Parra Eels vs Melbourne Storm (18-16)

In what was advertised as Parra legend Nathan Hindmarsh's 250th game for the Eels, this game quickly turned into a showdown between 2 of the best full backs in the league. Whenever one would pull off something brilliant, the other would answer back with a show of his own.

Jarryd Hayne continued his brilliant form sparked mid-season by State of Origin, and proved a handful for the Melbourne defense whenever he got the ball. On offense he continuously got involved in set plays and made half breaks to keep the Storm on their toes. On defense he ran down Billy Slater multiple times (which isn't easy) and saved a number of tries with his excellent positioning.

As always, Billy Slater looks dangerous every time he touches the ball and if it wasn't for some hard nosed Parra defense the score line would read a Melbourne victory. Slater played an important role, along with Greg Inglis (origin center) and Cooper Cronk to lead a late rush after being down by 10-0 at the half.

Don't worry I haven't forgotten that this was supposed to be Hindmarsh's game, I'll elaborate more on that in tomorrows post with some more photos from the game.

Both photos were taken with the EOS 50D and EF 70-200 f2.8L IS USM.

Settings: ISO 1600, 1/320, f/2.8

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Why we love panos

Panorama photos have always held a spell over me. When I first saw them, I couldn't see what the big deal is. If anything I thought panos were stupid, they're long, odd shaped, hard to frame, and have no standard in sizing.

Soon after the purchase of my first SLR, the EOS 400D, I realised the limitations of taking a single photo to capture a landscape. When working with lines such as the horizon and the contours of mountains, valleys & coastlines, it is natural to utilise a wide format frame.

This technique in photography have become such widespread that some photographers have dedicated themselves to panoramic photos, Ken Duncan is a well known example. What makes him so well known is not only his dedication to panoramic photos, but his style of image processing after taking the photo. In this day and age, an artist's post processing style is as unique as his signature. All successful photographers have a fine tuned way of processing their images that are instantly recognisable by those in the field.

Post processing has become especially important as almost anybody mildly interested in photography is likely to own an SLR. No longer will resolution and turn around time separate the amateurs and the pros, the market has become much more diverse and it will come down to how well you process your photos that will set you apart.

Me, I'm still working it out :P

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Featherdale - More Photos

This is more or less a continuation of the last post, with another example of the ability of telephoto lenses to take great photos of subjects behind fences. Sometimes at places like this, we think that if I was to be an animal, I'd like to be one in a zoo/national park etc.

Sure you don't have the luxury of being completely free, but you're not exactly a prisoner either. It would be a life of free food, drinks and accomodation, with people at your service everyday.

This photo is an example of the type of food certain animals are given in an attempt to make life as normal as possible. Only in this case, the animals don't even have to hunt their food, it's served to them on a golden platter.

As easy as it seems, you can never have enough space to fly, so the next step is to expand the area.

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Featherdale!

If there's one type of photography I like more than sports, its wildlife photography. If you live in Sydney, and you want to try it out then I really suggest you head to Featherdale Wildlife Park at Doonside.

It's better than being at a zoo in several ways:

- its closer for most people

- its cheaper ($18 for students compared to $28 at Taronga)

- less crowded

- wallabies, emus, and some birds are allowed to run free and be fed

As a result of all this, the photos that you get are generally more intimate, closer cropped, and more natural.

When you get there, you'll notice many of the exotic birds are within cages, and for good reason, some 0f them are birds of prey ... capable of ripping people into shreds if necessary. Here's how to successfully take a good photo of a bird (anything really) behind a cage/fence with an SLR:

- Use telephoto (100mm or more)

- Put the front of your lens as close to the fence as possible

- Try to use highest telephoto setting

- Use flash (preferable external) to increase contrast

And there you have it! By putting your telephoto lens as close to the fence as possible, you're focussing past the fence, rendering it almost invisible. Sometimes you still get a slightly hazy effect in the photo, so that's why you use an external flash to increase contrast and subsequently reduce that haze effect. And finally some finishing touches in Photoshop for more contrast, colour, cropping and you'll get something like the photo above.

Both photos were takne with the Canon 50D and EF 70-200mm f2.8L IS USM, but you can just as easily do these photos with most camera gear as long as it's fairly telephoto.

Will post up more photos in the following days :)

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Change

Since I'm on holidays, I have a lot more spare time on my hands ... still working, but no studying :).

I thought about an interesting question that gets asked around quite often, and the answers are almost always biased or bullshit. Here is my compilation of the best answers I've seen/heard/read/given to the age old question

"Will people ever change?"

- Once a cheater always a cheater

- You can't turn a hoe into a housewife

- Yes, but he won't do it for you

- "A man can train himself to stop chasing women,

but if a woman is chasing your man, he can't run fast enough",

the prophet Chris Rock

- Players change in their locker room

- Only werewolves, every full mooon

- when STD happens

- "Players don't change, they lose

so if you don't want a defeated man, let a player play" Anon

Me (4 years old)

Point & Shoot 35mm Film

Me (19 yrs old)

Canon 50D + 24-105 f4L

(who would have thought?)

When I posed the question to a wide demographic, it was interesting to find out that nearly everyone linked that question to a relationship (Chris Rock quote is definitely a personal favourite though haha).

Initially the idea came into my mind when I saw an old photo of myself (4yrs old) holding a point & shoot film camera. I'm now 19, and still holding a camera. That hasn't always been the case though, between the ages of 8-15 the photography part of me got brushed off to the side. Even though I haven't achieved a whole with photography, I'm always surprised with the photos I find buried in my hard drives.

I guess if you used me as an example, I didn't change, but I came full circle. Took the long scenic detour away from photography and came right back on the expressway. Or ... I could be an exception.

Change, maybe ... but we'll always go back to the roots

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Big Time Scanning

I'm finally on holidays, and I've decided to do something different with these holidays. I got my mind set on certain things that I want to get done before I get back to uni. One of them is to scan ALL of the old photos from albums into my hard drive. Simple 300dpi Tiff files, so if anything happens I've got it all on my hard drive.

So after scanning 543 photos tonight, I found time to write this post. It's been a really long day so I'll keep it short. Prize goes out to whoever can guess the relationship of the 2 people in this photo. I scanned the photo using my Pixma MP540 all in one printer, then simple editing with photoshop to balance out the colours and vignette. Great little machine by the way, easy to use and low maintenance with minilab quality.

Handy Hint: I recommend everyone with a half decent scanner do what I'm doing, photos from back then won't last forever. Let's face it, albums don't get looked through very often, but blogs and facebook get hits everyday :P

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Impressionist?

We live in a time where anything (and I mean everything) can be turned into, or be interpreted, as art.  From artworks with distinguished subjects and identity to abstract work that makes you say ... "are you serious? somebody bought THAT for $2 mill?"

However I do believe that the unconscious mind produces the best work sometimes.  And who knows, maybe that's how people come up with outrageous ideas for sculptures and paintings.  So without further ado, I present the collective efforts of 6 bored uni students on a friday afternoon.

Camera: Canon EOS 50D

Lens: EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

Settings: 1/125, f/2.5, ISO 1000

As a whole, about $200 worth of port and lamb ribs were eaten, not a bad effort.  There's something almost poetic about how those bones were arranged.  Click on the photo, take a closer look and you might see past the madness.

Cheers

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NRL Round 12 - Parramatta Eels (13) vs Cronulla Sharks (10)

I was sitting at home last nite, thinking about what photo I'd put up here today. Saturday, no work, no real plans ... normally means no photo. So I bought tickets to the footy for me and my mate.

For those of you who don't follow the NRL ... Parra is one of those frustrating, inconsistent teams with a lot of promise and a reasonable amount of talent. The Sharks are coming last on the ladder, have no clear future, a lot of negative publicity and well ... we don't even know if there's going to be a sharks team next year.

Long story short, horrible game, depressing weather, freezing cold, and only about 7500 people in attendance. I still wonder why I bothered to go ... wait that's right, Parra was supposed win this game no worries ...

So before I forget that this is a photo blog, and start analysing the game ... I'm just glad I atleast got some good shots :) You can read the match recap here

Location: Parramatta Stadium

Camera: Canon EOS 50D

Lens: EF 70-200 f2.8 IS USM

Shot Settings: 1/320, f/2.8, ISO 1600, no flash

There isn't a whole lot to say about this photo, but the original photo is ridiculously hazy (due to the heavy rain). So I saved what I could ... and we have the result. I still cringe over the game every time I see this photo haha

This next photo is a little more uplifting, only because it features a Parramatta player whooo

Shot Settings are exactly the same as above, since I used manual for these situations.

And finally, we have a shot of the Parramatta captain, Nathan Cayless ... one of the tireless workhorses in the game today.

Only thing I can say, love the face.

Yea I know the last couple of posts have been a bit dry, especially compared to the american indian post i did a couple of days ago. But hey, atleast the photos turned out alright.

By the way, for anyone who doesn't know this, you can enlarge the photos just by clicking on them.

Anyways, I shall head back to completing my phys chem reports.

Until next time, cheers

As always check out my flickr, there's always new photos on there.

Or if you don't like flickr, hit up the links on the side for facebook and twitter :)

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