Pep Bonet...

Found out about this guy from the 500 Photographers website (by the way this is definitely one of the pages you should visit daily), and what really struck me was his approach to photography, travel and I suppose in a way, life in general.

Whilst War/Disaster photography is always difficult to view and digest, and almost always leads to questions regarding the morality of the photographers involved, I think its worth to see the video above and take a bit more of a look into the work and philosophy of Pep Bonet.

GIGAntic PANoramas

Panoramic photography is surely one of the areas having gained most from digital photography. Some people push it to the limit - or beyond, regarding the capacities of normal PCs. At the GigaPan website one can find images with hundreds of gigapixels, stitched together from thousands of individual images. Via the Web interface one can zoom into the images and find details invisible in the full image. See, for example, this nice panorama of Prague at dawn or this (relatively low resolution) sunset shot of Madrid.

These photographers are helped by the hardware sold by GigaPan which moves the camera around automatically. Should we consider a GigaPan EPIC Pro for the Club to create such special images ourselves? Since Neil is now with Gaia, he should soon know everything about dealing with enormous datasets :-)

Yearbook 2010 published...

yearbook 2010 by esacphotoclub | Make Your Own Book

Firstly, congratulations to Silvia whose photo graces the cover of our fourth edition of the Yearbook as the most popular image on our gallery pages in 2010.

This year we have reduced the number of pages to take advantage of the new premium lustre paper, which I think really adds a lot to the look and feel of the book.

Above you can take a quick look at the 'Book Preview' which hopefully gives you an idea of what to expect.

I may be biased, but I think this years edition is our best yet and if it wasn't for you all taking the time and effort to produce the images you do throughout the year, the club could not produce such a high quality product. Many thanks to all of you for your time and enthusiasm !

In the bag with David Burnett...

In The Bag with photographer David Burnett from PhotoShelter.com on Vimeo.

We've spoken about David Burnett in the past, recently I came across this series on Photoshelter which gets various photographers to open and explain what they have in their camera bags. Always interesting to have a nose around in the bag of a professional photographer.

Blog Overhaul...

As you may have noticed the blog has been given a new look and a few new additions.

Firstly, you'll see the previous slideshow panel for our featured photographer has been changed for a very nice 3D Cloud style widget (many thanks to Roy Tanck for making this available).

Also, all the blog posts have now been labeled/tagged and you can now select entries based on their labels by using the label widget over there on the left. If you post remember to choose one of the already existing or add your own.

I'll also tidy up the links lists over time.

Hope you like it..
 

Best of the Best Of's...

Life Pictures of the Year 2010
Reuters Best of Year
BBC Pictures of the Year 2010
New Scientist 12 Best Pictures of the Year
LA Times 2010 The Year in Pictures
mnsbc The Year in Pictures
NY Times 2010 The Year in Pictures

...if you've got any more add them as comments.. Happy New Year by the way ;-)

Simply Beautiful

National Geographic's mails contain almost too much self-advertising for my liking these days. But the link in of the last ones drew my attention: Simply Beautiful Pictures has nothing revolutionary, but shows some nice specific examples of how choices can lead to a beautiful picture. Now I only should remember better, when in the field.

Composition 101...

Rule of thirds, Golden triangle, Golden Spiral and Golden Rectangle Division are all ways of attempting to define perfect composition.

Alfie Goodrich over at Japanorama has recently published an article on compositional rules, very interesting and well worth a look.

In addition, the long number you see above is the 'Golden Ratio' or Phi and has the habit of defining rather well images/paintings that appear to be attractive to the human eye.

Here's how to construct a 'Golden Rectangle'

1: Draw a square (here marked in red).
2: Draw a line from the midpoint of one side of the square to an opposite corner.
3: Use that line as the radius to draw an arc that defines the long dimension of the final Golden Rectangle.

Now start dividing up your favourite image with these rectangles and see what happens. Here are a few examples:

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is Maxi, who I assume is from the north of Spain.

To be honest I couldn't find out anything more than the obvious fact that he is a very good surf photographer.

Enjoy...!

Previous featured photographers:
October '10 - Gary Newman
September '10 - Martin Stranka
July '10 - m_i_n_o_r's
June '10 - AndersonImages'
May '10 - Siprico
April '10 - Lucie Debelkova
March '10 - Kent Mercurio
February '10 - Midnight-Digital
January '10 - Art Libre
December '09 - Ray maï
November '09 - *6261
October '09 - Vladimir Longauer
September '09 - LJ
August '09 - alex.alexander
July '09 - falsalama
June '09 - micmojo
May '09 - orvaratli
April '09 - ArTeTeTra
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

HDR Video - FACT or FICTION?

Right, I'm going to sneak this in before Neil takes away my posting rights... this one aimed at the videography wing of the club. Maybe some of you saw this when it rolled up on Slashdot a few months ago:



Now if you happened to have a pair of 5Ds and a beam splitter lying around the house I guess you could do this at home if you had enough patience. But I have to say that it does really look quite unreal. The clip of the man just looks like he's just lost a fight with a bag of icing sugar.

I think we've just trained to see pictures and film in a certain way and it will take some time to untrain our brains to accept HDR as soemthing which corresponds to our perception of the world.

A Challenger Appears

TalkUrbex is one of the sites on the urban exploration scene that caught my attention; a mainly British group of borderline lunaticsintrepid explorers who spend their free time mooching around decaying asylums, hospitals, factories and military bases.

Much of their time is spent into and around places with unsafe floors, walls and roofs, without much light to see with and all the time playing Hide and Seek with security guards and/or police. However they are also pretty decent photographers. Their shots are shooped to hell and back and they do appear to have an indecent love of HDR pictures but there is a pretty stark beauty to their work.

There does appear to be similar Spanish scene, for example Rutas Abandonadas has a nice showcase of locations (it appears that the Vicente Calderon does not qualify yet but surely just a matter of time).

Holidays 2010...

Always a popular theme and this year was no exception with almost 40 images presented.

Once again the club members have travelled far and wide with images from Iceland, Cuba, Patagonia, France, Bulgaria, Germany, Holland, Spain and the list goes on.

Daniel and Marion presented images for the first time and below you see the epic 'man conquers mountain and satiates his thirst' shot from Daniel and a clever shot from Marion with the jet aircraft contrails mimicking the bridge supports.

Above you will see Celia's iceberg image which drew a lot of comments from the spectators.

If you want to see more (and I can't believe you don't...) head on over to the gallery pages to check out all the images. And whilst your there if you feel like leaving some comments and giving some thumbs up, it's always greatly appreciated.

Next theme is 'Landscapes', so, until then...

Happy shooting..!.

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is Gary Newman, who is from Bristol in the UK. Most of the photo's on his Flickr stream have been taken in the Bristol and West Country area.

As you can see he dedicates his time to landscape and cityscape imagery and there really is a great collection of inspiring photographs.

Enjoy...!

Previous featured photographers:
September '10 - Martin Stranka
July '10 - m_i_n_o_r's
June '10 - AndersonImages'
May '10 - Siprico
April '10 - Lucie Debelkova
March '10 - Kent Mercurio
February '10 - Midnight-Digital
January '10 - Art Libre
December '09 - Ray maï
November '09 - *6261
October '09 - Vladimir Longauer
September '09 - LJ
August '09 - alex.alexander
July '09 - falsalama
June '09 - micmojo
May '09 - orvaratli
April '09 - ArTeTeTra
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

Latest Leica...

Leica M9 Titanium Special Edition.

500 only.

Price €23,400.

Ouch !!!!

Best Photography How-To Books...

I found this interesting entry over at The Online Photographer regarding recommended How-To books, plenty of the readers have also left comments adding to the list originally suggested by Mike.

Could be useful .?

Frank Ockenfels 3...

Camerabag.tv recently put up their latest entry regarding one of my favorite photographers Frank Ockenfels.

Frank, who appears to be an all round good guy, as you can see from all the comments written by attendees of his presentations and workshops, has the amazing talent of being able to do everything photographic, and do it well.
 
There has been much discussion over the need for professional photographers to specialise in order to survive in the commercial world, but Frank is a clear case that there's always an exception to the rules.

As you will see in the video interview on Camerabag.tv he is the owner of an amazing selection of analogue camera's that he uses to create the various effects you see in his images and his studio/home looks like a place I could spend hours looking at all the photographs, books and journals he has everywhere.

Apart from the video interview on Camerabag.tv, this blog entry on A Photo Editor will give you a very good insight into this fascinating character from the world of photography..!

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is Martin Stranka from Prague and to be honest I can't describe his photography any better than is written in his Flickr bio: 

"The work of Martin Stranka exists in that space between dreams and waking, those split seconds when a person has a foot in both worlds. Light like the first rays of twilight filtering through a curtain when even the dust seems to glitter with some sort of hidden purpose or meaning.

The language of stillness.

The solitary sound of your own footsteps echoing down the streets of a deserted city. And on every building the flickering image of a silent film like faded memories.

Martin's images.

So personal yet somehow universal they seem like your own memories. Your moments.

And maybe they are..."

If you would like to see more than his Flickr stream, you can find his website here.

Previous featured photographers:
July '10 - m_i_n_o_r's
June '10 - AndersonImages'
May '10 - Siprico
April '10 - Lucie Debelkova
March '10 - Kent Mercurio
February '10 - Midnight-Digital
January '10 - Art Libre
December '09 - Ray maï
November '09 - *6261
October '09 - Vladimir Longauer
September '09 - LJ
August '09 - alex.alexander
July '09 - falsalama
June '09 - micmojo
May '09 - orvaratli
April '09 - ArTeTeTra
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is Xavi Fuentes from Barcelona, Spain. In his biography he explains that he discovered photography a 'bit late', which doesn't seemed to have stopped him from creating such beautiful imagery.

You will see that he mainly concentrates on black and white photography with his wonderfully composed seascapes.

He is also winning awards for his photography having recently collected two 1st places at the PX3 Awards in Paris for 'Book Proposal' and 'Nature'.

If you would like to see more than his Flickr stream, you can find his website here and his blog here.

Previous featured photographers:
June '10 - AndersonImages'
May '10 - Siprico
April '10 - Lucie Debelkova
March '10 - Kent Mercurio
February '10 - Midnight-Digital
January '10 - Art Libre
December '09 - Ray maï
November '09 - *6261
October '09 - Vladimir Longauer
September '09 - LJ
August '09 - alex.alexander
July '09 - falsalama
June '09 - micmojo
May '09 - orvaratli
April '09 - ArTeTeTra
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

PHotoEspaña 2010...

The 13th edition of this international festival of photography began on the 9th June and will finish on the 25th July.

This year the common theme is 'time' and there are 69 exhibitions with works from 372 artists from 41 countries, along with various events to promote photographic art amongst the populace.

More details regarding artists, venues and events can be found on their website.

Macro...

Despite many absences due to holiday/mission/World Cup season, many photographs were still presented (even by those who couldn't attend).

As expected for a macro theme, the primary subjects for our cameras where insects and plants, two of which you can see here.

However, a few of the members found more non-conventional subjects with Nacho's images generating many comments from the audience.

As always, all the images are available on the gallery pages, so go and leave some 'thumbs ups' and comments if you feel so inclined.

Its summer so time to take a well earned rest and we will return with our usual theme 'Holidays', sometime in September.

Enjoy the holiday period and once again thanks for all your efforts in presenting photo's.