Bella Toscana

Just a few shots from a holiday in Florence, Italy, around the city, plus visits to Fiesole, Siena and Pisa.

Some of these shots are experiments with the hallowed manual settings. Early days but - good practice.

1) Santo Spirito, Florence, at night

2) Moon over Florence

3) San Romolo, Fiesole

4) Il Campo, Siena

5) Alleyway, Siena

6) Passage to the Uffizi, Florence

7) Florentine sunset...

Street and Studio Exhibition - Tate Modern, London

Went to see the Street and Studio exhibition of urban photography at the Tate Modern today and it fired me up completely - made me want to sit in subtle corners and take countless photos of passers-by and pay the extortionate price of a permit to photograph the London Underground (maybe one day...)!

Do go and see the exhibition if you have a chance. It's quite pricey at £10 a ticket (some concessions) but the exhibition is generous and jam-packed, with photos of urban and street life dating from the mid-19th century to today. Some disturbing WeeGee images of corpses in New York City but also some striking Diane Arbus shots (Child with Toy Hand Grenade) being one of them.

Meanwhile... below are a couple of my shots of the Turbine Hall - a wonderful, vast industrial-size space, in this building that was previously the Bankside Power Station (hence the huge chimney).

Also - the BFI (I think!) on the South Bank - not sure what the steel structures are but I like them!

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/streetandstudio/default.shtm

Dancing in the Moonlight

My quest for night shots continued this evening with a rather impromptu shoot at my friend's birthday BBQ.

I took most of the shots with the camera on a night portrait setting at a high ISO (1600) - here are just a couple. The motion blur adds a wonderful, surreal element to the pictures.

Night Fever

I took the camera up to London last night with the intention of capturing a shot of car headlights blurring, a real city scene. Of course London is so saturated by light now that everything around the cars would be too visible, and the effect would be lost.

I did, however, take a few shots, a couple of which I'm posting on here. I took them without the flash, and at an ISO of 200. In September, when the fairground comes back to town, I want to recreate the carousel shot (but without protective fencing and tree obstruction) - this was my favourite. I'm hypnotised by fairgrounds, their hypnotic gaudiness, the excess of light, noise and motion.

Holland Park (again), Friday afternoon stroll

(left) Waterfall, the Kyoto Garden, Holland Park

(below), close-up of budding plant

Holland Park, constant source of photo opportunities

Taken before work on an overcast morning. The peacock was an unexpected surprise - and a real treat. "I'm ready for my close-up - check out my iridescent plumage, woman."

Long time, no blog...

It's been a while since I posted on this site, so I may have to make up for it! I've been experimenting with my 10x macro lens, which has produced some fun results especially with close-up shots of plants... Predictable, but quite quirky.

Here goes...