Friday, July 23, 2010

Here Kitty Kitty Kitty...


Sometimes, on peaceful sunny afternoons, my neighbour's cat comes visiting. The tag on his collar says his name is 'Biggie'... I googled blue cats with yellow eyes and apparently he is a Chartreux, which are monastery cats that the French Carthusian monks used to keep the mice away from their Camembert... According to the Oracle (bless Wikipedia) the first letter of the official name of a Chartreux cat encodes the year of its birth; all Chartreux born in the same year have official names beginning with the same letter. The code letters rotate through the alphabet each year, omitting the letters K, Q, W, X, Y, and Z. For example, a Chartreux born in 2002 would have an official name starting with the letter T. Which means Biggie was born in 2006, making him four years old. He still has a playful kittenish spirit - his favourite game is to hide under garden furniture and then rush out to bat my feet while I'm hanging out the washing...

I Can See You!

Just learned how to post my images larger on the blog, so they can be seen in all their detailed glory! Turns out I was using an old version of Blogger Updater which was hiding all sorts of useful features to me. The Updated Editor button in Blogger can be found under Basic on the Settings page, near the bottom, where you can check to see which one you are using. The new one will let you see a blue menu bar with the sizes and positions when you click on your uploaded photos. It doesn't change my old posts, but at least new posts will appear Bigger and Better. Thanks Blogger Help - now my blog looks Just-Like-I've-Always-Wanted-It!

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Thanks for the feedback!

Following a suggestion from my friend Becs in Lismore who is also a keen photographer, I made a new version of the Newcastle headland photo in Lightroom3, using a combination of sharp (the man and the sculpture) and misty (the sea and the railings) - and this is EXACTLY the effect I was looking for. Well done, Becs! Thanks so much for your insight - a collaboration always makes more than the sum of its parts!

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Sculpture By the Sea - Newcastle NSW

Early morning walk around the headland of Newcastle Beach. Two versions... a misty one and a sharp one - which do you think works best?