Selective Colour

Selective colour is always something that I have dipped in and out of with my photography. It can be fun and creative when you want it to be and sometimes it can really make the point of your photograph really hit home such was the case with my "Lest we forget" photograph where you are drawn to the poppies.

Lest We Forget

I've been told by other people to stop doing it in order to make myself that little bit more professional, I used it when photographing a friend and again I thought it just made the photo that little bit better in my eyes and drew the attention to my friend more than what the full colour image would have done.

It also gives me a little time to get creative, recently I had the idea to do some selective colouring with fruit and crayons. The idea was simply to make it look like the fruit was in the process of being coloured in. It was simple and fun.

Should this be such a frowned upon technique in the photography world? I don't think so and as long as I can still have fun with it I will be doing it for a long time to come.

European Heritage Open Days

What with European Heritage Open Days (EHOD) fast approaching in Northern Ireland. I have decided to make a quick blog about it and of course with photos of some properties taking part at the bottom of this blog. You can also see more photos from Northern Ireland at Ross Caughers Photography

EHOD runs over the 8th and 9th of September with over 300 properties taking part. Many of these properties across Northern Ireland will be opening for free as part of EHOD

Organised by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) this celebration is designed to encourage people of all ages to discover Northern Ireland’s rich and diverse architecture and heritage.

EHOD takes place every September in 49 countries across Europe. Last year over 56,500 people in Northern Ireland visited properties, many of which are closed to the public throughout the rest of the year.

So if you like taking photographs of heritage sites, monuments, castles and building in Northern Ireland this is a great event to get to some locations, some of which do not open all year round and get some photos. 

I took part in EHOD last year and visited a local property that is not open except for EHOD. 

So if you are in Northern Ireland over the 8th and 9th of September why not visit a property taking part this year. You can find more information on EHOD at Discover Northern Ireland

Newtownards Priory - County Down

Ballycopeland Windmill - County Down

Grey Abbey - County Down

Inch Abbey - County Down

Dunluce Castle - County Antrim

Carrickfergus Castle - County Antrim

Giants Causeway - County Antrim

Mussenden Temple - County Londonderry

Food Dye Project

So today I thought I would try my hand at photographing food dye in a wine glass.

I had a quick check online to see what some people were coming up with from there I then decided to do a search to see just how simple a set up I needed. Then came the fun part getting the items I needed.

Thankfully a quick trip to my local Tesco's provided most of my items:

• Wine Glasses
• 5 bottles of food dye (red, blue, green, yellow, black)

I had tried to find a water dropper but after a hunt in three shops I gave up and decided to just try my luck with pouring the dye into the glass.

When I got home I set up my camera on the tripod, set up my remote flash on another tripod to the side, set the wine glass on a small table and also used two blank white canvases to give me a white background.

The rest was a huge trial and became very messy, very quickly. Food dye was everywhere as was water from countless refilling and cleaning the wine glasses. 

I did learn that a few dyes react differently in water blue lingers around the most, while green bursts and fades very quick, red is thick and sinks to the bottom very quickly any yellow bursts in a nice cloud. 

There was very little editing done to the end product if anything I only touched the exposure and cropped the photos in a little or rotated. I have to say I am happy with how some of them turned out. You can see for yourself below and more can be seen at my facebook page

Smoke Trails

As it is 2012 I had made a decision that my main goal for this year was to do more photography.

To get started on this the first thing I done was went and bought a photography magazine. As I use a canon camera I opted for photoplus a magazine all for canon camera's. To make sure I kept with this plan I even subscribed for a year as they have lots of tutorials and things to do.

As I was looking through the January issue i saw a quick project to set up at home and could take around 10 minutes to do all I needed were the following items:

• Camera
• Flash
• Black background
• incense sticks
• Tripod

I had all these so I thought why not give it a try. At first it took awhile to get the settings right but in the end after a smoke filled room and a strong smell of incense in the house i had done my first attempt. I think they turned out ok here are some from that:

I thought these were interesting to do and also as they were quick I could get more very quickly as I now knew how to go about the set up for them and how to get the results I wanted. The only thing I didn't like was my lack of colour choice for them so I had a look online and found a few more tutorials for this and on the second try I had managed to produce these:

The good thing about this is that no image is ever the same so there are unlimited possibilities.
As I have subscribed hopefully I can keep myself busy with the ideas in the magazine and I will try to keep blogging about them here.

Finally i have all these up for sale and can be bought here: Ross Caughers Photography or at Zazzle

I myself have one printed and framed it looks quite nice :) its a A3 print