We’re Never Going To…

Posted on January 6, 2024 by Guthlac

Everyday I try and learn something new. I think this is the only way to live and I do my best but some days I fail. Getting a new camera helps me keep to my aim. I have set my new iPhone to save images as RAW files and when it does that it the results so far are stunning. However, this being an iPhone it is not that straightforward. The default position of the camera is to save an image as an .HEIC format and you have to click a button on the screen to actually save the image as a RAW image (DNG actually but close enough). In the heat of the moment I forget to click this button so I get a HEIC image which, whilst very useful, has nothing like the data of the RAW file.

This is what happened this morning and it was annoying! However, I have overcome this frustration by diving into the settings and changing a setting. Perhaps the most frustrating thing about this is that I knew about this but overlooked it when I set the camera up initially. But life is like that – well at least my life is.

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Living next to the Floodplain…

Posted on January 5, 2024 by Guthlac

Has this been the wettest start to a New Year? Not sure. What I am sure it must be up there in the top 10. I am sure that this is wettest start to a New year that I can remember. We are used to the local park flooding as this is what a floodplain does. This is no comfort for anyone who lives on the floodplain or tries to travel across the flooded area. But we all have to adapt to the actual circumstances of our lives rather than just try and pretend the water isn’t there and then complain when things flood.

What is really unusual is that there is a new shallow lake that has been formed through the whole of the Soar Valley that wasn’t there just a few days ago. The good news is that it hasn’t rained for 24 hours and the water is starting to drain away. The bad news is that the land is so saturated it will take weeks of dry weather to really see the back of the temporary lake. The winters in Britain are notorious for their long dry spells (haha) so I guess the land will be saturated for the rest of the winter – we might have to start to think of a name for the temporary lake – Lear’s Lake?.

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Shine…

Posted on January 3, 2024 by Guthlac

I didn’t believe the hype but you know what I’m starting to believe – the iPhone 15 Pro is very very good – especially in low light. These are all hand held low light ProRes images which have absolutely no right being this sharpe (trust me they are in full res – not so here). They are not perfect by any mean but that really isn’t the point. Any camera that is hand held in low light isn’t but these are really good despite that qualification.

So what have I learnt? This is looking promising and lets hope over the months and years it keeps up this promise.

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New year…New opportunities…

Posted on January 2, 2024 by Guthlac

Well that didn’t take long. New year new camera. Actually, I’ve been turning this plan over in my mind for a couple of months. Anyone who has been following this blog will know I’ve been undertaking an awful lot of testing over the last few months, mostly with my iPhone. The conclusion I came to was very simple – the iPhone 13 camera just wasn’t cutting it. It wasn’t actually bad but it wasn’t really that good. I suspect the real problem lies with the dreaded computational photography – I just thought the results produced by the Apple camera app. were usually very suspect. (Of course your views may vary and that is fine.) So today was the day I took the plunge and podded out some more of my cash into the Apple money pit. I am now the proud owner of a iPhone 15 Pro.

There are so many new features I’ve got to get my head around but the first images are very promising. Now I really need to underline the iPhone 15 Pro is not really a match for my ‘proper’ camera and the selection of lenses I have built up over the years. What it is is the best camera I have with me all the time and so will be used when I’m out with family and friends when carrying a large back with a selection of lenses just isn’t going to work.

The weather has been impossible. We are having a very very wet winter and todays it has rained all day. Still I have got out and tried the camera in what will probably the most demanding conditions it is likely to face. It made quite a good fist of everything thrown at it. It is early days but I’m impressed.

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12 Outlines of 2023…

Posted on December 31, 2023 by Guthlac

This has been the dominant art genre I have created this year. Not sure why that is but you can’t argue with the data.

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12 Images of 2023…

Posted on December 31, 2023 by Guthlac

I have had a love/hate relationship with my iPhone this year. Be that as it may – these are my selection of images captured with my iPhone in 2023. Are they the best images? Probably not as I tried to spread things out over the year. Anyway…enjoy?…

What will 2024 be like? Not long now to find out. (At the time of writing 2024 is already here for people in the west Pacific)

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Back to The Future…

Posted on December 30, 2023 by Guthlac

So 2024 is going to be one of those crazy confluences where it will appear that much of the world is undergoing an election. Of course the one that I am most concerned with is the UK general election and yet another rerun of the Tory psycho drama that once more swirls around Nigel Farage is being played out. As the year grows more mature I will expect the column inches/social media nonsense (this blog included) will be concerned with what the Nigel Bot 3000 does next and what that means to the collapsing fortunes of the once great Conservative Party. Meanwhile in the real world most people will look on in bafflement. 

This election is unfortunately likely to be really nasty. I hope and pray that it is nothing more than mean, misleading and mendacious words. However, since 2015 two MPs have been murdered so…

Posted in Apple Pencil, Art, Conservative Party, Digital Painting, General Election 2024, General Election 2024/25, Graphic Art, Politics, Procreate | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

So How Was It For You?….

Posted on December 26, 2023 by Guthlac

I do hope you had a good Christmas – I did. One of the ‘new‘ things we got this Christmas was a new Doctor Who. He was great. The episode was great and quite honestly that is all I care about. Of course other views are available and that is fine.

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I looked to the sky…

Posted on December 23, 2023 by Guthlac

Very festive I hope. Merry Christmas one and all. 

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Shortest Day

Posted on December 22, 2023 by Guthlac

Apologies to anyone south of the equator who might come across this post but this is the shortest day here ‘up North’. I had planned to spend the day capturing image to make some form of photo essay but the weather forecast says it is going to rain most of the day and I am just getting too old to spend the day deliberately getting wet.

So instead I thought I would post some gloomy images captured in and around the shortest day.

At times its grime ‘up North’. But then the weather breaks and we get a wonderfully colourful dawn…over a flooded field!

I hope anyone who finds this post has a great Christmas.

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