Tractors, Lots of Tractors!

It's been a while since I photographed tractors, but on the 27th December, CTVEC hosted their annual Christmas Road run, complete with a Santa. I had a ball and despite the awful weather got some decent snaps of the day.

The early birds watching arrivals.

Happy driver

There's quite a queue to book on.

Booking in

Exchanging raffle tickets.

Double seater?

Cold and wet? Yes.

Watching everyone in to the parking spaces.

The weather didn't stop Santa visiting though.

Heads

So yesterday I payed a visit to the wonderful Newcastle Under Lyme College for the first time ever. It's such a lovely college, I had a nosey at the 3D work rooms and the ceramics room and was very impressed. I was shown around the photography facilities as well and oh my goodness, WOW! The studio was amazing and the darkroom.. HEAVEN! However this post is not to promote them and no they are not paying me to say nice things about them.

There was a hair and beauty competition on in the cafe area. Lots of heads on sticks with a festive theme. And so behold...

I'll ease you in nicely, I realise it's an odd sight.

Gift tag anyone?

This was the winner, a Christmas pudd.

Above and below are from the same style..

A more normal, elegant styling.

This was my personal favourite, based on a winter wonderland. The other side of the head had a little white birdy on too.

However, this would be my choice of Christmas do, a casual snowman.

The judges were sure they got a proper looking at the designs.

This shot I just like.

And these are the winners and runners up, for each class and overall.

It was so much fun photographing these, if not a little bit scary. And a double take was needed when I first walked in and saw an exhibition of heads. All of these shots and more are now on a disc ready to be delivered to the Hair and Beauty department in the new year. 

Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

I honestly do not know how our Christmas tree has managed to survive so long already. And without any broken baubles. To mark the memorable occasion of standing for a week and gaining only a slight forward lean I took a few snaps. Clichés of course.

One self portrait..

Two self portrait.

Yeah, my Cliches were intentional as I wanted a new self portrait and being in the festive spirit these made sense. 

Third Time Lucky

This isn't a photography blog, this is a boasty proud post because I've been trying to master making Sugar mice for weeks now.

My first batch wasn't too bad but they wouldn't set and they got squashed on the train.

My second batch was dreadful. Yeah, they didn't get better. They were runny and wouldn't stay in the right shape and didn't set and I ended up pouring half the batch away.

My third lot...

Well they actually look like mice! And they are all a decent size! 

Turns out though I'm not great at splitting halves,I have two extra pinks to white. But that's not all bad. And the food colouring isn't very even so the pinks look a bit tie dye but that's cool.

I'm pretty proud of these mice. Really.

Tonight I'm heading to CVTEC Christmas meeting.. CVTEC is Tractor Club by the way. SO EXCITED! 

Almost Ready For Christmas

I was gunna take a few "pretty" snaps of our house all decorated for Christmas, kindah like this one..

Look at that snowman keeping warm behind the candles, he's so cute. 

However, we have four cats. We've always had cats but this year one of the cats is a little doolally, racing everywhere and climbing everything so I thought it would be more fun to photograph the aftermath of her mad half hours. So this morning I came down to this, the tinsel that was wrapped around the bowl, now isn't. 

Shadow was after one of the presents tied to the tinsel.

Cannot wait to see my Mums face when she's home, although she'll probably just be relieved the tree hasn't been pulled down.

Rewind

Lately I've been looking back through my college projects and found the very first one I remember doing that wasn't a basic skills one. We had to choose two advert to make an advert for. I chose Amnesty and Greenpeace and these were my works of art.. Works of art that are now quite bad compared to later work I produced. 

Racial abuse campaign, but not focusing on black people.

The beautiful Laura McGahan modelling.

Deforestation campaign. 

My awesome Dad modelling.

I still like this shot, minus my Dad and the text.

Pittville Park

It's been bloomin' busy recently with lots of hand-ins and deadlines and oh so much. But today I've had my second hand in, tomorrow is my third and final one. It's gunna be nice then to have a break and relax.

Anyhow, today has been very foggy in Cheltenham but Pittville park looked beautiful in the fog - all mysterious. Even at 3pm.

It took me ages to get this shot of the man walking across the grass between the trees in the fog.

The grass looked so pretty with all the frost on today.

These two lads were having great fun playing in the icy puddle.

This shot was taken much later on in the evening.

I really enjoyed shooting in the fog today, it's not something I've done before properly to this extent so I found it really interesting to see what my camera took in a different speeds.

Playtime

So now that I've finished my Photojournalist project I've been shooting more lightheartedly. I've been out tonight, armed with a torch and a flash gun, just playing around with whatever I had in Pittville Park and James.

Flash first..

This bandstand is beautiful, and it looks even prettier at night when the white is so clearly standing out against the black. 

The depth of field on this shot is what I like the most as the branch fades out and in to the blackness. 

At first I was disappointed with this shot because only the foreground is sharp, it gets blurrier toward the back due to movement. But I've grown to love it (in the space of an hour).

Everybody loves a waterfall. 

Moving on, to the torch!

This shot is very dark but I like the halloweeny, spooky effect it has and the slight blueness of the sky sneaking through. I was actually trying to photograph an old man walking past.

Time for a quick stop for a portrait. I bet you've tried the holding a torch under your chin? I really like this though, even if it is cliché. 

These two I think only work if they are together in a set. Walking up from the tunnel on a long exposure with a torch. 

I know it's not in focus but that's just because it's hard to keep a camera still for 4 seconds. But I like the sky, fading darker and the effect on the trees. 

I don't like this shot, but it certainly makes the difference clear between using flash if no other shot does. 

I know that a lot of these shots are a bit on the rubbish side but tonight I've had fun experimenting, even if it was extreeeeemely cold. Unfortunately, now I must continue with my essay.