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Underground > Creation >

I have a nice new camera. Give me subjects.

19:57 / 10.05.05

I finally bought a really nice digital camera, and have spent two days taking uninteresting shots and then deleting them. This is my first foray into Creation (and yes, I can see you sneaking up with those Caran D'Ache candles, so stop it...) because I thought it might be neat if I used it to take photos of stuff you demanded. Nothing lewd, please, but what would YOU like to see that you think I might be able to take in and around the Edinburgh area?

01:43 / 11.05.05

kilts? i was going to say 'what lurks beneath...' first, but you said nothing lewd.

02:22 / 11.05.05

I want you to take 25 pictures of the most boring thing you see each day for one week. Then take the best pic and worst pic of that day and post them. (this was an excersise in my photo. class given when one student said "i dont know what to shoot!!"

07:03 / 11.05.05

OK, will try kilts and boring. This is the sort of thing I mean. I see kilt shops every day and don't give them a second look, but some people find them interesting. Boring? Hmm. I'll have to work on that. I'm one of those annoying people who don't do boring. I'll go for "supposedly uninteresting" instead, if that's OK, I think it'll perform the same function.

All Acting Regiment

11:15 / 11.05.05

An animal. Any animal, be it bird, insect, mammal, just whatever...they're buggers to spot but in going out looking for them you'll see loads more cool stuff to give you ideas.

11:48 / 11.05.05

Ooh, drainpipes. Ever notice drainpipes before? Got three good ones on my walk home for lunch. OK, birds is on the list, and I think I know where I can find a squirrel this afternoon. Must remember kilt.

12:13 / 11.05.05

Get a picture of someone with a really interesting moustache. Something ornate and jet-black.

13:01 / 11.05.05

Loomis and Ariadne playing contract snap.

Regrettable Juvenilia

13:28 / 11.05.05

Don't take this personally, cube, but I'm a bit amazed that anyone could buy a really nice camera without already having ideas as to what to photograph. Isn't it a bit like buying a nice typewriter before you have any ideas about what to write? I constantly see things I want to photograph and wish I owned a camera... Are you just very well-off?

14:34 / 11.05.05

could be a kinda snapper's block...i can remember getting a PC a while back and spending the next week writing less than i had when i was on paper and pen. i still had the pen and paper, obviously, but fore some reason i used neither the old nor the new tech.(my best guess is all that potential was daunting, a sort of 6gb blank page)buying decent coffee helped, as did getting stoned and reading private eye.

my advice would be that you should take pictures of everything. go out for a day and take a picture every five minutes, no matter where you are and what you are doing.
forcing yourself to find the best picture in any given space will hopefully help you start to get an eye for what things are photogenic and how they are best shot.
do that maybe two or three times a week for about a month, and you'll end up automatically sizing things up for composition without even noticing.

oh, and people.
take lots of photos of people.

17:38 / 11.05.05

I used to use my old camera a lot, and I resisted gettinga digital for a very long time because I liked the idea of limiting myself to being sure something was worth taking. It always annoyed me that on holiday friends would be zapping away at anything and everything, regardless of quality. My problem is not that I don't have a reasonably good eye, it's just that I see the same things day after day and got into the rut of taking nothing anymore because the processing was costing a fortune and I ended up with shelves full of packs of cacky photos with a few gems mixed in. So, it was time to switch so I can experiment more.
The purpose of this thread is to get an idea of what other people might find interesting about my environment that I'd forgotten about. So far it's worked.
OK, time to see what I have.

At last, changed my name on flickr to something less politically charged and can use it to show you the fruits of my labour without sucking up Tom's bandwidth.
So far, I have squirrel, kilt and a drain (and lots of older photos of a wedding taken with a real camera). For anyone who wants to know how I'm doing with the project.

13:56 / 12.05.05

Nae bad. Go get that 'tache!

21:44 / 12.05.05

a kilt behind bars? but i thought scots were brave! : )

22:15 / 12.05.05

I braved a quick shot of a piper with a tache, but it was nowhere near twirly enough. The only good facial fuzz I saw today was on someone drinking White Lighting and I didn't feel it was right to confuse him.

05:46 / 13.05.05

Or get your new camera shoved up yer arse.

06:45 / 13.05.05

You read my mind. He was upright and there's a lot of calories in a bottle of that stuff, not to mention its ability to make physical violence not hurt.

Whisky Priestess

23:26 / 14.05.05

A really really dodgy old Edinburgh boozer. Afternoon, the last of the sun streaming through the grimy windows, dangerous old men brooding over their pints.

Extra points if you manage to start a fight by your mere presence and get pix of that too.

07:58 / 18.05.05

I don't know Cube, you seem to be finding heaps of lovely subjects yourself. I particularly like your Parliament photo, it's line-and-angletastic.

I think you should take an interesting picture of the reflection of your camera.

16:43 / 18.05.05

Thanks, getting the hang of it now. It's quite wierd taking photos and not giving a stuff if they don't quite work. Still, I promised a good moustache and a boozer, and you shall get those eventually.

Whisky Priestess

00:58 / 19.05.05

I'd better. I love those old boozers but I can't go in cos I'm a Lady.

21:12 / 30.05.05

Wow, these are fabulous. You make me feel homesick for Edinburgh, and I'm already here!
How about trees - I only went away for three weeks and I'm gobsmacked at how lush the place is. And of course take pics of bikes, the more bikes the better. Though that may just be me...
And the gloaming - the nights are fair drawin' oot.
I like the old boozer idea, though I appreciate that's a bit tricky.

Whisky Priestess

08:59 / 01.06.05

where are my scary old alcoholics?
eh?
faces like grocery bags, cardigans like dishrags ...

come on where are they?!

21:52 / 05.06.05

Give me some old style signs, check out the alleyways on the side of the royal mile for some great distressed type on the walls. I had a great time with my camera when I was there, if you catch the light just right the colours of the buildings are amazing.

06:58 / 06.06.05

Oops, I thought this thread had dropped off the list. I promise I have been looking for moustaches. Boozer? Hmmm. Still a scary prospect. Trees? Right y'are. Wynds? OKdokey.