Long time between drinks!

Christmas and the new year have been and gone! I've let my blog go unattended for too long. Much has happened. I have yet to work a full 5day week, in fact I have not worked a full weeek since mid December. This comes to an end tomomorrow sadly. The next few months will have me working odd days and there will be a large block of time on carers leave. Violet is again going under the knife and will need some very special care for a few months ahead. Fingers crossed it will all go well and my mid 2010 she will be back on her feet and running!

Photographically I have had some absolutely fantastic trips away and day away shoots. Bought some more equipment, learnt more "stuff" and generally improved the quality of my work. As long as I continue to learn I shall be happy. Yesterday Moo, Peter and I went to photograph some Aboriginal cave art and then on to participate in a photographic treasure hunt. It was a long and challenging day.........and I loved it!

Today, by comparison, will be spent in a far less stimulating way with domestic duties filling the majority of the day. A late afternoon coffee at Warners Bay is a possibility though.

So now, a couple of images taken of late. I hope you enjoy them!

Christmas is approaching at an alarming pace. This year I made some gifts for family and friends. This is sooooooo not me, but I was impressed with the quality of the RedBubble calendars that Moo made for her "Looking for Love" exhibition and took the plunge and made my own. I had 5 calendars and 4 diaries made. The diaries were a complete leap of faith. I had them printed in France, sight unseen, quality unknown and I am more than happy with them.

October and most of November have been lost in bloggerville. Mum became ill and I had 5 weeks of novice nursing filling my world!! I did mange to get SOME pics taken and it is best if I leave them to speak for themselves.

Gallery Raw called for submissions for an exhibition to be held for the month of October to celebrate Mens Health Week. I had an idea for a shot and I only needed a heavily tattooed man to pull it off. Work provides me with access to many fit young males and I only needed to ask about until I found one with the right Tatts. When asked if he would be interested in posing he originally hesitated, but it didn't take much to convince him. A few days later I popped around to his place and with his lovely wife holding the reflector I took 6 shots of him. I also took another 6 shots of them as a couple. This shot was the first taken and was the image I had envisaged. I was in and out of their hime in about 20 minutes. I converted the image from Raw to Jpeg and tweaked the sharpening. I had it printed as a 20x30 inch metallic paper print thru Digital Works in Victoria and had it mounted and matted thru The Framing Game at Charlestown. The black matt was not really black enough, so I had it matted with a black linen finish matt and it looks great. It has been hung at the front door of Gallery Raw. I am really happy with it. It is the shot I envisaged, the print came out really well and the mounting and matting is really well done. I love it when it all goes as smoothly as this shot.

A Day at the Fair

My favourite Ranga and I made the long trip to Broke today. Well worth the drive to find the biggest collection of vintage and veteran cars, trucks, military vehicles and farm machinery I have ever seen. We started walking thru the cars and it appeared they would simply never end.

There was even one dude there with a ute full of traps. Mouse traps, rat traps, fly traps, fox traps, dingo traps and a whole heap of other traps I have never seen before.

Fast and Furious

Brad with the Blad organised a shoot out with some mad FMX motorbike riders at Redhead. Chicko and Trigger rode and rode and rode around their track for a couple of hours. Trigger came a cropper at one stage, but like a true madmad he got straight back on!! Just a couple of pics for you to enjoy!

Long time coming!

Since I freely admit I am not a whizz on the computer you will not find it suprising that I penned a long and detailed blog with appropriate pictures and subsequently lost the lot before posting! Thus, this post may well be short and sharp.

The most exciting news to share was that after months of trying Sal, Duncan and I managed a rare guided tour of the decomissioned Wangi Wangi Power Station. 3 and a bit hours of sheer bliss, with a touch of fear thrown in for good measure! I took STACKS of photos. Here are some.....

I shot about 300 and you might think that there is little of interest in an old power station, but you would be so very very wrong!! They even had a theatre where they showed both movies and educational material. There was a laboratory too, which was strangely still set up as though the lab technicians left on a friday and forgot to come back to work monday! It was a little eerie!! The 65 acre site now had government approval for 80 freestanding homes and 110 apartments. It will bring great prosperity and employment to the area. I can't wait to see it finished. The owner and developer has great vision.

As I don't want this post to disappear into the ether I shall post........Now!