It’s been a while since I missed a week, but I didn’t get around to posting a Photo of the Week the last two weekends, so this is a double-post to get caught up. As is my tradition with multiple posts, these are two related pictures – very related in fact, being two different renderings of the same picture!

The shot was taken on a fantastic summer day over-looking a field of Rape-seed flowers with an ancient ring fort in the left mid-ground, and the ruins of Rathcoffey Castle on the horizon.

The colour version was generated by tonemapping a single RAW image with Photomatix and Topaz Adjust, while the monocrhome version takes the colour version as it’s starting point before using the channel mixer in Aperture to convert it to a nice contrasty black and white shot.

Rathcoffey in Summer
on FlickrFull-Size

  • Camera: Nikon D40
  • Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
  • Exposure: 1/800 sec
  • Focal Length: 18mm
  • Focal Ratio: f/8
  • ISO: 200
  • Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
  • Processing: created by tonemapping a single RAW image with Photomatix Pro, tweaking the result with the Topaz Adjust 4 plugin, and finally making a few small fixes with Aperture’s built-in Dodge & Burn plugin

Summer in Rathcoffey
on FlickrFull-Size

  • Camera: Nikon D40
  • Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
  • Exposure: 1/800 sec
  • Focal Length: 18mm
  • Focal Ratio: f/8
  • ISO: 200
  • Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
  • Processing: created by tonemapping a single RAW image with Photomatix Pro, tweaking the result with the Topaz Adjust 4 plugin, and finally making a few small fixes with Aperture’s built-in Dodge & Burn plugin before using Aperture’s Channel Mixer brick to convert the image to monochrome

Tagged with:

This is an old photograph. I shot it back in 2001 with an old digital camera so it is small, even at full-size it’s only 640×480 pixels. I held off using it as a photo of the week for ages because of that. However, I’ve decided that size isn’t everything, so here it is!

This shot is a silhouette of the ruins of a once beautiful castle in my native town of Duffel in Belgium. It was shot against a lovely winter sunset. The castle itself dates back to the 12th century and was home to the first recorded lords of Duffel. It now sits in a small pond a few hundred meters away from the river Nete but when it was first built it sat on an island in the river. Obviously it’s not the castle that’s moved since but the course of the river! Like so many things in Belgium it was unfortunately destroyed during WWII. If you’re interested in learning more about the history of the castle check out this page.

Kasteel Ter Elst
Click to Enlarge (a little)

For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:

  • Camera: FujiFilm MX-2700 (point-and-shoot)
  • Exposure: 1/400 sec
  • Focal Length: 7.6mm
  • Focal Ratio: F8
  • ISO: 120
  • Camera Mode: Auto
  • Exposure Compensation: -0.9

[tags]sunset, Belgium, Castle, ruin, Duffel, Belgie, Kasteel, Photography[/tags]

Tagged with:

This is a shot I came across by complete accident when having my lunch outside with a friend. I’m not even sure why I had my camera with me but I did. This shot was taken with a zoom lens from the back of The Mill Shopping Centre in Maynooth and looks through the grounds of Maynooth Castle up towards the front gate.


Click to Enlarge

For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the shot:

  • Camera: Nikon D40
  • Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
  • Exposure: 1/50 sec
  • Focal Length: 55mm
  • Focal Ratio: F8
  • ISO: 400
  • Camera Mode: Auto
  • Exposure Compensation: 0.0

[tags]Photography, Maynooth, Ireland, Castle, Autumn[/tags]

Tagged with:

This photo was take way back in 2000 with the Olympus OM-1 I inherited off my parents. This was my first real camera and was completely manual. It was a great way to really get to grips with the technical aspects of photography. This photo was taken on our first trip to Spain as a family and it’s a trip I have many very fond memories of.

El Castell de Guadalest is an old medieval town high in the mountains in the provice of Valencia in Spain. It has been largely preserved and is now a tourist attraction. The village is surrounded on all sides by sheer cliffs and can only be entered via a single gate which has been cut into the rocks. The beautiful white tower you see in this photograph is perched at the top of the cliff over-looking the entrance.


Click for Full-Size Version (1.1MB)

Since good old fashioned 35mm film doesn’t store EXIF data I can’t give any technical specs for this shot.

[tags]Spain, El Castell de Guadalest[/tags]

Tagged with: