Still images of the mind's eye

jamaicawrites.com

2011-11-26T20:35:00.001-05:00

...where Writers and Photographers meet. Check out some of my photos at www.jamaicawrites.com

Abstractions of Cutlery: Side Spooning

2011-11-18T00:38:00.001-05:00

Side Spooning, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Abstractions of cutlery: Attack!

2011-11-16T22:54:00.001-05:00

Attack!, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Abstractions of Cutlery: On Top

2011-11-15T21:44:00.001-05:00

On Top, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Missed a day, so two posts for today

Abstractions of Cutlery: Balance

2011-11-15T21:43:00.001-05:00

Balance, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Abstractions of Cutlery: Spooning and Forking

2011-11-13T18:42:00.001-05:00

Spooning and Forking, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Another image from the series for restaurant week. My aim is to post one per day for the 7 days. Let's see if I can keep it up.

Abstractions of Cutlery: An Ode to restaurant week

2011-11-12T22:59:00.001-05:00

Spooning, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

November 11 - 19 is restaurant week in Jamaica, where selected restaurants offer significant discounts on certain items on their menu. Thought I would make a themed shoot out of it.

Beautiful Earth Natural Hair Haven photoshoot

2011-10-28T21:57:00.000-05:00

Location: UWI Camera Club studio

MUA: Bianca Welds

When Bianca called me about this shoot I was intrigued, how do you do a shoot for hair? More specifically how do you light the subjects? I found myself buying some hair magazines and flipping through trying to figure out how the lighting was done, and also researched at the university of Google. It seemed there was not a lot to it, just make sure you light the hair enough and you should be good.

So the lighting setup was a shoot through umbrella on one side above the model pointed down about 45 degrees, and another speedlight on the opposite side behind the model, diffused with the Gary Fong lightsphere. The models for the shoot follow a more natural lifesytle so they all had really nice skin...good canvas with which to paint :) Below are a few from the shoot:

The boss lady of "Beautiful Earth Natural Hair Haven" herself:

Beautiful Earth Natural Hair Haven
Shop #5
151 Constant Spring rd
Kingston 10
http://www.facebook.com/beautifulearthja

Random Photo - Wedding-ness

2011-10-24T23:01:00.001-05:00

Havent posted in a while, thought I would share one from a wedding I recently did (just one for now anyway).

Islandgems Jewelry - Jamaican custom jewelers

2011-09-21T23:15:00.001-05:00

Islandgems Jewely is a local jewelry establishment that specializes in custom jewelry design as well as jewelry repair, cleaning, and other jewelry related services. Taken from their website:

"Islandgems is committed to manufacturing and trading high quality semi-precious Gemstone Jewelry. With excellent grade Sterling Silver pieces and cultured and fresh water pearl ensembles"

My first encounter with Islandgems was when my then fiancee and I stopped at their store on Fashion's Night Out. We hadnt noticed the store before since they were open barely a week and decided to stop by. Later on in the year I chose them to do my wedding band similar to a design I found online. A few months after that I shot some of her jewelry for her website. The below are a selection (albeit more dressed up than whats on their website):

Islandgems Jewelry is located at:

Shop #47

Sovereign Centre

106 Hope Road

Kingston 6

Jamaica

Random Photo: Portraiture

2011-09-16T23:51:00.000-05:00

Did some experiments in post processing on this shot from this shoot. I kind of like it.

Digicel 4G Broadband

2011-09-06T23:00:00.003-05:00

Digicel 4G Broadband, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Idle shot taken on the arm of my couch at home

Damian and Nicola Wedding

2011-08-28T12:01:00.003-05:00

Date: August 5, 2011
Location: Knutsford Court Hotel 9ceremony and reception)
Scheduled start time: 3 pm

The best wedding I have done so far. Decor was great (props to Chameleon Concepts they made the job easier), everything ran on time, beautiful ceremony, the works. Here are a few selections of the day.

Random photo: Flora painted

2011-08-22T23:59:00.002-05:00

Flora painted, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Highly processed photo of flowers converted to b&w. I tend to love low key high contrast in my photos.

Random Post: Sultry

2011-08-15T22:31:00.002-05:00

Sultry, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

From my first photoshoot with Danisha, who knows how to work the cam :)

Random Photo: At Rest

2011-08-14T14:37:00.002-05:00

At Rest, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Photo taken at Port Royal on a club trip with UWI Camera Club

Random Photo

2011-08-11T19:02:00.002-05:00

IMG_8351_mod_rzwm, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

MarioEvon live at the Apollo!!!!

2011-07-26T21:28:00.001-05:00

MarioEvon is a Jamaican "reggae-soul" singer currently chasing his dreams in the US. He is a trained medical doctor but chose to pursue his real passion - music. He is a graduate of the Berklee College of Music and is currently doing his internship in New York. His most recent and very noteworthy accomplishment has been competing at the very well know Amateur night at the Apollo. He has so far won round 1 and round 2, he has two more rounds to go. Read more about his performances at his blog http://marioevon.tumblr.com/post/7967617114/amateur-night-at-the-apollo-round-2-m-e-again. Please follow and support as much as possible another Jamaican making strides on the international scene.

Photo info: Shot at around 7 am one summer Sunday morning in 2008 at Mandela highway, under the bridge. Only light used is the sun low in the sky.

Random Photo: Reaching

2011-07-23T22:03:00.002-05:00

Reaching, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Taken at Strawberry Hills

Facial Expressions fashion show

2011-07-19T12:41:00.001-05:00

My friend Kimberley (whose wedding I shot some time ago) is doing a make up course at HEART institute and requested that I cover a fashion show that the students organize. This show is aimed that displaying the students' skills at make up artistry that they have learned throughout the course. Each student has up to 3 models and they have to display 3 different looks. My job was to cover the preparations before the event, the event itself (full body and head shot of each model as they made their way down the runway) and individual headshots afterwards.

The students were making preparations in three different rooms. For this I used a speedlight on camera bounced up on the ceiling.

Different types of make up work was being displayed so it varied from the every day to the not so ordinary:

The lone male model being prepped:

For the show itself I decided to use my recently acquired Gary Fong lightsphere. The models, by the way, were for the most part everyday people, so they varied from the very mature:

...to the not so mature:

This for me was the most interesting one:

This was the first i was using the Gary Fong lightsphere. A fairly significant improvement over using hte bare flash as the light was definitely diffused better. It has one end opened and you have the option of covering it, I left mine open as I actually think the cover creates harsher shadows below the jawline, which I dont like.

For the head shots I shot into an umbrella triggering a flash wirelessly. For the sake of time I had everyone do pretty much the same pose (with a few varieties). A few of the head shots:

And the perfect couple:

Sakina Deer is Daphne in "Last Call"

2011-07-18T19:04:00.003-05:00

Sakina in "Last Call", a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Maurice Bryan is Cecil in "Last Call"

2011-07-14T20:35:00.003-05:00

Maurice, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

One of the portraits I shot for this show. July 29-Aug 21, go see it!

Random Share: Lifeless beach

2011-07-14T09:54:00.002-05:00

Lifeless beach, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Last Call photoshoot

2011-07-09T17:06:00.001-05:00

A friend of mine requested that I do the promo photos for a play that he has written and directed, called "Last Call". He wanted to shoot his cast of 5, in constume and all, on a seamless backdrop. He wanted:

- the cast in pairs
- full cast
- individual head shots

Ive never done this kind of shoot before (group in a studio setting) so the idea immediately caught my interest. The first thing that came to mind was how to light a group of five? Lighting equipment that I have (so far anyway) are as follows:

- Cactus 4 wireless trigger and 3 receivers
- one vivitar 285 flash, one canon 480 EX II, and one manual flash with only two settings
- one lightstand and shoot through umbrella

Quite limited to say the least. For the group shots I decided to go with two bare flash on either side of the cast (the manual flash and the vivitar) as kickers and the canon 480 EXII shooting into the umbrella. This would also be the first time im doing anything and triggering all 3 flashes. The headshots were simpler, I planned to go with the shoot through umbrella left of the subject with reflector on the right. Keeping it simple. For the backdrop I borrowed Julian's 9 foot seamless backdrop (thanks man). Not easy to transport I can tell you, I had to use my wife's Grand Vitara, and even then it ended up going all the way from the back resting on the dashboard in the front. Venue was their rehearsal space, a large store room on a compound downtown owned by Sagicor. Nice big space to work with.

Keiran (the writer/director) wanted them shot from a low vantage point and suggested that I shoot from far away, in order to not get the top of the backdrop in the shot. This worked quite well, as such for the group shots I shot them all sitting on the ground.

I did say this was the first time doing this kind of lighting right? Yes, learned quite a bit. First off:

- Cant put your kickers beside your subjects, way too much. They need to be some distance behind your subjects. For the manual flash, even though it was quite far away and behind it was still putting out too much light so I had to feather it:

Luckily it was far enough away so there was no glare in my lens. (Oh, this is also the first time officially using the new Sigma lens :) Must say im quite satisfied.)

- When shooting groups if lighting from the side you really have to watch for shadows. I found myself doing test shots to make sure no one's face ended up being in anyone else's shadow. And once you get the positioning right, cant nobody move really, or you have to start all over again.

- opposite to the above, you also have to watch for bright spots on the clothes from the side lighting coming through the space between the subjects. Sadly I did not see this in the viewfinder, so didnt discover it until I downloaded them to the pc. Theyre not such a big deal but would still have liked to avoid them. Not quite sure how I wouldve though :/

Once we got going things flowed really well:

The actors are experienced and know what theyre doing so were able to portray their characters easily. Keiran knew what he wanted and moved them into the various positions. My longtime friend and his fiance Rae was shooting behind the scenes, see a few below:

We starting setting up at about 7:30 Wednesay night and finished everything a little after 11 pm. Here is the poster currenlty being circulated:

The poster is getting rave reviews in and of itself. It really does have a hollywood feel to it. Hopefully it helps to translate into people coming to the show.

"Last Call", a play written and directed by Keiran King, starts on July 29 and will run for a month at Phillip Sherlock on Thursday and Friday nights, and also Saturday and Sunday afternoon/night.

Flickr Blog test

2011-07-07T13:13:00.001-05:00

Time Bound, a photo by sirpannist on Flickr.

Just checking out posting to the blog directly from flickr. This one is titlied "Time Bound"

Rejected by JCDC :(

2011-07-01T00:35:00.001-05:00

So my two entries did not get through to JCDC this year. I'll be honest and say im more a little surprised and confused. I read through the judges' reports for the past few exhibitions and got the impression that they did not want the usual run-of-the-mill work i.e. pretty flowers or landscapes. They want people to be more adventurous with their work, something that had more meaning behind the image being portrayed. It has to stand out, and of course that makes sense because the judges are looking through hundreds of entries, so if your work is too ordinary they will just pass it by.

So I entered the below:

"Down to Hades"

"Land of wood and ..."

Not too ordinary right? I can see with the 2nd photo, it is perhaps not the strongest photo composition-wise. But I thought I would have gotten through with the first one at least. That photo made it through to the Art Fresh exhibition earlier this year, which is a competition for more serious artists. So, yeah, puzzled that a photo that got through in a competition for more serious artists did not get through for a competition for amateurs.

So im now a bit put off from JCDC. I doubt I will have the same drive to enter next year. We'll see.

New equipment

2011-06-04T23:12:00.000-05:00

Ive been wanting a replacement for my kit lens for a long time now. Shopping for camera equipment for me is an arduous process. This is an expensive hobby so I try to make sure that every purchase is a needed and worthwhile purchase. Lens are pretty expensive so I shopped around for a long time. I needed something that had more reach than my kit lens that goes up to 55 mm, at least up to 70 mm where my other sigma starts (70-200mm). I however still wanted the wide angle the kit lens gave me (@ 18 mm). Im a sucker for shallow DOF so it would be good to get something that could open up to 2.8. The constant 2.8 lens were tempting but they were more expensive and people were getting rid of them as they were heavy.

I finally settled on the Sigma 17-70 mm:

It opens up to 2.8 but doesnt stay constant. I should be able to work with that. Goes up to 70 mm where my other Sigma starts so im covered throughout the range 17 mm - 200 mm, and I also have decent wide angle.

The last time I shot a wedding I found that I had gone almost 4 GB on the "getting ready" pictures alone on my memory card. This had me concerned so I decided to get a bigger memory card:

I figure16 GB should do the trick. This card is also suited to video, which I plan to start exploring when I get my new body, which will be either the T2i or the 3Ti. Why the older model as a choice? Price, and I hear the video capabilities on the older model is better.

I also decided to get a diffuser for my flash, the Gary Fong collapsible Lightsphere:

A nice little addition to my kit to help diffuse light better.Its an interesting device that I think can be used in a number of ways, so I have some learning and experimenting to do.

My camera bag is now full so I dunno how im going to carry around the lightsphere, but must find a way, its compact enough. I think I will very soon need a bigger bag.

Strobist info: All shot on my dining table with black foam core as the background. First two shot with one speed light on the left with the Gary Fong Lightsphere lighting the subject, and a 2nd speed light gridded on the right for the spot light on the background. The last shot was with the gridded speed light on the right.

Back to the archives

2011-05-10T23:06:00.001-05:00

Every now and then I go through the archives and look for photos taken long ago I may have overlooked for one reason or another. Maybe a new technique I learned over time may add something special to that photo, or maybe I just see it in a new way that I didnt see it before. Anyway here are a few:

This is from a photo trip in St Mary:

This one I took at Lyme Quay. My wife and I are split on this one, I like it, she doesnt. To get a few more opinions I posted it in a few groups on flickr, turns out most ppl dont like it either. This happens from time to time, where I like a photo that most people dont seem to like:

This is from Hope Gardens maybe 2 years ago. Trying something with lots of contrast and shadow:

This is also from St Mary, same trip as the first photo I believe. This is my favourite. Its also available for sale at http://dillyseyes.exposuremanager.com/g/black__white

Also gave the blog a face lift. I may change it again, not completely satisfied. Tell me what you think.

D

Jamaica Carnival 2011

2011-05-04T23:36:00.001-05:00

Ah yes, another year, another Carnival Sunday in Kingston. The parade seemed pretty big this year, in comparison to previous years. This time I decided to catch the parade across from JAMPRO (im usually at Devon House). The rain was really coming down whilst on route to my spot, but stopped just in time for the parade. I was kinda disappointed, was hoping to get some shots of the revellers in the rain. They went by kinda fast so didnt really get in a lot of shots. So we moved to Kings House road and met them there again, where they moved a bit slower since there was more crowd.

One year i'll follow the bands from start to finish. One year. Til then here's a sample of what I got. Enjoy!

Kimberley and Andre Wedding

2011-05-01T00:51:00.002-05:00

Date: March 27, 2011
Location: Knutsford Court hotel (preparation), UWI Chapel (ceremony), Pollyanna Caterers (reception)
Scheduled start time: 3 pm

The day started off with brilliant weather, the kind every couple hopes for: bright and sunny but not too hot. Things started off a bit rocky as the bride was having unexpected car trouble, and arrived at the hotel a bit later than expected. Weddings are complicated events, and often times things go wrong on the day, so you have to just work with it sometimes. The preparations also ran a bit later than usual so the ceremony was a bit off schedule. The ceremony was very heartfelt none-the-less, with the couple reading their own vows and also including the bride's late mother into the sand ceremony as a tribute. As we were pressed for time (and disappearing light) we had to do away with the original plan of doing the wedding party pictures at Hope Gardens, and did what we could at the Chapel Gardens. Not the most photogenic of places but I think we got a few decent shots in, despite the fact that I wasnt mentally prepared for Chapel Gdns (I usually scope out all the locations beforehand). The reception ran very quickly with pretty much no break, there were some good laughs, the couple had fun trying to figure out how to drink from each other's glass, the best man speech shot, fierce battle for the bouquet, and lots of bell ringing for the couple to kiss (instead of knocking the glass). All in all a good day but a very long day, basically on my feet 12:30 pm - 9:30 pm straight, quite a marathon.Couldnt eat either as the reception went without breaks, so in the future need to stock up on some energy bars for situations such as these. This is my 3rd wedding, learnt a lot, still a lot of learning to do.

I put the below sideshow together (trying a ting). I didnt focus much on the choice of music, just kinda threw something in there, was going mostly for the visuals and the transitions. Please let me know what you think, I may offer this in my package in the future.

http://www.vimeo.com/23101757

Cinemagraph

2011-04-27T16:08:00.000-05:00

This is the most amazing thing ive seen in a while. Check out the "moving pictures" on this tumblr site:

http://fromme-toyou.tumblr.com/

I need to learn to do this!

Digital Commodities - First Product assignment

2011-04-15T16:37:00.002-05:00

As the title suggests, this was my first product job, to do photos of products for Digital Commodities on a pure white background, thus my first foray into the world of product photography. Folks, this was a task and a half, im telling you. This is by no means an easy genre of photography. The job was to photograph 40 - 50 items on a pure white background. Note: not a white background, a pure white background. If you point a camera at a white sheet of paper it will look white to the naked eye, but if you put that photo against a web page that is html white (i.e. pure white) you will definitely see a difference, as I learnt. It really has some shade of grey there, and chances are it wont be an even shade of grey. Which means to get it pure white you will have to do some photoshopping. But youre gonna be photoshopping 40 - 50 items. Very time consuming, not fun. Also, depending on how you do it, in getting the background white you will be blowing out the highlights of the object and spoiling the object itself. Not to mention photographing a white object on a white background (ha!). Flash is a whole other kettle of fish, cause once there's flash there is the shadow to think about, each differently shaped object will have different shadow characteristics, and also using flash on reflective objects will obviously create a glare on the surface.

So my approach was to build a home made lightbox (didnt have one at the time). A lightbox is basically a box with white translucent walls and at least one opening through which to shoot. The idea is that, as all the walls are white, light will bounce off the walls and wrap around the intended object, thereby reducing or eliminating shadows. I basically got a frame built and used a white tablecloth to drape around the frame. I went for the flash option as I needed a lot of light to get the background as close to white as possible. I used either one or two external flash units, triggered remotely, depending on what I was shooting at time. Some items needed one light source from above, some needed two light sources coming from the sides, of course in this case both lights needed to be perfectly balanced so there is no shadow. Hence I was constantly changing my setup.For the shiny objects, I ended up lighting them from the sides, turning the reflective surfaces away from the light so there is no glare. Through trial and error I ended up managing to shoot most of them such that the background was almost pure white, and needed only minor adjustments in post to get it to pure white. Some I even managed to get perfect straight out the camera. But not before spending many hours going through many different setups and trying many different things and shooting over the same objects everytime I learned something new. It was a lot of work but I learnt a lot, and im all the better for it.

Its one thing to do your first job for a client and have done it successfully...its another to actually see your work up on their web site:) The photos on this page, this page, this page and a few on this page are mine.(Note, the border around the photo wasnt done by me).

Leafscapes

2011-02-27T11:30:00.002-05:00

Last day of vacation before I go back to work, wanted to get some shooting in. Started off going to Castleon Gardens, bright sunny day, blue sky, the works. By the time I got there, as I parked, rain. Nah, shouldnt last too long. Hour and a half later, still raining.

Ok, fine.

Took my umbrella and decided to try shooting while holding the umbrella. Didnt work out. Got a bit fustrated and decided to go somewhere else. Palisados? Or Hope Gardens? Palisados too far, Hope Gardens it is.

As I drove in I noticed a lot of leaves on the ground below one of the garden's large trees. Looks promising. Parked and walked over. Snapped this on the way:

Got to the tree, started snapping away. Just when I was getting into a groove, my phone rang. Outside pipe at home burst, need to go home

Cho.

Decided I wasnt going to let this go to waste. I grabbed a couple of the leaves and took them home with me. Got home, dealt with the issue, then shot the leaves at home. This is how I started:

I usually take the flash off camera but because of laziness/tiredness decided to leave it on camera, just to see what would happen. Since the leaves are flat and I have to bend over them to shoot them, I pointed the flash to the back of the sofa. The light coming from behind the leaves made for some interesting effects.

This turned out to be one of the more productive photo sessions Ive had in a long while. Below is a few:

Going for something a bit more abstract:

This is one of the 3 entries that made it to the Art Fresh exhibition. "Down to Hades"

You can see a few more at http://dillyseyes.exposuremanager.com/g/leafscape_series

Art Fresh 2011

2011-02-20T15:56:00.001-05:00

Orchids, Family, Jamaican society

2011-02-20T15:43:00.003-05:00

Last Christmas my wife received a total of four orchids as gifts. Yes, four, all at once. She keeps one at the office and the other three at home. Ive been meaning to do a shoot with them but kept putting it off (lazy). During my vacation earlier this year one of the orchids had two flowers in bloom, two buds that never opened and were dying, one young bud, and a flower that had died. All this on one orchid stem, which made for a very interesting subject. Kind of reminded me of a family tree. So I kept it simple, used black foam core as a background, with just one light source. This is what I came up with:

I'll be honest with myself here, I dont think I shot as much variety on this as I could have. I cam away from this feeling a little bit disappointed that I didnt do more with it, know what I mean?

The last two below were shot with the original family tree idea in mind, but during editing, for some reason a completed different interpretation formed in my mind, more of a political nature (weird, I know). Anyway, here they are:

This one I called "Jamaica on politics". This is what happens when you have something with the potential to grow into something beautiful and exotic but has all the life sucked out of it by politics.

The next one is "Our Society":

For visitors to this blog that have never been to Jamaica, we have a fairly interesting society where very upper class areas tend to be very close to very low class areas, as seen above with the beautiful brightly coloured flowers and the almost dead unopened buds beside each other. The two areas, even though both are products of Jamaica (products of the same orchid stem) they operate almost totally independent of each other (that darkened area between the flowers and the dying buds).

You can tell me what you see.

(btw "Jamaica on politics" is one of the three that will be in the "Art Fresh exhibition" on February 24.)

Feather on a beach and lost dreams

2011-02-07T22:30:00.001-05:00

So on the last day of the honeymoon, the missus and I went to Lyme Quay. We got there at about 10 am and realized going there on a week day means you pretty much have the beach to yourself, which is nice. I knew she loved to nap at the beach so I took my camera along (im not much of a napper). After a couple minutes of walking around with uninspired shooting, I happened upon a feather lying on the beach.

There was something about the feather, lying there on an almost deserted beach, that somehow spoke to me...

I associate dreaming with flying (you know, the whole sky's the limit thing...or not...) so seeing a feather, a symbol of flight, lying on a deserted beach, was telling me a story...

...of dreams, aspirations, that have been lost, forgotten, shot down, never to be seen again

Its a bit sad but hey you have to take the inspiration when it come:) I chose a shallow DOF because 1) I tend to love it and 2) to try to put a dream-like feel to this set

So to attempt to end this post on a somewhat positive note: you have to work on your dreams to make them reality. You have to keep putting fuel to the fire to keep the passion going, or else you wont get where you want to go.

2011

2011-02-06T17:04:00.000-05:00

Hello folks! It has been quite a while since I posted but quite a bit has happened since then. Firstly, I got married, on the last day of the year no less, December 31 2010. So up til then everything was the preparations for the the big day, the big day, then enjoying the "after-big day". In addition to starting off the year as a married man and enjoying the "honeymoon phase" as they call it, ive been shooting quite a lot as im focused on building a portfolio, so I have quite a bit to share. In addition to this I have 3 photography jobs lined up. One is to do product shots for "Honeykist honey", a product line owned by my wife's colleague; another is product shots of jewelry for IslandGems in Sovereign, which is the same place through which I ordered my wedding ring; the third is a band member's wedding in March. Im also participating in this year's Art Fresh exhibition at the Mutual Gallery, they accepted 3 of my 4 submissions.

So the year has started off with a bang (hence the title). Im really hoping that the momentum will continue for the rest of the year.

Dont worry folks my next posts will have photos :)

Pecha Kucha

2010-11-23T20:24:00.002-05:00

Last week Thursday I participated in Kingston's first showing of Pecha Kucka. When I got the invitation my instinctual reaction was to say "no", but I really had no reason to say no, so I went with it. Im not fond of presentations, especially to a crowd of strangers, and the other presenters that I knew who were also presenting were all lecturers/teachers, so theyre used to this sort of thing. So that had me a bit intimidated but I tried not to let that affect me too much.

So what is Pecha Kucha? Taken from their website:

"PechaKucha Nights are informal and fun gatherings where creative people get together and share their ideas, works, thoughts, holiday snaps - just about anything really, in the PechaKucha 20x20 format. PechaKucha 20x20 is a simple presentation format where you show 20 images, each for 20 seconds. The images forward automatically and you talk along to the images."

I didnt know that Pecha Kucha was a worldwide event until I got there. Its been held in 370 cities so far. So of course you know, once I realized this I immediately got even more nervous lol. However, despite a rocky start I think it ended up ok. One or two of the photos got a reaction from the audience, which had me feeling pretty good about the selections I made. A part of me wishes I knew about Pecha Kucha before, I probably would have done my presentation differently, but then again had I known how big it was I probably wouldnt have done it at all! There's a reason for everything I guess.

What was also pretty cool was that the next presenter plays in the same steel band I do, his presentation was on our band "UWI Panoridim" and some of the photos he used was mine. So got some double exposure there.

All in all it was a good experience, I like the idea and I encourage any creative individual (poets, visual artists, graphic designers, djs, photographers, illustrators, actors, floral artists, architects, landscape designers, sculptors, chefs, furniture designer, fashion designers) to come and share their work and thoughts, and network a little bit. The event will be staged every couple months. Keep up to date on the facebook group for Pecha Kucha Kingston.

Below are the photos I presented, in order:

Old Harbour Bay part 2

2010-10-24T21:32:00.001-05:00

Part 2 as promised.

This is an empty shell I found on the beach.

The first kinda looks like a planet that is on the verge of falling apart. The surrounding environment seems fiery and harsh, the surface of the planet is anything but lush and green, and there's a hole in the center, almost as if it has lost its soul. Thats what i see anyway....

Next set is a potential series:

And a few more landscape:

In this one I see a woman in the sky dancing. Does anyone else see that?

And a few of these are available as prints for order at http://dillyseyes.exposuremanager.com. Enjoy!

Delayed post: A bit of the Palisadoes

2010-10-11T23:42:00.001-05:00

These photos were taken on October 25 2008 on a club trip. The UWI Camera Club met up at UWI at 4 am I think it was to be out to Palisados by 5:30 am to do some shooting. Below were a few of what I captured:

8 second expourse of i recall correctly:

Also 8 seconds

Old Harbour Bay part 1

2010-09-21T19:36:00.001-05:00

Ok, so ive never been a landscape person, never really had an eye or much of a feel for it. However, these actually did not come out too bad..

Saturday August 14 (i know, long overdue) saw me leaving home at 5 am to get to Old Harbour Bay by dawn with a few other members of the UWI Camera Club. We were to do a 3 hour tour of the harbour in a fishing boat. Pretty cool if you ask me.Started off rocky (no eye for landscape) so the first few were pretty much rubbish. Eventually started to get into it a bit:

We were also blessed with a rainbow:

Then, further down, coming towards us, RAIN:

Thats right, rain. In the middle of the open seas. In a fishing boat. Yah. Our giude said that during rain we cant go anywhere, we just have to sit tight and wait it out. And so we did. I wasnt sufficiently prepared, luckily a fellow member had a spare "poncho in a pack" that i was able to use to shelter from the rain.

Eventually the rain stopped and we were on our way again, and stopped by the 1st of 3 intented quays around the harbour (the name escapes me at the moment). Can you say PRETTY!!

Think this was most of the landscape shots. In part 2 i'll post some non-landscapes I took on the quay(s).

...and more flowers

2010-08-24T22:56:00.002-05:00

A bit more colour this time. I think this might be it for a while....maybe...need to move on to something else.

My next post is actually long overdue....did a photo trip two saturdays ago with a few people from the UWI Camera Club in Old Harbour Bay...literally in the bay...you'll see what I mean...will post when I go through those photos.

Some tabletop photography

2010-08-15T19:18:00.001-05:00

Ok, so we have a glass table, a white tablecloth, an external flash with wireless trigger, and some flowers. Spread the tablecloth over the table, flowers on the tablecloth, and flash under the table. Below are some of the very cool results. I think I will be doing more of this...

Strawberry hill flora

2010-08-05T23:26:00.001-05:00

The little woman had a function up Strawberry Hill and she strong armed - I mean, suggested, :) that I tag along for the ride. Ive never been up there before so I figured id take my camera and make the best of it. Beautiful place to say the least. The below are a few of what I got:

Im working on doing more nature shots with very shallow depth of field:

The below wasnt taken at Strawberry Hill but included it as another with shallow DOF:

Gwendolyn Phillips

2010-07-27T21:06:00.000-05:00

a.k.a Grandma, more specifically my fiance's Grandma. The head strong woman that raised her granddaughter to the woman she is today, with the title of Dr. before her name and VP of an organization. She led quite an interesting life, being an orphan from very young, surviving the Kendall train crash, and an ardent political supporter having worked on several campaigns for her party of choice. Not to mention raising her 6 children and her granddaughter. Unfortunately she fell ill and passed a few weeks ago.

RIP Grandma, you will definitely be missed.

JCDC

2010-07-25T00:01:00.001-05:00

I entered JCDC this year, entered 3 prints and got a Ceritificate of Participation for two. So I have two prints hanging on the walls at the National Gallery, thats pretty cool. The two prints are:

I get the feeling that JCDC looks for work that is more abstract and conceptual, which I dont do much of. So some motivation to work on that :)

Rains and Nature

2010-07-22T21:51:00.001-05:00

So ive been making the best of the recent rains and going out and shooting whatever catches my eye outside my gate. Im happy with the results, seems I have a series in the making. Tell me what you think:

These photos can also be purchased here

...and we're back!!

2010-07-22T20:30:00.000-05:00

Whooo! Its been a loong time since we've been in here. Ok, i know my last post had said that i would be switching blogs but I couldnt stay away :) Ive decided to return to the world of the blogspot (on the advice of a fellow photog). Folks quite a lot has occurred, and lots of clicks of the camera has happened in the 3 years that I made my "last" post. However, i will attempt to rectify same by adding photos that ive done to the different photo sections you see above, and a few new sections as well. For starters ive added to the "Building and Architecture" and "Nature and Landscape", and will be adding over the next few days.

Hope you enjoy as much as you did before, and maybe more than you did!

Performance samples

2008-08-23T23:44:00.001-05:00

Samples of photos from a few performances Seretse Small Mario Evon

The Tenor Steel Pan

2008-06-13T08:05:00.001-05:00

A tenor pan, black backdrop, a yellow light to the right and a blue light to the left. Somewhat interesting result. Close to what you see under differently coloured stage lights.

New Blog

2007-09-20T11:59:00.000-05:00

Ladies and Gents, I have switched blogs. I will no longer be posting anything here. The link for my new photo blog is here. Thanks for all the comments and support ive gotten here for you all, hope to see it continue on animus3. See you there!

Steel Pans on stage

2007-07-31T14:00:00.001-05:00

These were shot backstage during UWI Panoridim's 2007 concert, while our guest artiste Seretse Small was on stage doing his thing. Once again taking advantage of the stage lights.

Indecent Exposure

2007-07-16T15:48:00.001-05:00

Also please check out a few selections from Dana's shoot.

Dana

2007-07-11T16:32:00.001-05:00

Portrait

2007-07-11T16:31:00.001-05:00

Wandering off...

2007-07-11T16:30:00.001-05:00

A pleasant memory

2007-07-11T16:27:00.001-05:00

Elegance

2007-07-11T16:01:00.001-05:00

Somerset Falls

2007-06-30T16:44:00.000-05:00

About a month ago I took a Friday off from work and found myself at a little hideaway called Somerset Falls in Portland. I say hideaway because very few people know about it. They are still doing some work on the place before they start to market it properly. For starters, you have to be taken by boat to the actual falls. Think going through fern gully, only on water. Thats what its like. The falls itself is nothing short of great. While youre walking around underneath the falls, because of how the light bends you see little rainbows right in front of you! I couldnt take the camera to the falls unfortunately, so no pics of that, but I have a few shots otherwise.

Streaming

2007-06-30T16:43:00.000-05:00

Cascade

2007-06-30T16:41:00.000-05:00

Water on the Rocks

2007-06-30T16:40:00.000-05:00

A mini waterfall on the way to the real thing

Polly

2007-06-30T16:36:00.000-05:00

They also have a wide variety of birds...parrots, swans, peacocks, ducks and more.

Leaf

2007-06-30T16:35:00.000-05:00

Up close

Portland Sky

2007-06-30T15:49:00.000-05:00

Twig

2007-06-27T15:50:00.000-05:00

A few more nature shots

Digicel Fashion Block

2007-05-31T08:55:00.000-05:00

A combination of being busy and being lazy when I do have the time is the reason for the looooong hiatus in posting. I have been shooting tho, its just to get the pics up. The most recent shoot was runway modelling at Digicel Fashion Block. Difficult shoot to say the least. Tricky lighting, in that the show was at night but the runway itself was adequately lit, which means getting a good exposure for the actual model was tricky as the camera was being fooled into thinking there wasnt enough light. I didnt get it right until after 200+ shots. The following is a few that came out good. You can see more at my Flickr account

Pose off

2007-05-31T08:50:00.000-05:00

Pose

2007-05-31T08:49:00.000-05:00

Model Pose

2007-05-31T08:48:00.000-05:00

Lollipop Model

2007-05-31T08:47:00.000-05:00

Hot Bod

2007-05-31T08:45:00.000-05:00

Ok fine, something for the ladies

Check me out

2007-05-31T08:43:00.000-05:00

Male model

2007-05-31T08:42:00.000-05:00

Soldiers

2007-01-28T11:46:00.000-05:00

Boat Lamp

2007-01-18T11:51:00.001-05:00

Its all black & white today.

Abandoned Ship

2007-01-18T11:50:00.002-05:00

Fork you!!

2007-01-01T16:41:00.000-05:00

Its been a while since Ive done a conceptual shoot. So this last shoot was of the most interesting and fascinating subject I have ever encountered------a fork. Im joking of course. Anyway, this is a simple fork on my kitchen counter lighted from the background.

Fork 1

2007-01-01T16:37:00.001-05:00

Fork 2

2007-01-01T16:36:00.001-05:00

Fork 3

2007-01-01T16:35:00.001-05:00

Fork 4

2007-01-01T16:31:00.001-05:00

Hiatus

2006-10-12T13:47:00.000-05:00

This is just to let you know that I havent posted in a while mainly because, other than the usual culprit (lack of time) my camera has not been working properly. Something's wrong with the circuit board, which results in the LCD flickering and this flickering shows up in any pic I take. In addition to that the camera will delete pics from the memory card at random times. So I am in the process of getting a new camera, the Canon Powershot S2 IS, an old model but right now its what I can afford. And of course it will take me a little while to get used to it, so it'll be a little while before I post any new pics. Til then I will just put up the pics that seem to be the visitors' favourties (from number of comments).

What If....?

2006-09-14T10:52:00.000-05:00

Do you want to...?

2006-09-14T10:50:00.000-05:00

Well, do you?

2006-09-14T10:49:00.000-05:00

Silhouette dance

2006-09-14T10:48:00.000-05:00

Smile

2006-09-14T10:47:00.000-05:00

Focus on me

2006-09-14T10:45:00.000-05:00

Red Bull Smokin Streets

2006-09-05T07:55:00.000-05:00

Red Bull brought go kart racing to the streets of New Kingston on Sunday past (Sept 3rd). The entire course was fenced off so very difficult to find a good spot to take pictures. Only managed to find one spot. They also had a couple of not-your-every-day cars on display so I got a few pics of those as well.

Kia

2006-09-05T07:54:00.000-05:00

Skoda lights

2006-09-05T07:53:00.000-05:00

Go Kart 1

2006-09-05T07:52:00.000-05:00

Now to the go karts

Go Kart 2

2006-09-05T07:51:00.000-05:00

Go Kart 3

2006-09-05T07:50:00.000-05:00

Rocky V at Village Cafe

2006-08-03T08:00:00.000-05:00

On Tuesday night, July 19, I ventured to Village Cafe to watch Mario (also of Choir Boyz) perform with his band, Rocky V. This was a challenging shoot, as there wasnt a lot of light, its protocol that flash is not used whilst a performance is in progress, and my powershot A75 is very limited in low light. Another factor was positioning, the place is small, and it was very crowded so I could onyl shoot from one spot. Didnt get all the band members in action unfortunately. But somehow I made it work and got some shots of Rocky V in action as well as couple of the other acts.

Rocky V

2006-08-03T07:50:00.000-05:00

The Rock of Rocky V

2006-08-03T07:49:00.000-05:00

Founding member, Rayon "Rocky" Russell.

Mario

2006-08-03T07:47:00.000-05:00

Mario singing backup (for now, soon bus on the frontline)

Drummer and Singers

2006-08-03T07:46:00.001-05:00

Drummer and backup singers.