The Demise of P4...

30 December 2010

I loved my little Nikon Coolpix P4... it photographed Sasha dolls, outfits, macros and closeups, landscapes and portraits and pretty much everything I asked it to attempt brilliantly...  in all weather conditions, pelting rain, snow, bright sunlight, indoors and out...

On Monday morning I turned on my trusty little P4 as I called her... and... she made a feeble little whirrup... flashed up "lens error" and died... I did everything remedial I could think of... I took out the battery... I changed the battery... I gave her a gentle tap with my finger... I tried again... again... then I sat down and cried... as I tried to fathom what mishap had befallen her... I couldn't remember her falling or having a knock...  But the sorry fact was... she was deader than the proverbial blue parrot (old monty python sketch)...

By the time Neil returned I was still sniffling pathetically about P4's sudden and unexpected demise...

Then we turned to D3000... many photographs later (the problem being that Sasha dolls have a lovely natural coloured skin tone but they were looking in the photos as though they had been given a very bad fake orange tan)... as I became more and more panic stricken... and mumbled something about trying to find a replacement for P4 who Nikon no longer make... Neil found a page in the David Busch's Nikon D3000 guide book about Active D-lighting... Apparently, as he informed me, the Coolpix cameras like P4 had something called Active D-lighting as well as a f2.7-5.3, 7.5-26.3mm lens that allowed them to cast light onto shadow and slightly soften colour... hence the beautiful "natural" portraits of Sasha doll...
At which point he continued to read that Nikon had recently put Active D-lighting onto a couple of their recent DSLR's the D3000, D300 and D3... How lucky am I that my sister decided to buy me a D3000?

Much reading and fiddling later...

At this point Neil discovered that his Compaq laptop could tell us what settings a photograph (previously taken by me of Sasha by P4) had been taken at... we realised that the Nikkor 18-55mm f4.5-6 lens couldn't get the effect that my little point and shoot could with her lens ability of f2.7...

Then I remembered that the Nikkor 35mm prime lens (very recent arrival) was f1.8 so we took it out of the (new specially padded) camera bag (don't want any more accidental deaths of camera equipment) and tried it with the active d-lighting on at an ISO of 100 (P4 was able to take them at ISO 50)... and we had success... Never was I so glad that I had bought that prime lens... Of course I won't be able to zoom in and out for the photos but I will get used to that...

I am also very glad that I have a DH who has excellent ability at fathoming out the deeper workings of technical equipment...  and thankfully had a day off work on holiday...

At this point... bedtime reading has now become a manual on using D3000... I think this will be a steeper learning curve than I had realised... until very recently I just turned on my camera, pointed and pressed the button, and then downloaded the image...  now I am learning about apertures, shutter speeds, etc... but I am so glad that I have my Christmas present camera already (thank you Pip, mum and Steffi) so that I can actually take photographs for my website and blogs...  I think come Christmas Eve, I shall wrap D3000 and its lenses up inside their camera bag and pop a pretty bow on top...  and out of the huge spectrum of entry level DSLR's what were the chances that my sister Pip would choose one with the ability to take images using the Active D-lighting that I had become so used to taking for granted unknowingly...

I thought I would blog about her demise as she was behind the majority of the photographs on Sasha Doll Style and Sasha Doll Style Blog .

Macro Monday... Seagulls on the Wing...

29 November 2010

We decided on a walk on Sunday...  I can't believe that this is only the 3rd walk I have gone on in the past 2 weeks... this appalls me... I look outside at the cold weather, give a shiver and turn back to the warmth...

These are not quite as close-up as I usually try to do for Macro Monday... but I did get some close ups of the Seagulls on the Wing... so I thought I would use this set of images for Macro Monday...

Other wonderful Macro photos can be seen at Lisa's Chaos...

We took the new Christmas camera with us... took two lenses, the kit lens 18-55mm and the 55-200mm lens that was already on the camera.  We ended up keeping it on as it was too windy and cold to risk trying to change the lens without getting dust into the camera's inside...

I have been reading a couple of books by Bryan Peterson and one of the things that he suggests is going out with a theme in mind... along with your camera...

My theme was Seaguls on the Wing... and I hoped for some close up images for Macro Monday...

Initially I had some problems... it was windy... it was bitterly cold 2 deg Celsius... and I was shivering...

At which point I wondered why on earth I had opted for the second hand 55-200mm Nikon lens that didn't have the VR...  many of my images were very blurred... probably due to my shivering...

Also, in the wind the seagulls seemed to swirl and swoop in the air at such speed...

I found myself spinning around in a weird pirouette trying to keep the particular seagull in focus...

or at least still in the frame...  many images had parts of seagulls... a tip of a wing, a tail, as they disappeared out of my picture...

I have always wanted to take photographs of seagulls flying... Flight is so amazing... they are so graceful...

The sea was incredibly rough... Crawfordsburn doesn't usually have such high waves... normally we travel up to the north coast to see the big breakers coming in from the Atlantic Ocean...

I loved the way the were able to move their wings so that they could literally stay still in the air... while watching the water below...

Many of the seagulls I photographed today were immature birds who don't have their adult plummage yet...

I loved the textural quality of the rough water...

Looking up I realised that the sky was starting to get its pinky sunset colours...

They looked so elegant from behind...

Now I need to work out how to keep warm when taking photographs outside in the middle of winter...  at least we only had -2 deg Celsius last night... my sister Pip had -17 deg Celsius in Powys...  incredibly cold weather when we are still in November and winter hasn't quite begun...  maybe I should invest in some type of thermal clothing and knit a pair of fingerless gloves to stop my hands going mauve and white...

Seaweed in the Surf...

28 November 2010

A bitterly cold Sunday afternoon and we decided it was a good opportunity for a walk at the shore...

The normally pristine beach at Crawfordsburn Country Park was covered in thick piles of seaweed after stormy weather and high tides we have experienced recently...

I loved the shiny texture of the seaweed at the edge of the sea...

where the incoming froth surrounded it...

I noticed that because the seaweed was wet I got a lot of reflective glints... I wonder if there is a filter that could correct that...  something else to research... what fun...

And as the surf rolled back the seaweed was left glazed with the white bubbly froth...

The seaweed has a beauty of its own...

The depth of the rust, brown and ochre colours against the pale sand...

And the beautiful wet shiny pebbles... gleaming in the light...

Christmas knitting...

28 November 2010

The Christmas present knitting progresses if a little slower than I had hoped for...  I now have 5 completed socks...  more to come soon...

Fungal Frog...

27 November 2010

I had some fun last night... testing my new Christmas present... 

The 35mm prime lens arrived in the post... followed by the set of diopter lens attachments which arrived yesterday morning so the resistance was gone...

I wanted to see what they could do.  I had read that the prime lens makes a huge difference with sharpness of photograph when photographing in the evening in low light conditions...

(35mm prime lens with +1 diopter)

So I tried all the different attachments there is one of +1, +2, +4, and +10 in the pack...  

(35mm prime lens with +2 diopter)

I really love the way I was getting a sharp image where I was focusing and the lovely softened area around it.

(35mm prime lens with +4 diopter)

The more magnification the diopter attachment had the larger the contrast between the area in focus and the background softness...

(35mm prime lens with +10 diopter)

I loved this photo.  I was focusing on the frog's eye and side of face. 

I adore the photographs of the little green frogs that I have seen on other people's blogs.  So incredibly cute.  We don't have little green frogs like that here.  The frog in the photo is carved from a dry fungus that I bought when I visited Canada in 1991.  I have always liked it.

It is interesting the different effects that can be achieved using different types of lens.  It is going to be a steep learning curve working out how to achieve what I want and remember how I did it...  So different to using either my trusty little Nikon P4 that I just adore or my camera phone...

Trekking Socks...

26 November 2010

Neil chose this lovely Zitron Trekking XXL Shade 419 out of my most recent Sock Yarn Order...

I think he liked the dark shades... a nice mix of a mocha brown, mid grey and dark mauve...

I have noticed as I knit the first sock that the colours are spiralling around the leg...  This has happened with some other socks that I have knit and it makes it impossible to match up the pattern when I knit the heel flap gusset type of heel so I am wondering what would be the best way to try to retain the pattern all the way along the sock...  I don't mind if it isn't quite right for a sock for myself but it is different when it is for someone else and I really want Neil to like these...  time to look through the sock books for help...

I have chosen a nice mid grey plain sock wool and thought it might be an idea to do a short row heel or after thought heel in plain grey which would allow the sock pattern to continue all the way to the toe and then I could do the toe in the same plain grey.  I think that might work quite well and look nice.  Haven't tried an after thought heel yet so that would be fun... I really love trying something new.  I have noticed in socks I have knit for myself that I don't like when a yarn end is darned into the sole of the foot... I don't like the little lumpy bit when I am walking on it so I think it might work better if the ends for the toe and heel are darned in neatly on the inside of the top of the foot...  I do think socks knitted for a gift ought to be as comfortable as possible...  I suppose the after thought heel won't be as long lasting as the heel flap would be but I think the Trekking XXL is supposed to be quite a hard wearing sock yarn...

Christmas Socks...

24 November 2010...

A beautiful pair of socks which I am knitting for a Christmas Present... not going to say who they are for as that would ruin the surprise and not going to show a photo of the finished pair at least until after Christmas... This pair only needs the second toe knitted and then they will be finished...

I have used a beautiful Autumnal coloured Trekking XXL Maxima yarn... gorgeous colours and hard to part with... but it wouldn't be a lovely present if I didn't really love the finished result myself...

I really should think of a name for this ivory coloured bear who holds my socks for me...  Snowball?  Snowbear?  Fluffy?  Any suggestion welcomed...

Macro Monday... Beech Hedgerow...

22 November 2010

It is Macro Monday...  over at Lisa's Chaos and it is great fun taking part...

and I have taken a couple of photographs of one of my favourite beech hedgerows on Cavehill... it is very windswept and the trees all angle in one direction...

But I find the curving sinuous shapes of their branches and boughs very pleasing to the eye...  I loved the colour tones in these photographs... it was quite a grey day and the trees seemed to glow in the light...

Trial Run of Christmas Present...

21 November 2010

Okay, I'm not supposed to try out the new Christmas present camera but I felt it would be wise to see that it was working... and the new lense 55-200mm had arrived on Saturday morning...

I hadn't been out for a walk for a few days... and we thought it would be good for us to get some fresh air...

What should I see looking down the field but horses (well they may actually be ponies as they weren't all that big)...  perfect for trying out the new camera...  so we traipsed down the field...

and it really was fun...

they nuzzled...

looked really cute...

they bickered...

and snickered...

and pranced...

and posed...

okay... sometimes the person behind the camera let them down... didn't get the focus quite right on this one.

they really were a lot of fun to photograph...

very handsome...

then Neil decided to share out the remains of the apple...

they wandered over to investigate...

took a good sniff...

one party seemed very pleased with the piece of apple...

while the other didn't want to share...

I think it will take a little while getting used to the focus.  I have never tried using a zoom lense like this before and it can be very easy to get the wrong thing into focus...  and yes... it will now be reboxed and wrapped up ready for Christmas... really...