A Wiggly Pole

Good morning! Today is an exciting day for me! For ages now, one of my favourite things has been the British show "QI" which is hosted by Stephen Fry and, even more importantly, always has the adorable Alan Davies on it. Well, QI has come out to Australia and I've scored myself tickets to see them live *tonight*! So, since I'm in a celebratory kind of mood, I've decided you can all have a funky cheerful picture for the day.

Shiny:

I saw this pole in Wiggles World at DreamWorld on the Gold Coast and it was just so cheerful and zany I knew I wanted to photograph it. It took a little bit of physical wrangling (of myself!) and my camera's zoom & macro functions, but I'm really pleased with how bright and cheery it came out - exactly the mood I was hoping for.

Machinery #2: Ready To Pounce

Ha! Grand plans will always be foiled by circumstance, I think. Day one of my new idea and a storm hits while I'm in the middle of scrapbooking. My mother pulled the plug on the internet long before I was done enough to contemplate my post, and went to bed before I could ask her if I could put the internet back on. Oh well, there's always tonight! ;)

Old-fashioned farm machinery at Brisbane's Exhibition:

One of the sections of 2009's Ekka (what we call the Brisbane Exhibition) included some examples of old-fashioned farm machinery. I just loved the shapes and lines the machines created, especially when viewed from some of the more unorthodox angles. Unfortunately because it was the Ekka, I was laden down with a bit of stuff and couldn't quite try for all of the angles I'd normally use!

Another for the Edges, Angles and Lines series, I snapped this as-is, after mildly adjusting the usual settings (yup, another one for the macro!) and changing my camera's colouring to sepia.

Right There

I've been thinking about how I was going to write these posts every morning, and it's just not working so well. I keep having things to do in the mornings, or places to be, and things are generally too crazy to get this posted up at the same time so I think I'm going to make it that I write these up the night before and schedule them to post in the mornings, like I mostly have been doing. It seems to be working so far, anyway!

Soldier statue pointing at memorial:

Brisbane's ANZAC Square is filled with statues devoted to the Australian & New Zealand Army Corps. Sometimes, if you move around to view them from a different angle, it really changes things a lot.

A friend and I used to meet up in ANZAC Square occasionally, and I took this on one of those days, as I waited for her to arrive. I love that moving just a few feet around from where one sits to view this statue makes it look as though he is pointing to the monument above (with the always burning flame in rememberance).

I adjusted the focal length and the exposure time on this, zoomed in a fair bit, then crouched with my camera balanced upon the edge of a seat-back in order to capture this.

A Hand To Hold

Quick write-up for Thursday's picture, done on Wednesday (this is starting to become the norm!) as I'm out early again on Thursday. So ready to have a quiet day at home, wish I could!

Evie and Kendall holding hands:

Rhi and I took an outing one day to the Botanic Gardens at Mt Cootha with Evie and Kendall. I managed to get several shots of Kendall in various outfits, and a couple of the two bears together.

After posing the bears how I wanted them, I used my macro setting and zoom lens to snap just the bears hands 'held' together.

Lights: Ferris Wheel

Welcome to another Monday! It's early morning and the birds have beaten me up again - Summer is definitely on its way over here, despite the chill still in the air overnight.

Ekka Ferris Wheel at night:

I love Brisbane's Exhibition - from the quiet arts competition entries to the busy-ness and bustle of the Sideshow Pavillion, and all the things in between, and I love that there are so many opportunities for photographs of all kinds. As evening turned into full dark on my '09 visit, I stole down into Sideshow Alley and found myself a quiet spot to photograph the beautifully lit up rides and attractions.

This Ferris Wheel shot was taken on the 'night' setting, quite zoomed in, while I braced myself and my camera against a pole. I love the way the night sky makes the colours really 'pop'.

"Lights: Ferris Wheel" is part of my Ekka series.

Forgotten Flowers

Once again, I'm cheating and prescheduling. My day intends to include a trip into the city for the Craft & Quilt Fair, which I am quite excited about. I have plans to buy beads and scrapbooking things. None of which I need... ;)

Ah well, on with the post!

Plastic flowers in a decaying cage:

On a trip to the Toowong Cemetery, I spotted these plastic flowers inside a long-forgotten and unkept 'cage'. There was something so sad and yet beautiful about this arrangement that I knew I wanted to capture it on camera. It's just such a bittersweet realisation - this person was once so loved that someone added "forever" flowers to her grave, and it has been so long now that even the forever flowers are fading and drooping inside their broken prison.

Shot in black & white mode with semi-automatic settings, I most likely used Macro and zoom to grab this image.

City Slant #2

Yesterday's photograph turned out to be quite appropriate since I saw two Eastern Water Dragons while I was on a walk between the gym and my doctor's surgery. Very pleased! And it did, if you were wondering, include the gym and a pumpkin scone. Sadly, there was not enough time for a Lush bath. Perhaps next week?

As for today... it was a very productive and interesting day, but I am absolutely exhausted tonight! And I have a brilliant tattoo that took an hour and a half. :p

Sliding over the edge of the world:

As a postcard, this would be an absolutely shocking photo... but as an interest photo, I love the way it feels like the world's sliding off the edge of the image, carried along by the gently flowing waters of the Brisbane River.

I can't recall what settings I had the camera on this day, probably semi-automatic with small adjustments to the focal distance. I love how clear it all is, and how bright and vivid the colours came out in this set.

This photograph, like the others in the set, is part of the Angles/Edges series, as well as my Suburban Life series.

My Cross To Bear

Well, good morning! I've been up for a couple of hours but hadn't yet got around to doing anything about posting this. Still, I'm within my timeframe (just), so hooray for me!

Today's thankfully much calmer than my last few days have been, with just a few things on the to-do list - including an appointment, pumpkin scones and, with hope that the weather holds, some washing.

A signpost in Logan Central:

On one of my many trips into Logan Central with my camera, I spotted this signpost and it felt like the perfect photo opportunity. I let the post extend slightly to the left past the photograph's boundary to enhance the air of mystery and moodiness that the black & white exposure brings.

I took this with my camera set to greyscale, and adjusted my focus length and exposure time slightly to increase the photo's ambience.

My Cross To Bear is part of my Suburban Life series.

Best Of Friends

Good morning world. The sun is shining, the clouds of yesterday have wandered off and I don't have time to do my washing as I have a morning appointment every Friday! Oh well, such is life, hopefully tomorrow will be clear instead of stormy.

Kendall shows Evie the sights:

A friend and I both got Build-a-Bears at the same time, Kendall's mine and Evie is hers. I wanted to get these two kneeling and looking somewhere interesting, but they wouldn't have stayed up so I got the next best thing - kneeling together and cuddling on a park bench.

This photograph was taken using generic settings, no flash and some amount of zoom, and is part of the Teddies series.

Cracked

The weather yesterday was absolutely beautiful, but at some point last night it turned very cold! I'm not very impressed, and nor are my goosebumps.

Broken gravestone at Toowong Cemetery:

I caught a glimpse of this old tombstone while I was wandering around looking for something in particular, and it just felt 'right', so I threw my camera onto its sepia setting and crouched down to bring my eye-level in line with the old stone. This one is of course part of the Suburban Life: Toowong Cemetery series but is also tentatively part of a separate series I'm putting together that I'd consider displaying eventually.

I don't have much to say tonight, so I think I'll just put the photo. I may come back in a day or two and add some blurb.

Old-fashioned farm machinery at Brisbane's 2010 Ekka:

Season's Greetings

Happy new year!

Again, apologies for the unintended hiatus. Let's hope I can do better this year!

Jelly spill in Christmas colours:

Almost everybody that celebrates it has a favourite Christmas tradition or two; one of mine is that every year either my mother, or I, or both of us together, make trifle. We usually use both red and green jelly, and this year was no exception - although this year our trifle was a bit smaller than usual, which turned out quite lucky as we spilled about half of our green jelly! Apparently it's bad form to lick it off the drainage board, though... so don't worry, I used a spoon! ;)

Ninth Birthday

Ack, when did it get so late and how did that happen without my noticing? I'm afraid you'll just have to pretend it's an hour ago, so I got a post in on Thursday. ;)

Make a wish and blow out the candles:

On my niece's ninth birthday, I was trying to get a shot of the candles in the dark as she blew them out... and I seem to have caught it at a perfect moment. I know it's grainy, but I'm really fond of it, especially because when you print it out, once you get it in just the right light, you can see the face - the rest of the time it's too dark!

Wheel Spokes

Oops. I gotta get back into the habit of posting this daily now.

This one wheel-y spoke to me:

At this year's Ekka there was a man who worked for one of the historical type places, with old machinery and so forth. He'd brought some of the old farm machines and had them set up surrounded by bales of hay and straw.

I just love the angles and lines on things like this! This one, as you can imagine, is part of the Edges series focusing on angles and lines, which is, I do believe, my favourite series to take.

Abandoned

Alright, you're all in luck. I'm waiting for someone to get back to me about a word sprint, and I don't want to spoil my perfect count while I wait, so you do get a second photo today!

An old rusted car at DreamWorld (in the dingo enclosure):

On a bright day, trying for some over-exposed bright shots, I got this photo of a rusted car. No idea what setting I was using that day, unfortunately, but I did zoom in.

Allerton

Not much to say this morning, so have at it!

Allerton in Southbank:

On a visit to Brisbane's Southbank, sitting down at our favourite area, I snagged this photo of my friend's bear, Allerton. Macro (big surprise, I know!) on general settings, on a lovely clear day and voilà!

Just Grate

Sorry I missed my post this morning; I had to rush out nice and early and didn't have time to post before I left. I'll probably have more luck posting in the morning tomorrow.

A street grate in Loganlea:

Sorry for the bad pun - but not so sorry I'm not going to use it. Part of the Edges series, I don't remember much about taking this photo except that it was on the black and white setting.

Treasure From Trash

Instead of doing this post, or cleaning my room, or writing my novel, I've spent my morning revisiting old poetry favourites. Falling in love all over again with poets like Nikki Giovanni and Marty McConnell, whose words dig down and rip my insides open; that has been my morning.

An abandoned bicycle lends its pedal to a bit of macro-photography:

On a puddle-jumping expedition on a rainy day, my friend and I spotted an abandoned bicycle hanging off a pole. Something about it just called to me, so I snapped a couple of shots of various aspects of the bicycle. This one was taken using general settings and the macro function, and it's a part of my 'Edges' series.