Smiles & shakes – Lens Artists Photo Challenge #67 – Candid

This weeks challenge from the Lens-Artists is:

Taking photos of people or animals when they have no idea that you’re doing it is called candid photography. One of the beautiful things with photography is being able to catch someone in the act. It adds natural life to your pictures. Even if my choices here are mostly in B&W, of course feel free to use what you find most suitable for your shots!

So, this week I thought we would go for candid photos of people or animals – Have fun with the challenge, and we are looking forward to seeing your candid finds!

This sort of challenge is hard for me, I rarely ask people if I can photograph them, friends are usually aware I have my camera with me, and so even if at times they are unaware that I am taking the shot, is this true candid photography.

Sometimes I find I have taken a Candid photo quite by accident, and where the figure is identifiable I am left with the quandary of  what to do with the photo, can I use it, as I did not subsequently ask their permission to use it.  Animals are eaisier they nearly always give their meow or woof of consent.

Anyway here is a photo from a recent trip to St. Ives when I walked around with Focus set manually to a few feet and snapped away, in search of interesting street scenes.

‘Smiles & shakes’, St. Ives, 2019.

Ken

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As far as you can see – V.J.’S Weekly Challenge #67: Sky

Well this week V.J. has challenged us with ‘Sky’

Yes I think it is fairly correct to say that I am also obsessed with the sky, purely from a photographic view point I often spend a long time getting the sky ‘just right’, sometimes to the determent of the rest of the photo as the sky then becomes the focus!

Sky and skies often appear in the lyrics of my songs, and when I am out walking, moor, hillside, fell, countryside, it amazes me how big the sky is, and how small we are in comparison.  Even when walking in wood or forest you occasionally see the sky, and then when you come out of the trees, bam! there it is, stretching away before you.

Only in cities and towns do I find myself bereft of the sky, as buildings close in from all sides, yes you can look up, but look up too long at your determent, and urbanity will bite you.

Anyway a photo from a recent trip to Dunster castle, I think it is safe to say my focus was more on sky than building and landscape here! A three photo stitch where the focus of the middle photo is mostly sky.

‘As far as you can see’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

Ken

 

Giant woman, little people – Weekly Prompts: Big and Small

This weekend GC and SueW have chosen the following as the theme for their challenge.

This weekend GC and I give you BIG and SMALL as your Weekly Prompts Challenge.

Our initial thinking on this one was to challenge you to find pairs, opposites sizes etc. You, of course, may have other ideas, and that’s just fine with us.

Whichever way you choose to interpret our challenge, remember it’s flexible, and anything goes. Photos, Fiction, Poetry- it’s your choice, so have fun!

Well I did initially find a few photos of Big and Small with matching pairs, sheep and lambs, adults and children, cakes!

However I settled on this photo, probably the only time a husband gets to refer to his wife as ‘big’, or ‘Giant’, without being in trouble!

‘Giant woman’, Polperro model village, 2019.

This photo does actually contain a match, invisible in the above until you zoom in are…

‘Little people’, Polperro model village, 2019.

Ken

Gatehouse- Friendly Friday Photography Challenge – Photo Edits

This week the friendly Friday photography challenge is:

This week on Friendly Friday your topic is ‘photo edits’. . . Join in the fun, this week, on Friendly Friday. You are limited only by your imagination

We most of you probably realise that the photos that reach here never do so without some form of editing, I shoot primarily RAW files, but occasionally jpeg for certain situations where I want the camera to do the editing.

Therefore every photo is edited to some degree, but I see this as akin to stepping into the darkroom to develop the film, and photo!  It is just these days I have far more control and if more than simple ‘development’ is required, it is now far easier an quicker.

So choosing a recent photo here is the undeveloped RAW photo:

‘Out of the camera’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

Here is a basic edit, something like what would have come out of the camera if I had shot in jpeg.

‘Basic edit’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

And then below a bare minimum of how I would edit, cropped, straightened, and a small amount of processing. This would be the least work a photo would have before it reached the blog or my photo albums.

‘Minimum’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

If I liked the photo it would end up with a little more tinkering. A new sky maybe, some of the saturation taken out, a little more texture.

‘Tinkering’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

But then of course if I go this far why stop! A little glow, some post Bi-filtering, and overlay, get rid of the figure in the archway.

‘Further’, Dunster Castle, 2019.

Maybe even pop it on the study wall to look at!

Or maybe have a further tinker and even use it for another blog post – so here is one – Altered way

Ken

501603 – Lens Artists Photo Challenge #66 – Filling the Frame

This weeks challenge from the Lens-Artists is:

This week, we invite you to explore filling the frame for Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #66.  You can include images of buildings, people, objects, and/or elements from nature.  Feel free to include shots of the same subject before you filled the frame and after you filled the frame.

Well I did not even have to try to think about how I would compose this shot, as the bull decided he would fill the frame for me!  It looks a lot more scary than when I took it a minimal crop at 18mm so I was quite close!

‘501603’, Anglesey, 2019.

Ken

Sinking – Weekly Prompts: Rectangular Prism & Bronze

This weekend GC and SueW have chosen the following as the theme for their challenge.

For the month of October I have chosen to highlight the color challenge BRONZE  for Susan and my site.

Many colors can be described as simple and the mere mention of it evokes certain types of personal memories towards it. Red, orange , green and yellow are such warm and welcoming colors to be sure.

I was away last week for the challenge, of  Rectangular Prism, but this sort of fits that also!

The actual material is Copper and Brass, but it has a bronzed colour so I feel I can get away with it as that is what the challenge was about :).

‘Sinking’, Saltram, 2015.

Ken

Wild and tame – Lens Artists Photo Challenge #64 – Countryside and/or Small Towns

This weeks challenge from the Lens-Artists is:

Tina, Patti, Ann-Christine, and I [Amy] are looking forward to seeing your photos and reading stories of countryside and/or a small town.

I would say that at lest 50% of my photos could fit into this category as I live fairly rural, and my holidays usually take me to rural places, in search of ancient stones I tramp across wild open spaces, through forests, past lakes, up and down hill and mountain, and along public pathways.  Farmland and the ever patient farmers with the walkers on the land are a recurrent theme.  I live in Wales so I have access to some of the UK’s best countryside and small towns, even our big towns and cities are small :).

The countryside and our towns can be both wild and tame, so here are a few photos for you about what this means to me.

‘Cerrig Duon View’, Brecon Beacons, 2019.

‘Brecon stream’, Brecon Beacons, 2019.

‘Working’, Anglesey, 2019.

‘601555’, Anglesey, 2019.

‘Beaumaris’, Anglesey, 2014.

Ken

Friends – Weekly Prompts: Grin

This weekend GC and SueW have chosen the following as the theme for their challenge.

This weekend the Weekly Prompts Photo Challenge from GC and me is GRIN.

Animals, babies, unfortunate gaffs and even partners are just a few of the things that make GC and me grin. So, what gets your giggle juices flowing? Whatever it is we’d love to hear about them and see your photos.

As usual this is a flexible challenge and anything goes, so grin and bear it and have fun!

Well first of all thanks to my wife for this photo from the archives, it makes me smile, yes it is blurry, but you can see the warmth, happiness, friendship, and grins!

Two old friends meet up in a foreign land after a good number of years of not seeing each other, the meeting a fairly random chance encounter that they happen to be in Vienna on the same day!  If you don’t know, I am the one on the right.

‘Friends’, Vienna, 2013.
 Ken

Lined Up – Weekly Prompts: Line-up

This weekend GC and SueW have chosen the following as the theme for their challenge.

The Saturday photo challenge here on Weekly Prompts is Line-up.

Lots of possibilities here – Line em up and shoot em… photographs that is!

Line-up – The cast of a theatrical show, a list of players in a sports event, a queue, a row. But You don’t need us to help you out, GC and I are certain you’ll have plenty of ideas of your own so we’ll leave you to it.

The first – two stones that are part of a stone row, a line, lined up, but also lines that go up.

‘Lined up’, Devils arrows, 2019.

The second – A slightly cheeky entrant of a line that is up!

‘Line Up’, St.Ives, 2019.

And finally the third – the Up line from St. Ives to Carbis bay.

‘Up line’, St. Ives, 2019.

Ken

Merry Magic – Lens Artists Photo Challenge #63 – Magical

This weeks challenge from the Lens-Artists is:

But Magical can mean so many different things to everyone of us – At Lens-Artists, we have already had Magical Light as a theme, (last year) but this time it is all up to you! What is Magical to you? People, places, things, nature, adventures, moments… – this week we are looking forward to having some of Your magic!

I think it might be fair to say that most of you have realised that I find monumental ancient places magical.  There is a mystery around their purpose, how and why they were constructed, in the locations they were. What went on here? would there architects approve of my visit, my capturing of this place, and my interpretation both mental and visual?  Surely this would be seen as magic.

I still find the ability to capture images of what we see magical, it was magical when it was chemical and mechanical, and it is still magical now it is captured by a small electronic box.  It is now made even more magical by the fact that I can perform so many interesting tricks after the image has been captured, a magic that once could not be performed at home nor in the studio in many cases.  Once we had to send our undeveloped film off to the chemical magician, and wait for the sound of that small packet hitting the doorstep.  For those lucky enough we could perform this magic in our own homes, the smell of developing fluid and fixative in our nostrils and under that magical red bulb.  I do sometimes miss those days.

So here is a photo of the Merry Maidens in Cornwall, an especially magical place as this is where I proposed to my wife, the thought of asking someone to share their life with you, and the in the asking and answering a magical contract made between two souls.

Ken