2016 Project 52, Third Quarter by Adam

[Adzman808]

Probably time I started the 3rd quarter thread, seeing as it's nearly August!

And we'll kick this off with something a little less avant-garde

I saw my cat race up into a small tree...

Nooooo I nearly screamed, no Luna - leave the birds alone...

Obviously she completely ignored me, largely because she enjoys hunting, but of course also

she's a cat, she doesn't tend to enter into extended existential dialogue with me about the intrinsic gravity of personal identity and why she does what she does

So I raced into the tree to save whatever poor feathered creature was about to meet its maker....

(Birds huh? Technically a form of living dinosaur, therefore descended from some of the largest and most fearsome animals ever to roam the planet, now -by and large- small creatures that like to sing to each other first thing in the morning !!)

Anyway

That tree had no bird in it

I'm not sure who was more keen to flee, me or the cat....

The Calm Before the Swarm by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

I've never seen a swarm of bees before... and I'm not sure that a few inches away is the best position to start from!

And (again!!) in a way which is of course 100% inconsequential, but pleasing nevertheless, this shot proved to be very popular on Flickr, (averaging 1 view every 30 seconds, for a continuous 36 hours or so)

'Viral' is a term both over used and not applicable here, so I think we'll coin the term "bacterial" for that much internet popularity in such a small space of time

I know the discerning eyes of the CiC massive, will quite likely provide a missive not quite a glowing as the average Flickr member, but for what it's worth I'm quite happy with this shot....

It was an awkward angle, I had to use a flash (not my strongest skill by a long way) and frankly I was quite scared whilst taking it! I'm not allergic to bees... but equally I didn't want to find out what happens if you get stung several hundred times either.

[Urbanflyer]

Great subject matter made more interesting by seeing them amongst. under and on the leaves! Good instincts to grab this shot!

Though there are improvements to be had by toning done the hot spots and sharpening and minor color adjustments, just bask in a great capture!

[Shadowman]

Nice start.

[Geoff F]

Bee swarms are certainly an amazing site. I had one settle on a fence in my garden last year; so I called a bee keeper friend who came and collected it.

Unless actually attacked they are reasonably docile when swarming.

As Judith said, just a little bit of work on the leaves and you will have a first class image.

[Adzman808]

Thanks one and all!

Yes, I would like to rework this one, I had to use a flash, and what I don't know about flash photography could fill a warehouse!

Docile as they were, there enough of them coming and going, flying through my hair and buzzing past my ears... and although I didn't feel they were about to attack me, I was concerned that if they did, I had no where to run too and no where too hide!

Risk management equals severity times occurrence, so high X low is still pretty high!

I'm GUESSING that somewhere deep inside that little lot was a queen, and as long as she was feeling cool and the gang, then everything was gravy!!

I'm extremely glad the cat didn't stick her beak in though!

I'm a largely a documentary tog (if you wanna stick a label) so to see this and capture it has given me a lot of pleasure, the large amount of flickr attention it received is the preverbal cherry on the icing so to speak!

Oh and I have a new camera! So it's a nice way to start off our relationship and spares you lot the plethora of kitschy crap that one tends to shoot when one gets a new body

[IzzieK]

Congratulations for not falling off your perch! You've done very well here...I like the pp very much too. Pity about the leaves...but your shot turned out OK and you are OK and I like your commentary as well.

[bnnrcn]

I like it Adam

[Adzman808]

Righty!

Time to make my selections for the past few weeks... as ever I have been shooting, just not posting!

As I mentioned before, I have a new camera but with a new camera I PERSONALLY find that 2 things happen..

1. Life gets a bit busy and you don't have the time you want
2. It's a new camera, so you (especially in context of point 1) shoot any old rubbish

So for #32 I had a few choices to make.

I went with this:

He Shoots, He....? by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

To be honest.. I wished I'd waited a second to capture the ball going towards the goal... but I was paying to much attention to the dynamism of the boy's leg... had I waited, would the dynamism of the boy looked how I wanted? I don't think so... But would the shot have looked better? Quite likely, yes. So this one won out, because I got exactly what I wanted. But with the caveat 'be careful what you wish for'

[Adzman808]

So here are the outtakes for week 32!

I want to ride my... Actually no, far too hot by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

I took this as a GENTLE rib to Leica M shooters (those guys seem to love shots like this if their forum/Flickr/IG posts are anything to go by - NO OFFENCE intended to any Leica shooters here on CiC. It's just a good natured joke)

It proved to be quite popular on social media. I like it, but the football shot won out as I put more effort into it and it was harder to get.

This next one

Luna by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Yes it's our cat, Luna AGAIN

Now my new Fuji, is supposed to have an amazing internal Monochrome SOOC capability, which mimics Acros.

Personally I feel a lot less comfortable with BW PP than I do colour...

So this is completely 100% SOOC, and yes I know SOME of you hate that... go RAW or go home blahblah

Well I'm sorry, but I'm believing the hype.. in fact at 24mp and around 15mb, these SOOC Acros shots have a reasonable degree of PP ability, and FOR ME this is very exciting. For now, I shoot everything in Acros, my RAW SW shows me the Mono Jpg alongside the colour RAW. I make my mind up which to use.

I'm happy with that

[Adzman808]

OK.. confession... for this week I had very little to chose from.

So new camera story... there's apparently some issue with it, when you shoot heavily backlit subjects, some random grid pattern appears.

So I thought I'd try and replicate this issue...

I didn't manage it.

I just got the expected purple flare.

And a shot that I think has a certain charm, and a little bit of mood.

Long in the Day by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

For this week... I was spoilt for choice!

I'd finally had some quality time with the new camera, and had run enough shots though my workflow to feel comfortable with the files, and I even got a pass out to have an afternoon in town. Which generated a LOT of shots.

So here was my personal fav!

31 de Janeiro by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

Here are 2 outtakes from the same day..

I've always liked bold colour, and this new Fuji doesn't disappoint!

Eyes by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Party Echoes by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

In case anyone I had thought I'd forgotten...

I have been keeping up with this (honest!), so here's some missing entries!

The Final Three by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

A bit of departure for me... it's not my usual subject matter, and to get it looking how I wanted, I had to go out of my comfort zone in PP and use an app I don't normally use!

I shot this as we were leaving after a family day on the beach, one last look back and saw that not everyone had left.

[Adzman808]

For #36 it's back to what I do best - which is doing things a little badly

Technically there's plenty wrong here...

But I'm fond of the colours, the framing and the content. A contentious opinion I know

Watching/Waiting by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

I've been nuts busy all of August.

Plus it's been heatwave-tastic (I mean like a lot of Portugal has caught fire heatwave)

But finally I had a whole day to myself, and went to one of my fav places to shoot.

I like to re-visit places again, sure it's challenging not to just re-shoot everything you have before, but I find that to be a good exercise... YMMV

I've walked past this place many times, never gave it a second look.. but sometimes KISS is good for the soul...

a bit like bread and water!

Bread and Water by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

Another day to myself.. another day of 37 Deg C and challenging light.

I have my camera set up to make a Mono Jpeg, that way - when I'm on the computer I get too see a BW and colour (the RAW) version of each shot side-by-side, which I like as it can guide my decision as too whether or not proceed in colour or mono (although I usually make my mind up at time of capture)

Well this was a lovely blue sky, melting into an expansive blue ocean. It was a colour.

Only it wasn't, because it was just a bit too bleached out.

So I so, so, SO nearly deleted it.

Then I took another look at the SOOC jpg and it had some charm (IMO)

A little contrast and a black level tweak, and off it went to my Flickr stream...

Well 3 days later and it's become my most popular shots on Flickr (and I've been on flickr nearly 8 years!!)

In 3 days it's picked 6700 views, 114 favs and was (at it's peak) ranked as the 104th best shot of the day (out of how ever many tens of thousands of shots get uploaded everyday!!)

I know this is pretty meaningless in the great scheme of things... But still pleasing, no?

And too think... I came *that* close to deleting it

Stroll on By by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

[Adzman808]

Here are the "out-takes" from the same time period... I liked them - but the shots above are my personal picks from each of the weeks:

Bicycle Enticement by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

The Stalker by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

The Companion by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Crammed by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Crossed by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Fear the Reaper by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

I appreciate that you may think some of these are technically superior (or even just superior!!) but I look for things in my own shots, things that appeal to what I'm trying to achieve, and when I get close - these things tump over things !!

YMMV!

[Shadowman]

#36, good focus on the cat, a bit too much CA upper right.

[Shadowman]

I've been nuts busy all of August.

Plus it's been heatwave-tastic (I mean like a lot of Portugal has caught fire heatwave)

But finally I had a whole day to myself, and went to one of my fav places to shoot.

I like to re-visit places again, sure it's challenging not to just re-shoot everything you have before, but I find that to be a good exercise... YMMV

I've walked past this place many times, never gave it a second look.. but sometimes KISS is good for the soul...

a bit like bread and water!

Bread and Water by Adam Bonn, on Flickr

Nice patterns.

[Shadowman]

#38, nice series, good compositions. Crossed is the best in the sense of story telling, the Companion fits the bill as well.