The middle bit of the above image is my dinner for tonight (and for the next few days, I’d imagine). The left bit of the image is dried pearl mushrooms – the right bit of the image is the same mushrooms after making a tea for 1.5 hours.
Ingredients
375g arborio rice
250g (dried) pearl mushrooms
1 litre vegetable stock
2 large white onions
1 large red onion
1 bulb garlic
1 bunch asparagus
1 small sweet potato
parsley – as much (or as little) as you like
parmesan cheese
olive oil
Instructions
cover pearl mushrooms with 500ml boiling water, set aside to soak
finely chop garlic, onions
turn hob to medium
sautee garlic, onions until clear in olive oil
stir in arborio rice to garlic, onion, oil mixture, thoroughly coating rice
add 250ml vegetable stock, stir, turn hob to low
simmer mixture, continually stirring
when liquid absorbed, add 250ml vegetable stock, stir
when liquid absorbed, add liquid from mushrooms, stir
add mushrooms
when liquid absorbed add 250ml vegetable stock, stir
snap ends off asparagus, chop in knuckle length portions
dice sweet potato into small cubes
add aspargus, sweet potato mixture, stir
add last of vegetable stock, stir
simmer until all vegetable stock absorbed
turn off hob, let mixture sit
serve in large bowl with parsley, parmesan and add a glass of wine
Yesterday morning – Tuesday, 2 Feb 2010 – I awoke and did my usual morning rituals. Or started to do them, that is. I quickly realised that things were missing in my flat. Wallet. Gone. Camera bag – with camera with lens attached and the fisheye in a pouch in the bag. Gone. Laptop. Gone. A few bottles of wine (from my visit to Sinclairs Gully in the Adelaide Hills last November). Gone. My front door – slightly open. My cats outside the door, freaked out (the dearest kittehs in the world, my Bonnie and Ganzou) as they are inside cats. I bring my kittehs inside and try to soothe them a wee bit but all they wanted to do was run to their favourite spots and just be themselves.
My head is spinning – how the fark did this happen? A burglar, it seems. D’oh!
I finish my morning rituals – dazed the whole time – and do my usual walk to the bus stop feeling incredibly uncomfortable and freaking out about the person(s) that did this and worried that they were still in the area and might return at any time to remove the rest of my possessions from my flat. They shouldn’t have been able to get into my flat – but did. Surely they could do it again?
I get to work, moving like an automaton, do a necessary few work tasks, contact the police and then arrange for a friend to bring me home. When I get home, I have another, closer look around my flat to see if I can notice if anything else has been stolen. Not that I can tell. I then go outside to feed my fish – which I had neglected to do in my automaton-like state earlier in the morning and then I look around my front garden and the verandah. In the corner of the verandah is my garden trollie. In this garden trollie is my laptop. One bit of relief. Photo from my mobile phone below:
The investigating officer will be at my flat to have a look around and take a statement sometime soon and I call the police number (131 444 – should you ever need it) to let them know that I have found my laptop on my verandah but that is all. The investigating officer arrives at some point during the day, looks around, takes a statement. Considerate man who offered me advice on other security measures I might take around my flat to prevent this happening again.
A friend brings around the D40 that I had loaned him as he knows how much photography is a part of my life and that I am doing a Flickr 365 project (ie taking a picture every day, all year) and only having my mobile phone camera was not going to be quite what I was after for my 365 project.
I then have the rest of the day to fret about what has happened, worry about what might happen and generally freak out about life in general. Oh – and there was a bottle of wine – though not from Sinclairs Gully – which took up a large part of my evening.
The above image was taken whilst I was walking through my local shopping centre on the way to the bus. I wasn’t intentionally trying to look terse or angry or annoyed – or anything, for that matter – I was merely trying to get used to do the D40 again and trying to get my automatic memory of using the camera back. This will take a while, I thought. Not happy, I was – not happy at all. I think the picture – unflattering though it is – sums up how I was really feeling quite perfectly.
Within 20 metres of taking this shot – maybe a minute at most – I was through the shopping centre and walking out toward the bus stop. I’m approached by a gentleman who spotted me taking pictures on “that little camera” who then told me that he had a “proper flash nigh con” (I write it like that as that is how he pronounced it – obviously not a photographer) for fifty dollars. I asked him what sort it was and he invited me to come around the corner to have a look. My alarm bells were going OFF. As he turned around to lead me around the corner, I spy (with both my little eyes) my camera bag (it’s a back pack) on his back.
Without thinking or hesitating, I grab the centre handhold and drag it down and off his back and yell “That’s my camera you thief – you stole it from my house and I want it back” (I just know there were at least 3 fucks in there, but I’m not sure where – so I shall leave them out). My darling D90 was now in my possession again and I continued to shout at him such that as many people in the area would witness the interaction. He didn’t try to take it back from me. Instead, he merely yelled at me calling me a loser and saying that he’d had the camera for years, whilst he was walking away from me and heading around that precious corner where he wanted to show me my camera thinking he’d make a quick $50. How wrong was he?
I should point out, after having written the above paragraph, that I am not a physically strong person. Anything but, in fact. When there is aggression or violence anywhere near me, I move away as quickly as possible. I was quite surprised by my actions in ripping my camera bag off his bag – it wasn’t planned, I didn’t think, I had no time to think – I just did it. Damned fucktardasshatwannabees!
My heart, as you might imagine, was thumping up around somewhere near my throat and I had to consciously remind myself to breathe. I briefly spoke to a woman that I see almost every morning as I’m heading to the bus and she’s waiting for the shop to open to get the newspaper, trying to help her to understand that I hadn’t stolen anything from this gentleman but was merely reclaiming my property that the fucking thief had taken.
I then cross the road to catch my bus to get to work, still having to remind myself to let air into my lungs and hoping to high heaven that my heart would calm down sometime soon.
I cross the street and get to my stop, sit down and open the bag to see what is there. Amazingly, everything that was in the bag was still there so I pulled the D90 out of the bag and take the shot above. It’s no grand shot and I have not even the remotest thought that it is – it’s merely an “is the D90 working” shot and, fortunately, it is.
I’m so elated that I can’t stop smiling so I have to let several friends know via sms that I have my camera back and I also have to let my Plurkfiends know as they have been incredibly supportive during the past 36 hours when I was full of anger and fear about what had happened. Thank crikey for mobile Plurking.
The bus arrives, I get to work, updating a few colleagues with the most recent developments and then contact the police to give them the latest update. I ended up going to the police station for close to a few hours to make a statement as well as have a look at a few photos of potential thieves. Not quite The Bill, this cop shop – but there were more than a few cuties lurking about. Don’t tell them I told you that, okay?
The officers then drive me back to work (sorry folks, unmarked car, so I didn’t get to make the sirens and lights do their magic) and I continue with my work day and then, at lunch time, return to my usual self and go on a fotiez walkabout.
The above image was taken during this lunch time fotiez walkabout. I am quite pleased with the way it turned out and, I believe, it captures the warmth and relief that I am now feeling now that my camera is back with me.
What an interesting 36 hours this has been.
PS – The above video was on my camera when I checked it out this evening after getting home. It was taken at 8:58pm on Tuesday, 2 Feb 2010 when the camera was in the hands of the thieving fucktardasshatwannabe. If anyone in Darwin recognises the signage that is visible in the background, I’d be most appreciative if you could let me know via commenting on this post. Thanks!
PPS – the video has been sent to the investigating officer – police forensics may be able to pick up more than I can.
For more information on the image above, click the image to go to the flickr page. If you’d really like to have a spin, take a seat and visit the Interactive Version (1.15Mb – requires flash).
The photos for the above equirectangular were taken in November 2009 at the Mt Lofty Botanic Garden in the Adelaide Hills. They were stitched together last evening and further tweaked – just a wee bit – this morning. If you ever get a chance to visit, then you should certainly do so. Tis a beautiful place and I hope the interactive panoramas will give you a good idea of its beauty.
You can view the interactive version here. You can roll the image upward to get a grand view of the sun rays at the zenith. Please note that you can select a second panorama via the drop-down menu on the top right. You can also go from one pano to the other via the hotspots, but they are difficult to see. I must remember to fix that for the next iterations.
The static image was created from 21 images shot handheld, using AutoPano Giga to stitch the photos together and the flash version was created using AutoPano Tour. The shockwave version is courtesy of fieldOfView | Spi-V engine.
With the flash version, you can select from two different panorama views by selecting the drop-down menu on the top right.
Continuing on this theme from my post at the end of 2008, the above images are my 12 favourite photos that I took in 2009. The selection above I allowed myself 5 minutes at most to choose a favourite from each month. If I were to choose these on a different day, there would certainly be a different selection. That’s just the way it is.
The above images are those that I’ve taken (or, in the case of most of the Panospheres, modified) during Dec 2009.
You’ll find a range of images in this slideshow, from Panoramas to Panospheres and from the Birds to the Cats. It’s been a grand month photography wise and I managed to take and upload at least one photo per day – good preparation for my PAD 2010.
The above is one of my last photgraphs for 2009 – I thought it perfect to introduce my main photography project for 2010: a photo taken and uploaded every day for 365 days. I’ll explain more about this madness later on in this post, but I want to start with thanking the various photographers who have inspired me through flickr over the past year or so. I’ll start with the four who have inspired me, through their photography this past year, to undertake this madness: Alan, Claude, Auntie P and Jeff. I first came into contact with Alan, Claude and Auntie P via Plurk and then somehow that is the ways of the web, came into contact with Jeff’s photography. Jeff’s long – for flickr, at least – explanations of, his photographs and photography are just as good as his photography.
The next two are Murfomurf and Stephen, also met through Plurk and then this past November out there in meatsapce for Plurkfest Oz 2009 in Adelaide. Both Murf and Stephen’s photographs offer quite different takes on Adelaide – visit their flickr for the details.
The final two are madpoet_one and GrungeTextures. I’ve only made contact with these two photographers qutie recently via flickr but both have inspired me for particular aspects of my PAD 2010. GrungeTextures as I intent on at least one of my photos each month to be of a similar in quality and kind to this photographer’s and, finally, the madpoet as we’ll both be participating – with many others – in the Plurk People Photo-A-Day group on flickr.
Now, the details:
I’ll be taking and uploading at least one photo that I’m happy with each and everyday for 2010;
Over the past few months, I’ve been using G’MIC – a set of filters for GIMP. There are whole variety of filters in this plugin and you can find more information about both the plugin and the scripting language by visiting their site at sourceforge.
The Panospheres above were created with the Sphere script, which is available in the Deformations section of the plugin when you’re using GIMP. I’ve taken a particular liking to this filter and will be creating more Panospheres from the panoramas that I’ve made over the last eighteen months as well as from any new panoramas that I make.
I hope you enjoy looking at the images and, more particularly, I’d recommend you download and use same if you’re a GIMP user. If you’re not a GIMP user, I’d suggest you’d start being one.
The electrickery went off for a few hours last night, so I grabbed my headlight, put the camera on the tripod and had a bit of play. The frogs did their thing well into the night – twas grand to go to sleep listening to their beauty.
Last night I had intended on making photos whilst playing with my Light Diablos, only to discover that the battery had died in my camera’s remote and I couldn’t find the spare. This morning, whilst at the markets, I got a new battery (two, actually – just in case) such that I can make photos of the playing.
This evening at around 7.30, I noticed on the Bureau of Meteorology’s NT page that there was a storm approaching Darwin and it would be here at around 8.30. I postponed the playing with the diablos and got myself – and my camera with tripod – ready to make photos of the storm – just in case.
What luck I had: whilst these shots are nowhere near as some of my storm-chasing flickr friends, they are my first lightning shots and I’m quite pleased with them. You can see all of the lightning shots I’ve uploaded from this evening’s fun in the slide-show below:
The above images are those that I’ve taken during this past month: many you will have seen in my previous post and the rest you will have seen if you follow my flickr – I’m posting them again because I can and because I must.
There are a plethora of flowers, buildings and my usual take, albeit odd, on the world around me. I trust you may enjoy looking at them as much as I’ve enjoyed making them.
I’ll start this post with one of the last images I took whilst away from Darwin visiting Adelaide and then Melbourne. The above photo was taken at the Green Cafe on Sydney Road in Brunswick. It was my last meal in Melbourne, enjoyed with the dear I~. Actually, the above photo was I~’s brekkie – but I ate about 2/3 of it. Twas yum – not that my meal wasn’t yum, but this French Toast not only tasted magnficent, it also looked quite grand, served with a poached pear and cinnamon stick. Noms.
The above is a shot of the ground covered in Jacaranda flowers, taken in Adelaide on the evening of the 19th, when I arrived in Adelaide it was 43 Celsius on this day, 8 degrees warmer than the usual high of Darwin – and dry, very dry. Beautiful, these Jacaranda flowers and the sound they made crunching under foot is one that will be hard to forget.
The above slide show is from images taken in Brighton and Glenelg, during a fotiez walkabout with Kay.
After visiting Brighton and Glenelg, we then drove up to Mt Lofty for an afternoon of glorious photography in a magnificent botanical gardens – the video above was made towards the end of our walkabout: the various birds and insects providing a perfect back drop to a beautiful walk.
As well as the above video, I also managed to stitch together three panoramas – these dare still in draft mode and I’ll work on better stitched version over the next week or so. For now, you can visit the draft versions here – be sure to select via all three of the panos by selecting the options available in the drop-down menu on the top right. You can also see the other photographs from the fotiez walkabout in the slide show below:
The road and country side in the above photograph is the road to Sinclair’s Gullery Winery, situated in the Adelaide Hills.
The slide-show above is the rest of the photographs taken on Friday night whilst at the winery and driving through Adelaide at night.
This Victoria amazonica is one of the beauties at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens, and the slide-show below contains the other photographs from Saturday, 21 Nov 2009 in various spots around Adelaide:
The above photographs were taken on the evening of Sunday, 22 Nov 2009 after I arrived in Melbourne to stay with C~ and P~ – photos taken at their house as well as on the streets around their house. Twas a beautiful evening – as these images show quite clearly.
On the 23rd of November, I celebrated 23 glorious 23rd of Novembers with one of my dearest of friends, V~, by having a beautiful breakfast and then driving to Cranbourne, where most of the photos in this slide show were taken at the , a beautiful gardens that you really should visit you should get the opportunity. The most intriguing, for me, part of these gardens is their 200 year plan – in 2206 the Eucalypt Walk will be ready for those of you reading these rantz (possibly via the great interwebz archivez) to have a leisurely stroll through. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed the idea of them.
The photographs in thise slide-show were taken whilst walking around South Yarra and then the Melbourne CBD on Tuesday, 24 Nov 2009. This walking around was initially with J~ and I~ whilst we were walking from our lunch venue to various book shops and coffee venues in the CBD. The walk with my dear friends was wonderful: good friends, good food and good coffee – interspersed with lots of happy snapping.
This final slide-show is the last of my trip to Melbourne, topped of with a final few photographs taken whilst at the airport in Adelaide before flying home to Darwin. Twas a grand last day, topping off a grand week.
I’ll end this post with one of the photographs from the Cranbourne Botanical Gardens as the colours are very much my favourites: Orange, Green and Blue – I hope you enjoy these images as much as I enjoyed making them.
The above images are photos taken of my television with various images magnified with the MegaView TV Microscope last evening. I like the moiré patterns that show up on most of these images and will be exploring more of these over the coming months.
These are my juggling balls. I’ve had them since June 1986, when I purchased them from a magic/circus shop in the Melbourne CBD.
I’m not a grand juggler by any stretch of the imagination: I taught myself to juggle from a book when I was eight years old. It took me a while to learn but, like riding a bicycle, I haven’t forgotten. I juggle a little bit every day and I’ve also moved onto other skill toys (eg pois, fire pois, diablo, devil’s sticks) but it’s these balls that keep me interested in hand-eye coordination and proprioception.
Given I’m 44 at time of writing this, I’ve had these dear balls for more than half of my life: they’ve survived my house buring down, they’ve travelled the world and one of them almost became lost in Horseshoe Bay on Magnetic Island (poor thing was gone for three days and I just happened to kick it out of the sand whilst walking along the beach – grand find, that).
These balls will be with me when I’m cremated: they are for my fun and I’ll take them with me even though I don’t believe in an afterlife.
For much of the past year or so, since I became madly fixated with making panoramas – and then equirectangular, interactive panoramas – I’ve been using my D40 as I’m lazy: by using the D40, I keep my fisheyes lens on the D40 and use my other lenses on the D90. I’ve loaned the D40 to a friend for a while so that’s not an option at the moment.
Now, I have to be not-lazy and switch lens from the one I use for my general photography to the fisheye such that I can more easily make equirectangular panoramas (eg 7 images instead of 23+ images). I intend on making a few panoramas over the next few weeks so thought it was about time that I calibrated the pano head such that the resulting panorama was smooth with no – or as little as possible – stiching errors.
The first is from the back garden:
And the second is from the front garden:
You can also view the interactive version where you can spin round-n-round and up-and-down as much as you wish by loading this flash file. Please note that you can easily switch from the back garden interactive to the front by using the drop-down menu in the top right corner.
I had reason to look for something on these rantz and then realised I hadn’t posted a slideshow of my photographs from October 2009 – so here I am, posting eight days into November. I’ve neglected this blog – and the various others – for months now, the more I spend time on flickr and the more photographs I take of the world around me.
Pity for the blog – good for me. Must remember to calibrate the pano head for the D90 before I head towards the Southern part of this huge land for a brief visit.
Yesterday evening, just as I was finishing off my flickr time, the various greasemonkey scripts (mostly from Steeev’s Flickr Projects) I use or flickr stopped working. As a result of this, when I posted the calendar screenshot of my month of photo-a-day, looked like this:
My usual flickr screenshot looks like this:
The second is far easier on my eye, at least. You can, of course, tweak the css to your liking.
Fortunately, it only took two or three minutes to sort the problems that I was having with my browser and the various greasemonkey things running here and there and my flickr now has the appearance of the second image.
I use flickr every day in one way or another, and my flickr experience is made easier, more enjoyable and far less frustrating by the various scripts that I use that not only allow me to alter the colours as per the second image, but to do such mundane activities as adding photographs to groups, organising groups and clever ways to easily respond with images and links to the person/image you are referencing.
Steeev’s Flickr Projects is the primary source of the scripts I use, but there are few other ones by others that I reckon you might like as well:
I won’t link directly to those as you should visit Steeev’s page to get the most recent versions. There are stacks of scripts on that page that you can use to customise flickr to do much pretty much what you think it should do.
I’d also like a script that would allow you to easily send photos to your own sets but there doesn’t seem to be one around as yet and I haven’t those skills.
