Category Archives: Photography

Rhyl Air Show: Pictures from Saturday with Red Arrows, Tornados, Seaking, Lifeboats and Rv8tors

Posted on July 22, 2012 by | 2 Comments

This Weekend, I went to the Rhyl Air Show. I thought i’d share a few of these with you.

I rented a 100-400mm lens from lensesforhire.co.uk and I think the results of it are pretty good. These are just a few of the pictures from it – there’s a lot more at my Flickr page

I went to the Saturday day only. It started with the Red Arrows:

Red Arrows passing each other

Red Arrows make the Infinity sign

Red Arrows passing each other

Red Arrows Splitting

Red Arrows 6 and 7 Looping

Red Arrows on Approach

There was a flypast from a Spitfire – this one the PR Mk XIX reconnaissance Spitfire.

Airreccee.co.uk has this info about it:

It was produced by taking the Mk XIV fuselage, adding the PR Mk XI wings and PR Mk X cabin. It could carry 254 gallons of fuel internally, using space in the wings that had originally held cameras. [...] It had a top speed of 445 mph and a service ceiling of over 42,000 feet, putting it out of the range of Luftwaffe. All but the first 22 of the 225 produced were equipped with a pressurised cockpit.

Spitfire

The Tornado GR4 performed a tactical display, showing the capabilities and power of the aircraft.

Tornado GR4

Tornado GR4

Tornado GR4 with Afterburners

They were from RAF Lossiemouth, and paid tribute to their colleagues who recently lost their lives tragically whilst flying Tornados, including Flt Lt Hywel Poole.

Also flying at the Air Show on Saturday was the RV8TORS. They demonstrated just what they can get their planes to do – quite a lot it seems.

Rv8tors

Rv8tors

Rv8tors

RV8tors

And also at the display, for the last section of photos in this, was an RAF Seaking and RNLB Lifeboats Search and Rescue demonstration. Performed by 22 Squadron ‘C’ Flight out of RAF Valley on Anglesey, it is the same squadron that has Flt Lt William Wales, AKA Prince William. I don’t, however, think he was flying the helicopters.

22 Squadron RAF Seaking

Seaking and RNLB Lifeboats Search and Rescue Exercise

22 Squadron RAF Seaking

Seaking and RNLB Lifeboats Search and Rescue Exercise

A fantastic day, and I even managed to get a bit sunburnt through the clouds! Well done to the RAF in Rhyl who put this on for free to the public. Great event.

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Adain Avion – A cultural space in Llandudno

Posted on July 11, 2012 by | Leave a comment

Adain Avion is an art space, currently in Llandudno, which is touring as part of the Cultural Olympiad for the Olympics.

As I was on my way home this evening from work, I thought I’d pass it by and see what it was exactly. I timed it perfectly, as the stewardesses, dressed in British Caledonian uniforms, and the Captain, Marc Rees, were coming down the promenade to board it.

The Stewardesses

They walked down in unison, and stood by the plane. It’s a fantastic installation, and brings a lot of interest to Llandudno. The town has some really good things, for instance the dry ski slope, museums, and the Victorian Extravaganza every May are things the town can shout about, as well as being one of the best preserved Victorian towns in the UK, if not the best, and two fantastic beaches, with the longest pier in Wales.

However, sometimes it seems that people don’t really have as much care and love for the town as they should. We’ve had Alice statues put in recently, along the Alice trail, and amongst the praise, there is still complaining.

These stewardesses parade down the prom in an orderly fashion, and visitors seemed to love them

Adain Avion Stewardesses Boarding the DC-9

And they lined up on the side of their plane, a DC-9.

[It was] discovered and transformed by Spanish sculptor and designer Eduardo Cajal (more about the journey of Avion). Welsh artist Marc Rees will celebrate its twentieth anniversary by bringing Avion to Wales in the summer of 2012.

Adain Avion and the Crew Boarding

And when they aren’t there? Well, the fun carries on, as this picture shows:

Adain Avion in Llandudno

So, what are the opinions of people who’ve seen it?


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Timelapse in Llandudno as the sun goes down

Posted on June 30, 2012 by | Leave a comment

Since I started doing timelapse photography more and more, i’ve learnt a few of the tricks and things I have picked up.

For one, you need to have something interesting. For another, the gap between photos really matters. I usually use 5 seconds because it just seems right. However, want it quicker? Use a longer gap. Longer? Shorten the gap.

If you get the gap wrong, the way it looks in the end can be totally different.

As I explained in my previous post on timelapse photography, I used a plugin for Lightroom to edit the photos into 24 fps. This means I have to take enough photos, as one second of footage will include 24 of them. Self explanatory, yes, but it makes you think when you have to sit there for hours getting the shots.

I went out to Llandudno’s North Shore on Friday night, and took this of the sea going out, and light falling over the pier. You can see the light change in the sky, and the lights come on along the pier and the Grand hotel.

The problem I had with this, and a similar one I did the other day, was that I started possibly too early. It is over nearly 90 minutes, and the light changes more dramatically at the end of the video. The sea going out is dramatic, and it’s what I wanted to capture, but I also wanted to capture the sky going to dark. I think at the moment it’s going dark too late- I couldn’t stay there for much longer. Once I can get stay there for longer, it’ll be better, I hope.

To do that video, I put it on AV, underexposed the shot but keeping detail in most of the shadows, and let the exposure change with the light, to keep it fairly constant, and allow it to drag as the light went down. This is more noticeable at the end, when it was on 30″ exposures – one second is about 12-14 minutes of filming.

The same sort of thing happened with this one – same direction, but different lens and perspective. I hoped for a good sunset, but it wasn’t to be. It speeds up towards the end, then stops. I need to wait at the end for the timelapse to get a good amount of low light stuff, it seems.

Another one I did on Friday evening, which worked OK, but does seem a little boring, and short, is this:

It’s 10-20mm lens at 10mm, same as the previous one, and with 10 seconds between photographs I think.

I think I’m going to get some more down. I’m enjoying timelapse photography, and I have a few ideas of what I want to do next – it just takes time to get there, and good weather. I hope they’ll converge in the next week or so.

And finally – you want some thoughts in person on getting these done? I did an Audioboo. Enjoy.

listen to ‘Timelapse photography in Llandudno boo’ on Audioboo

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Timelapse Photography – My First Thoughts

Posted on June 20, 2012 by | 2 Comments

One area of photography I haven’t really done much with is timelapse stuff for videos.

I do take star trail photographs, but for that I stick them through a blender programme to merge them. Usually, I use Starstax for Mac. I process each image in Lightroom, export, blend in starstax, add a watermark, and upload.

But Timelapse photography is something I’ve wanted to for a long time, and haven’t had the time or the ability to do it properly. The Intervalometer from Canon is way too expensive, and the third party ones not as good, or still quite expensive. Basically, I never found my way to justifying buying one.

That is until I saw the iOShutter on Photojojo, linked to me by @nicktheguitar that I thought this might be a good idea. It works off the iPhone or iPod, making it easier to control, and was at the right price and time for me to say go for it.

It came fairly quickly from the USA, and I used it to create some time lapse footage yesterday over the bay in Llandudno.

I set it up using (for the first three) my Canon EOS 7D, with the Sigma 10-20mm f/3.5 lens, on my tripod locked off, and it firing off my iPad. This was the first set up:

Timelapse set up

I set it to do about 30 minutes of photos, at 5 seconds each. I ended up moving after 20 or so, when I realised the shots were not that great.

Afterwards, I processed them in Lightroom, as normal photographs, and then to put them to video, I used the slideshow function in Lightroom, and a user preset I had been linked to. Anthony Woodhouse, AKA @ffotograffiaeth shared with me on Twitter a link to Lightroom:

 

I used the link, available on the video page, and instructed in the above video by @gavin_hoey to make the video I exported using the Slideshow function 24fps, 720p.

This is the end result, after a bit of tweaking in Final Cut and music added to it:

I hope you enjoyed it.

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