Lifestyle

March 20, 2016 Peter Damo

No, I haven't become a food photographer. However, the image itself says a lot anyway. Those stretched gluten strands through the 'burst' section of the crust are a characteristic of a tasty sourdough offering. This shot was taken with an EM5 but otherwise I haven't done much photographically recently. Several years ago, I imported an array of sourdough starter cultures with the aim of producing breads with a variety of tastes and textures. I wasn't so successful in that endeavor and finally after a month or two decided to throw out the six or so bottles I had accumulating in the fridge. For some reason, I decided to give it another crack - this time armed with more research. I had made bread previously for quite a few years (yeasted variety) with good results so my foray into the world of sourdough was somewhat disappointing.

So what does all this amount to? Persistence and discipline including attention to detail returned a very satisfying result ( that I could eat! )

Vista Vs...

January 2, 2016 Peter Damo

A discussion about what 'type' of photographer are you made me think about why I like or choose the subject matter for my photos. I've always been an outdoor kind of person. Having spent many years by the sea and coastal areas made that environment a natural subject for my photography. In the early years I looked, as many photographers have done, at the work of others who were prominent in the field. Its natural enough to want to emulate the work of those and even try to see some similarity in your own efforts. Then you hear stories of how they spent days under trying conditions waiting for the right light before making an exposure. But I had enjoyed the experience of nature too much to go through any kind of penance to get those shots. I rather developed an interest in the detail and smaller scenes that presented themselves. Seven months in Tasmania allowed me the luxury of walking around coastal areas and observing the intricate forms and colours that were served up. The imagination was stimulated to a higher degree. As with any genre of photography the results are open to interpretation and I often see people glossing over images which I find engaging and vice versa. However I still find more meaning or perhaps relevance in an 'intimate landscape' rather than a richly coloured sunrise or sunset.

Revisiting

December 2, 2015 Peter Damo

Occasionally I'll go through old folders from trips and find images I didn't notice much the first time around. The reason I missed those being they didn't conform at the time to some preconceived notion I had. I was looking for a certain 'type' of image. Maybe colour or texture even subtle things like exposure might guide me to an image that will process into a final result I had envisaged. The choice could also be influenced by previous choices and had to conform to those parameters. Whatever the reason, some images are always overlooked and so its always worth going back to rediscover them. This shot was taken at Coutta Rocks, Tasmania. My previous blog posts reflect a small obsession with rocks. These were by the shore and in the original colour RAW file the rocks almost merge with the water. I kept the low contrast look till the final jpg which is here. In this version the rock features become more noticeable.

*Edit: Another image from the same area. Something resembling a T-Rex skull emerging from the sand. A black & white treatment would be appropriate and perhaps even more effective but I also like the colour version.

50 kms from Alice

November 20, 2015 Peter Damo

This is a photo from 2006 taken at Standley Chasm about 50 kms from Alice Springs. Not a lot of water in these areas but the huge rocks provide ample shade. This was in June. Daytime temps still tolerable.

Ormiston Gorge. Would have been nice to have this shot without footprints in the sand but.. black & white conversion shows a lot more detail than the colour image for these rocks. Especially for this shot which has had a yellow filter applied. If you shoot in jpg as I had too for this trip due to not having adequate card storage, underexposure is a must.

Rock face(s)

October 13, 2015 Peter Damo

The black & white image

October 11, 2015 Peter Damo

I thought to post some further thoughts on my experiences with the Olympus OM-D EM5 now that I have been using it for a year. But I find that after working on an image (below) taken with that camera I became absorbed in elements of the image making the technical qualities of the camera much less significant. In other words, I might have take this photo with just about any recent version of a 4/3 or APS-C or full frame camera. I also could have just post-processed the image in colour paying attention to exposure, sharpness, contrast etc. Even converting to black and white with a standard process through PS or other software and left it at that. However that would not have satisfied my 'artistic' vision at least for this image. Of real significance for me was that as a black & white image, the blacks were not as black as I wanted the in the places I wanted them. Adding black in the same way that you might add eye-liner (not that I have ever done that myself) created definition increasing the 'dimensionality' of the image. A little like selective contrast. The final image has far more impact for me than the straight conversion to b&w. I'm not really a documentary photographer nor strictly a landscape photographer. I rarely do big vistas and in this case this image reflects more of what interests me artistically - personal expression through the medium of photography.