The Author – Bart Busschots
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Aug
17
Photo of the Week 26 – Small Tortoiseshell Butterfly
Filed Under Photography on August 17, 2008 | 1 Comment
Just because something is common, doesn’t mean it isn’t beautiful. After the Cabbage White the Small Tortoiseshell (Aglais urticae) is probably our most common butterfly, but I also think it’s one of our most beautiful. You can’t miss the lovely reds, but look closer and you’ll also see wonderful bright blue spots along the edges of the wings. These guys are strongly attracted to a lot of garden flowers so keep an eye out for them in your back yards! I snapped this one while it was feeding on some Thyme that was flowering.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of this shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/160 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]butterfly, Small Tortoiseshell, Aglais urticae, Cavan, Ireland, photography[/tags]
Aug
12
Photo of the Week 25 – Commuter Reflection
Filed Under Photography on August 12, 2008 | 3 Comments
I really don’t know why this is one of my very favourite images but it is. Maybe it’s the colours, maybe it’s the reflection. I do have a thing for reflections in photographs. This is just an ordinary Irish commuter train making it’s way from Maynooth in to Dublin along the Royal Canal on a summer evening at rush hour. For my fellow train spotters this is an Iarnród Éireann Class 29001 Diesel Multiple Unit.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/1000 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F10
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -0.67
[tags]train, canal, Royal Canal, Maynooth, Kidlare, Ireland, photography[/tags]
Aug
3
Photo of the Week 24 – Large Bindweed
Filed Under Photography on August 3, 2008 | Leave a Comment
Technically this flower is a terrible weed, you really don’t want this in your garden, but it’s still beautiful! This shot is clearly processed but I hope you’ll agree that it’s been done tastefully. What I’ve done is desaturate everything in the shot apart from the flowers and leaves of the Bindweed so that it stands out from the grass that it was growing amidst.
I got this shot while mountain biking along the towpath of the Royal Canal between Maynooth and Leixlip, or to be more precise, between Pike’s Bridge and Deey Bridge.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/320 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
The processing was done using the GIMP. I used this image in my tutorial demonstrating this technique.
[tags]wild flower, flower, blossom, Bindweed, photography, Maynooth, Kidlare, Ireland[/tags]
Jul
29
Photo of the Week 23 – Dog Rose
Filed Under Photography on July 29, 2008 | 1 Comment
When it comes to Irish wild flowers I’ve always considered the wild, or Dog, Rose (Rosa canina agg.) to be a real treasure. They’re quite rare, and in my mind, spectacular. They range from subtle pinks to pure white, this one is about as pink as they get. Compared to the fancy blossoms on modern garden roses the Dog Rose is exceptionally plain, but I like it’s simplicity, almost makes the modern garden varieties seem vulgar and over-the-top.
This shot was taken in the extensive grounds of what’s now the Farnham Radisson SAS hotel in Cavan. It was once the Farnham Estate and the lands contain some fabulous woodlands which are now open to the public. It’s at the edge of this woodland that I snapped this fine example of a Dog Rose.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/250 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]wild flower, flower, blossom, rose, Dog Rose, photography, Cavan, Ireland[/tags]
Jul
20
Photo of the Week 22 – Kasteel Ter Elst
Filed Under Photography on July 20, 2008 | Leave a Comment
This is an old photograph. I shot it back in 2001 with an old digital camera so it is small, even at full-size it’s only 640×480 pixels. I held off using it as a photo of the week for ages because of that. However, I’ve decided that size isn’t everything, so here it is!
This shot is a silhouette of the ruins of a once beautiful castle in my native town of Duffel in Belgium. It was shot against a lovely winter sunset. The castle itself dates back to the 12th century and was home to the first recorded lords of Duffel. It now sits in a small pond a few hundred meters away from the river Nete but when it was first built it sat on an island in the river. Obviously it’s not the castle that’s moved since but the course of the river! Like so many things in Belgium it was unfortunately destroyed during WWII. If you’re interested in learning more about the history of the castle check out this page.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: FujiFilm MX-2700 (point-and-shoot)
- Exposure: 1/400 sec
- Focal Length: 7.6mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 120
- Camera Mode: Auto
- Exposure Compensation: -0.9
[tags]sunset, Belgium, Castle, ruin, Duffel, Belgie, Kasteel, Photography[/tags]
Jul
14
Photo of the Week 21 – Owenreagh Wind Farm
Filed Under Photography on July 14, 2008 | 2 Comments
There’s lots of wind farms in Ireland these days but this one hold a very special place in my heart because I played a very small part in getting it built. Now, when I say small I really do mean it. My Dad developed the project in his spare time and I helped him erect the measuring mast on the site and clambered up and down that mountain more times that I care to remember to collect the data from the mast. The wind farm I’m talking about is Owenreagh in County Tyrone in Northern Ireland. You can see it very clearly as you travel from Armagh to Strabane along the A5 just after you pass the Ulster American Folk Park.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/500 sec
- Focal Length: 50mm
- Focal Ratio: F11
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]wind turbine, turbine, wind mill, wind farm, Tyrone, Northern Ireland, photography, Ireland[/tags]
Jul
6
Photo of the Week 20 – Summer in Maynooth
Filed Under Photography on July 6, 2008 | 3 Comments
I’ve shot a lot of photos on the grounds of St. Patrick’s College but this is one of my absolute favourites. You don’t often get to see so many flowers on the lawns, the grass gets cut quite often so the lawns are usually just plain green. Add a perfect evening and some students out enjoying it to those flowers and you have the ingredients for a really nice photograph. Well, I think it is anyway. Judge for yourself 🙂
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/1250 sec
- Focal Length: 45mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.3
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]summer, lawn, architecture, park land, Maynooth, Ireland, photography, St. Patrick’s College[/tags]
Jun
29
Photo of the Week 19 – Enlightenment
Filed Under Photography on June 29, 2008 | 1 Comment
This is a shot I got on the spur of the moment in the College Cemetery on the campus of St. Patrick’s College in Maynooth, Ireland. I had come to the cemetery planning to shoot a few HDR shots when I saw the sun picking out just one cross in the very last row of the cemetery. The HDR shots didn’t turn out nearly as interesting as this unplanned shot.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 55-200mm
- Exposure: 1/1600 sec
- Focal Length: 112mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.0
- ISO: 400
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -0.33
[tags]Celtic Cross, cemetery, Maynooth, Ireland, photography[/tags]
Jun
23
Photo of the Week 18 – Connolly’s Folly
Filed Under Photography on June 23, 2008 | 3 Comments
As some of you may know I do a weekly slot on the NosillaCast with Allison Sheridan, and at some stage I happened to mention that I was thinking of buying a graphics tablet but that that would have to wait because money was tight. Allison had an old Wacom tabled lying around that she hadn’t used in ages and she very kindly dusted it off and posted it to me. Thanks Allison!
Anyhow, the tabled arrived late last week so over the weekend I had a play with it. Among various experiments I re-visted an old image of Connolly’s Folly near Maynooth which I shot last year. Applying a much improved version of the Selective Colour technique I described previously on this blog I generated this week’s photo of the week. I’ll be creating a tutorial on this new technique soon because it’s a lot more powerful than the one I described originally. For a start it’s non-destructive, and it also allows for the desaturated areas to be slightly re-saturated so the effect is more subtle and less glaring.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/320 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F9.0
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
The image was processed using the GIMP. The black & white conversion was done using the channel mixer, the coloured regions were enhanced with an 80% LAB Colour Boost, and the black & white regions are 10% re-saturated.
[tags]photography, selective colour, Connolly’s Folly, local history, Maynooth, Ireland[/tags]
Jun
15
Photo of the Week 17 – Stars Over Taghadoe
Filed Under Photography on June 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment
I shot this photo quite a few months and all but forgot about it. It sat un-processed and forgotten in a dark corner of my gallery gathering electronic dust until I stumbled across it yesterday. The raw image didn’t look too promising, the whole thing had a very nasty red colour cast and didn’t look at all appealing. Some fairly extreme twiddling with sliders in iPhoto managed to turn this ugly duckling into a beautiful swan! The moral of the story, don’t be too put off when your shots don’t look great straight out of the camera! To give you an idea of how much editing had to be done I’ve included a small version of the original below.
If you’ve been following this series you’ll have seen Taghadoe before, this is the same round tower you saw silhouetted in Photo of the Week 5 – Nightfall in Taghadoe. It’s a real hidden gem located just a few miles outside Maynooth Village in Co. Kildare, Ireland.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 14.6 sec (using tripod)
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F3.5
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Manual
- Exposure Compensation: -1.0
[tags]Photography, Maynooth, Ireland, Kildare, Taghadoe, Round Tower, astrophotography, stars, night[/tags]