Why aren’t you Celebrating this?

Alvin : Wow why aren’t you celebrating 200k views?

Me: I know I know if I only had a $1 for each view.

Alvin {Thinks}: Be real even 1c would be OK.

Alvin :  So why don’t you have Ads?

Me:  No simple answer there. First I don’t like pop ups and Ads. Second I did try to monetize the blog with the Google's AdSense but I was disapproved (for a strange reason? My blog was considered unsuitable!). At the time a troll/lowlife was skimming off my blog posts and posting them unaltered on a site that looked like a legit camera review web site and it had Google AdSense ads  but it the content all totally fake (thanks to copyscape for helping in this research) . However Google was clearly paying him for my content. Didn't seem fair at the time. After a lot of investigation and DCMA notices, with the troll changing the countries hosting his rip-off website many times the hassle eventually stopped. I also wrote to google many times during this period via links in blogger and forums but never once got an answer back about why I was considered unsuitable. So I just lost interest.

Alvin: Ok makes sense but why are you still blogging?

Me: Good Question. I must like it.

Alvin: You mean a fun way to waste your time then? What happened to your enjoying the social media silence?

Me: No comment

Have a Happy & Prosperous New Year

 

— oz_endless_summer (@OzEndlessSummer) December 31, 2016

My #endlesssummer adventure start tomorrow, you can also follow be on that as @OzEndlessSummer on twitter and/or @oz_endless_summer on instagram

ThePatch :: Celebration/Musical Instrument

Queue the samba drums, Timbalada, Daniela Mercury and/or Olodum, that’s my idea of celebration music. Well a good excuse to get out the bongle drums and another party shirt. It was a dull day and the light fading but It did let me experiment with a few options to try and capture the rhythm of the carnival.
Ok none of these get close to the atmosphere of the real thing, but I’m not in Brazil I’m in Oz. AND Hopefully the light will be better tomorrow when I can work on finding a better composition. in the meantime …

I know this clip is a little on the long side but if you enjoy drum music it is worthwhile (and you will recognise that Paul Simon used them and their rhythms in his obvious child.)

So the new plan is to try the composite motion again by perhaps more front on and playing the bongos in the more conventional sitting position, so more hand action can be captured. So I found a sunny spot, turned up the burst mode to max and only captured jpeg, Set up the tripod and delay, then pressed the shutter, quickly in position. Now I have 355 images pretty much the same from which to find half a dozen hand positions and learn how to do multiple masking bug techniques in Perfect Layers, ok I have bitten off more than I can chew, So I’ve settled on using just a few hands, less is more,  in my final submission.

ThePatch :: Decoration/Celebration

I began this week fairly determined not to leave the patch project to the last day, but I did not find to much celebration. There was some decoration in the local shopping mall, but it didn’t scream celebration. In Australia having a Christmas in July Dinner has become a popular family event. Whereas in the middle of summer on a hot day sitting down to the traditional Christmas roasts and rich puddings, can be less than fully appreciated but having a second festive feast in Winter is a perfect excuse for more excess. Anyway some of the Christmas decorations can be pulled out to decorate the table, so that sounded close to the theme.
My first thought was to just use the table decorations under some natural light and get a classic bracketed exposure set to create a conventional HDR. I have also added a little tweaking of clarity on the angel's wings and the tinsel with lightroom.



The results says decoration and is pleasing, but its a very calm celebration!

My second idea was to try an available light shot, something a bit moody, a photography of the angel that has become somewhat of a traditional Christmas in July centrepiece for my family, she needs to be in the spot light. I wanted to set this against Christmas tree lights, just outside the depth of field. That was a plan, but as I was testing out the low light conditions I also got me the idea of including a small crystal angel to add some awe and wonder. I experimented with lighting just with a torch and painting the light where I wanted it (back lit and below on the crystal angel, more straight on for the purple angel). My experiments where a bit hit and miss and I could not get the background far enough away to achieve the bokeh effect I want. So armed with several photos that were ok in one or another area I figured it was time to have a lengthy play in Perfect Photo Layers, to merge sections of different photo and Prefect Effects to give me a better bohek on the Christmas lights.  I am pleased with the result given it is my first foray into these steps and the limitation of the exposures I started with.

ThePatch :: Colour, Celebration, Street Scene

The patch themes seem to be getting harder. Finding a colourful celebration street scene in Melbourne in winter was always going to be a challenge. Melbournians are renowned for just wearing black, and particularly so in winter. Then there’s the fact that all out festivals are in the warmer months. Today was the aftermath of the world cup and sport is the true religion of Melbourne so I thought there might be a chance there. Seems all of the German fans where celebrating somewhere else and no other team colours to be seen. Then I had the brilliant thought since it is also Bastille Day,  plenty of good food on offer (another Melbourne passion), I figured there might be a little bit of France around to photograph so I headed for the current production of Les Misérables. No luck there either BUT China Town was decked out in its colourful finery, but I could not find what was being celebrated. Perhaps it is just being a long standing part of Melbourne life.