weekly 69bonni (Steve) TP52 2015... Words, Support, Religion and Geometric Added

Love your Bizarre shot Steve. Much prefer the colour version - I keep expecting to see elves and goblins popping their heads out from behind the trees (y)
 
Broken!
I've been getting slightly fed up with all the broken stuff in the workshop, this was my initial thought for a shot, but TBH it gets a bit depressing, its always full of peoples "Stuff" they want fixed.... Getting fed up with the "Oh take it round to Steve he'll be able to fix that".... I'm sure a lot of you on here know that old story.... So decided to do something different! One of my favourite woods not so far away is Mitcheldever. I was down there shooting the Blue Bells a little while back and remembered all the downed trees further into the wood. So I went on down and took some more shots. Getting back and dumping them in the "Mitcheldever Folder" I flicked through them all there are stacks of Bluebells and the Beech Woods and a handful of the downed trees, anyhow this is the result .... I hadn't realised I had cheated until noticed the date on the Exif data on flickr! :eek: Hay Ho don't think I'll get banned for life from TP for that misdemeanour, anyhow it is freshly processed! But I do have some shots of the same area I took Sunday if you don't believe me!:)

Broken by Steve Rickman, on Flickr
 
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XenosElaine said:
Love your Bizarre shot Steve. Much prefer the colour version - I keep expecting to see elves and goblins popping their heads out from behind the trees (y)
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Hi Elaine
Thanks for popping in! Oh yes the elves and goblins are there you just cant see them.... I don't get on with the Goblins they aren't very nice, they steal your lens caps and spare batteries, trip you over in the woods, and kick the legs of your tripod to mention but a few things. The Elves talk to the trees like me, and they find my lens caps and batteries too. Unfortunately they are becoming fewer and fewer and I only see them now when I'm deep in the woods early in the morning or late at night.;)
Thanks for the comments Elaine when i convert something to B&W which isn't often TBH I end up with a double dilemma and have 2 shots that I'm not sure if I like!
 
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Hi Steve. You know the bit I like most is the write-up - the story behind the image as it were. I never even thought to associate Broken with the woods but you are spot-on with the interpretation. (This is the nearest I've got to fresh air all day ha ha).
 
Carl Ayling said:
Hi Steve. You know the bit I like most is the write-up - the story behind the image as it were. I never even thought to associate Broken with the woods but you are spot-on with the interpretation. (This is the nearest I've got to fresh air all day ha ha).
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Hi Carl,
Nor me actually, I have plenty of broken stuff, but needed to get out of the house last weekend else would have gone mad! TBH don't much like the shot myself and it was more of a means to an end. Was conscious I was slipping behind .... again!
Actually its interesting viewing this shot at work between the two monitors I have here! .... So processed on a calibrated screen at home.... here on one screen it looks totally different then flick to the other screen different again (but on one it looks more like the shot I processed at home).
Not surprised really just seems very pronounced here!
Thanks for the comment mate(y)
 
ChrisHeathcote said:
The fallen tree is a little lost in the frame for my eyes, maybe a tighter crop might work. A good original interpretation of the theme :) (y)
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Hi Chris.... Thanks for looking in!
Bugger, just realised I haven't been to your post for some time.... will rectify that ASAP!
Totally agree with your crit Chris, of all the topics I though this was going to be the easiest for me.... Been a bit preoccupied of late which is a pretty poor excuse for churning out shoddy work!!! It was a "Thought it was a good idea at the time" moment!:eek:

Think I'll be reshooting this;)
 
ChrisHeathcote said:
I know the feeling Steve, to be fair I've not posted a huge amount up until this week so there wouldn't have much to see :)
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Well i need to get my finger out, seem to be drowning in work lately :eek:

posiview said:
Yeah, it is a bit lost. Perhaps closer with a wider angle??


You've caught some nice warm and soft light there.

Cheers.
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Yeah Andy, that'll teach me, moral is if your not happy with your shot don't post it:rolleyes: Looks like that ones on the re shoot list then;)
Thanks for stopping by!

d00d said:
Hmmmmm ............
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Yeah my thoughts exactly! Re Shoot!!! :D uugghhh!
Cheers David
 
Entertain
Is this gonna be another uugghh shot?
Mottisfont Abbey down near Romsey, a lovely NT house beside the River Test, lovely place lovely gardens. Just wondering around the house on a day I did manage to get off and saw this dining room, reminds me of the old upstairs downstairs routine!
Guess that when they used to dine properly and entertain the landed gentry!

Entertain by Steve Rickman, on Flickr
 
Hi, just a normal dinner time in my house :) nicely spotted and very grand
 
Hi Steve,

I went to Mottisfont with my daughter a few years ago, it's a lovely house :), and this is a lovely choice for entertain (y)
 
alsjazzera said:
Hi, just a normal dinner time in my house :) nicely spotted and very grand
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Ha Ha Ha I guess it wasn't so very long ago we all used to sit down at the table was it, seems a thing of the past now. We always do when we have visitors, its bad really and a bit sloppy I guess but I think its a sign of the times to some extent. When I lived at home we all sat round the table but then my Father worked locally and more often than not was home for 5.30. Now driving home from London every day I rarely get home before 6.45. Bloody Rat Race:( its got a lot to answer for! Note to self must start eating at the table..... Makes me feel sloppy even admitting to not doing so!!:(

Carl Ayling said:
Very nice Steve. Great for a hand-held slow shutter.
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Hi Carl, yes was slow shutter was surprised how well it came out considering! Must have been having a steady hand day;)

Dem55 said:
Hi Steve,

I went to Mottisfont with my daughter a few years ago, it's a lovely house :), and this is a lovely choice for entertain (y)
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Hi Lorraine, Yes this was actually a resultant of my Sons Xmas present to me and the wife... NT membership! Have been to a few places and have only just realised what I have been missing. For some reason I always assumed they would be stuffy, upper classed, jolly hockey sticks sort of places, how wrong could I have been! Making up for lost time now. Yes Mottisfont is very nice especially with the river test running through (plus up stream is the eel traps at Longstock a fantastic spot for photography!;)

Seem to be struggling at the moment seems my Mojo has deserted me, must make a concerted effort to get my finger out and catch up.

Thank you all for taking the time to comment I DO really appreciate it .... Thank You all
 
Hi Steve ... viewed this shot a number of times and what I find both fascinating and maddening is the BG, those doors, frames, wall panels are beautiful but squiffy
 
Well Dave there hard to get hold of these days Its taken with a Nikon f2.8 Squiffy Lens:)
I cant tell you how much I ponced about with this in Photoshop, Distort this and that in the end I thought to hell with it. Cropping didn't work as it decapitated the backs of the chairs. Then following an major Mojo failure I thought sod it I'm too far behind to muck around anymore!
I guess with a little persistence I could have got it straight somewhere;)
When I catch up I may well revisit it!
I do appreciate you popping by Dave and I find it just as irritating as you and that's going to force me to straighten it else it'll drive me potty:).
Cheers David
 
It's amazing how, when on the 52's, you learn to look more closely at what you're photographing ... I reckon if you'd lowered your camera a smidge and levelled her up a smidge then you'd have gotten straight lines. We all fail to do it from time to time. :bat:
 
brilliant interpretation for entertain :) great shot too :clap: although a bit tightly cropped
 
d00d said:
It's amazing how, when on the 52's, you learn to look more closely at what you're photographing ... I reckon if you'd lowered your camera a smidge and levelled her up a smidge then you'd have gotten straight lines. We all fail to do it from time to time. :bat:
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Hi David your actually spot on there! In that area there were lots of interfering things not that I'm making excuses for my ineptitude :eek:. As it was had to clone out some signs and notices that were placed on the chairs.
I think that commenting and giving critique on photos here has improved my photography (obviously not enough:rolleyes:). I think problem is blasé for a few shots in 52 which is not the attitude... I need to get my finger out and not just bang out any old clutter just to catch up. Need to make a concerted effort to catch up now! Seems like I have been failing far too much due to laziness :(
Thanks for the comments David time to pull my socks up!

sturisoma said:
brilliant interpretation for entertain :) great shot too :clap: although a bit tightly cropped
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Hi there Summer How you doing? Yes it was a handy opportunity but in desperate need to catch up:eek:, life and work has been getting in the way:(. All the tight cropping was down to other bits and bobs in the room, but I'm gonna revisit it.
Appreciate you sparing the time to comment, Thank You(y)
 
Now you were hoping you'd got rid of me now weren't ya!
Well work, family, illness blah blah, got in the way for a while, but now I have come back to catch up.... Hopefully DK hasn't earmarked me as deceased yet!

Spiral this is from my 2016 Spring collection:rolleyes:. I do wish Flickr would stop faffing around with there options!
Anyhow sadly I have a large collection of springs, not because I collect them (Now that would be sad) but to fix things with.... Unfortunately my workshop is full of things belonging to other people to be fixed.
Now I did take some shots of a heap of springs but it looked about as artistic as a pile of bricks, so this is my 2 attempt. It wasn't particularly easy to get the springs to stay still as they were ..... errrrr Springy:rolleyes: and it was windy, i did manage to get them in the end albeit with the LH spring a little OOF at the top (Thought id get that in before you do!).
This Spiral theme actually stumped me for a long time and sort of stopped me dead in my tracks, that and a little loss of Mojo...

Spiral by Steve Rickman, on Flickr
 
Silhouette

Was out the other day after not feeling so clever and dragged myself up to a field near my Sons house. It was a lovely sight to see all the poppy's out, unfortunately not like some of these huge great fields you see full of them, but a rather modest affair. So as you can see I was up there in the late evening alone watching the sun set. It was quite a moving, I could almost feel the hairs on the back of my neck tingling. I don't know, there's just something about Poppy's that makes you think!
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England.


Silhouette on ridge.jpg by Steve Rickman, on Flickr

This was a blend of 3 images, One for the sky (Damn where my Lee filter holder, in the other bag). One to remove a circle of flare, and the other, the main image.
 
"this is from my 2016 Spring collection" :tumbleweed: :D

Like it, nice funky interpretation, with good, dramatic lighting.

Silhouette, it doesn't scream silhouette to me, but the tree line is in silhouette. Lovely scene, though.

Cheers.
 
Well, if this is a bona fide silhouette then that's just fine by me. :)

This pic is stunningly heart-warming ... but, 3 images blended! don't know how you did that, and don't think I need to know right now. :clap:
 
posiview said:
"this is from my 2016 Spring collection" :tumbleweed: :D

Like it, nice funky interpretation, with good, dramatic lighting.

Silhouette, it doesn't scream silhouette to me, but the tree line is in silhouette. Lovely scene, though.

Cheers.
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Hi Andy!
Yeah guess it could have been worse! It was Natural light, I had a white card infinity curve set up on a garden chair picking up the afternoon sun. It was a bit hit and miss with the clouds though.
Uuummm Yes it was a bit of a shoehorn TBH I could have done better. I was actually looking for a shot I took about 2 months ago which would have been perfect! Can I find it, nope!
Really appreciate you popping in Andy(y)

d00d said:
Well, if this is a bona fide silhouette then that's just fine by me. :)

This pic is stunningly heart-warming ... but, 3 images blended! don't know how you did that, and don't think I need to know right now. :clap:
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Well yes David, not strictly in the sense of the word but there is a silhouette in there..... Just ;)
I took a fair number of identical shots and each had something I didn't like, so it had to be sorted! Smoke, Mirrors and Photoshop. It was lovely light though!

Appreciate you taking a look David .... Will have to catch up with commenting on peoples work now!
 
Now that is one, well ok two, nice spirals - sharp and I do like the shadows. Silhouette is marginal but Wow what a lovely image :clap:
 
Spiral ... thanks for the intro :LOL: ... as springs go, I rather fancy the RHS one ... looks stretched and casts a lovely shadow. (y)
 
Hi Steve,

Firstly, I must humbly apologise for not commenting since... well since January :eek: :( To stop you getting bored, I'll comment on a few...

Relax: With you all the way. Tea always tastes better with a hint of chain lube ;)
Machine: I've never had anything British but I do love bikes and she is stunning. Spot on.
Alphabet: Great history to that. Like the fact that you have spelt out the theme (y)
Experiment: :D Great expression. Perfect for the theme.
Household: You have achieved what I spent ages trying to do but failed. Spot on :clap:
Spiral: Thanks for the intro. I nearly spat my tea all over the screen :D Good shot - it works really well with the shadows too.
Silhouette: It's close but not really working as a silhouette photo for me - sorry. Lovely poppy field shot though.
 
Spiral - Excellent, like the shadow positioning and the light, nothing more to say its a great image

Silhouette - This shot is really up my street and i think the trees are in silhouette but the rest im afraid doesn't lead you to that theme, its a beaut of a photo but I too didn't master this theme and pulled too much detail in the shadows and foreground to earn the silhouette status.
 
Animal....
Not that I'm on a catch up or anything for a change! I'm just conning you into thinking i have quit:).
Just doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day lately, and I'm not gonna give you any old waffle! Here is my effort for Animal, poor little sod looks a bit unwell, tried to feed him some little worms but he didn't seem to interested:(. Wondered if he had this disease that's wiping out a lot of the Frog population, hope not!
The lens here is an old kit lens 18-70mm f3.5 not a bad little lens its the nearest thing i have to a Macro lens, seems to still do a reasonable job.

Mr Frog by Steve Rickman, on Flickr
 
Medical....
The amazing thing for me about these poppy's was how fast they went over. One day I went past the field when I first spotted them and just the blooms around the perimeter of the field were in flower 2 more days and the whole field was in flower then within a day or so the whole lots started to drop. First they thinned out then they just went bang gone.... I visited yesterday and there all brown seed heads now, not far short of harvest I shouldn't wonder.
So why medical, well these are used in the production of Morphine etc.. I have heard the Government are keeping the location of these fields secret, but to be honest I think these would need a whole lot of processing to get anything out of them!
Opium Poppy's by Steve Rickman, on Flickr

Thanks for looking!
 
69Bonni said:
Silhouette

Was out the other day after not feeling so clever and dragged myself up to a field near my Sons house. It was a lovely sight to see all the poppy's out, unfortunately not like some of these huge great fields you see full of them, but a rather modest affair. So as you can see I was up there in the late evening alone watching the sun set. It was quite a moving, I could almost feel the hairs on the back of my neck tingling. I don't know, there's just something about Poppy's that makes you think!
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England.


Silhouette on ridge.jpg by Steve Rickman, on Flickr

This was a blend of 3 images, One for the sky (Damn where my Lee filter holder, in the other bag). One to remove a circle of flare, and the other, the main image.
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Just spying on your previous work, I've fallen in love with this image [emoji7] I can't wait to be able to do something like this. It's beautiful [emoji106]
 
Animal; he's sure doesn't look too well. I feel the crop is too tight at the left and too much empty space the other side.

Medical; what a beautiful image. :clap: Well balance exposure, good sharpness from foreground to as far as you eye can take you and leading lines throw in for good measure.
 
Hi Steve: Animal: Pretty good lens going by the detail in the image. Crop tight as Stan says but very pleasing for all that.
Medical: Wow. Beautiful image. Imagine that in brilliant red. Nicely composed in thirds and lead lines and love the way the sunlight at the far extreme of the field..
 
Animal - brilliant good shot, people are saying the crops too tight but I didn't notice until I read that. It's ok for me :)

Medical - really really like this it's so tranquil and utterly beautiful [emoji106]
 
Lauraloo83 said:
Just spying on your previous work, I've fallen in love with this image [emoji7] I can't wait to be able to do something like this. It's beautiful [emoji106]
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Hi Laura, Thanks for the kind words! I'm sure you will be able to shoot images like this no problem. Its just a matter of finding a location and shooting in the right light either early morning or late evening, the golden hours! TBH there isn't much of a focal point here but I really loved the scene. I visited the place almost every evening and some evenings I didn't even take the camera out of the bag! However I have a few more that feature the sunset, but haven't got round to processing them yet.:rolleyes: They will probably end up on the Landscape section of the forum when I get my finger out:eek:.
Thanks for the comments Laura!

rpn said:
Animal; he's sure doesn't look too well. I feel the crop is too tight at the left and too much empty space the other side.

Medical; what a beautiful image. :clap: Well balance exposure, good sharpness from foreground to as far as you eye can take you and leading lines throw in for good measure.
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Hi Stan thanks for popping in... Yes purposely cropped it tight to get rid of all the clutter around it! I'll post up the SOOC shot and a different crop. Perhaps a tad tight but the bugger kept hopping off:) so have some pictures of nothing too!
Yes the Poppy field turned up not that far from where I live which was fortunate as they are pretty short lived as I mentioned. I would have been very happy if there had been a tree or some point of interest to anchor the eye, but alas nothing:(. In some of my unprocessed shots I do have the sun setting which provides a nice focal point. Just need to get them sorted!
Thanks for looking in Stan and appreciate the comments.

Carl Ayling said:
Hi Steve. Animal: Like it but as Stan says, a little tight on the crop
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Hi Carl, watch this space! The little begger was hopping around and wasn't the easiest subject, but it presented itself just when I was groping around to fulfil the Animal theme!
I'll post a different crop shortly ;) thanks for the comments (y)

Lauraloo83 said:
Animal - brilliant good shot, people are saying the crops too tight but I didn't notice until I read that. It's ok for me :)

Medical - really really like this it's so tranquil and utterly beautiful [emoji106]
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Thanks again Laura,
I actually only cropped it tight to lose all the garbage and decking around it:rolleyes: But it didn't help it kept moving around when I hit the shutter!

It was very peaceful up there, however it wasn't very peaceful one evening when I had parked in a field entrance! See where I took the shot.... Well dead centre of the image on the horizon is the field entrance. I saw a tractor coming (yellow flashing lights) and it stopped right behind my car.... Blast! Well I ran the complete length of the field (Phew) to move my car apologising profusely to the farmer. I never ever normally park in field entrances, having being brought up on a farm, and the one time I did!!! So that would have been an opportunity for somebody to have relieved me of all my camera gear that I left in the corner of the field!!!
Thanks again for the kind comments!
 
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Like the story behind the image Steve ..... not sure I would have made the full length, probably flaked out well short. Maybe best if I develop a fitness regime as an aid to photography !?!
 
HA HA
Only made it cos they have a Gym at work now and got a fair bit fitter! Wasn't happy about leaving a LOT of expensive gear in the corner of the field so had to trot back pretty sharpish too :eek:
 
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