Council House Entrance

Council House Entrance
Originally uploaded by Clare Selley

I'm actually not uploading many to Flickr now - it's taking long enough to process the ones I want anyway!

I've been unable to find a place that'll do a landscape photobook in A4, so I'm trying 10x8 with Blurb.com. I'm not entire sure they're the best choice, but I don't have huge amounts of options! ¬.¬

I'm now on 54 pages... o.O And about 100 photos... o.O I think I have a limit of about 80 pages...

Current places still to do:

Black Horse - Do on way home
Football figures - Do on way home
Ford's Hospital - Way home?
St. Mary's Guildhall - Try Sunday morning?
Christchurch Spire - Erm...
Canal Basin - Erm...
Far Gosford Street - Erm... Might skip?
Spon Street - Way home if I get the 19W
Canal Walk - Next weekend?
New Cathedral - Hope for a sunny weekend!
Old Cathedta from top of spire - Next weekend
Whitefriar's Monastery - No idea.

I'm worried I have too many pictures, but I can't see any getting left out...

My Bane...

Swanswell Gargoyle Face On BW
Originally uploaded by Clare Selley

This was a picture I've been trying to get for a few days. It was not working in colour. At all. Luckily I tried turning it black & white, which works nicely, but doesn't quite fit with my idea of doing colour. Ah well, a few B&W shots should work... :/

There's a few items around the city which just are not wanting to be photographed. These gargoyles, the tower on top of Bluecoats - which I think I'll try as a HDR...

I'd rather not spend the weekend reshooting, there's plenty of places I need to go for the first time!

Edit, edit, edit...

Elephant on Gate
Originally uploaded by Clare Selley

Went around town taking more photos today - and editted some more. I'm trying not to over-use the perspective correction too much, but I'm realising that I probably don't spend enough time getting it right in-camera.

I usually have to straighten, and at least a few pictures are a bit OOF but they're gargoyles and grainy anyway, so the camera wasn't having fun focusing on them... :/ I always have to boost colours/contrast, but I guess that's 'cause I shoot RAW.

The perspective correction, however, is WAY too tempting to straighten up some pictures from odd angles. I've only used it on a few - the door panels and circle pictures being the obvious ones where they're sets... But I used it on another and then tweaked the picture until it looked 'normal' again. I feel like I cheated a little...

But then, I editted bird poop off a gargoyle because, well, bird poop. :P

Was late for work today because I went to get pictures of the Council House... Oops... But hopefully they should be OK.

I'm also debating, assuming I'm over the 35 pictures, putting in one or two of my not-going-to-get-again-easily shots... Hmmm... I know it's bending the rules slightly, but...

Anyway. Back to editting. And maybe bed eventually!

List of places to go.

I need a list (other than post-it notes!) of places I need to go to take pictures:

Black Horse - Roundabout near station.
Football figures - Roundabout near station.
Ford's Hospital
St. Mary's Guildhall - Try Sunday morning?
Naiad statue in Lady Herbert's Garden - no longer there. :(
Christchurch Spire
Canal Basin
Far Gosford Street
Spon Street
Canal Walk
West Orchard's Dome?
New Cathedral
Old Cathedtal (inc. from top of spire?)
Whittle Arch at night.
Timezone thingy under Whittle arch at night.
Whitefriar's Monastery

Argh... This is going to take years!

Gargoyle on Coventry Cross

Gargoyle on Coventry Cross
Originally uploaded by Clare Selley

And now I've editted this to pieces to take out some background, I'm off to bed. Only 56 more in my 'to process' pile - and some are duplicates...

Zonk.

SoFoBoMo Day 2/31

Elephant on Pole
Originally uploaded by Clare Selley

Uploading about 20 more images for SoFoBoMo... However there's a 'set' of 5 and a 'set' of 12 that will be used together, so I probably should count them as only 2 images!

Also discovered the perspective tool - so I got to correct a horribly skewed picture (evil shop in the way!) and the 12 panels are from the bank door, so correcting them makes them look a lot better as they weren't taken straight on!

Had a good after-work photo session going round Coventry with a friend yesterday. The picture's from the walk and is the elephant on the very tall pole opposite the Godiva statue. It was backlit, and I under-exposed to get the sky, and I'm really pleased with how it's come out. :)

Got some of the photos I wanted to reshoot, and she showed me places I'd not found yet. I really need to go slightly further afield (Far Gosford Street) and I've got a list of places to go from a quick google and look at the CVOne pages:

Canal Basin
Far Gosford St
Council House
Canal
West Orchard's dome
Black Horse

Well, it'll keep me fit!

Only another ton of photos to go through. And I need yet another reshoot of the tower over Bluecoats School. Argh.

SoFoBoMo Day 1/31

So, yesterday I decided to do SoFoBoMo. This is a challenge to yourself (like NaNoWriMo) to produce a photobook in a month. My month will therefore be 18th May - 18th June. :)

The most important thing (apart from the pictures) is a title. And the My Coventry project the BBC ran, and I got exhibited in, inspired me to choose, well, My Coventry as a project. The nooks, crannies and bits and pieces that people don't always notice in Coventry.

Equipment. I use a Canon 1000D (Digital SLR) and 4 lenses - 30mm 1.4, 105mm 2.8, 70-300mm 4-5.6 and a 18-55mm kit lens. This lot should be sufficient, although I really wish I had an off-camera flash... :/

Next problem - actually taking photos. I toddled into town after work and took about 200 photos. Having gone though them, I might, if I'm lucky, get 10-11 of the 35 I need. :/ To the right is a rather nice picture of Trinity Church that I got lying down on the floor and praying I didn't get run over...

While I was taking pictures (actually, lying on the grass trying to get some bluebell pictures - none of which came out sharp) a man started watching me. Just standing and watching. And when I moved on, he just moved to a different seat. Which seemed creepy. Turned out he was a photographer and interested in watching someone at work... :) Was a nice guy. :)

Now I just need to figure out how to take 20+ more decent photos, figure out re-takes and if I can get access to any better angles... Oh, and then put it all together! Wish me luck...