Matthew – a short film

I treated the manic videoing of Phil’s family trip to our house a bit differently this year and have decided to edit it into little chunks of film. Matthew’s a good age now for co-operation when it comes to things like this, and he makes a good subject (and a lovely nephew!). Music is “Aquarius” by Boards of Canada’s timeless album – released ten years ago, “Music Has the Right to Children“

Eight Haygarths in a Barbie play tent

… and that’s magic, folks. No room for Barbie to play in our tent.

A little present to brighten my day

The new job has meant that I’ve hardly had a chance to look up from the desk for two weeks. It’s very enjoyable – don’t get me wrong – but there’s plenty of learning to do and things aren’t quite intuitive yet. A warming advantage of working at home, though, is hearing a knock on the office door when a little person comes in from pre-school to bring you something like this, neatly folded up. Thanks Lils. xxx

Vignette: a mini photoshop tutorial

I’ve seen quite a few photos on Flickr lately that took my fancy for one reason or another, and one of the things that crops up from time to time is the Vignette that comes with some photos. It reminds me of older times and when I used to do a bit in the dark rooms (of Blackburn College, Sheffield Hallam University and the Brewery Arts Centre in Kendal). It’s something that can make a bland low-light photo into something with more focal punch, but without the cheesiness of soft focus.

I should point out that it works effectively on landscape shots too, but you could go overkill, and it tends to have happened (with older cameras and darkrooms) naturally in lower light conditions. Whaddya reckon? (Here’s a link to the Photoshop tutorial I used – it’s very straightforward, but the ‘feather’ setting it refers to will need to be increased for higher resolution original photos)

Left Dave, Right Dave, and the normal twisted Dave

Lily took a photo of me on Sunday and it made me realise how uneven my face is! I made copies of my face in Photoshop – Left, Right, and the original are here….

Scarily enough (apart from the huge difference between my left side and right side), the ‘normal’ photo’s clearly the ugliest. Before anyone leaves any cheeky comments, have a go at it yourself (or better still, send me a photo and I’ll do the same for you!!)