Needle II

I have been having more fun with the reversed 28mm f/2.8 lens. I held the syringe in a retort stand clamp, filled with olive oil.

Iowa Ditch Tigers

Spike and Three share a cosy cardboard box

Tunnel Vision

Our Friends at Blue Gate Farm had their poly tunnel demolished by a tornado in May, and we went down yesterday to help them build their new one. Tons of photographs were taken, but I kinda like this one :)

Left to right: Sean, Maggie, Jill.

Jam!

Yet another birthday present! This time from our good friends Jill and Sean at Blue Gate Farm. I think birthdays are cool - I ought to have them more often :) I'm really looking forward to tasting this!

Mamiya Pics

I shot a couple of films through my new Mamiya RB67, and got them processed today. There are a couple of minor problems - the darkslide interlock isn't working, which means that it's possible to shoot frames without actually exposing the film, and the flash sync is intermittent, so not all flash pictures work. But apart from those hiccups, I'm quite pleased with my new toy.

Here's the very first frame I took, of our house. The light was really hard and contrasty, and not very good for testing a new camera. I used Kodak Portra NC, and the exposure was 1/250 sec at f/11.

This one is of the lovely Hippie Bus that Des and Karen sent me for my birthday, using available light. The exposure was 1/8 sec at f/4.

Adel Sweetcorn Festival

One of the highest points on Adel's calendar is the Annual Sweetcorn Festival, which is held in August every year. There's a parade, market, sideshows, bouncy castles, food, music, rides, and....

...sweetcorn. More than seven tons of it. And it's free!

All sorts of vehicles took part in the parade - there was even a lawnmower!

Some of the corn being unloaded...

...cooked...

...served...

...and enjoyed!

Shoppers at a vendor's stall in the Square sporting this year's festival tee-shirts :)

Festival goers enjoying the sunshine and atmosphere by Adel's beautiful courthouse.

Taking a break!

Getting Agait

One of my latest projects down on the farm - building a new gate for the horses' paddock:

Now all I have to do is hang it!

iPlod

What a fabulous birthday present! I got it a couple of weeks ago, but have been too busy playing with it to put it on my Blog.

It's an Apple MacBook Pro, with Intel Dual Core 2.6 GHz processor, 4 Gb RAM, high resolution display, and a 200 Gb 7200 RPM disk drive. It is loaded with Adobe CS3 suite and Apple Aperture, and has the marvellous Mighty Mouse.

I'm a happy camper!

(BTW, Plod was the name of my old computer, so this being an Apple is iPlod)

Mama Miya!

One of the lovely birthday presents I got - a Mamiya RB67. This is a completely manual, all-mechanical camera (it doesn't need batteries!), that produces negatives or transparencies 60mm x 70mm. I'm looking forward to exploring the world of film photography again. I got a few rolls of film the other day, and I'll go out during the week and shoot some landscapes and product pictures to see how they turn out. I hope to post some of the results here, if they're any good :)