Doneraile Park Gallery 1

Yesterday we went to Doneraile Park in Co. Cork for a photowalk. Weather was nice, if overcast and it was very warm so walking around the park was, errr, a walk in the park. Katie has already uploaded a few shots this morning! Looking forward to seeing more from the others.

This is my part 1 of my shots. There’s almost another 100 shots to upload, I think a gallery of 220 or so images might be a bit much ..


Apertureƒ/7.1
CameraCanon EOS 20D
Focal length10mm
ISO100
Shutter speed1/125s

Doneraile Photowalkers

I had a busy day today. This morning I became aware that hackers had started using WordPress blogs they had previously hacked to redirect search engine queries. So I spent this morning working on a post about that hacking issue. No wonder we were late for the photowalk this afternoon.

Shown above are almost all the photowalkers. My wife isn’t included as she was in the car, but from left to right, here are the rest: Andrew, Katie, Kevin, Will, me (Donncha), and my son Adam. Adam didn’t take any photos but he was an integral part of the day! Thank you all for coming along. It was nice to see the same faces again. I’m never sure about landscape shots but I shot a few nice ones. Got plenty of deer shots too! Just before we got back to the car it started to rain lightly, and by the time we got home to Blarney the rain was bucketing down. Looks like we got the best of the day!

Shot was taken in Program mode, with fill in flash of +2EV to illuminate the wide angle view of the lens.

Aperture ƒ/5.6
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 12mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/80s

Doneraile Photowalk on June 8th

The month of June is going to be a busy and exciting one as the Midsummer Festival will be in full swing! To avoid clashes with any other event I think it’s better if the photowalk in Doneraile, Co. Cork be on Sunday June 8th before it starts at all.

Where: Doneraile Park, Co. Cork.
When: Sunday, 8th June. 3pm
Directions: Leave Cork going north through Blackpool towards Blarney and Mallow. Pass through Mallow and keep on the main road until you get to “New Twopothouse”. Doneraile town is sign posted there so take a right. When you get to the town go through it to the other side. You’ll see Doneraile Park sign posted. See the Google Map above, or check this one for the route.

Doneraile Park is a beautiful park with at least one river running through it, a small weir near the carpark. Deer and livestock can often be seen in some areas of the park as can fowl like ducks or swans. Doneraile House overlooks a large part of the park and is famous because a member of that household was the only female Freemason. The house was closed the last time I was there and I’m not sure if it’s ever open to the public. It faces north from what I can remember so you’d have to be there before noon to catch any sun on the front of the house.

If you’re going to blog about this, or post photos afterwards, please tag them “corkphotowalk” so anyone interested can find them easily!

More:

Cork Midsummer Festival

If you can’t make it to Doneraile on the 8th, there’s still plenty happening in the weeks after as the festival starts on the 15th and continues for 3 weeks. I’m particularly interested in the following, mainly because they’re outdoors, and as they are in public places, photography won’t be a problem.

  • Sunday, June 15th from noon to 6pm. The Lord Mayor’s picnic in the park. Fun and games and food stalls in Fitzgerald’s Park, Cork. I was there a few years ago. Lots to see, plenty to photograph, although we’ll have to be considerate of children.
  • Saturday, June 21st. Shandon Street Festival. Music and entertainment on the street all day. At 1pm in front of Brown Thomas there will be a Bicycle Ballet. It lasts 30 minutes. Must try catch both.
  • Saturday and Sunday, June 28th to 29th. Senszione. Sounds like a weird fairground with unusual looking rides. Unfortunately it’s at 6.30pm, 7.45pm and 9pm. Both earlier times are bad for me, but I’ll try for 9pm. Bad light then of course but it can’t be helped.
  • Saturday, July 5th. Robodock. IAWS Warehouse, Cork Docklands at 3pm and 8pm. I’ll be going to the 3pm show. Remember those weird iron sculptures in Emmett Place on St. Patrick’s Day? Lots more of them. The Docklands is due to be developed so it’s worth getting down there if for no other reason than to record something that won’t be able to happen there again.

I almost forgot. The Cork City Marathon is on Monday, June 2nd. Grab your place at the finish line!

Phew. It’s going to be a busy month!

The Lough Daffodils

We walked around The Lough and wandered over to the daffodils growing by the footpath at one of the lake. That’s Sean Murphy in the background as he preps some of his equipment to take a shot.

Probably my last photo from the Lough Photowalk!

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/400s

Swans on The Lough

Swans swim past on The Lough in Cork City. This was one of the first photos I took at the recent photowalk there. Despite the clear blue sky and lovely light it was quite cold with a biting wind!

Aperture ƒ/8
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/200s

Three’s a crowd

Some of the swans at the Lough a few weeks ago during the photo walk. Got a few more shots from that session to post!

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 125mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/640s

Church Flowers

Flowers outside The Lough Parish Church, “Church of the Immaculate Conception”.

You can read more about the church and mass times at the The Lough Parish page on the Diocese website.

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/100s

Heads up at the Lough

This was shot from a precarious position. I jumped up on one of the concrete posts dotted around the pond and very carefully snapped a couple of shots. I just about managed to balance there for a few minutes! See the two black swans everyone else was shooting?

From left to right: Donal, Ryan, Kevin, Katie and Sean spotted me and started shooting the biggest birdbrain there ..

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/200s

A big head is natural

I was setting up a shot by placing that wheel cap leaning on the bus shelter when these two teenagers ran across the road carrying a football goal between them!

Anyway, there’s the Murphy’s stout advert I wanted to shoot. I wonder if they advertise anywhere else in the country?

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/125s

The pigeon flies away!

Besides the beautiful swans, there’s the usual gathering of pigeons waddling along on the path picking up bread crumbs.

Too tempting. I had to chase after them and encourage them to fly a little. Some of them need the exercise!

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/800s

The Swan’s Wings

You really only appreciate how large and imposing a swan is when they rear up out of the water and spread their magnificent wings. While at The Lough on Sunday there were a number of fights between swans. Guess it’s that time of the year again, eh?

The swans were fairly tame towards us humans, and allowed us to shoot quite closely, but I’ve had run ins with swans before and I’m always suspicious of them!

Katie caught me as I lay on the ground to get a shot of The Lough Church. Embarrassed? Me? Never, I’ve been in many other more compromising situations just to get a shot!

Ryan posted a whole set of photos from the day and Kevin has posted his first shot.

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 21mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/320s

That bread is mine!

A heron swoops in on a bunch of greedy gulls at The Lough yesterday!

For more pictures, check out Katie’s set and Will’s photos!

In retrospect, we were very lucky with the weather for the photowalk. Just after I got home the downpour started and 60mph winds ravaged the south of the country!

I was going to upload a bunch of the photowalk shots today but I’ll let them trickle in and then post the remainer on Friday.

Aperture ƒ/6.3
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 88mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/500s