May 19 , 2012 … at anchor

Purposeful trips are the best.

Photographically speaking, that is. Admittedly there is always the possibility of a serendipitous encounter with something that is worth taking, but the odds are low. Far more likely, then, that something useful will emerge from a trip with a planned theme.

Yesterday, for no particular reason, I decided to visit the Interisland ferry terminus. No ferry was due, and the lanes where the cars and campervans and trucks wait were empty. Over the fence in the rail yard, a shunting locomotive was assembling rakes of wagons ready for shipping to the South Island the next time the Arahura or Aratere made the trip (the Kaitaki has no rail capacity).  Over that, was the constant thrum of traffic on the flyover as the early rush hour began to gather momentum.

Despite some cruelly deceptive patches of sunshine, there was a biting Southerly wind, stiff enough to cause my camera to quiver despite the solid weight of the tripod.  And speaking of the Arahura, she was at anchor out in the harbour, just South of Matiu/Somes Island.  She is no longer in the first flush of youth, and a good coat of paint would work wonders for her appearance. On the other hand, as I watched, one of those sunshine patches applied its healing touch and she appeared sparkling white against the dark green of the Wainuiomata hill.

I put the long lens on, and that tended to reveal  the rust streaks. Also visible, in accordance with maritime law, and the customs of the sea, was the large black ball hoisted at the forward jack-staff to indicate a vessel at anchor in the hours of daylight. Why she was there, and indeed why she has been there so often recently, is a mystery to me.

Nevertheless, she is a well proportioned vessel and the light was nice, so here she is, in undramatic circumstances. 

The land immediately past her bow is Matiu/Somes Island. The houses on the hill behind are at Point Howard.

There was some bird life  around, mostly of the gull variety, and they seemed to find something of interest in the confluence of the Kaiwharawhara  stream. A line of them on a handrail were amusing, though in hindsight I wish I had opted for more depth of field

Today is the day of our planned clean up of the river. I am hoping the weather is not as chilly as yesterday.

I must plan a photo trip today.

May 18, 2012 … having a leg to stand on

Some of us are capable of finding the creative desert, even in a region of plenty.

Yesterday started cold and a little grey, but the weather got steadily better. By late afternoon there was that perfect golden light, and no wind, so I took myself out along Gray’s Road around the Pauatahanui Inlet. Somehow I snatched mediocrity from the jaws of nature’s majesty.

On the other hand, that’s the shot I took, in my obsessive pursuit of the photo a day, so I have to put it up here, even though I am unhappy with it. 

So, what do I have? A fraction of a much larger image taken at full zoom, showing a quartet of somnolent spoonbills sleeping in the sun, while standing on one leg. In the foreground a pair of spur-winged plovers mooch around for food. The tyre? Well, that’s symptomatic of a problem with coastlines around the world, at present. There is just some much water-borne junk washing up.  However, that’s a big heavy tyre, and I doubt it would float, so I suspect some idiot dumped it there rather than pay the disposal fee at a landfill or recycling site.

Tomorrow I have organized a clean-up at the Hutt River estuary where it adjoins the Hikoikoi reserve. A group of Facebook friends and fellow camera-club members have indicated that they will join me. Our goal is to remove as much as we can of man-made rubbish from the area.  We expect to dispose of all plastic, paper, rubber, or metal. The Lower Hutt City Council have donated rubbish bags and some plastic gloves, and will cart the rubbish away afterwards.  They also provided advice on handling any dangerous items.

No doubt subsequent tides will deposit new litter in a short space of time. As the proverb of uncertain origin has it, “better to light a candle than to curse the darkness”

I intend to make the shot I take today better.

 

May 17, 2012 … Gaudeamus igitur*

Deserts come in various forms.

Some are sand, some are rock, and I have even seen images of the Mojave desert in riotous bloom. Thus it is, too, with periods of photographic drought. Yesterday I took a lot of images. How could I not? It was graduation day for part of our faculty, after all.

I had seven students with whom I had been connected, first as programme director and then, in some cases, as research supervisor, graduating with a Master’s degree. Retired or not, it was appropriate for me to be there for them.

It’s not considered good form for the academics in their formal regalia  on the stage to be taking photos, so I left my big cameras in the office. However, I smuggled a little point and shoot camera on the stage (what are they going to do? Fire me?) and recorded some of my people being congratulated by the chancellor. Of course, my friend Simon Woolf was  out there dealing with the professional side of things and he and many of his organization were taking pin sharp images on their SLRs as they have been doing for as long as I can remember.

I could not be so indiscreet as to use a flash from the stage, so I was doing my utmost to push the low-light capabilities of my little SX130IS. Hand-held shots in semi-darkness at 1/15 sec are a tribute to the image stabilisation abilities (that’s the IS part) of the camera. Nevertheless, nowhere near the abilities of either of my DSLRs.

As you can see it was a full house, and this was only the third session of six. I believe there were almost 2,200 degrees and diplomas being awarded over the three days this week.  My ceremony was at 6pm and dealt with half of the Faculty of Commerce, and the Law School.  It takes considerable administrative juggling to get related schools and all the friends and families of the graduands into a reasonable number of ceremonies at the Michael Fowler Centre.  The auditorium has seats for 2,200, but each student can invite up to four guests.

There was one particularly moving moment when the family of one student accepted the posthumous award of their loved one’s degree.

Earlier in the day, I had been invited to make a photographic record of an exhibition  called “Boundless and in the Frame” by the Central Print Council of Aotearoa, NZ, at the New Zealand Gallery of Fine Arts. Fascinating the different hobbies we all have. They are probably equally mystified by the obsession with digital image making.

Anyway, I spent an hour there in the afternoon, and about four hours of post-processing today. I hope the images meet their expectations.

So what does all this have to do with deserts or droughts? The short answer is that I did not succeed in making a personally satisfying image yesterday or today.

Rats.

*I am not sure how widespread is the singing of Gaudeamus at graduations in other institutions. Though I am normally a supporter of tradition, very few students learn Latin now, and hardly anyone knows it. When sung badly, as it usually is, it is cringe-inducing.  It is a mediaeval relic whose time has now passed, I fear.

May 16, 2012 … rescuing a pleasant evening from the wreckage of the day

Sometimes you just have to walk away from technical problems.

If you have promised to go to an exhibition, drinks and dinner with your nearest and dearest, there is, of course, no option.  They will still be there waiting for you when you get back.

We began on the waterfront, at the National Portrait Gallery of New Zealand, in Shed 11. Currently on display is “All Woman: A modern portrait of New Zealand women”, a splendid exhibition of photographic portraits by the extremely talented Bev Short.

I went with some trepidation, not sure what I was getting into, but I have to say it was splendid. This is a small country, but I was astonished to find several images of woman I had met personally. Accompanying each image was a well told narrative, about the remarkable woman in the picture, and it was a very enjoyable experience. It is on until 8 July, from 10:30 am to 4:30 pm daily, so if you are in Wellington with a spare half hour or more, I recommend it.

Outside in the late afternoon sun, I spotted a pair of buskers tuning up in what, at first sight looked like an unpromising spot. Their music was fine, and it is not often I get to hear duets with mandolin and guitar. My concern was that there was not a lot of foot traffic to drop the anticipated contributions into the open instrument case. But in perhaps 15 minutes from the time I took the shot, the number of passers-by would swell from a small trickle to a veritable torrent of rush-hour commuters. In reasonable weather, this was a very well-chosen site.

We went on to celebrate with a friend who has survived his oral defence and subject to minor amendments will graduate with his PhD very soon.  We concluded our evening’s excursion with a very pleasant dinner for the two of us at Soi restaurant at Greta Point.  On the way home, Mary was very patient while I did the obligatory night shots of the city from Pt Jerningham. 

At home, the problem I described yesterday is, for now at least, fixed, but I doubt that the fix will survive the next boot. Thanks to those who offered suggestions.  I appreciate it.

May 15, 2012 … patience? I want to wreck something!

I’m not sure who to hate most.

It has to be one of Dell, Microsoft or Intel, and perhaps all three. I have spent the morning wrestling with the two miserly USB 3.0 ports on my high-end Dell Laptop. I have hitherto had  two large (3TB) external drives plugged into them, but recently acquired a new USB 3.0 device, a high-speed card reader. This required that I obtain a fourth device … a USB 3.0 hub to allow me to expand (daisy chain, as USB was designed to allow)  my capacity for high speed devices.

It all worked fine for a few days, then the USB drivers (supplied to Dell by Intel) stopped recognizing devices, and even caused the system to hang when booting up in the morning.  Unplugging until the boot is completed usually gets around this, and they are recognised when they are plugged in later.   This is an unsatisfactory solution.

The latest drivers are installed. The USB is the last in the boot priority in the BIOS.  Some very expensive work-around solutions have been suggested.  Any expert advice in the area of USB 3.0 and Renesas  drivers would be very welcome. Explicitly unwelcome will be any evangelisation or subtle smirking from Apple or Unix enthusiasts.

The only good to come out of the morning is that I have now rationalized the mare’s nest of power cables, power bricks,  and USB cables that had evolved over the last few years.  And my desk is clear (though I now have to deal with the floor).

Back to photography. Yesterday was a teaching day. I spent most of the day in the office, but having got where I needed to be by mid-afternoon, took myself for a walk along the waterfront.

My love of everything maritime has been confessed previously. I regard it as a tragedy that our collective paranoia has forced the closure of the most interesting parts of the port, and for that matter, our airports. The red tugboats, for example, have been part of Wellington’s visual identity since the early 70s when Kupe, Toia and Ngahue replaced those two old heroines Taioma and Tapuhi. Kupe was sold  and was replaced by the Vietnamese-built Tiaki. Sadly, it is no longer possible to walk alongside and examine them as you once could.

Shots through hurricane-wire fences are very unsatisfying. Fortunately, part of the port is still open to the public, though it is rare that anything of great interest berths in those parts. Yesterday, there was a sturdy steel trawler in port, a stranger to me. She was the “San Jennifer” owned by Hikurangi Fisheries Ltd, and normally resident in Mangonui, Northland. She left port as I walked by, and despite her rough-looking exterior, she had the sweetest sounding diesel I have heard for a while.

A little further around, at Queens Wharf, which the barbarians keep trying to develop with preposterous notions like hotels, HMAS Newcastle was berthed. She has been there for three or four days now. An Adelaide class frigate, she is based on the Oliver Hazard Perry frigates of the US Navy. They were superseded by the ANZAC class vessels. Newcastle is not pretty, but she has a purposeful look to her.

In the end, I chose to go with an image of architectural textures taken from the waterfront. As you can see there is an enormous variety of styles from the sheet glass at either end of this stack, to the textured panels and painted concrete of the intervening structures

Back now to the problem solving (and to clearing the floor before Mary gets home).

May 14, 2012 … and a grey mist on the sea’s face*

I have no idea where that wave came from.

For a while at least, there had been a flat calm. That’s consistent with the story the water was telling. The Korokoro stream insinuated its bush-stained outflow seamlessly into the salt water of the harbour. Suddenly the harbour kicked back.

Grey stones on a grey beach marked the edge of a gun-metal grey harbour. Somewhere out there behind a curtain of grey cloud, beneath a grey sky the city was hiding. Even the green bush on the Western hills was washed with the grey drizzle of advancing rain.

Then, for no apparent reason, with no visible source, no boat, no dorsal fin, this little wave came in against the flow of the stream and curled around the shingle bank. I’m not even sure why I thought it was a picture, but I pressed the shutter button anyway. Several other foreshore shots were taken during the morning, but I am weirdly attracted to this one. It feels right. It is simple, and uncluttered.

We walked to the other end of the beach, around the reserve and into the estuary and back. No herons were visible. On the way we observed some strange behaviour from a mixed flock of black-backed gulls, oystercatchers, and pied shags. They were swarming slowly and steadily Westward along the wave line, almost certainly following a shoal of fish. At one stage I counted at least twenty-four shags on the water (and I have the image to prove it). 

While we were walking the weather changed a few times. It became too gusty for the local sailing community who abandoned their racing. There was rain , and a rainbow (which I also captured). When we got back to the car, the wind dropped again.

In the end however, this is today’s chosen picture.

 

*Sea Fever by John Masefield

May 13, 2012 … variety is the spice

Such a variety of photographic opportunity!

Some will say that every day offers such possibilities. There are 24 hours in every day … and there are the nights as well (old joke!). My day had three distinct photo-zones yesterday.

It began with a hope to capture sunspots at dawn. Alas, no visible dawn … just a lighter shade of grey in the wall of cloud to the East.  Nevertheless there were some gaps in the cloud to the North, and some intriguing fingers of light on the foothills of the Tararuas. So, risking mockery from my clubmates, here is yet another image from my bedroom window.

The second zone of photographic opportunity was at the Taita netball courts where my seven year old granddaughter, Maggie, was playing with her school team. Her dad is the team coach. I was immensely proud of both of them. Anthony is a very positive and affirming coach whose primary mission seems to be ensuring that each and every member of the team enjoys their participation in the game. Maggie is not especially tall for her age, and we think that the team they played yesterday was a year older than her team, so she seemed dwarfed by  members of the opposition. Nevertheless they played valiantly, and one goal was scored (the team’s first !). For those unfamiliar with it, netball is quite a different game to basketball, and players may not step while in possession of the ball.

We ended our day having dinner with Anthony and Sarah and the children to celebrate mother’s day. It was a delightful occasion which concluded with a  game of Jenga (one of those wooden games where the goal is to be the last one to successfully extract a brick from the stack and place it on top without causing the ever more unstable tower to collapse). How does a seven year old get to be so good at such games?

Before we left I held the camera firmly on the railing around the deck and attempted to catch the view from there, of the city under cloud at night. 

Today is shaping up to be more bland, but we are just heading out for a walk, so who knows?