Adventures of Reverend Timothy

Weekend Photo Challenges

Recently, I’ve been taking part in a photography exercise called the “Weekend Challenge.”

A new topic is announced each Friday, and that topic is used as inspiration for a weekend photoshoot, with entries submitted on the following Monday.

Although “winners” are picked each week, it’s not a real competition per sé - there are no prizes - rather a way for photographers to sharpen their skills and get ideas/tips from others.

The topics from the last two weekends were “Street” and “Time”, and you can see my entries below.

It’s been really fun so far, so expect more to come!

Weekend Industrial Shoot

On the weekend, Lauren, Eddie and I went on an Industrial photoshoot around the city and Port Adelaide. Some of you may remember the last industrial shoot I went on, and that turned out pretty well so I had high expectations this time around.

Since we were shooting in the middle of the day, I used an ND filter to avoid any harsh overexposures. This worked a treat.

Couple that with a little bit of Photoshop (and only a touch of HDR here and there, I swear) and the results were great!! 

We ended up finding more locations than we had time for shooting - I can’t wait ’til I get time to head out again and snap the rest of them!�

Another Birthday, come and gone.

I’ve been saying for a while that I’ve been really busy over the weekends - too busy to post here, even. However there was something different about last weekend:

a) It was my birthday (15th March), and
b) I took my camera with me all weekend.

Starting with Friday night, I was invited to the AVcon poster launch after work at Buddah Bar. It was an open bar, and great fun catching up with friends and getting a taste for some of the costumes people are preparing for the convention.

It was also a good opportunity to check out my new Canon Speedlite which Lauren got me for my birthday!

After AVcon, my company had a “funster” event, where we all went to dinner at Jasmin’s before heading off to the fringe to see Hooray for Everything’s comedy act, “YouTube Your Own Adventure.” The dinner was supurb and the show was hilarious.

Saturday night was Sarah’s birthday at the Hilton Hotel (no, not that Hilton, the other one on South Rd) and it was a blast.

Sunday morning was an early brunch with the Hsiu Ling crew, before she jet-sets off to the UK in a few weeks time. It was my first time at “etc” cafe on East Tce, and whilst the service was pretty bad (the waitress didn’t know the difference between scrambled and poached eggs, and when asked if the Cappuccino she’d brought out was made with Skinny milk, she replied, “It’s whatever you want it to be”), the food was great.

Sunday night was a quiet dinner with family and a couple of friends at Montezumas. I’d had a craving for Burritos earlier in the week, but nothing came of it. Then, I got one of those promotional birthday vouchers in the mail for Montezumas and decided it would be perfect for a birthday dinner.

In the end, it was an action-packed but wonderful weekend. It’s the first time I’ve dragged my camera out with me in months, so I was glad to get the oppotunity to show everyone how busy I’ve been, haha. I’ve also had my motivation reignited with the new flash, which means my indoor party shots are now waaayyy better.

Expect some more photos soon!

Has it been that long?

Is it February already? Almost March? Was my last post back at the beginning of the year? Holy crap, this year is going fast.

This is just a short post with some roll-ups of recent photos I’ve taken, along with a few updates along the way!

I had a few requests for updated pictures of my dog, so I recently took some new shots of Axis, as well as my two cats - Stewie and Jinxy.

Back in January, my friend (and professional photographer) kindly let me borrow his studio and lighting one afternoon. Portraiture has been one of my weaker photography points, and I was really looking forward to getting a bit more hands-on experience in a proper studio. I think the photos turned out great, thanks largely to Eddie and Cat, who were wonderful models.

I saw Raph’s band, The Phonics, play a lazy Sunday arvo gig. It was a great show to relax with a beer on a hot Sunday afternoon, and a good chance to take some gig shots. Since I don’t currently have a zoom lens, I had to use what Eddie calls, “Leg Zoom” to get some of the close-ups, haha.

Finally, I celebrated Chinese New Year with Lauren and some friends at T-Chow before heading down to the May St Chinese Temple to watch the lion-dancing and fireworks.

In other news? I’m keeping well. Jogging the dog every day (so that he doesn’t get bored and rip up the backyard) is keeping me fit. Work keeps me busy, and going out nearly every night after work keeps me busier. Last weekend, I played my guitar for the first time in SO LONG that it cut open my fretting finger, which had gone soft from lack of playing! Sliced it right open on the high ‘e’ string, like a cheese-cutter. Valentine’s Day was quiet but romantic, and I’m currently watching Fantasia (for the millionth time) while writing this.

I think that just about sums up the last month or so. Here’s hoping I get more time to blog in the next month! Haha.

The cardboard box robot costume

For New Years Eve, my friend Curtis threw a “Future Theme” party. From the moment I heard the theme, I knew exactly what I wanted to dress as.

For those of you with YouTube blocked at work, you can download the 33mb WMV here.

It was an absolute blast!

Unfortunately I couldn’t take photos while in the suit, so the party photos seen here have been scraped from friend’s Facebook shots. Sorry I can’t credit everyone.

Click below to read the full build process.

Continue reading The cardboard box robot costume…

Canon 1000D - Final Thoughts

For those of you who remember, I have been participating in the Canon Blogger Review Program, and spent the last few months trialling the Canon 1000D DSLR.

Now, I already have a Canon 450D DSLR, so I was very interested to compare it against the 1000D.

The similarities between the two are striking. The same 18-55mm kit lens comes with both cameras, and the two behave in a very similar fashion. In fact, it’s probably better for me to list the two obvious differences between them:

• The 450D has a slightly bigger maximum resolution (~12 megapixels, opposed to ~10 megapixels).
• The 450D has a sensor that switches off the LCD screen when your eye gets close to the viewfinder, whereas the 1000D only switches off the LCD when you half-press the shutter.

Other than that, they’re pretty much identical.

So, for people who are sitting on the fence about whether to break into the DSLR market, the 1000D is a great choice for its price. It costs about the same as a high-end compact camera, and for that price, with these results (below), you can’t really go wrong.

That said, for a little bit extra, the 450D is a bit more “future-proof” (with a higher res) and has a few nicer body features.

Price is the real decider on these two, since I was able to swap between the two interchangeably and get great results each time.

Thanks again to Canon for the opportunity to participate!

Hanako Visit and Elaine’s Birthday

Just before the Christmas break, three things happened: Elaine’s penpal from Japan came to visit, Elaine had her birthday, and then Elaine left back to Malaysia.

First things first! Hanako, Elaine’s penpal, came to stay with us for one weekend only.

In just one weekend, we managed to fit in the following things for a complete South Australian experience:

• Pie floaters
• Lamingtons
• Frog cakes
• Adelaide Zoo
• Giant Rocking Horse
• Petting kangaroos (at the Rocking Horse wildlife park)
• Bit of the hills and scenery
• Hogs Breath (real steaks, as opposed to Japanese steaks )
• Aussie strip club (the Palace)
• Clubbing
• Drinking, the Aussie way (incl. Coopers Pale)
• Rifle shooting
• Aussie backyard BBQ
• Visiting Santa
• My Auntie’s 50th (ie: typical Aussie relli bash)
• Too drunk to hear alarm, sleeping in, missing an official wine tour (but still paying for it)
• Aussie wine drinking and vineyard viewing (makeshift wine tour on way to Rocking Horse)
• Windy point for night viewing

It was a hectic, tiring, and absolutely fun weekend.

The reason we missed our wine tour on the Sunday was because Elaine had her birthday/going-away on the Saturday night, and boy was it a big night!

It started at Rice restaurant, Parkside, and ended with a messy night of Karaoke (and dice-based drinking games) at K-box.

I took my Canon along to record the festivities, and borrowed Elaine’s Speedlight flash. The results were fantastic! I’m going to have to buy my own now! I’m really glad with how the shots turned out. Not only are they perfectly lit (thanks to the great big flash, haha) but because we were all having so much fun, each shot has something funny/interesting going on.

Three Cameras, Three Photos

This photo was taken with my Holga 120N, modified to use 35mm film (instead of medium-format). This makes for a lovely sprocket-hole effect, which unfortunately wasn’t included in the prints. A few of the shots came out great anyway, though, such as the shot above taken at the Adelaide Show.

My Photoshop methods have changed over the years, and I decided to revisit some of my old photos with updated editing techniques. This was taken back in 2006, when I was in Japan (Panasonic Non-SLR.)

Coming home from Karaoke this afternoon, the sky was filled with some pretty dramatic clouds. As soon as I arrived home, I quickly ducked inside, grabbed the Canon 1000D, and nipped back out to take a few shots. HDR, plus some Photoshop sprucing.

My new goal is to meet Kevin Rudd

Allow me to describe a scenario which, if it were to happen, would absolutely be the Number One event in my whole year.

It would begin with me calling up Kevin to find out when he has a free moment in the middle of all his busy Prime Minister duties. Then, we’d arrange a time to hang out.

He’d come over to my place, and I’d crack open a couple beers. We could break the ice by talking in Mandarin for a bit (something I’m also currently studying) while I put on a CD quietly in the background - maybe the Ministry of Sound Chillout Sessions, or maybe Teresa Teng’s greatest hits haha

Once we’re both settled and comfortable, enjoying our beers and music and outdated Chinese pop-culture jokes (I actually do like Teresa Teng, by the way), I’d turn to him and ask:

Dude, c’mon man. What’s really going on with this Internet Censorship thing?

I mean, he seems like a well-educated and pretty reasonable guy. From one rational person to another, I’d like to see it from his point of view, because I simply don’t understand his motivation. At all.

Forget the Family First extremists. Sure, it’d be interesting to have a chat with them too, but I think their motivation is already pretty clear. And besides, you can’t talk facts with someone who’s talking faith - that’s like 鸡同鸭讲 (English: like a chicken and a duck trying to speak with each other).

But Kevin? I’d be really curious to hear his opinion on the whole thing. Not the political spin bullshit, but a real heart-to-heart. That would totally be the best thing that could happen to me.

He can’t really think that a Nation-wide Internet filter is a good thing, right? Surely he’s anticipating that the current trials will fail, and he’s just playing along to pander to the Family First voters? Right?

Or if he really did support it, I’d like to find out who’s in charge of determining which sites are “unwanted” and/or “inappropriate” for adults. What moral criteria would content be judged against? And whose interest would this serve - the people’s or a party’s?

Don’t get me wrong - I’m completely against Child Pornography, and if there was an effective way to prevent it, then I’d be all for it! … But the proposed system’s vagueness, performance troubles, and dangerous susceptibility to scope creep leaves me more than just a little concerned.

Online censorship is a topic close to my heart. If you look in the bottom-right-hand corner of this blog, you’ll see a little JavaScript protest popup, which was my response to the Chinese Internet Censorship strategy. I wanted to remind people how lucky we are to live in a country where our freedom of expression is protected online, without Big Brother looking over our shoulder. Should this Internet Filter become a reality, I might have to rethink if we are, in fact, still the lucky country.

Here’s hoping I’ll be having a drink, singing piano man, and chatting about Internet Filtering with the Ruddster in the near future.

Hey, Michael Harbison - I know you read my blog! Are you able to pull any strings and get me a meeting with Ruddles? I’ll even pay for my own flights! hehe thanks dude!

Happy Halloween!

As most people know, I’m a huge fan of horror movies. You can pretty much split my DVD collection 50/50 into horror (including slasher, gore, exploitation, etc) and then everything else.

It should come as no surprise, then, that Halloween is my favourite time of year. Everyone is my friend at Halloween time!

The first Halloween event this year was the 2008 Adelaide Zombie Walk. That’s where a bunch of fellow horror-lovers all make-up like Zombies and walk down Rundle Mall. Haha. There were a lot of people, and it was great fun crowding around restaurants, clawing at the windows, and moaning “BBRRRAAAAIIIINNNNSSS.”

I wonder if there’s a Rule #34 for Zombie Chicks?

The next event was a Halloween party at Curtis’s place on the Friday night.

Jesus blesses… everyone.

It was awesome. Lots of great costumes, including a golf-loving Joker (”Why So Serious about the Hole in One?”) a Klansman, Superman, Luigi, and Jesus himself (pictured).

I dressed as Alex from A Clockwork Orange, and Elaine dressed as a “non-specific Anime character.”

Me with my Clockwork Orange costume, and other partygoers.

Once I’d recovered from Curtis’s party the following morning, I was out again to Sky’s house for his party on Saturday night.

Sky as Harvey Dent (centre) and the rest of the gang.

Sky’s party was very… messy. Hahaha. But a lot of fun! he had gone to a fair amount of effort with the decorations, including a “Ringu” paper-mache ghost coming out of the TV, and a paper-mache zombie hanging from the ceiling!

Yes, I recycled my costume from the previous night. No time for a change! Haha

Again, there were a lot of great costumes. Sky disfigured his own face with rubberbands and glue to make his “two face” costume, Eng Len made a VERY convincing ghost with just a sheet and some fake teeth, and the axe-murderers, fairies and dictators were awesome too!

It was an awesome couple of weeks, with great parties and stacks of laughs/scares.

Can’t we just replace Christmas with Halloween? Oh well. I guess I’ll just have to wait ’til next year.