Home straight

I'm on the homeward straight to completing this assignment with a new deadline of January 12th 2011.  It's all the background stuff that holds me back and I need to find all the background details to complete the accompanying documents.

Completed Images

20 Dec 2010

I have finally taken all the images I intend to use for this assignment. I have been trying to add a slideshow to my blog but it won't show the current list for my Picasa web album. I've even tried the Help but that doesn't really help.  All of a sudden the new list will appear but I have no idea how it happens.

21 Dec 2010 (winter solstice)
Success with Picasa!! I went into the Help Section in Picasa and requested advice on inserting a slideshow. Several people had put advice online but the slimplist actually worked and you can see the result on the right hand side. Now to put the back up stuff together.

As we are in the winter season and have had the heaviest snowfall for 30+ years, I have had to include some snowy pictures as part of my portfolio. I'm pleased with my choice, let's hope my tutor, CliveW, is too.

Catching up on Assignment 4 Images

19th December

Sherborne Lane in the snow

 More snow yesterday which made it extremely dangerous to walk about. The safest place was in the middle of the road where the snow had turned to slush. No buses are running as the hills are so steep around Lyme and early in the morning (sunrise is about 8.15 am) only fool hardy photographers were out and about taking pictures. Any sensible person stayed at home until later when it had warmed up a few degrees.

17th December 2010: It snowed here in Lyme last night which is a rare sight to see. I'm told that the salt in the air defeats all but the heaviest snow falls. But there is snow and I shall be out at first light to catch the last remaining images for assignment 4 (apart from the one of  carol singers around the Christmas tree on December 22nd) before other people get out and spoil the sights with their footprints.

Slow down on Assignment 4

My deadline was December 12th but I had it extended a month to January 12th 2011 as I have been so busy. I was running a class for 8 students in basic Photoshop under the auspices of the local U3A association. I hired the local Internet learning centre for four 2-hour sessions and had forgotten how much prep it takes for even short sessions.

I had not realised that one member of the class was a complete beginner in digital imaging and a couple of the men were advanced workers. This makes it very difficult as there was a wide gap between skills and I found it hard to start at the right level for the majority of students. I had prepared a session on Layers but two or three of the people found they lost their way completely so I decided to keep the lessons much simpler and just concentrate on one or two basic topics each time. 

I have also been designing a website for the local photographic club as I am now a member. All the clubs in the surrounding area have websites but Lyme Bay did not partly because there was no one to design it.  I spent about a week putting it together and am using WordPress to host it. It's fairly basic but I'm pleased with it.  See what you think, here's the address:

Lyme Bay Photographic Club website

Assignment 4 will feature Lyme Regis in autumn/winter as an upmarket travel brochure and I think I will use one of John Fowles 'Three Town Walks' as my guide.  Lyme Regis will be all lit up for Christmas and I thought it would be interesting, as well as taking standard daylight pictures of Broad Street, see what I could achieve with the Christmas lights on. The town makes a big thing about lights as it draws the crowds in to spend money.

Taking additional images for assignment 4

5 November 2010
Been out this morning taking lots of views of Lyme Regis town and the Cobb to see what would go best in my tourist brochure. There are so many views that I feel I need to make a particular point of including pictures with people participating in some type of activity rather than pictures of views, streets and buildings.

The light was terrific and the sea calm although I would like to manage some shots when the sea is crashing over the Cobb and the spray soaking people on the other side of the high wall. 

Additional work for Assignment 4

2 November 2010

I've been planning my town guide and what angle to take for it. I find it very useful to look at other people's work to see how they have tackled this assignment. The only problem is that there are many students working on the Art of Photography but numbers seem to fall away on other modules. Those that there are are mainly behind me in their work. We did have a list of all student blogs as a page in the OCA Forum but that seems to have disappeared in the switch over to the new website. It would be very useful if it was reinstated.

The weather is still mild and sunny but cold and the colours of autumn are stunning, especially the beech and horse chestnut trees. I was out early on Friday last week when the sun was just getting to a decent height and took some great pictures of it lighting up the Cobb area of the seafront. See what you think?

I think the light is great, a pale yellow sun was just moving up in the sky when sunrise was about 7.30 am before the clocks went back. I used Levels in Photoshop to brighten it just a fraction but was amazed to see what the Auto button did when I used that, see below:

It has completly ruined the effect, so back to my original with very slight tweaking.

I also took some pictures of birch trees against a very blue sky and was pleased with the effect, here's a couple:

These are entirely un-Photoshopped, the sky really was that blue and I didn't even use a polarising lens either. I know I have a problem with my horizons and getting them straight, but these trees were on the side of a steep hill and the shape of them has been affected by the seawinds.

Assignment 4 - Starting off

21 October 2010

As Autumn moves along at a fast pace I want to take my images for a tourist brochure featuring the wonderful colours that we see in England, and Lyme Regis in particular, at this time of year. So I will be taking pictures for my brochure as I complete the exercises for Project 4.