June 30th, 2008
Thanks to a busy schedule, it has taken me a while to put up my photos of Riga, Latvia, but here they are! As with my photos of Vilnius, Lithuania, I have not yet included descriptions or keywords for the galleries - they will be added later. For now, you shouldn’t have trouble finding anything.
Of the three Baltic capitals I visited, Riga felt most like a modern city. It’s medieval old town was not quite as compartmentalized from the rest of the modern developments like Tallinn, for example. Vilnius felt considerably smaller and didn’t seem to come with as many of the trappings of a larger city.
That said, Riga was still a wonder to explore. The art nouveau architecture was ubiquitous and it was impossible to get bored wandering the cobbled streets and visiting the plentiful landmarks.
Have a look at the photos here.
June 28th, 2008
Julius von Bismarck, a student from Berlin, has come up with a clever hack of his old Minolta SLR so that instead of capturing an image, it projects one. Dubbed the Image Fulgurator, it’s not just any old projector. It’s controlled by a sensor which syncs the projection with flashes from nearby cameras, making the projection all but invisible to the naked eye and visible only on the image of the flash photographer.
This post on Wired details Bismarck’s invention and some of its potential uses (and misuses). Of relevance to the travel photography site that you are currently reading, imagine you’re visiting a famous landmark and you want to take a few shots. Maybe it’s a little dark and you want to lighten things up with your flash, but when you look at your photos, all is not as it should be. Maybe there is an ad where a wall should be. That seems like the most likely scenario to me - that advertisers will try to get a hold of an Image Fulgurator and project their brands into your holiday snaps. Forgive me cynicism, but remember, if there is a vacant area available, it will eventually get an ad placed on it one way or the other.
Ads and pranks are the obvious uses for this invention, but a more productive use might be to use it for some special effects in photography. Depending on the kind of quality you can achieve, maybe you could use something like this in the studio to create backgrounds out of nothing. Maybe that’s a little ambitious for this early incarnation of the device, but the potential may be there.
Let’s just hope this never falls into the wrong hands!
June 12th, 2008
After last night’s glitches were ironed out by a moment of clarity, I can now happily report that my gallery of photos of Vilnius, Lithuania is now up and ready for your viewing pleasure.
I got off to a rocky start in Vilnius with a cab driver and B&B manager both ripping me off. That’s not so great when they’re really the first two people you meet in the country!
It was, however, smooth sailing after that and I gleefully wandered the fantastic medieval streets of the capital of Lithuania. The medieval old town held enough treasures for me to walk until very ugly things started happening to my feet. And then I walked some more. When I have a camera in hand and I’m surrounded by a beautiful city, I don’t notice so much.
In the interest of getting the photos online quickly, I have not yet provided descriptions and keywords for all the images. This will follow once more photos are online, but if you need any further information about any of the photos, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Enjoy the Vilnius gallery!
June 11th, 2008
Between addressing mysteriously non-functional contact forms on this site and pulling my hair out because of a massive amount of corrupt image files, I’ve managed to upload a group of galleries of photos from Vilnius Lithuania. There is plenty more where that came from and sometime tomorrow (depending on where in the world you are), there should be a complete set of my photos from that beautiful city.
For those of you who are curious, those corrupt files of mine are, in fact, my Baltics photos. All the RAW files that I had sorted seem now to have corrupt headers and Photoshop won’t open them at all. All these RAW files are saved elsewhere, but they are unsorted and unprocessed, so this glitch is more than a little bit irritating. What’s strange about it though: All the files still open in Lightroom. I guess I’ll be learning that app pretty quickly! So, the data is all there - it’s just some messed up header or something that’s preventing the files from opening.
The files seem to have gotten corrupted when I (and apparently, this was a foolish mistake) renamed my folder from “Baltics” to “Baltics sorted.” After that, every RAW file in there got sick.
I don’t know if this is related to the problems people are experiencing with OS 10.5.3 and Photoshop CS3, but it seems like it might be the case (even though I wasn’t saving remotely). Either way, for all you users out there who have this combination of OS and software: back up now! Now!
To top it all off, since the forms on my site aren’t working, (cross your fingers for a good reply from my host!), even if someone goes to my contact page and mails me a miracle fix, I won’t get the message! Best to leave it in the comments. Any happy thoughts are welcome too.
Update: Why didn’t anyone tell me to update my Camera RAW plugin? That fixed it all up. No corrupt files, just a messed up plugin. Too bad I panicked when I saw my files wouldn’t open and immediately assumed they were corrupted. Rookie mistake.
Oh well. All’s well that end’s well!
April 7th, 2008
In honour of a wee trip recently made to Northeast England and its beautiful scenery, I have posted a small I have posted a small gallery of images that feature the Angel of the North.
This sculpture, designed by Antony Gormley and located in Gateshead (near Newcastle) was controversial when it was first constructed, but in its ten years of towering over the A1 motorway, it has become an icon of England’s Northeast.
With that in mind, I am putting this up as the first of a few galleries to come from a recent trip in that direction.
My expectation was that I wouldn’t like the winged giant, but standing beneath its massive wings, I was impressed. I hope I can share some of its grandeur with you. See the photos here.
March 16th, 2008
Here’s just what everyone needs on a Sunday morning: some great aerial photos of islands from National Geographic.
I have to say, Bora Bora looks like something out of a dream. Palau too. If I win the lottery anytime soon, I think some island hopping might be in order.
March 14th, 2008
It’s time to continue some travels through Asia. When last I left you, we were in Ayuthaya. Well, we’re still there with the latest batch of photos to be added to the gallery.
This time I have uploaded photos of Wat Phra Ram, another of the fine temple ruins in the centre of the city. Go have a look!
January 20th, 2008
Wat Phra Mahathat is another of the fine temples in Ayutthaya. The centrepiece of this site is the sandstone Buddha head embedded in the trunk of a tree. A bodhi tree has consumed most of the statue and all that remains is a face staring out from the roots.
Please visit the gallery of photos of Wat Phra Mahathat here.
January 4th, 2008
More images from Ayutthaya! Yes, they keep coming (and will keep coming for a little while yet)!
This time join me a little tour through Wat Chai Wattanaram, one of the more impressive temples in Ayutthaya. Its sprawling, riverside ruins are dominated by a central prang and its satellite towers. Climbing the steep steps gives a good view out over the temple’s walls, the surrounding flat area and the river. It’s just another reason to make Ayutthaya more than a day trip from Bangkok.
More photos here.
January 1st, 2008
If you’re a photographer working in (or passing through) the US, you may want to take a look at this post on Chase Jarvis’ blog to find out more about a new regulation that has just gone into effect in the United States regarding the transportation of Lithium-ion batteries (the kind that may power cameras, flashes, laptops, etc.).
Long story short, there are now limits to how many spares you can carry and you will likely have to carry them in your carry-on baggage. The rationale behind this change is that if the batteries catch fire, they can potentially burn hot enough that the fire extinguishers in the baggage compartment may be insufficient to put out the fire and there are better systems in place in the cabin to handle such occurrences.
Flyingwithfish.com has some more information here and also has an interesting suggestion on how to carry more spares here: if the battery is installed it is not considered a spare. If the battery is in a charger, it is considered ‘installed.’ This may or may not get you through security with an extra battery or two, but it’s an interesting thought.
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