New For Old

An interesting and unusual composition—a close up from dead astern of the Waco biplane operated by Adelaide Biplanes, from Aldinga Aerodrome, South Australia. The Waco is a modern-build of a classic 1930’s patent, this particular aircraft dating from 1992. The lines are most engaging, and this unusual aspect presented itself from the way the aircraft was parked near the airfield cafe! I grabbed this frame on January 11^th, 2023, and would love to go see the planes coming and going again! Image was minimally enhanced—contrast, colour and sharpness only. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike. (As it’s been two weeks since I posted, I’ll get something else up tomorrow, as well.)

Steel Bike

 The Kenny Blake Memorial Sculpture on the High Street of Strathalbyn, South Australia is an internationally recognised sporting monument. Kenny Blake was a South Australian motorcycle racing icon until his untimely passing at Britain's Isle of Mann in 1981. This sculpture took three months to build and contains over 4000 mechanical components and items of scrap. The imposing, life-size monument stands on a stone pedestal on a street corner, and perfectly captures the power and grace of the sport. The intricate detail is endlessly fascinating, and it would be interesting to reshoot at different times of day to catch the changing light across the monument. I captured this image when passing through Strathalbyn on January 19^th, 2023. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Busy Airport

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This was a simple enough shot, but compsition was the object, looking for a frame filled with machines and the implicit action of people interacting with them. Flights were arriving and deplaning at Newcastle Aiport, UK, this evening in November, 2007, and while I waited for my own connection to London I amused myself shooting through plate glass, defeating reflections by easing behind a standing display of some sort, and using telephoto to close on the subject matter. As evening drew toward night I held the lens surround hard against the glass to control shake. Here a row of Boeing 737s was marshalled at the arrival terminals, and handlers were busy with their offloading and replenishment. The usual enhancements were done; Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic, telephoto. Image by Mike.

Catch the Flash

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Reflex shooting can give unpredictable results, sometimes good, sometimes bad. Here a Robinson R-22 helicopter is framed quite well, at a high telephoto value, as it passes obliquely, at the Goolwa Classic Airshow, February, 2007, south of Adelaide, South Australia. The short exposure time has stopped the blades and the timing of the shutter has also captured the strobing of the beacon on the aircraft's tail boom. The general grain of the image is an artifact of the telephoto setting, and the fact it was taken at only 2mp, a way of getting a large number of frames onto a flashcard in the days before really big cards started to become affordable. Sharpened and colour-enhanced. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Metal and Complex Light

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Here the POV is under the tail of the DeHavilland Sea Venom at the Fast Jets Fighter Museum, Parafield Airport, north of Adelaide, taken in January, 2007, and the range of tonal values the chip has gathered are striking. The shadow areas have been adequately registered, while the main lighting source is burned out, yet the general colours of the environment have been captured with great truth. The image was sharpened, and the colour and contrast adjusted slightly. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Lens Flare by Night

Given that this image was also taken through a window, it turned out very well. After several hours delay for weather, my plane finally backed away from the terminal at London Heathrow bound for Australia, in the third week of November, 2007. I had photographed the aircraft from the terminal, and at last got some shots through the window as she started to move. Here the massive flood lights burn out in lens flare, and reflect from the wing. The shot was cropped down to better focus on the area of interest, then sharpened. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Bridge on the Esk

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This is an intensively reworked shot. The original was taken, with plenty of telephoto dialed up, in November, 2006, through a train window (note the marks), looking under the road bridge just inland of Whitby, alongside the River Esk in North Yorkshire. This perspective, framing the historic buildings on the East Cliff, is hard to obtain from anywhere else but the moving train. The image was squared up using fine rotation, then extraneous top and bottom areas were cropped. The softening effect of the window (due to shooting obliquely through it, rather than square-on) was ameliorated by sharpening around 15%, then the contrast and colour were adjusted. The final result is not up to the standard of shooting without that dirty window in front of the lens, but the unusual composition goes a long way to forgiving the shortcomings. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Big Bridge, Small Boat

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This is the lift bridge over the river at Port Adelaide, photographed in summer, 2008. It's almost visually humorous to see a gigantic bridge opened fully to allow through a tiny sailboat on account of the mast being a fraction too tall to pass under the closed bridge! It also nicely contrasts the weight of the industrial construction of the bridge against the relative delicacy of the boat: one built to work solidly through the generations, the other built for speed in a mobile element. The picture was taken from the Hart's Mill Waterfront area, at medium-high telephoto, and was simply a matter of composition, the bright day providing ideal conditions. Sharpened only. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Crystal Clear Image-Stop

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This is an example of what a camera can do when there is enough light on the subject. I was shooting at high telephoto to close in on the subject, which would have been perhaps 100 - 150 feet above the ground at this time, and let the automatics handle looking into the afternoon sky, maybe 45 degrees of arc away from the sun. Extremely short exposure time resulted, stopping the spinning blades as if they were motionless, while the aircraft is perfectly exposed. This was part of my Goolwa Classic Airshow shoot from February, 2007. Sharpened only. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic, telephoto. Image by Mike.

"Black 5"

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"Black 5" is a very famous locomotive: it used to draw Queen Victoria's train over a hundred years ago. It is preserved in immaculate condition at the National Railway Museum, York, UK, and makes for a very difficult photographic challenge. First it is a highly reflective black object, second it's stored in a museum whose internal lighting is a mix of full-frequency and fluourescent types, thirdly the object is too big to paint with flash, and lastly, the light level is even softer than at the RAF Museum at Hendon. It's dark in there, and upping the virtual speed may not have made all that much difference, going by more recent experiences with concert shoots. I held the camera steady any way I could and just kept shooting, sure something usable would be among the blur. This image was gamma-corrected to bring up mid-tones, then contrast and colour balanced to restore overall integrity, and sharpened for clarity. November, 2006. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

New Cars on an Old Bridge

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A little-seen angle on London's Tower Bridge: I took this shot standing on a traffic island, and took my time lining up the symmetry. Even so the frame still needed a custom rotational fix to square it up, along with the usual enhancements. This was Sunday afternoon traffic in November, 2007, and London is a permanently busy town. It's another example of the old and the new, the centuries-old architectural style of the bridge counterpointed with the up-to-date designs of the cars crossing it. This same bridge has carried every era of car design since the car was invented, and shows every sign of continuing to do so into uncertain futures. Fuji FinePix, S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Unintentionally Artistic

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When you're shooting on the fly you can only take advantage of what happens in front of you and see what comes out later, and sometimes the results are surprising, things the eye did not register at the time. This is an old T-28 Trojan trainer, flown by Wayne Pearce, at the Goolwa Classic Airshow, February, 2007, an aircraft I captured in many studies. The conditions were bright sunshine (exposure time is short enough to stop the prop) and a strong, buffetting wind, and by afternoon a lot of heat was reflecting from the landing strip, creating the heat haze seen here. I was tracking with the aircraft on landing, at maximum telephoto, and it seems the heat haze meant the sonic focussing beam could not find the subject. But it did find the strands of grass blowing in the foreground, generating an image that suggests I focussed deliberately on the grass to let the subject matter blur artistically. This is serendipity, I certainly couldn't have made it happen! Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic, telephoto. Colour- and contrast-balanced. Image by Mike.

Visually Deceptive

This is the Sunderland,UK, marina, a residential development at the mouth of the river, off the entrance to Sunderland harbour. The modern high-rise apartment blocks are partially protected from the north wind by the Roker cliffs, and from the often heavy North Sea swell by the breakwaters. The colour of this image, barely enhanced from the raw file, along with sharpness and contrast, suggests a very Mediterranean climate, which is the deceptiveness of photography. This picture was taken in November, 2007, it was cold and a biting wind had been blowing out of the north all week; these yachts are laid-up for the winter. The vertical format is here the result of cropping the central body of the image from a horizontal format frame. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Inside, Looking Out

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An amazing thing about the evolution of a city is the way its structure becomes interlinked. In eastern London, the Docklands Light Railway was built as a 'people mover' linking the residential redevelopments taking place around the long-disused docks (the revolution in sea freight with containerisation made the old docks redundant long ago) and this elevated railway snakes amongst the buildings, crossing canals and docks, and passing right through some buildings. This station is inside a low floor (third or so) of a high-rise tower, and immediately outside is a bridge across a wide canal. The city engineering is impressive and almost picturesque in a 21st century way. Here the chip has done an amazing job of balancing the dark interior with the bright exterior, and creates a real feel of conditions on the day. The natural contrast is very hard, and mid-tones were enhanced with gamma correction. Colour was also encouraged a little as an image like this is preferentially close to black and white. December, 2007; Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Hong Kong Dawn

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The plane from Australia got into Hong Kong around sunrise and the smog made for strange lighting conditions, like this purple twilight. This shot was taken at the end of October 2007, over the wing of a taxying Qantas 747, and was the clearest of a batch of frames. The duplication effect around the lights was an artifact of the plane window. The frame was cropped down to a panoramic view on the subject matter, and colour, sharpness and contrast were enhanced slightly. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Early Evening in London

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This sunset shot was an opportunistic one. I had battled my way back from the East End on a Sunday afternoon when several tube lines were down for service, and finally managed to get a bus from King's Cross Station to Victoria Station, which was walking distance from my hotel. I snapped this while crossing the road from one stop to another. Angling up to frame the tower has created a vanishing-point symmetry in the verticals. It has the feel of coming night, but notice the clock in the tower: it's only 4.40pm! This shot was taken in November 2007, and another month would go by before the days would start to lengthen in the north. This frame was considerably enhanced to bring out the mid-tone areas, with a lot of gamma correction, contrast and colour saturation work. The city lights burned in pleasingly also. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Colourful Livery

This is the nose-end of a Transpennine Express, a service/route of one of the rail corporations that sprang up since the denationalisation of British Rail many years ago. Commuters will tell you service has gone to pot since the railways went back to private enterprise, and if the likelihood of actually getting a seat on some journeys (as opposed to standing between cities) is anything to go by, they're probably right. This photograph was taken in November 2007 on the platform of York Station. The exposure control of the chip is quite amazing, given that this is inside a huge building. I was impressed by the way the train's headlights burned in, and the sharpness of the reflections of the skylights in the windows. The colour scheme always reminds me of a roll of Kodak film, about ten years ago, though I'm not sure which grade had the purple in the packaging! Colour, sharpness and contrast were adjusted slightly for publication. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

High and Dry for the Winter

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These yachts have been taken out of the water to over-winter, among many others at the marina just inland of the Harbour office near the railway station in Whitby, UK. I took this shot as evening was gathering in late November, 2006, and the low sun striking under clouds made long shadows and warm colours. The composition was aesthetically pleasing, though boats are both elegantly streamlined and oddly-shaped to fit the frame. Does one concentrate on the hulls and ignore the masts, or fit the whole thing into the frame against some appropriate background? The sunlight on the buildings on the far side of the river made just such a background and the two yachts balanced each other in the frame. The usual round of minor enhancements were made for publication. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Sheen on Metal

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This, I believe, is what a Jaguar looks like these days, since the revitalisation of the classic British brand. I passed this aerodynamic beauty on the seafront in Scarborough, UK, in November, 2007, just before climbing the cliff trail to the castle, and couldn't resist the elegant lines and the fascinating things the afternoon sun did with reflections from metal and paintwork. Look at the tonal variance between the sun highlights on the flank and the reflections of the sky in the hood: that's subtle, the kind of things it takes a student of reflection dynamics to understand and reproduce correctly in artwork (I'm thinking Syd Mead's classic work for Ford and US Steel). Enhancements include 5% sharpening and colour saturation, but contrast was not adjusted as the image contains true black and true white, and the highlights are already burned out. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Speedbird by Dawn Light

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I was very tired after three connections so far, but on my final leg from London to Newcastle I still had the energy to keep the camera clapped to the window. It was dawn over London when the domestic left Heathrow, and by the pink light (the first light I'd seen in 21 hours) what should I see but a Concorde! This was years after they were retired from service. If I remember correctly, 'Speedbird' was Concorde's generic radio callsign. I took a series of frames, needing maximum telephoto to catch her properly. The morning was cold, you can see condensation streaming across the wing. Luckily the window was clean. The image was cropped and enhanced (colour, sharpness and contrast). November, 2006. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.