Wisteria's Scrap Book [Photography]

[[Desolate Divine]]

Late 2016
So I have actually taken a lot of photos, however haven't uploaded them. The main reason was due to me getting a new computer. I went from a MacBook Pro back to PC, due to the better specs. Tonight was the first time I have regretted it.

See, with Mac, and I loved this, there was a native tagging feature. I'd tag all my uploads green, all my photos to print red, ones to email yellow etc. And from there I just highlighted and uploaded or copied based on colour. Windows doesn't have this. On my Mac, picking photos and uploading would take twenty minutes max. This took me an hour and a f***ing half...

I decided to use Windows native Photos app. This was good. It had all my photos in one place organized by date. I'd just select the ones I wanted. So I selected about eighty. However it wouldn't let me drag and drop it into photo bucket. I had to do that from Windows Explorer. Easy, I'll just create a folder, copy them there and use that. Simple. Bulls***.

It took me a while to catch on, but what was happening was that for some reason, it was copying the files from temporary memory, and between me pressing copy and paste, it was deleting them from there. And somehow, a few photos I really liked and was proud of disappeared from their folder. That has got me pretty down.

In the end, I had to copy and paste five at a time. Just to make sure they copied properly.

Here they are.

Youth Unite and a new toy

Spoiler:

This particular Friday Afternoon, I spent my hard earned payslip from scrubbing seaweed tanks and making snail pellets, on a new lens. A 55-250mm zoom lens. This was a few months back. And I have had some real fun with this.


These are both my mate Ash. However the second photo is an example of why I wanted this lens. Other than being able to take photos from a distance, when zoomed in, it gives a really shallow depth of field, which is something I wanted to experiment with.




I also had a lot of fun seeing how the lights affected the drum kit and the shot. Note, this was at another church. Not my one.

Melbourne CBD

Spoiler:

My mate Luke has got this strange obsession with the city. Not sure what it is but he loves going there. Like, I don't blame him. It can be pretty cool. But he takes this to another level. Anyway, we decided to catch up and naturally, he suggested heading into the city. I brought my camera as I wanted to see what sorta shots I could get. This was the first time going in with my camera, so it was all new territory for me. We drove in and as we pull in the car park, the first thing we see is this.

An R34 Nissan Skyline GTR. Luke isn't a car guy, but even knows these are cool (granted that's from Fast And The Furious). This bad boy has an RB26DETT engine under the bonnet. A twin-turbocharged 2.6L straight-six engine, that spits out 276HP. The Skylines are most recognizable by their iconic 'hot-plate' tail lamps, and the R34 stands out from the bunch with the slightly larger outer ones, as opposed to the R33It was beautiful. I got two photos of it, however this was the worse of the two. The other one was one lost in the fiasco of trying to organize and upload the pictures.






When sorting through them, I couldn't view the full size image, and only saw a thumbnail. I really liked this one, until I posted it here and saw the full size shot, with the bloke on the left. The one in the center though makes the shot. And he doesn't even know it....









That my friends is a Lamborghini Aventador. It has a 6.5L V12 engine, that produces roughly 730HP if my maths is correct. It reaches 0-100kmph (0-60mph) in 2.9 seconds, and has a top speed of 350kmph (210mph). Costs roughly $960,000 here. A good way to show you have more money than sense. Why? A Nissan GTR (R35, which is not to be confused with the R34 mentioned before. Different car) has a twin-turbocharged, 3.8L V6. An engine just over half the size of the Lambo. It does 0-100 in 2.7 seconds. It only has a top speed of 315kmph (196mph), however, let's be honest, no average Joe will get it to that speed. It costs $245,000, however that is the most expensive one on carsales and there are cheaper ones. You're paying $715,000 more for 35kmph more. $20,500 per kmph (roughly). Hence why if I became rich as hell, I wouldn't get a Lamborghini. It is paying for a brand name.

Lorne

Spoiler:

A couple of months back, my friends Katie, Michael and Lauren decided to have a weekend away in Lorne for their birthday party. I couldn't stay overnight, so I came up and went home on the Friday. I arrived at the campsite to find it empty, and due to the lack of phone service, it took an hour to track everyone down. They went for a hike to the nearby waterfall, so we headed there.








This is the last photo I took before we found them. Getting to them involved a river crossing. I didn't want to go barefoot across the rocks, as my shoes were grippier and I didn't want to cut my feet. I got most of the way across the river, then SPLASH. Slipped and drenched my shoes.


One of the other people there brought his dog, who was a good model for my photography. Meet Darcy.


Then there was Michael, having a jam.




After a little while we walked the half hour walk back. I walked it barefoot, partially because I don't wanna wear wet socks and shoes. And mostly because I am stubborn and pig-headed and the others thought I couldn't do it. I showed them.







We had a BBQ for dinner at a park near the beach. One point of entertainment was Darcy making a friend, who looked exactly like him/her (I can't remember if it was a boy or girl). The other was pass the parcel. As I was a musician who brought his guitar, I played the music, which to a degree meant I could delegate who got to open it. Then when the parcel ran out, we played with a bottle of 'Death Sauce'. I made it land on Katie as we have that sort of relationship. Then another girl there whom I had a thing for for a little while, until I realized she only ever responded to my messages when she needed a lift to and from Bible Study. Granted she didn't know it was for that. Afterwards I headed home for another adventure which I will discuss another time.

Random Shots

Spoiler:

My mate Adam is going on a mission trip to Liberia. Being a fan of poetry, he organized a fundraiser with music and Poetry. One of the musical acts was Katie and Michael. I made sure to get a few shots. Granted most of them were either blurry (due to the low light and needing a slightly slow shutter speed) and the ones that weren't were all similar. So I picked this one.


This one was taken at Youth Group this term. We had it set up, and I decided to throw the camera on a quick shutter speed and get the perfect shot. I did it, even with the fairly shallow depth of field as well.

Ocean Grove

Spoiler:

During mid-December, the church organized a trip for the young adults to go to the beach at Ocean Grove. The meaning behind it was that the young adults hardly get to spend time together without the youth kids ending up there. And when Youth Kids are there, those of us who are leaders are responsible. We have tried to organize something without kids there, but people didn't get the hint and brought kids along. So this was good. An event advertised specifically for young adults. I decided to skip out on the surf lessons, and instead take photos. I got plenty, however they are mostly the same, and some people I don't think would like to have their picture put up.

Raymond Island: December 27th-31st

Spoiler:

I'll be honest, until Raymond Island, I had kinda lost my passion for taking photos. However being here really helped me bring it back.




This was the first time I ever really experimented with Manual Mode. I had done Shutter Priority until now, which would allow me to input the shutter speed I was after, then the camera would sort out the rest. But this was good for me. Forced me to actually use the concepts I had learnt at uni, and I really liked some of the outcomes. That and my phone absolutely s*** itself, so for the first two days, I had no phone and ended up using my camera a lot.


One thing Raymond Island is known for is the large amount of Koalas living there. Something I like about this shot is the wideness. I have spent heaps of time looking into zoom but not much on wide-angle. I intend on getting a better wide angle lens eventually.



This evening, we walked to the ferry and caught that to the mainland for dinner. As we walked out, we found the sunset like this, so we took a few minutes to get photos.


Then it was like this on the Island a little while later. I wish I had my tripod with me so I could have gotten a better shot. Because I couldn't hold the camera steady, I had to light it up with ISO instead of a slow shutter speed, which made it look really grainy.



This is BJ, one of the other families dogs. If I remember correctly, he is about 14, and stone deaf. I snapped this shot as he was walking around, looking for food to steal. I wasn't quick enough to focus it manually and the autofocus was just that tiny bit off.


This... This could get us in trouble... This is a sparkler bomb. Over the weekend we bought about $80 worth of sparklers and many explosions were made...




And this is my brother. I know, we look nothing alike. The first two nights, we were there by ourselves. Our parents weren't coming until the 29th so I had to look after him. I went out the second day to the nearest town to try and get my phone replaced by my carrier. Came back and he was burnt to a crisp...


This shot, though I like it, didn't meet my expectations. Granted it is my fault. My idea for the shot was to try and get the horizon, the water and the seat. I even looked up when the Golden Hour started and got there early to set up. Unfortunately, I could only have in the shot well lit and focused either the seat and the water or the horizon and the water. I got a new lens when I got home which might make the plan a bit more possible. I'll find out next year.












Then the fireworks. There are two lots. The 9:30pm ones to show the kids so you can put them to bed, and then the midnight ones. These were the 9:30 ones, as by midnight, there was no way I was sober enough to get a decent shot...

@Suicune's Fire @Pokemon Trainer Sarah @Neo Emolga I'm back...