2008 April | The World According To ...

MacRitchie Twilight

MacRitchie Twilight, originally uploaded by Okashikunai.

Another great shot of MacRitchie Reservoir taken by my brother

Snow Slide

Snow Slide, originally uploaded by Russ G.

The first real snowfall of 2008

I know Easter was a fair few weeks ago, but I’ve finally finished publishing the final set of Photo’s from our day out in London on Easter Good Friday. The first set was the visit to the Doctor Who Exhibition at Earls Court in the morning, which can be viewed here. The second set that I’ve just published were taken around Westminster and Big Ben and then on the London Eye.

I think this must be one of my favourite sets of Photo’s I’ve taken to date and was very lucky or unlucky with the weather for most of them. Unlucky in that it was windy and wet while waiting to get on the London Eye, but lucky in that it made for some very atmospheric photo’s, with sun rays coming down through clouds and then getting very dark and moody before it rained. I think the photo above and below show exactly what I mean and are my two of my favourites.

The next shot was a very lucky shot indeed as I was after a shot of one of the London Eye pods right at the top point of the ride, which I managed, but also managed to capture a plane directly above the pod! I’d like to say it was intentional, but I didn’t notice it at the time, only when processing the photo once home, but again very lucky

All of the photo’s were processed in Lightroom, where I follow a fairly standard process of choosing the best shot’s, tagging, adding a title and then finally tweaking them as required! This normally involves checking the white balance and cropping along with minor tweaks to the tone and presence. With a few of the shots I’ve increased the Recovery, Light Fill and Blacks settings to highlight the clouds slightly more and on doing this it seems to have given the photo’s a HDR feel, but it seems to have worked well! The full set of Westminster and around and on the London Eye can be found below, so enjoy!

Full Set

T’was a Dark Stormy Night …

T’was a Dark Stormy Night … originally uploaded by Russ G.

It was daytime actually, but it came over very very dark and windy as we queued to get on the London eye.

View Large

Rising High Above

Rising High Above, originally uploaded by Russ G.

See where this picture was taken. [?]

Bathed in Glory

Bathed in Glory, originally uploaded by Russ G.

This is from a set of photo’s on and around the London Eye and Westminster, which is where we visited after the Doctor Who Exhibition on Easter, Good Friday.

I really like the way I captured the sunlight streaming through the clouds in this shot and enhanced it with some post processing in Lightroom only. The effect is similar to some HDR shots you see, but not as extreme as I have only increased the recovery, fill light, blacks and vibrancy settings on a single RAW file.

Foreign Affairs

Foreign Affairs, originally uploaded by Russ G.

Doctor Who Exhibition, Earls Court, Easter 2008

For those of you that didn’t already know, I’m a big Doctor Who fan and have been since I was a child and watched it from behind the sofa like countless others. Recently little “H” who is four has started to enjoy watching the show and collect some of the new action figures, with a little persuasion from me of course! So now we both look forward to sitting and watching the show when it’s on or watching one of the DVD’s I’ve collected.

Although being a big fan I’ve never really had the opportunity to do more than watch the show, that was until this Easter just gone! I saw with some delight that the Doctor Who exhibition showing monsters and costumes from the series was coming to Earls Court in London. Not wanting to miss the opportunity (I’ve always wanted to go to this!) I booked tickets for us all to go on Good Friday and also make a big day out in London for “H”

So, with family in tow and camera in hand we headed off for our big adventure in the city, which consisted of a trip to the Doctor Who exhibition followed by lunch and then a trip on the London Eye. I don’t know who was more excited about the exhibition really, little “H” or the big kid, me!

What did I think to the Exhibition, well I’ll give you a brief overview without trying to spoil it for everyone and then a few tips to help any others planning a visit. Overall the exhibition doesn’t disappoint if your a fan the new show, as it follows the adventures of the ninth and tenth doctor through each episode. It starts with The first new episode “Rose” and the shop dummies and follows the first season right through to the Christmas special, where the new 10th doctor takes over. You then go straight into the second season with The face of Boe and Cassandra the last human, followed by exhibits from the episodes of the second season, then the third season. Finally you finish with a display of the 2007 Christmas special “The voyage of the Damned”

The Good: It’s Doctor Who, so it’s all good! But getting close up with the Cybermen and the mini Dalek show were highlights, along with seeing K9

The Bad: Nothing bad to say really, but being an older Doctor Who fan I was disappointed not to see any exhibits from the older Doctor Who episodes, other than a few pictures of the old doctors. Not really a downside as this exhibition is really aimed at the new, younger viewers of the new series and from that point of view it’s fantastic to see.

A few tips if you plan to visit the exhibition yourself:

Don’t get there for when it opens as there was a long queue and it took us over 30 minutes to get in, even though we had booked tickets online beforehand. There was no queue when we came out at around midday.
Book tickets online as it does save time
Camera’s are fine even with lenses and Flash units
The exhibition is dark, so use your flash to get the best results and make sure you have your set-up sorted. I heard several comments that normal point and shoot cameras were getting very dark or poor shots with the darkness, so be aware.
You can only go round the exhibition once and it follows a route, once you leave the shop at the end you can’t go back, so take your time waking round.
As I said take your time walking round as there is no time limit on how long you take looking at each item.
Hang back from the initial crowd and let them look and take photo’s and move on, you then get better unblocked access to the exhibits for your photo’s. The first real exhibit is the Tardis and everyone wants a photo in front of it! This is a dark area so a good place to get your camera settings sorted while you wait for everyone to move on.
You will find the popular exhibits always have people round them so you will have to wait patently to grab the clear shot, but the most popular exhibits were The Tardis, The Face of Boe, K9, Interactive Tardis (Where you could see yourself within the Tardis), The Cybermen and obviously the Daleks.
The Shop at the end is small and busy and the only way out, so either get through quick if you don’t want anything or expect it to be busy and tight (Especially if you have a pushchair)
Finally, if your taking young kids don’t expect to get much time seeing everything! They see what they like, get excited then move on quickly, as you can expect. If you want time to enjoy it as a “Big” Kid either go alone or plan a revisit without them!

Overall the exhibition is an excellent day out and well worth the visit if your a Doctor Who fan or even if your not. I also understand that costumes from the new forthcoming fourth series will be on display once the episodes have been show, so a revisit may well be required

My Christmases Are Always Like This!
Full Set of Photo’s