I Heart Faces - Pets

Who knew?...

That flies blew bubbles?...I certainly didn't until I saw this geezer early in the summer. I know it's not a pet, who in their right mind would keep a fly as a pet, even a cool bubble blowing one, but it is an animal! I was going to post a pic of my dog, but he was in 'pets' a while back and this fly is pretty cool with his super bug eyes too! More happy pet photos at I Heart Faces!

I LOVE my new camera and lenses

...it takes really nice pictures!
I never thought I would say this, but I LOVE not having my DSLR with me when I go out (and agonizing about which lens to bring!). Until now, I wanted to say it but didn't want to admit or believe it because I am a member of 'Hello, my name is Pam and I am a PHOTOHOLIC!', but it can sometimes be a right pain in the arse! There I said it. Weight lifted off shoulders. I liken it to when you have a small child and you have to lug everything with you: diaper bag, snacks, change of clothes, sippy cup, toys, blah, blah, blah, the list is endless...then there comes that day when the toddler becomes more independent and gradually your bag becomes lighter and there's room for you again and you still love that child of yours, but now they can carry their own stuff and you can be freeeeeee!!! This is what happened to me when I got the iphone. I swear my husband regrets buying it for me now, I resisted and resisted and now I sleep with the damn thing ha ha ha. I live for visuals, but sometimes I want to experience the moment and not be strapped to DSLRs. I feel quite liberated just going around with the iphone and even better, I now have some iphone lenses I got from Photojojo. Yep, you heard me right: IPHONE LENSES! The fisheye is def. my fav. as you will see. These gadgets have given me room to photograph and to live the moment too....Here are a couple taken with the macro attachment, which I will admit, I don't use too much...a fallen Sakura...

Some dreamy flower petal...

On a recent trip to London I had some fun snapping the old icons like the phone boxes. Whenever I go back to my hometown I still love the red phone boxes, postboxes and buses! You can take the Londoner out of London but you can't take London out of the Londoner! <- So true!

The lenses created quite some interest. Here's My Dad and I (me with a deep concentration frown, it's not easy doing this LOL) at Big Ben (being tourists in our own city. LOVE) and a nosy bloke wondering what that thing is on my phone no doubt!

Even the police got involved...

I called this 'ello, 'ello, 'ello, wot's goin' on 'ere then?!!! These police were particularly interested in the lens. I love this photo and I just sold my first 2 iphoneography images, this being one of them! YEAH!
Here's some 'drive-by shooting' on the District line...entitled 'smiley happy people!' LOL!

The Westfield Mall in Shepherd's Bush. I went here quite a lot 'cause it was the only place I could get free wifi! Plus, Marks and Sparks had a cafe!

Another Iconic scene. Fountains at Trafalger Sq.

Going Underground (of course!) The second print I sold! Yeah!

Moving on to Tokyo...You can tell I'm from a city, I really miss subway trains!

The kids were knackered after a hard day at the Disney Sea resort and took refuge on the BUSY subway floor!

Shibuya Crossing, this was so much fun to see and yeah we sat in the packed Starbucks too and watched the crossing unfold!

On to the wide angle attachment: Back to Okinawa. This was winter at the north of the island, I LOVE how the sea is electric luminous blue!

Docked boats...

More sea. Apparently I can't get enough of it!

The golf course lake where Mark Twain (if it was him which apparently it wasn't...) would have stated 'a good walk spoiled'!

American Village at night in the middle of Okinawa. Grunge textured.

I used the lens attachments on my iphone 4 and the images are edited with Camera Plus (another fav that the hubby downloaded LOL) And one more fisheye of the sea. The 'wassup wave!'

I have lots more, I wish I could share them all but this is already weighed down! I have some others in my Flickr (I think). I shall leave with a quote I like: Great photography is about depth of feeling, not depth of field. - Peter Adams. Thanks I love your stuff and especially like the dinosaur ;oP

I Heart Faces - Beautiful eyes

Sometimes when out and about on my little adventures I come across someone with a face and eyes so captivating that I simply HAVE to take their picture. I already have the portrait image in my head. I get over any 'shyness' or nervousness and ask them if I can take their photo because I know if I didn't ask I would have their image in my head for the rest of the day LOL. No joke!
This lovely lady was one of those faces. She was in a temple in Kyoto and her face just lit up the room and as you can see her eyes have a lightness about them....life is literally dancing out of her eyes! I love her face! I asked her if I could take her photo and I took just 2 within the space of a couple of seconds! I love how it came out, just like the visuals I saw in my brain!
There are nearly 1,000 uploaded 'beautiful eyes' photos at 'I heart faces' go check some out! Cheers!

Bugs, bugs, bugs!

The micro madness all started in Feb when I got my Nikon Micro 105 VR lens (Macro)...

Not only is it a fantastic portrait lens, but it has allowed my to further open my eyes in a different kind of way when looking for things to photograph. So, if you see me crouching down, staring into a bush, I haven't gone crazy, I am looking for bugs! This tiny butterfly was up at Ryukyu Mura. They are very flitty, so I was lucky to capture him! I Love the striped antennae!

I never imagined I would find so many cool creatures to capture photographically out here. It's a new passion (along with the sunsets, the people and oh, just about anything!!!)...One of my fav's so far, the bubble blowing fly...

This wet butterfly was actually in this position all night and I got the image in the morning up at Okuma. This was Feb.

Here's another of the rained on butterfly...

Oi, what's all that noise out there. Yep, summer is here in Okinawa when the cicada's start singing! It's loud, but I kind of like it!

Punk Rocker Caterpillar...This guy was on the move! My neighbour brought me another (bigger) one over in a jar, but before I could photograph it, it had made a cocoon! Texture courtesy of the brilliant Skeletel Mess!

These guys are really cool. They are black and white polka dots. It was funny because the day I took this photo (at the start of summer), I had bumped into a friend and said I want to take some bug pics, and this thing landed right on the wall as we were coming up the stairs to the house. April kept watch on it as I instructed her to 'not let it fly away' as I ran in the house to get the camera!!! I just found out it is called an 'Asian longhorn beetle' Thanks to PhotOkinawa! Come on in if you are in Okinawa!

This next one was at Okuma too. The kids found him for me. I think this was the first macro use of my new lens! Sometimes I feel like I've walked into an Eric Carle book!

Front view! Wassssup!

More bugs coming in a later post. I am super behind on all the blogs I want to get done! The Nikon 105 isn't cheap. Before this I was using my 55-200 VR zoom (about $200 but IMHO a decent lens) with a nikon 'close up lens' attachment (about $20). I have gotten some great images with that combo too, especially of sakura. So, even if you can't fork out $800 plus for a lens right now (trust me, it took me a while to save and DECIDE) you can still go macro/micro for less and if you have a passion for macro you can finally get a dedicated macro! These are all handheld in good light and zoomed to 200% on the computer for sharpness in the eyes. Trust me I got lots of blurry shots! Thank God for digital! One day I will go out with the tripod!