Clicking Mad

back to the park again ... I've pretty much written April off - but I do have next week off work, I may have a come-back left in me? and I'm going through a major black & white phase ... it developed quite slowly but seems to have taken over ... well, not entirely, but I feel the need to edit a least a couple to b&w out of a photoshoot and because I haven't posted much ... we found a tennis ball

tlc - love the playful "skipping" shot for today ... and "old man and the sea" is cool too

I've gone for a fun shot today, taken with the point'n'shoot on our walk today ...

rocco - that dude asleep is great! Love the black & white. Nice and brave of you to ask if you could take a pic too good work with the you and roc series, really! that one with the cheese burger cracked me up then I noticed the drool down your arm ... ick! tlc - I love the one of your guys all tuckered out and lined up "down hill" loveasd - great sunsets leopuppy - love the one of Leo being the king of the castle ... your flower pics are really nice too bindi-boo - great old Morpeth pics ... I like the first one best ... I also really like the Nobby's beach shot! terranik - I like the red medicine, and I too used to love taking that stuff as a kid darien - love the kookaburras I was going for a dark and mysterious sorta shadowy forestry look in these, but taken in the middle of the day it just didn't really work how I meant, anyway, so I adjusted with "cyanotype" which I think helped it from the original coloured shot. Cyanotype isn't for everyone, but I like it or the middle of the day kind of help?

okay, cool, good shots and creative work guys I've only got a couple of places left, that I think will work on my "out and about" list ... so back to dog park pics ... I've been making an effort to take Chester and Jamie on a long walk on my days off, so these first couple are with the cheapo point'n'shoot kodak I have - not carrying the canon for an hour and a quarter it was a beautiful day today and then later I had to get Texas out for his sedate paced walk - he just can't handle long walks :D ... so took the canon with me for that cheers

thanks for the comments everyone, sorry I've not been able to get back here for a bit ... this getting out of the house to take photos is quite time consuming and I've ticked off most of the easy places already bindi-boo - I like the magical mushroom playground one, your creations are ... like the racing pigeons idea pps - Pootie is adorable in her hard working outfit, dirty knees and big smile darien - great flower pics! I like the working class man too clover - go flyball Harri, who I keep mistaking for a girl ;) tlc - I like your dogs' shot on the 6th with the corrugated iron fencing as background and the sepia works really well ... and I like the Roxy ring-in poocow - the doog is looking good (uh oh, I just noticed that good and doog are reversed), I like him in the long grass :p and destructo ... not the gooddoog! hehehe rainy - love your waiting pup, and his? little tongue poke, I like the jet tails too! huga - great work all round! I particularly like the sewing next to the open windows :D rocco - always great! love day 12 and 15! this pic almost stopped me this month - I'd taken Chess to the vet and decided to stop by this statue on the way home, 30 excrutiating minutes stuck in suburban railway crossing peak-hour traffic watching every inch of light drop out of the sky as the minutes ticked by landed me downtown next to this statue with only street lights, I ramped up the ISO hence really crummy grain, but due to my inability to concentrate on dog and passing pedestrian traffic and operate a camera in manual mode, I chose Av which overexposed Chester in every shot I took, and with my concentration totally sapped the best/clearest shot (the one below) also happened to have a great big pedestrian caution sign rising from the center of Chester's head! It killed me, I tried so hard to fix it, managed to do a passable job of removing the sign, but everything else, awful ... actually there is one shining light: his expression! anyway, the next day I went to the good old reliable park ... with tree ;) nothing yesterday, but this morning I revisited the dog statue (not much better really gonna have to give up on this idea) ... ... and a trip to a different beach where boating people where making the most of the public holiday

there's a river down there somewhere

mural

PPS - can't deny Pootie has glamorous hair! tlc - love the sepia of them today bindi-boo - I like the blue swirl and the snowflake texture terranik - I like the black & white otoscope! I'm gonna have to visit the train station again, this wasn't what I had in mind really, but here is today's shot

... I was thinking when you said art you meant arty as opposed to abstract art ... but now I'm caught up

thanks guys for your nice comments on my pics so far :cool: so far I've managed to avoid too much public contact - there were a couple of passersby on the footbridge, no-one at the park or in the street, this morning I got quite a few comments at the train station, but all good! I'm actually feeling a little better about the whole idea, it's not so scary huga - I love your "days" so far, the bed making ... and the look on your little boys' face, the whole setting of that shot, pugs pic on the wall, the movement of your hand on baby's bum ... all ... fantastic dreamy look on your face at the kitchen sink too, perfect! am - feeding the dogs ;) ... love the dyson shot too, I agree you could sell it to the company for advertising poocow - Darcy is a great subject! I love the colour contrasts, his beautiful dark red fur against the green grass ... Super Wet Dog, I love the wet grass flying terranik - that Jedi doctoring Ahsoka shot is great! I love that trick of him putting a paw on her ... the dummy wrist one looks like they are really trying for realistic with the red in the syringe and a bit of a red stain on it's hand No, I don't have PS and never tried b&w when I had a trial, so not sure of how it works there exactly. I use 1 of the 2 lightroom pre-sets then adjust things according to what I like. I know the pre-sets change the hues and saturations via "Camera Calibration" (whatever that really means??) and white balance (which I usually reset to "as shot") ... Yeh, I guess it can't hurt to play around with the colours and the tone curve too? to see if you get a less grey black and white. But, I'm no expert Your 4 dogs are fantastic! I love how similar they all are with their little beardy faces. I love the shot of them all lined up chasing the magpie at the park! ... bed hoggers in the morning - not much room for humans there ... that shot on the log is great! Such good dogs to stay there, wind in their fur ;) ... and the sychronisity of them on the bench with Bert :cool: clover - Harri is gorgeous in sleep, I like the desaturation and her nose in that pic, and the tongue poking out in the other one darien - that bed is show room perfection! lea - month of madness is looking fun so far, I like the one on the train tracks ... naughty naughty Bond! Love the chat between Stella rainy - love the morning tea bindiboo - very interesting art, but I have no idea what they are cheers all, sorry if I've missed you, I'm loving the diversity of the shots so far this month, really interesting!!!

I'll get a chance to reply proper tomorrow for now, we have Chester down the other end of my street tonight - we were out shooting for about 20 minutes and encountered not a soul fyi: the colour is as natural as the camera took it, that back lighting in the sky is from the main road lights I guess; and this shot was taken on a slow exposure, you can actually see Chester's profile as he turned his head mid-exposure. I love this pic :D

Great pics so far Very creative! I didn't really intend to take park and/or beach pics as my "out and about" but it's easy for me ... A trip to the off-lead park after work is a regular thing for us, when I get the timing right, we rarely see any other dogs :D ... just a black and white of the 3 of them ... Texas has a tennis ball I found, Jamie is sniffing and Chester is watching them ... it was a really warm afternoon :p

Bindi-Boo great work so far guys seriously rocco you've outdone yourself (again) ... love the patience vs frustation!!! I'm having a really bad couple of days, generally shi++ed off with everything. Earlier this evening I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to go out and take Chester on a photoshoot - I'm not even sure where it fits in this challenge??? but I'm running with it - despite my earlier commitment to sleep ... I followed through all the way to a footbridge I have had in mind for a while and took some photos - it wasn't even that hard, but the quality is dodgy-as, I was just glad I did it And my mood has improved significantly And just 'cause I took it, we got there just in time for this:

a month of your dogs would be great. I'm with lea! Hey it is a dog forum - can't get bored with dog pics

being April (the 4th month) I've run out of dogs but I really want to try and get out of the house/backyard - so I'm thinking I'll make April about "beyond my property" or some such name wish me luck, I'm actually a little scared to take the camera off the property ... with a dog (or 2) maybe the point'n'shoot will be the way to go ... we'll see ...

thanks all for comments on my pics, it's been fun this month for me, though there were a few I wish I'd gotten a little better, if I find some time over the next couple of days I'll give 'em another go. gila - love your darkness shot, beautiful browns animalmad - great tongue shot! Love that curl! iltby - great droplet shots, I particularly like "tear" ... I've already said how much I love your cat yawning, brilliant! ... zoom series is cool too ... I prefer the original dangerous, no real reasoning behind it, just what I like rocco - I like little yellow Ralph, nice! ... love the rocco with self-portrait, and I like your new idea too! quoll - nice birds in flight you have there! I particular like your mountain and reflections pics j - I like your rose pic with the single colour ... cool begging shots too ... and great giraffe shot cordy - great pics! I like your water shots ... love your cat hugging the rock!! lea - that junk yard car almost looks like a toy? ... upside down is cool, really like the perspective ... good work with the textures too, they are all really interesting leopuppy - investigate is really cool and raindrops is nice too! clover - I love "joy"! Scraggy-wet-look flying along - can't even see any footprints so she must be flying (can't always see if it's Elvis or Tinny, sorry) ... I totally love that mine shot you got too! montall - great evaporate pic, love the soft green! ... and underwater is that for real? I can see a face in the reflection in the far left where is this? kirislin - good to see you back The Ibis is a nice shot! and the whips whipping about ... I think I've already said I like the ghostly Kibah ... and joy is hilarious! darien - I like your image of humidity pic, crystal clear! ... I really like the little village pic too, and excommunication is interesting poocow - jack in a box is funny, and I love seeing Darcy running pointeeblab - nice perspective of your sleepy cat! (btw did you see my new work dog Xandi quite a few pages back in this thread somewhere, better looking lab than Paige hey?) ruthless - nice collar, suits Angel beautifully (and I'm not a fan of pink but you know if it works it works ) ... beautiful dobe puppy pics kja - love your "quiet" shot, your dog (which one is this?) looks really fit and healthy! ... uber sexy is taurus - cool angles on your shots! I really like your twisted shot okay, that's me caught up, may see ya later with a new "M" or "T" or something else just for fun ... can't do textures don't have the software but I'll probably look into it, I've already used a 30 day trial of both photoshopCS4 and elements7 ... if not see ya in the April challenge, whatever that may entail

Jamie says "Hi" ... my 2nd attempt at "W" for wave couldn't get one shot of her waving with all of her ears in shot and no tongue man, she pulled some funny looks in this shoot

naw rocco's not disgusting, it's just the "slinger's" he throws Yup, that flickr Milkbones pic is great, a really clever idea well done, I just had to give it a go, and as soon as I uploaded here this morning I thought I shoulda done the whole "zzz's" idea with it, so like have her asleep with "zzz's" coming out the top of her head or some such thing ... oh well, may try it later kirislin - I love the way dogs look at reflections, my dogs definitely know and watch, a nice interesting pic of Kibah ;) ... I'm a big fan of reflections atm kja - that maternity shot is amazing, those colours incredible helen - ooo cool lensbaby! my next thing other than re-visit a couple of the letters is to try and rewrite that post that I accidently killed - I'll be back in a week

for anyone who ever asks I always say: "I was made for this job" ... in all seriousness, I love my occupation thanks for the reply ash "Y" is for yellow - this photo isn't that good but I want to get to "Z" and then re-visit a couple of the others "Z" - this idea was inspired by this photo

lea - I think "quaint" is brilliant! Love how the texture matches the wire fencing thanks, I work for Quarantine Active Detector Dogs Because unless you are spot metering or metering manually, the camera will try and meter for the 'average'. The spider takes up a small amount of space and the background is usually darker. Camera meters for the background; spider comes out over-exposed. In Montall's case, the spider was being hit by direct sunlight but you would find that the background was in the shade, hence the spider looks like it's glowing. This may get long-winded but I feel the need to explain how I work with my predominantly white dog to avoid the whole over-exposure. Obviously I use manual exposure, and I mostly use evalutive metering but I also use the "manual AF point selection" (you know the squares that you can select where the focus-point is taken from) and I rarely use the center-point, but say I've got Chester in the sun and I want to take a pic of his darker nose in focus, I'll half press the shutter and meter at the whitest spot, probably on the top of his head, adjust to the correct exposure then re-focus to his nose and shoot, once you have metered correctly you can shoot away at different points of focus as long as the light remains stable That didn't sound as bad as I thought it was going to I've also found this useful with Texas and Jamie specifically around their muzzles which are a lot lighter than the rest of them, early-on, maybe 6-8 months ago I kept finding I'd over-exposed their muzzles, with this method I don't make that mistake as often. I've found that generally the results tend to be an overall darker pic, but if you choose the right times of day, and/or lighting situations - still learning with that - you can get light (correctly exposed) images without overexposing Ash - that's probably why I wasn't having too much success with Av priority mode earlier this month - as I wasn't able to make the adjustments according the the brightest spot in the shot - I kept getting overexposed bits in my shots ;) ... would this generally be an okay method? I mean it's worked for me, but would you consider it a good way to do it, or would I be better using another kind of metering method?

thanks, yeh, he's pretty hard to resist taking pics of thanks, Jamie is only about 19kg - she's my small dog, the one I can do jumping into and through my arms-type tricks ... Chester weighed in at 28.3kg today. And Texas is normally around the 30kg mark. thanks, she's way too pretty for me, my "old" working dog Paige I've always thought is kinda ugly, stumpy, but she is so good at her work that it wasn't something I ever really cared about, but, man Xandi is so good looking AND she is doing really really well work-wise, maybe even better than Paige did when she first started

I wrote a big reply then forgot to send it before I turned the computer off and took the dogs for a walk so ... you're all just gonna have to accept that I think you've all contributed some awesome photos on this thread and I'm very pleased to visit "U" is for under ... the side gate when I get home "V" is for vanity argh ... again, 'cause I can't decide "W" is for wave ... with Chester, just because I took it this morning "X" is for Xandi (my new work dog, and the best looking yellow labrador around ) I have "Y" and "Z" to do, with ideas, and I hope to revisit a couple, "M" and "T" at least, and maybe "W" for Jamie

thanks for the comments all that "O" box trick is so useful! Some of my favourite shots have been taken using that box (there's actually 2 boxes), the dogs love them and the trick and I can put them anywhere in my yard, I have Jamie jumping from one to the other as in "J" and they can pirouette or spin on them, Chester regularly sits there throwing waves at me while I'm out having a coffee! And I've been able to generalise the behaviour to other "box-like objects" while out and about if need be iltby - nice in your face "A"ttention whore :D ... I've got that frisbee, it's actually the best one I've had before, so easy to throw it right, and easy on the dogs mouths I took some frisbee shots this morning, so I could get a good pant outta Jamie :cool: ruthless - love the v and cool self-portraits - nice red! aquaticmal - looks like a fun weekend ... beautiful palomino leo - good to see you join in, I love "sad" too! And Leo looks extra fluffy "P" is for pant - after the frisbee session on the cool tiles. I was going to go for more movement in this shot, but it wasn't working and something came up, but I like how her ears go back and her eyes half close when she pants :D ... I was originally going to go with a peaches for "P" shot, as the dogs (Chester particularly, but I'm sure Jamie gave him the idea) have been gorging on peaches from the neighbours tree ... I swear they went through an excess of 500 peaches within a fortnight ... but they seem to have finally dried up thankfully "Q" is for quad (as in 4 paws) "R" is for reflection - in through one of the kitchen windows out into the yard (I think I prefer colour with this, but the colour version I have uploaded is not as good composition-wise) "S" is for silhouette and in case I don't come up with something better: "T" is for icky-frisbee-Tongue

thanks for the nice comments guys hey bindi-boo, I can't believe you've gone through all the letters, it's not even half way through the month, you'll have to start again lea - I love that orange, is it a bit of a fence? Animalmad - I love Nellie, she's adorably scraggy rocco - rocco's a "drool-king" ... and oh Ralph's foot is fantastic! and his ears are cool ... great catch kja "N" is for night-time "O" is for on-a-box