Rooftop Surveillance

The houses and roofs of the North Side, Cork City.

This was taken from Carroll’s Quay carpark almost a month ago. I love the old-style quality of the image, even if the shadow of the dish at the bottom detracts from that a bit.

Check out Stabarinde’s Christmas in Cork shots. I’m glad my photos inspire you! There are a few gorgeous night shots in that set.

Aperture ƒ/7.1
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 18mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/160s

Slow down in 2008

I’m going to slow down this year. I’ve been trying to keep up with everyone else, moving without thinking, on auto pilot sometimes.

I blog too fast. There! I’ve said it. I tried to post here, to Holy Shmoly!, to The Funny Video Blog every day but there’s only so much one man can do.

Instead, this blog will of course be updated every day, Holy Shmoly will be updated at most 3 times a week, and I’ll try to post one funny video a week.

Then I’ll have time to play with my son, watch him discover the world and enjoy the great times.

Ryan – thank you for the recommendation and a happy new year to you too!

Aperture ƒ/4
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 400
Shutter speed 1/10s

Cork Landmarks

In this one single image are pictured several landmark buildings in Cork City:

  • The bell tower of St. Anne’s Church, or Shandon Bells as it’s commonly known as.
  • The North Cathedral can be glimpsed in the background.
  • Part of SS Peter & Paul’s Church off Patrick Street in the foreground, and the distinctive red brick buildings on Paul Street that used to belong to that parish. (I think it was sold? I remember seeing a sign for a solicitor on one door!)
  • The large distinctive roof to the left of Shandon Bells is I believe the roof of the Firkin Crane Centre by the old Butter Market. Is it?

The day I shot this was gloomy and overcast. Thick black clouds covered the city but for a few minutes a small part was bathed in light from a sun peaking through a gap in the clouds.

This was shot from the roof of the car park on the Grand Parade.

Oh yes, I’m toying with the idea of watermarking my images. I hate seeing an image destroyed by a name written over the actual image. A false bottom border and my details there might be a good compromise. It’s simple to remove but it’s one more step for a thief to take. What do you think?

For sale at Sherry FitzGerald

These are the swanky new offices of estate agent Sherry FitzGerald in Cork. I find it intriguing that the owners decided to bring in other agents to sell the other floor space in the building.

There are signs for Savills/Hamilton Osborn King and Lisney on the top floor directly above the "Sherry FitzGerald" logo. I’d be really unhappy about that if I was them and had spent so much money on new offices. 🙂

Aperture ƒ/9
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 28mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/125s

Housing market slow?

The Irish housing market is slowing down but sales are still being made.

A tiny house down the road from this one in Blarney sold a few weeks ago even though I’m sure you could hardly swing a cat in it …

Aperture ƒ/4
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 800
Shutter speed 1/15s

The Kerry Flag

Kerry were still celebrating their win in the All Ireland when we stayed in Dingle a few weeks back and flags were flying everywhere!

Aperture ƒ/11
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/250s

Clouds move at night

Clouds fly across the sky in this nighttime shot of Cork City. A crane is in the middle distance, practically a symbol of the City at this stage.

The building site in the foreground is on the old site of the Guy And Company building. There’s St. Anne’s Church or Shandon Bells in the distance.

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

The house in the bushes

This is the side of the small gatehouse in Fitzgerald’s Park, Cork.

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

Gateway to old homes

If you walk along the Mardyke in Cork you’re sure to have spotted this green area nestled in off the main road. Does anyone know anything about it?

PS. Here is where this is. Google Maps don’t have it on their map, but you can make out the green area in the center of the map above. The Flickr/Yahoo map does better, naming this green area Alverna. Cool

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

Grand Parade on the Lee

This is the Grand Parade in Cork, from across the River Lee on Sullivan’s Quay. It was the graffiti on the river wall, “Tek”, that prompted me to shoot this image and I like how it came out.

It does lose something in this resized version because of the distant detail but it’s going to be a while before everyone has 20″ monitors and even longer before I put full size images on display for public consumption.

Aperture ƒ/13
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 20mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/160s

Clouds over Dingle

Clouds floated by on a glorious September afternoon in Dingle, Co. Kerry. Tourists relaxed on seating on the waterfront.

I just love clouds and wide angle shots!

Aperture ƒ/11
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 100
Shutter speed 1/250s

No Entry to Tuckey Street

Tuckey Street is a one way street that joins The Grand Parade with South Main Street in Cork. In typical Irish fashion, the one-way has been reversed over the last few years and anyway, the road works on The Grand Parade make getting onto the street a bit more difficult at the moment.

Nothing left to say, I’m off to the hospital again shortly. Hopefully Jacinta and Adam will be left out tomorrow. I’ve already registered Adam‘s domain name for the next couple of years!

Does anyone know how to get namecheap’s DNS to not redirect to the www hostname? I prefer nowww urls but it doesn’t seem possible. On the “@” line, entering the IP address of the server as an ANAME record simply causes a URL redirect to the IP. At least I have two servers now so maybe it’s about time I host my own DNS.

Aperture ƒ/4
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 10mm
ISO 200
Shutter speed 1/3200s