The Author – Bart Busschots
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Nov
2
Photo of the Week 37 – Laraghbryan Church
Filed Under Photography on November 2, 2008 | 1 Comment
The ruins of Laraghbryan Church are set amidst an old graveyard and next to a modern grave yard. The whole lot is surrounded by high trees so although the church is only a few hundred yards from the road, many people drive by every day without ever realising the wonders hidden behind those trees. Because of the trees though it’s very hard to get a good shot of these ruins so I’ve had to resort to HDR to even have a chance. I’ve taken a lot of shots of these ruins and I’ve settled on this one as my favourite because of the nice shadows being cast across the church.
For those of you interested in such things, here are the technical details of this shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.0
- ISO: 400
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Three Brackets:
- Exposure Bias: 0.0 (Exposure: 1/800 sec)
- Exposure Bias: -1.0 (Exposure: 1/1600 sec)
- Exposure Bias: 1.0 (Exposure: 1/400 sec)
Aug
24
Photo of the Week 27 – St. Mary’s Church
Filed Under Photography on August 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment
This shot shows the tower at the back of St. Mary’s protestant church in Maynooth as seen from the St. Patrick’s College/NUI Maynooth South Campus. In some ways this almost a cliché in Maynooth. Very few photographers pass through the arch outside Callan Hall without thinking “wow, this arch frames that church tower perfectly”. For that reason I can take no credit what-so-ever for the concept of this shot, just for the implementation. It’s amazing how many different shots you can get from the identical spot by changing your height above the ground and your focal length. I must have taken about 50 shots before choosing this one as my favourite.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of this shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/160 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: F11
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]Maynooth, Kildare, Ireland, NUIM, SPCM, church, tower, arch, photography[/tags]
Jun
15
Photo of the Week 17 – Stars Over Taghadoe
Filed Under Photography on June 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment
I shot this photo quite a few months and all but forgot about it. It sat un-processed and forgotten in a dark corner of my gallery gathering electronic dust until I stumbled across it yesterday. The raw image didn’t look too promising, the whole thing had a very nasty red colour cast and didn’t look at all appealing. Some fairly extreme twiddling with sliders in iPhoto managed to turn this ugly duckling into a beautiful swan! The moral of the story, don’t be too put off when your shots don’t look great straight out of the camera! To give you an idea of how much editing had to be done I’ve included a small version of the original below.
If you’ve been following this series you’ll have seen Taghadoe before, this is the same round tower you saw silhouetted in Photo of the Week 5 – Nightfall in Taghadoe. It’s a real hidden gem located just a few miles outside Maynooth Village in Co. Kildare, Ireland.
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: 14.6 sec (using tripod)
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F3.5
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Manual
- Exposure Compensation: -1.0
[tags]Photography, Maynooth, Ireland, Kildare, Taghadoe, Round Tower, astrophotography, stars, night[/tags]
May
25
Photo of the Week 14 – The Moon Over the Gunne Chapel
Filed Under Photography on May 25, 2008 | 3 Comments
I took this shot back in December last year as the sun was setting after work. This shot was taken as a very special time of the day, when you can expose both the landscape and the Moon correctly in a single exposure.
The shot shows the Moon over the Gunne Chapel (AKA the College Chapel) on the campus of St. Patrick’s College in Maynooth, Ireland. This campus is also shared with NUI Maynooth.
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: 1/200 sec
- Focal Length: 45mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.6
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: 0.0
[tags]Photography, Maynooth, Ireland, Moon, church, spire[/tags]
Apr
20
Photo of the Week 9 – The Light of Christ
Filed Under Photography on April 20, 2008 | 10 Comments
No, I haven’t had some sort of epiphany, I’m still every bit as agnostic as ever, however, I think the title fits the photograph perfectly. I took this image months ago but was never quite happy with it until yesterday. So what’s changed? I converted the image to partially black & white using the technique I described yesterday. I had a hunch this image would work well partially mono-chormoed but my jaw still dropped when I saw the result. It went from a picture with promise to one of my very favourite photos.
The image is of one of the stained glass windows on the back of the Gunne Chapel on the campus of St. Patrick’s College in Maynooth, Ireland. I took it shortly before Christmas last year.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Sigma EX 30mm 1:1.4 DC HSM
- Exposure: 1/15 Sec
- Focal Length: 30mm
- Focal Ratio: F1.4
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -1.0
- Post Processing: Partially converted to black & white with the GIMP.
Updated (21 April 2008): At the request of Paul in the comments I’ve tilt-shifted this shot too. Personally I’m not over-joyed with the results. You can find the tilt-shifted version here.
[tags]Photography, partial black & white, stained glass, Maynooth, Ireland[/tags]
Mar
23
Photo of the Week 5 – Nightfall at Taghadoe
Filed Under Photography on March 23, 2008 | 1 Comment
This photo was taken on the evening of the 26th of July 2007 at Taghadoe Round Tower just outside Maynooth. One of the things I really love about living in Ireland is that there is history all around you if you just go out and look. What disappoints me a little is how few people who live in Maynooth realise that this little treasure is hidden just a mile or so from the edge of the village on one of the smaller back-roads.
Click to View Full-Size (1.2MB)
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: 1/10 Sec
- Focal Length: 22mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.6
- ISO: 1600
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -2.0
[tags]Ireland, Maynooth, Sunset, Taghadoe, Round Tower, History[/tags]