime real estate with a view. Perched on the Millennium Bridge like it owns the place, this feathered opportunist represents everything brilliant about urban wildlife adaptation. While Freddie Mercury sang about another one biting the dust, this gull’s motto is clearly “another one bites the crust”, and judging by its confident posture, business is booming.

From this vantage point, our avian overlord can survey the entire pedestrian buffet streaming across the bridge below. Dropped sandwiches, abandoned chips, and tourist snacks are all fair game in the urban food chain. Those gleaming towers in the background might house London’s financial elite, but this bird has figured out a more direct route to success: position yourself where the food comes to you.

Aperture	ƒ/9
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	122mm
ISO	160
Shutter speed	1/500s

Carey’s Lane After Dark

I was out with Blarney Photography Club during the summer and one member of the club kneeled to photograph Carey’s Lane. I went high and lifted my camera over my head to get it from a different perspective!

Carey’s Lane is one of Cork’s oldest medieval streets, originally part of the walled city that dates back to the 12th century. The narrow width and cobblestone surface are remnants of medieval urban planning, designed for foot traffic and horse-drawn carts. The modern drainage channel follows the same path that medieval gutters would have taken, showing how some aspects of urban infrastructure remain remarkably consistent across centuries.

Aperture	ƒ/3.5
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	24mm
ISO	1600
Shutter speed	1/500s

Roses on Westminster Bridge

Westminster Bridge is one of those places that is always bustling with tourists. It is so busy.

Westminster Bridge is one of the few locations in central London where street vendors can legally operate without special permits for certain goods, thanks to historic trading rights that date back centuries. However, flower sellers must still navigate complex licensing requirements, and the competition for prime spots along the bridge is fierce, with established vendors often working the same locations for years.

Aperture	ƒ/4
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	24mm
ISO	125
Shutter speed	1/500s

A Little Privacy

When there’s CCTV everywhere and you just want a little privacy to check your phone, you have to hide from the cameras.

Aperture	ƒ/6.3
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	160mm
ISO	1000
Shutter speed	1/500s

Ballycotton’s Beacon on the Island

The lighthouse on the island just off the coast by Ballycotton is always a nice subject for a photo. The night we were there, we hoped to photograph the moon rising behind the lighthouse but a large bank of cloud covered the horizon.

Aperture	ƒ/8
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	124mm
ISO	1600
Shutter speed	1/250s

Biking Home After Dark

Someone was going to be cycling home after dark from here in Kinsale.

Aperture	ƒ/8
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	24mm
ISO	5000
Shutter speed	1/125s

ÉALÚ emergency exit

An emergency exit sign spotted in the first floor window of a building in Kinsale, Co Cork. Despite the shadows, the sign gives a clue to the internal floor plan of the building. It looks a bit out of place, but it has to be there.

Georgian sash windows like this one were originally designed as a fire safety feature themselves. The large panes and sliding mechanism made them easy escape routes during emergencies, which is why many Georgian buildings have windows that open directly onto the street rather than requiring ladders to reach. The modern exit sign is actually continuing a 300-year-old tradition of prioritising safe evacuation!

Aperture	ƒ/6.3
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	132mm
ISO	4000
Shutter speed	1/640s

Cobh Shines Bright Over Cork Harbour

Cobh, a few minutes before fireworks lit up the sky last month.

Aperture	ƒ/6.3
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	105mm
ISO	800
Shutter speed	10s

Dingle’s Dykegate Street Mural

Large-scale street mural on blue wall showing portrait of woman with flowing blonde hair and blue eyes with a bow and arrow made with a sycamore-seed tip. A red car parked in the foreground on Dykegate Street, Dingle, Co Kerry

On Dykegate Street in Dingle you’ll find a spectacular mural.

The mural was painted by artist, Ciara McKenna. You can find out more about it in this Irish Independent article.

Aperture	ƒ/4
Camera	ILCE-7RM5
Focal length	24mm
ISO	100
Shutter speed	1/500s