Posts Tagged ‘hs20exr’

with a little less preamble here is part two of my share for my quotography project with Nick Exposed and Seeing Spots.

If you missed part one you can find it here.

My second quote was “every artist was first an amateur” which was initially said by Ralph Waldo Emerson an American Essayist who I know next to nothing about. I didn’t even bother doing any research as you will see from my below photo it wasn’t necessary, as my son The Monkey Boy comes home from nursery looking much like this every other day.

who needs paper when you can draw on your face

I hope that my thought processes are making sense to you.

Part three will follow shortly.

TTFN

Mr Bunny Chow

Advertisement

Howdy to all you wordpressers,

I hope that you’ll be pleased to know that I am now on the mend and my manflu seems to be mostly in recession, although I’m still very tired I’m back at work and back to carrying a camera around most of the time. Thank you for all your kind messages and thoughts, they really did help.

This week’s theme was symmetry and I like to think that my rather surreal shot portrays this. The question I’m going to ask you though is can you tell what the big picture is, do you know what the shot is actually of? I can’t wait to hear your guesses.

There will be a couple of other posts from me coming up today and tomorrow discussing the quotography project I’ve been participating in for Nick Exposed and Seeing Spots.

Hope you’re all well and happy.

TTFN

Mr Bunny Chow

 

harumph, I’m grumpy and moody and feeling very sorry for myself, once again I have been struck down with that most deadly of diseases Man Flu.

It all began on Friday night after spending two days at home from work looking after my poor sick elder child often referred to in these pages as The Monkey Boy who been kept home with a slightly high temperature and general malaise, he is two so malaise is a concern, I began getting a sore throat and feeling rather sorry for myself, and unlike the last time I had a sore throat I didn’t reach for the whiskey, partly because I’ve not actually got any in the house but more because that ended in tragedy the last time and anyway as the evening wore on I began feeling really really rough.

10pm rolled around and I decided that I was freezing and feeling really crap so was going to bed, checking my temperature on the way to find it was sitting just shy of 40C or 104F I demanded a hot water bottle and withdrew to some very odd dreams.

Saturday and Sunday passed by in a blur of wailing children, no interest in food an aborted dog walk and no noticeable change in my core temperature. Monday morning came and I despatched Mrs BC to do the school run and deal with a puncture whilst I visited my much maligned NHS GP he took one look at my temperature and began testing everything, discovering my hear rate would not drop below 160, my blood pressure was way too low and in general I was in pretty poor order.

Of course I am still awaiting my thumb operation so not wanting to put that at jeopardy he immediately prescribed me industrial strength doses of antibiotics and sent me home to bed.

The antibiotics alongside my ravenous appetite for cold and flu drugs seem to be winning at last with my temperature not back down to normal human levels and my chest and throat still sore but not to the point of having a desire to rip them out of myself.

Today (Thursday) I’ve even managed to stay awake all morning, although I’m fading fast and feel the need for a nap coming on as soon as I’ve finished grumbling at you lot.

so without further ado I’m not going to try to justify the best I could come up with for a Kitchen shot, i.e. nothing to do with the kitchen other than that the dog is chewing and looking mean.

Bunny Chew

My next post to share here on this project is on symmetry which could be fun if I can drag myself away from my sick-bed.

I’m also taking part in a project with Nick Mayo of the excellent NickExposed Blog

I’ll let you read more about the idea from his own post but the general idea is everyone submits three quotes and these are then divided up and you receive someone elses quotes which you need to interpret photographically.

The quotes I submitted were:

  • Quote one: by my father  “Son, if you have to drink gin then for gods sake use a tot measure” (his actual words have been edited for the sake for public decency)
  • Quote two: by Monkey Boy “No Scooby Doo? Take me home Daddy want Scooby Doo”
  • Quote three: by Cecil John Rhodes “So little done, so much to do”

and the quotes I have received back are:

  • 1.”It’s never just an ordinary day.”~ slogan for the Calgary Science School
  • 2.”Every artist was first an amateur.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • 3.“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas Edison

Anyway that’s me for now I’m gonna hit the hay.

hope you’re all well

TTFN

Mr Bunny Chow

 

This week I’m going to talk to you a little about technology, which was the suggested theme for this weeks project 52 post.

Things may get a little geeky at points and I apologise for that I’m passionate about a number of geeky things though so you’ll either have to skip this one or put up with it, you never know you might learn something that will be useful in your life. Actually I doubt that you will unless you are slightly geeky.

left to right we have FujiFilm HS20EXR, Canon EOS 10d, Canon EOS 650

I mentioned recently that I’d managed to buy an old Canon EOS 650 film camera but wanted to borrow a lens to ensure that it all worked before investing any further in it, well I put out the shout and an old friend who I’ll call Mr Falkland came through and has leant me not only three of his lenses but his incredibly beautiful Canon EOS 10d semi professional body so that I can have an idea of what the lenses to before wasting valuable time and money on film and shooting blind. I know he’s an occasional reader so thank you Mr Falkland, I am hugely touched that you trust me not to break it. I plan to make the most of your incredibly generous loan and learn as much as I can.

Going into a little more detail about the picture contents included we have my trusty HS20EXR which looks dwarfed in this company, I still love her though, she’s a great camera and hugely flexible. The strap is obviously not original and is a retro look GoTo strap purchased for me by Mrs Bunny Chow as a 4th anniversary present.

Squashed into the middle and barely visible is Mr Falklands EOS10d fitted with a Sigma 30-100mm (I’m working from memory here so could be wrong) lense.

and then finally my Canon EOS650 in this instance fitted with Mr Falklands Sigma 18-30mm wide-angle lens and another GoTo vintage strap bought again by Mrs Bunny Chow.

I’ve not had much opportunity to play with either the loan or film camera as yet but will endeavour to get some shots done over the weekend to share with you all next week. (longer for the film stuff I suspect)

moving on.

The rather poor quality picture was taken with my new phone a HTC One X running Android in its latest Ice Cream Sandwich incarnation then skinned with HTC’s own sense interface. As many of my longer term readers will know I have been an iPhone user for a number of years now and decided to make the switch for a number of reasons which I’m going to list.

  1. I’m a geek and no self-respecting geek is entirely happy with how iOS locks you into doing things they way they see as being the right way.
  2. I couldn’t see enough of an update between the iPhone 4 that I had and the iPhone 4S to justify making the swap but wasn’t prepared to wait for the theoretical iPhone 5.
  3. 3. I wanted to see what all they hype about android was all about and if I’m honest just fancied a change.

So what do I think so far?

Pro’s so far:

  • The huge 4.7inch screen is beautiful to behold and the colours really pop, the iPhone’s retina display still has smaller pixels and deeper blacks though.
  • It’s different, I had an iPhone 3G followed by an iPhone 4 and other than the semi regular iOS updates which were evolutionary not revolutionary I’ve had the same basic concept for four years now or an eon in technological terms.
  • Widgets and live wallpapers are an amusing/fun thing even if not much more useful than a red circle reminding me that I have more emails to check than I have time for.

Con’s so far:

  • The camera on paper at least should offer superior performance to the iPhone with an aperture of f2.0 (smaller number means more light hitting the sensor) and 8mp as opposed to the iPhone 4’s aperture of f2.8 and 5mp. The reality is though that the picture quality from the iPhone’s sensor seems to offer much lower levels of noise (sparkly bits) in low and even medium light levels. This noise is obvious and apparent on the phone’s screen never mind when blown up to its full size on a computer screen. As a camera guy this is a big deal to me and time will tell if software updates and improve this major flaw. 
  • The 4.7 inch screen despite being a beauty to behold is just a tiny bit too big for my hands to comfortably type on single-handed. Not a big deal 90% of the time but if you have lady like hands something to be conscious of before considering one of these.
  • The screen is not as sensitive or as accurate as that of the iPhone, I’m sure that I’ll get used to this one as my friend who’s always been an Android man thinks it’s fine but to me at least it’s still a niggle, the difference is subtle but still there.
  • Despite its quad-core +1 processors, the fact that apps etc continue to run in the background unless you force them to stop means that it’s no faster than iOS the majority of the time. 

I’m still happy with the phone and realise that a lot of my niggles are more things just being different from what I have become accustomed to. Time will tell if they are things that affect my next phone upgrade and whether I go back to iOS or stick with Android in the future, but that day is at least a couple of years away so we’ll have to see how things unfold and where technology has gone by then.

If you’d like to see more of my pictures there are plenty available through my Google+ account, be sure to introduce yourself as not everything is posted publicly.

Next week the suggested theme will be in the Kitchen so as well as taking some pictures for you I may even make an effort to revive the fortunes of www.mrbunnychowcooks.com

Until then

TTFN

Mr Bunny Chow

I’m in a bit of a rush this week being rather pushed for time trying to catch up on loads of work after a weeks holiday on the beautiful island of Malta so forgive my brevity I will try and do a more detailed post with more pictures over the long weekend but for now I wanted to publish this weeks project 52 picture.

I had a choice of two themes this week, the first was fire and the second Easter and if I’m honest I wasn’t overly keen on either of them.

Those of you who know me well will know that I’m the worlds least religous person and despite my love of old churches it’s difficult to get me into one during a service even weddings and funerals make my skin crawl. I have no issue with other peoples religous or non religous views I’d just prefer not to hear about them.

Before I offend my readership further though I’ll talk a little about the picture I chose instead. The shot is of the Rotunda of St Marija Assunta or Dome of the Church of St Mary in Mosta on the island of Malta. It’s a stunning church with it’s own catholic approved miracle having a bomb pierce its dome or rotunda and fall among a congregation of several hundred people failing to detonate or even injure any of them.

The picture itself is not my finest work having been taken through the rather grimy window of a bus moving at speed but I think it still works.

Project 52 Week 15

As I say I will try and publish some more pictures of the trip over the long weekend, next weeks theme is Technology which will no doubt have me posting pictures of either my new to me Canon EOS 650 film camera or brand new out the box but I’ve still not even seen it yet delivered today Android Ice Cream Sandwich equiped HTC One X which the wonderful and beloved Mrs Bunny Chow has on charge waiting for me to get home.

I’m still not sure if abandoning the tried and trusted iOS for Android is the right choice but my geekier side suggests that it will probably suit my own personal needs better, check back for a full report in the coming weeks.

I’ll love and leave you for now with a badly cropped image of the same church

Project 52 Week 15 also ran1

TTFN

Mr Bunny Chow

I’ve been very quiet this week, unfortunately I have been struck down by that most deadly of diseases Man Flu.

Luckily the kids thus far seem to have avoided it so I can’t even blame them for being disease carrying pests as I would normally do when I’m sick.

The poor dog has also suffered as whilst I have walked her a couple of times this week it’s not been as frequent or for as long as I would do normally.

Anyway moving on from my sympathy gathering attempts I’d like to talk about this weeks photography theme which was playing with light. I was really excited about this as the majority of my free time for photography is at night anyway but the battery in my little Canon IXUS died and the charger is buried under a whole bunch of kids stuff that we’re planning on selling but haven’t gotten around to doing yet. So I decided that I’d take out my other camera my bigger and much more obvious Fuji HS20EXR, something I have historically avoided during my nocturnal wanderings for a couple of reasons.

One being that we don’t live in the nicest of area’s and I’m not that keen on being mugged for it, not that I’ve ever personally felt threatened but I know plenty of others who have.

Two it’s pretty bulky and difficult to shoot single-handed which is something I need to do with the dog being held by my other hand.

With these thoughts in mind I was pretty nervous about taking this weeks shots but I must strike a pretty imposing figure in my bulky coat, baseball cap and heavily muscled Staffordshire Bull Terrier Straining at her leash as I’ve still not had any issues with the drunken yobo’s who inhabit our neighbourhood. It’s taken my a while to figure out the best settings for night shooting with the Fuji, the automatic settings that I initially tried (one-handed and looking for a base to work from) produce incredibly unacceptable levels of noise even if I limit ISO to auto 400 (capped at ISO400).

The shot I submitted after playing with the settings is below

Camera: FinePix HS20EXR
Exposure: 0.357 sec (1/3)
Aperture: f/5
Focal Length: 29.1 mm
ISO Speed: 400

 As you can tell the noise levels are still pretty high but I liked the varying aura’s around the lights enough to decide that I could live with it.

I’ve still not dug out the charger for the little Canon and have continued to tempt fate and play with the larger Fuji during my walks, I’m still not happy with the levels of low light performance that I’m getting but my shots are definitely improving especially if shooting in black and white.

Will you still love me will you still need me....

colour's also improving but I'm still not that confident with it.

a different perspective

This coming weeks theme is Night so I’m going to have to keep focussing on my low light skills to provide you with something I’m proud of. Until the next time TTFN Mr Bunny Chow