Day Thirteen - Smokey Morning

Firstly, this was the worst cigarette I've ever smoked. They're called Cohibas. My friend Mikey knocked off a carton of them from his job at a second hand dealer in Melbourne earlier in the year. The amount of toys, figurines and random items in his room is amazing. He slipped a box of these Cohibas into my brother's bike box when we were over there knowing how much everyone hates them. Along with the shit cigarettes was a dvd entitled 'DOG CIA.' I'll leave the contents of this dvd up to your imagination. I'll just say that dogs weren't the only animals featuring in the production. In fact it was about 90% goat. Disturbing.

Enough of that.
I went for a walk up a street i've never walked up before this morning. Nothing too interesting but it was a nice area. I love this time of year. There's so many colours. Wherever you look. Summer seems so bland compared. Especially for photography. The sun washes everything out. I have work till 10pm tonight then back there 7 hours later for a 5am to 2pm shift. Because of this I most likely won't have any new photos to post until tomorrow night.

Nikon D200
50mm f1.8 at f2
ISO at 100 and shutter speed was around 1/1250th

Day Twelve - Bokeh

I love Bokeh. I love Autumn. Even though Autumn is now over and we're in winter. I thought i'd capture a little bit of what's still shining through. I'll have you know it was probably the coldest it's been at this time of day all year.

Nikon D200
50mm f1.8 at f1.8 (again)

Day Eleven - Work

Work till 10 again and I have to be back there at 6am. So this is all I have for today as far as photography goes. I miss my beautiful Katie and need to sleep.

Two Wheels 'N' Pub Meals Promo

My brother Toby and myself have been filming pretty solidly for the past 2 years for our third bmx dvd set to come out in a month. Of course i've done the editing because Toby's a goat and is too busy graffin' to edit. Plus I wouldn't want ironlak on my computer keyboard.
We're premiering Two Wheels 'n' Pub Meals on July 25th at The Anchor in Melbourne. It's going to be tits. This is somewhat of a promo I put together last night. And yes. Take it seriously. Because you know I don't use sarcasm on any level.

Day Ten - Knock Lofty

Not much to write for today. It was one of the worst days i've had in quite some time. Lots of little things going wrong all day. I just couldn't do or say anything right. But never mind that. So I went for a walk as it was getting dark because i needed to force myself to leave the house. I ended up here. I've pretty much taken this photo before but thought i'd try again. I used two flashes. I didn't have batteries for my third otherwise I would have lit the ground in front of the building and also the left hand frontside of the wall. Oh well. I really don't care today.

I've also begun working on a promo for our third bmx dvd that premieres on the 25th July at the Anchor in Melbourne. I'll post that once it's done.

That's all for today.
Hopefully tomorrow's a better day.
Peace.

Day Nine - Zoo

Apparently Hobart used to have a zoo. I stumbled across it today for the first time in my 22 years in this city. And I used the term 'city' lightly. Hobart's more of a boat village than a city. Only there aren't any boats. Except on the wharf. But that's beside the point. What I mean is, Hobart's ridiculously small. So is Tasmania. So how could I have lived here this long and not known there's an 1800's zoo sitting there? This is probably a sign that I need to open my eyes a little more. There's so many interesting things around me every day that I just take for granted and don't absorb, let alone document.

The area was quite interesting. There were a couple of 1800's structures that were clearly animal housings scattered about the place. There was a small description on the gate that told of the main remaining enclosure which housed a polar bear. The bear escaped, as they do, and mauled one of the zookeepers resulting in his death and ultimately, the closure of the zoo. The area was later converted into a storeyard for Hobart's oil industry.

Even though there were awesome 1800's structures, the most intriguing part for me was the gate. It looked as if it was undergoing restoration, but it was covered in little cast iron sculptures of zoo animals trapped behind bars. Needless to say, they all looked rather unhappy, which probably wasn't the best image for the zoo. But at least they were being honest.

This photo's of one of the caged animals in abstract form. I believe this one was a tiger. But it could have been a bear.
For photo info and camera settings etc click the photo to link to my flickr page.

This photo to the right is what's left of the polar bear enclosure.

Royal Derwent Project

For those of you who are unaware the Royal Derwent (originally New Norfolk Insane Asylum), which closed down in 2001 is slowly being sold off and demolished taking all history with it. I've spent quite a bit of time out there and have grown quite fond of the place. I was talking to one of my lecturers yesterday at uni who underwent a study and a residency inside Ward C in the late 90's and he seems to think that it wouldn't be too hard to gain access to some of the wards that have been thoroughly secured since the hospital's closure, and hence left untouched and unvandalised. Of most interest to me is Ward C which was a high security lock up for the insane. Marty (My lecturer) told me of 1900's medical equipment he found there on his first visit to the secured ward. Old school wooden shock boxes with head pins and rubber pads for the mouth. Nasty! Old school glass syringes with ceramic plungers. Each ward had drawers full of complete patient history dating back to the 1800's. Unfortunately most of these things have now been either destroyed or lifted by bogans. Another reason why i'm so keen on getting inside the untouched sector.

I'll be expressing interest to the mayor and land owners via contacts from my lecturer. It wouldn't be the first time university students have been granted access to the buildings for study. Now isn't a bad time either as the asylum's future looks more and more hazy each day. So i'm feeling quite optimistic about it. I'd really like to do a photo study out there or a short film in Ward C. I'll update as soon as I know any further.

Click the image to fly over to my flickr set on the Royal Derwent.

Day Eight - Gelled

This is day 8 of my daily photo project. I promise i'll hold off the self portraits for a while after this. It's currently midnight and i've spent the last hour or 2 making various coloured gells for my vivitar flashes. I figured since I hadn't taken a photo yet today i'd try them out.

As I said in the above post i've been pretty busy the past week getting uni work done. But that's all out of the way now so i'll be getting a little more creative.

Now you see I didn't actually want to take a self portrait. I wanted to photograph my brother but once i'd set up he'd gone to bed and every other person in the house had also retreated to their beds for one reason or another. Then I tried the cat. But cats are never cooperative when you want them to be.

Anyway. I used a green gel on a Vivitar 285HV at 1/16th power above/behind left. And to the right I bounced a raw Vivitar 285HV off the wall for fill.
For further details click the image to fly over to my flickr page.
I spent about an hour in this shed this afternoon cleaning it out in the hope of converting it into a dark room later in the week. I've got hold of some equipment from a friend. So that should be a bit of fun.

I've been thinking about starting a blog for quite some time now. I've recently decided to get myself motivated and this is definitely a good tool in doing so. You may or may not know i've been filming a fair bit of late trying to put together something of a showreel by the end of the year. What i've been doing is basically taking any ridiculous idea or thought i may have during my day-to-day business and somehow documenting it on film, preferably in as abstract form as i can. Needless to say this usually results in something bizarre. Especially when Max is involved.

I am also going to be using this blog as an output for my photography which i've also recently rekindled my love for. I guess you could call it Project 365 or whatever, but I don't like to sound that cheesy. It's nicer to just think of it as using my camera every day to keep my creativity flowing.

Speaking of which, i've not touched my camera today. Two major subjects of uni work were both due so i've been glued to my computer screen and pulling at my hair. But now the creative side of uni is out of the way. For now.

Time to leave the sitting position i'm thinking.

I'll leave you with a short film I made last year with Max that hasn't yet seen the light of day. A mockumentary about a local music/metal/vegan enthusiast by the name of Chalky. All fun poked is good intentioned. We love the guy.

Also here's a link to my flickr page which also has daily updates.


Ciao for now,
Sam