My G9ii Journey

  Today, I've been choosing my photos for the next SNDCC Internal competition.  We have six each year and this will be the fourth for the 2023-24 season.  There's no set subject and there are four classes - colour and mono prints  colour and mono DPIs (projected JPGs).  Here are my entries .... Colour Print Mono Print Colour DPI  

I didn't sleep well last night and around 4am,  I decided it would be better to get up and do something to occupy my mind rather than lie there thinking unhappy thoughts.  Thankfully there's a snooker tournament on TV this week so I watched some of that on catch-up .  Two hours later,  it was still dark but my weather app said the temperature was below freezing with a chsnce of a little sun in the early morning.  So I headed for the Pits with my camera,  hoping for some mist over the water,  possibly lit by some sun.  Unfortunately I wasn't that lucky - very little mist and the sun was behind cloud.   I was getting cold so returned to the car and headed for the local power station,  hoping the exhaust from the cooling towers might give some nice effects in the low temperature.  Again,  I wasn't lucky.  I headed a bit further out into the countryside and that's when the sun started to break through.  I got a few s...

I don't like cold weather and I know it's not that cold really, but I've stayed in a lot this week. I took the opportunity to sort out some of my images, editing or deleting some old shots that never got edited at the time. But this afternoon,  it was sunny and I took my camera down to Paxton Pits to see if I could get some pictures. There wasn't much happening but I did see NS in the Hayden Hide and some banter was exchanged. Later I took this shot of the moon. Lots of people take full moon shots but I prefer some of the moon to be in shadow - that makes the craters show up more near the change from sunlight to shadow - I think it's called the terminator Goodnight all   🙂

The original of this image was taken before I got my G9ii but it's been reprocessed today using the Posterise function in Phototop.  It allows the number of colours in an image to be reduced to give bands of colour as in some posters.  I rather like ehe effect but it won't work successfully for all images. I'm sure it's not everyone's cup of tea but I really like it

Recently , a good friend said he might have a spare ticket for this event and offered me first chance to have it.  I accepted gratefully.  Then,  on the morning,  he contacted me to say he couldn't go either and I could have both tickets.  After posting on the Geezers Facebook group,  I arranged to take RR.  Because of an accident earlier in the day, the A428 was closed so we had a difficult journey through the back roads but we arrived in time for our 4.45pm entry slot.  Walking around the lit-up gardens was very enjoyable and we both took quite a few photos.  It was less crowded than I'd expected which helped with our photography.  After having had a 5 mile walk that morning,  my legs were aching when our visit ended.  And thankfully,  the A428 had been re-opened for our journey home. (I later heard that a 20 year old lad had sadly died in the accident) Here are some of my photos from the evening :- This last shot is of ...

Today our U3A Woldlife Group visited Paxton Pits.  It's quite an informal group and our meetings are often as much of an excuse to chat as look at wildlife and this month we had a few new members to chat with.  We looked for fungi in Rory's Wood and then looked for birds from Bobs Bench and the Hayden Hide.  A Kingfisher was spotted in the distance but was too  far away to photograph. I did get a chance to try out my new camera's focus-tracking when a swan took off coming slightly towards us.  Results were encouraging.  There were also some fungi. I didn't have my fungi-gear with me but I tried anyway ...

In what has been a tough year for me,  I've been very grateful to the "Old Geezers" for their friendship and support.  We're a group of six male friends,  most of whom now live alone,  who share an interest in photography and a strong bond of friendship.  We go out together quite frequently and today's outing was for breakfast at the RSPB's recently opened cafe at Sandy, followed by a walk around the reserve.  Autumn is here. I used to feel that monochrome photography was "old school" - that the world was colourful and we  had the technology to capture it. But I'm now coming  to appreciate it more. This isn't a great example but I think it shows the dilapidated state of the tree better than a colour image would.  Another genre that seems to be flavour of the month is ICM - Intentional Camera Movement.  I'm not a great fan but thought I'd have a go. It just seems a bit odd to spend lots of money on a camera and lenses to get pin-sharp ...

Today I visited Anglesey Abbey with friends J and M. It was the first opportunity for me to show off my new camera  🙂. It was good to see J using his camera again - he rather lost his mojo this year with his music playing a larger part in his life. As for my G9ii, I continue to be happy with it and the dropping of the post-focus function isn't going to be a serious blow. I can always use my G9i for that if necessary. '

After getting myself confused by trying to read the G9ii manual last night,  today I took the camera out for some practical learning I went to Hinchingbrooke Park on the outskirts of Huntingdon.  It's near the hospital where Mave was a patient for approx 8 of her last weeks and memories flooded in as I drove past the ward she had been in. I took a range of lenses and hoped to explore the G9ii's focus tracking - one of my motives for buying it - but I didn't find any suitable subjects.  So I contented myself with some fungi shots, mostly focus-stacked.   As an aside, although I haven't explored it properly,  my first impressions suggest the new sensor better high ISO performance than it's predecessor.  Can't be bad! 

DEN'S LUMIX G9ii JOURNEY I've started this blog as a way of displaying my photos to anyone interested in viewing them.  The start coincides with my purchase of a new camera,  a Lumix G9ii.  Rather than sell my existing G9 (Mk 1), I decided to keep it as a second body - this will mean I seldom have to change lenses when out shooting. Most of the photos I post here will be taken with the G9ii but occasionally G9 and phone pictures will be included. As a small tribute to my dear wife, who passed away this year,  I wanted the first photo I took with the new camera to involve her in some small way.  So below is a photo of one of her favourite photos that she took during a visit to Benington Lordship. It still hangs on our lounge wall RIP my Love  xxxx