The low light article got me thinking about exposure times. I wanted to test what my camera would do using two opposite settings of 8 seconds and 60 seconds of exposure.

I went onto my roof deck and setup my camera and tripod.

8 Second Exposure

The airport is fairly close to my house and you can see the planes coming in to land, lined up one after the other in the sky. I snapped some photos with an 8 second exposure, resulting in streaking lights which are the planes coming in to land. The dots along the streaks are the lights on the wing, body and tail flashing on and off. you can see that the line is not perfectly straight, there are areas where it wobbles. This is due to the aeroplane hitting turbulence. The sky was dark and only the edges of the clouds could be seen, but due to the exposure time, it makes it look like there is a blue sky and yet the street lights are on.

60 Second Exposure

With a higher exposure time, I focused on two shots, the first being the lightening storm that was brewing while planes zipped past. In the photo below, you can see a huge streak from the plane and again you can see bumpy lines where there was turbulence. There are two light sections of the cloud, these are both from lightening flashing within the cloud during the exposure. In this photo, you can see the stars as streaks as the earth moved enough within the 60 seconds to cause the stars to change position. This happens in all of the 60 second exposures I took. It was already dark by the time I took these photos.

The next are I focused on was the stars. I wanted to be able to get a decent shot of the stars with a small section of the horizon on the bottom of the image. The two photos I took came out better than I expected.

I am very happy with these tests and look forward to getting more photos when we have a nice clear night with no moon, which will make the stars brighter and will give a clearer photo as the stars move within 60 seconds and blur in the photo. With less light interfering such as the bright moon (its full at the moment), the stars would be much brighter and I could lower the exposure time so that the stars were a single pinpoint of light instead of a small streaky line.

Watch this space, I will be posting more soon.

Please click on an image to view in full screen.

Choritzo – These images were taken at a Spanish Restaurant in Makati, Manila, Philippines

The following sunset images were taken from my bedroom balcony in Las Pinas, Metro Manila

This skyline image was taken from a taxi window as we headed into Makati, Manila, Philippines. The photo shows the Makati Skyline with some very dark clouds moving in to the right of the picture.

I like the reflections that standing water gives and I was experimenting with angles and settings when I took the following image.

Standing on my balcony, I noticed the neighbours yard tab was casting a perfectly straight shadow. I snapped a picture and with the help of Ian, we edited it to give it a more dramatic effect.

Recently, I had the chance to take part in an underground punk label. Duct Tape Records Uk were recording their first album, a compilation containing 4 tracks by 4 bands. One of the bands I knew, and the other 3 I had heard of in the local music scene in Gateshead, Tyne & Wear, UK.

At the time, I offered my help as I was living in Gateshead. Since then I have moved to Manila in the Philippines, some 14’000 miles (28’000km) away. From here I have helped Duct Tape Records Uk distribute their album online via their website and by pushing it to iTunes and similar sites. I am very excited to be involved with this project and look forward to continued work on it.

The album is called “4 Ways of Thinking” and you can read more about it on DuctTapeRecordsUk.com

While at Freedom bar, a few pics were taken that were put on facebook. I got a copy of them so that I could put them side by side with the pics that were taken within a day or so of me landing in the philippines.

The following pics were taken a few days after landing.

The following pics were taken at Freedom Bar last week.

Photos

If you require higher resolution images, please contact me. All images you see are available in 2304 x 3072 pixels (landscape) and 3072 x 2304 pixels (portrait).

The following photos were taken on 29th October 2009

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