Life in a fishbowl

Don’t know if I’ve blogged about it before, but I’ve recently got a new baby! .. Just over a month ago my friend helped me buy it back all the way from Beijing…

Lomo Fisheye 2!

It is a different camera to use, well, cos its a fisheye and I used it as is. I haven’t gotten too creative with it just yet… with the multi-exposures and such, So.. here goes -

Accidental double exposure – of me with my infected eye – which somewhat looks extremely obvious in this shot @_@ and ..blackwattle bay?

my baby cousin, looking oh so street with her hoodie

insane sisters =lol=

the four of us

bf & i at emmilou tapas bar *link*

the family – my baby cousin took this, not bad aye!

baby cousin, again

day trip to illawara fly! (jamberoo) yay for fisheye!

illawara fly <3

t & a

photoclub stall on welcome back day!

<3

Autumn’s Child

My favourite shot from the photo shoot with Lydia just a few month’s ago…

These shots were taken with film; my Canon AE-1 (can’t remember what film I had in there..)

I really love the colours reproduced here, the tones of the film really worked in favour with the atmosphere in this shoot.

Something I’d love to do more.. that is photograph a subject using film, I find it more beautiful and ‘real’ than digital shots.

If anyone is interested in being my subject one lovely afternoon, drop me an email

More shots to come; which has a different ‘feel’.

The JULY Project Day #05

Day 05 – A picture of your morning

An early blog post for once!

Yup, fresh strawberries.

I had set my mind to this the night before, after several mornings of drooling over Jamie’s Strawberry Cream Cheese Bread recipe at My Baking Addiction. For one, I’ve never had strawberry bread before, and can imagine how lovely the flavours would be; just that taste of sweet-sourness breaking through the cream cheese. It had to be done.

how good do those strawberries look?

I’ve never cooked bread loafs before, so this is my first time. I never thought it takes about 50-60mins to bake, quite unlike cakes I guess. I might’ve over cooked it just a little bit, hence its more tanned than Jamie’s, next time! I’ll try make it look better I just wish it had a bit more sourness to it, imagine if they were fresh, fresh strawberries? mm, mm.

In fact I’d love to experiment with blueberries or something

Hope you all have a great rest of your day~

The JULY Project #01

I am utterly exhausted since the last blog post, why?

Dad is in town and we’ve just been driving out places, and the highlight? of this week is going to Ikea, TWICE. Yesterday & Today.

I was pretty excited about it yesterday, we spent a good 2ish hours walking through the inspiring set ups and spent almost half that time finding what we wanted to buy. We bought some new furniture for the house, and some new furniture for my parent’s place overseas (yes its much cheaper to buy here, esp from Ikea!) I on the otherhand, bought some simple decor, from beautiful vases to pretty (literally) faux flowers… flowers to come later when I’m bothered to assemble them in place.

Today, we had to go back, because the boys (dad & my bf) forgot to get a part of the furniture… so 40minutes long drive later we were back again.

I wasn’t so excited, but before the long stroll begins we feasted at the Ikea restaurant/cafe, Lambshanks for 11.95 is pretty damn good, and it was quite alright too. Dining at Ikea reminds me of when we were just little kids, dad would drive us to our local Ikea (at Supa Centre), have a walk and end with lunch, lovely bacon & eggs, nomnom.

Second trip round, I bought a 3 photo frame, single photo frame for the house, I think its about time I get some family photos in place! More ‘homely’

The Ikea trip ended within the hour (excl eating time), and the bf drove us down to DFO where we spent the next 2 hours. DFO doesn’t excite me, I don’t know, it just doesn’t have an overwhelming amount of shops I’d like to get bargains from. So we just mainly shopped for some work clothes for the bf

Anyway, that’s the summary of my day.

Now back to the title of this post. Yes, I’m challenging myself (& others) to the JULY Project. Remember this? Almost forgot about it if Letty hadn’t reminded me! I guess that just shows how fast time has flown ;( We’re in July already

Since I took on a personal challenge between moi & Austie, who challenged me to a fresh photo everyday .. (haha), I shall try my best!

But anyways, to begin this project, is -

01. A PHOTO OF MYSELF ~

Simple to achieve?

It’s no challenge at all when it comes to cam whoring, haha, especially with Photobooth at my finger tips!

But, I’m not in the greatest mood today really. (as you can see in this photo). I’ve been in pain since last night. Suddenly, under my eye just started to hurt, like it was bruised… like I got punched in the eye. So for the last few hours I’ve been assuming that the bf must’ve accidentally punched me in the eye or something (hah), which can’t be right… since it came out of the blue. Then I remembered back in highschool when one of my friends grew an -eye pimple- on her bottom eye lid, I immediately did some googling, and found really similar symptoms! They are called ‘styes’. I’m so grossed out at the thought of it ;(( I went down to the chemist tonight to get some eye drops or something to make it go away sooner without it having to visibly ooze out ;(

Still in pain, and one eye a little hazy from ointment when I blink. *grumbles* Hopefully the next ‘Photo of self’, I won’t have a bloody EYE PIMPLE visible *knocks on wood* ;(

Does not help to have a headache now too grr!

Adios amigos~

Felt like a child again

1:37AM; Just got home not too long ago after a spontaneous late night outing with the girlfriends down at Pancakes at The Rocks. Even though I shared a Devil’s Delight (Chocolate Pancake, strawberries and ice-cream… i.e. HEAVY) with a friend, I feel fatter than ever tonight.

So rather than sleeping with a heavy tummy, or so my mind tells me, getting warm under the blankets in bed with my laptop is the next best thing to do It’s a new found hobby I guess, be it web surfing/blogging on laptop, it just had to be done in bed, blankets over me and music playing softly in the background.

Week has gone by so, so quickly! I clearly remember just a week ago (what seemed like 2 days ago), the boyfriend had just finished his exams and I have yet to decide what to do these holidays. Till today I’m not even sure what we’re gonna do, and we’ve already lost a week.

For a fact, my dad suddenly decided to come to Sydney tomorrow night (I really should be resting up for a long day of house cleaning tomorrow!), so I’ve got to spend time with family, and the boyfriend, oh and girlfriends too of course… There is only so much you can do in Sydney this time of the year, especially if you don’t intend to go to the Snow :/

But anyway, the future seems a little too unpredictable right now. Instead lets recap on my somewhat food-filling week.

I don’t even know what I did this week. All I can remember is going to eat, here and there. Oh caught up with the girlfriends a few times over brunch and lunch, short shopping trips at local shopping centres… nothing wow really. Since the boyfriend is free, we drive to different parts of Sydney getting errands done, i.e. getting my Grandfather’s old film camera (Olympus OM-2) cleaned. Which would probably cost a fortune. But I’m willing, I find it’d be special being able to share my Grandfather’s gear/interests, don’t you think? There are 3 lenses, which approx cost $100 each to clean. oomph. I’m praying it’d be less and that they do a good job!

Other than eating, highlights of my week is watching Shrek 4 and just today Toy Story 3.

Shrek, not the prettiest animation you’d come across, but its entertaining nonetheless! The first movie was probably the first or so movie that I watched in cinema Since moving to Sydney. So I remember it so clearly, when my Uncle took me and my cousins to this little privately owned cinema in Hornsby. It was totally nothing like Hoyts or Events. The 2nd movie was the first time the bf and I went on a -unofficial date-, or should I say the first movie we went to together. Shrek 4, is the last, and it was great! I’m amazed how they could manage to have different, non-cliche story lines each sequel! It has to be the most touching by far though

8.5/10 for me.

I’m so sad after today, after watching Toy Story 3. It is, yes the last sequel as well.. and it’s sad because it’s (my first?) Pixar animation, and a movie that was part of my childhood… I  mean it was released in 1995, and I was only 6 then. I’m 21 now, and watching Toy Story 3 really brings back Childhood memories.

Wow Andy (boy in the movie), is all grown up now and so are we… makes you realize how fast time flies! I really, really loved the movie though, hard to explain in words. There were ups and downs throughout the movie and it really catches on to your breath. I know people who cried near the end, unfortunately it wasn’t tear jerking enough for me, but at most, it was heart felt. I walked out of the movie, both happy (childhood), and sad that the story is all over now. I’m gonna miss the toys!

I really felt like watching the movie again, haha it was that good, and me I’m the kind of person who wouldn’t watch something again unless its a long while later. Watch it and you’ll know what I’m talking about! Try watch the previous ones too though It’d make much more sense. Barbie & Ken’s just hilarious haha.

10/10, duh

After watching both Shrek and Toy Story, I have this temptation to collect small plushies or toys as memorabilia. I’d wanna buy the actual toys (similar to the movie, Toy Story), but I’m not going to do anything with it, cept let it sit in the box, hah, so plushies will do for now Sudden splurge? possibly.

Pixar is amazing <3

Anyway. I think its time I rested up. I’ve got another project I’m working on, I hope I can release it soon

Those photoshoot photos I ‘promised’?, yeh, it has yet to come :S I’ve been lazy to sit and work at my desktop lately hah.

Hope you guys enjoyed my rolls of film though There’s more I can share every now and then.

Have a great weekend kiddos!

<3 Clar.

A walk in the park

One Sunday afternoon, I suddenly had the urge to go for a stroll at the park nearby, and bring along with me my Golden Half to try finish the never ending roll of film.

Well obviously from previous posts, I did get to finish it *yay* So these are the last few shots from my Golden Half roll.

I went during sunset, I think its the most beautiful hour to visit this park, especially when the warm light of sunset reflects off the lakes and the green leaves of the willow trees.

It’s winter, the trees are bare, but the light just makes everything lovely and warm It’s a big park, so I’ve only been to a percentage of it! I might go there again soon

It’s been rainy and gloomy in Sydney this week

for some reason I keep thinking these are ducks, but no! they’re too big to be! I just realised they are actually geese.

Don’t they look lovely? I wish I could zoom with the Golden Half, haha I was a little scared to get too close to them

Melbourne snippets

Camera: Golden Half

Didn’t take much during my Melbourne trip (I -did- bring about 5 cameras afterall, and only used like 3 of them hah. Yes I couldn’t decide!)

I wish I had captured more with the Golden Half though, I think I’m starting to love it a little more

Morning breakfast at Queen Victoria Markets; I wish they had something similar in Sydney!… or do they??

Toorak; in town

fin.

Scenes in Two

For my 21st Birthday, I was given a new toy camera, the Golden Half from Jeff & CT. I was delighted! Way unexpected to get one for my birthday It’s been on my wishlist for some time and glad I finally got to tick it off!

As you guys know, the thing about Golden Half is as the name suggests, its a half frame camera hence two photos in one shot. (I learned that they are actually 3 x 4 and not half of 6 x 4.. odd.. )

So you would think, you’re saving money from developing, since you’re getting like 48 photos from 24 exposures (I got 51 from my roll of 24) in fact you’re not.

I only just found out from my boyfriend today, that its more costly than I think it is, mainly due to labour.

Not a lot of photo printing machines accept half frames, so the print shop would need to have purchased an extra attachment for their machine that costs about $10,000 alone :O

Other than that, you have to manually feed it into the machine, it took my boyfriend about 20minutes just feeding it in. (Thank god he did it hence I didn’t have to pay for his labour haha, I would’ve felt bad if his parents did it ) And usually they would charge you $1/frame… hence it would’ve costed me $51!!

Maybe only because my boyfriends’ parent’s machines are newer, however if you find a photo shop with older machines that already has that half frame facility, then it would be cheaper… like half the price… I guess you are almost paying for developing 2 rolls of 24 anyways though, or rather getting more out of your one roll of film, so its not -too- bad, just, you’re not saving money by having half frame cameras heh.

Otherwise… in terms of usability…

- I love the size of it, small and compact, easy to hold.

- Build of the camera is really good, the one I have has a rubber exterior, I would say it’s the best built toy camera I own.

- The shutter release button is so small, in a corner, sometimes you gotta be careful you don’t shake when you click it. Such a cute click sound… it’s so subtle haha.

- Has a flash mount on the side of the camera, so you can slip one on I didn’t get around to trying it with flash.

Photo Quality

Hmm I have mixed feelings.

- It’s not as consistent as I’d hope for it to be.

- Some shots are slightly blurry, not sure if I might’ve shook just a bit. But otherwise it is quite sharp.

- I find that the corner has slight blurring

- Vignetting? Not so much… barely.

- Colours are quite nice, not as contrasted as my White Slim Angel,l I had a roll of Kodak 400 in there (came with it).

I won’t even comment on colour, since apparently my bf colour corrected it (which most private photo shops would do anyways), but he didn’t do it for all of them, lazy butt!

Here are a few sets I manually put together with Photoshop, yeah the half frame thing on the machine actually processed each shot as a single frame rather than 2-in-1. If you were to scan your negatives with a film scanner, it would come out as 2-in-1. I’m not sure what happened with mine actually heh. You can judge the photos for yourself I’ve got more to come! I don’t wanna bomb my posts with photos

Seasons of Randwick

Autumn to Winter

One of the first shots I took in Randwick and One of the last shots I took in Randwick

Portraiture

Candids of Lydia I took during UNSW Photo Club‘s Portraiture Workshop

Biennale 2010 @ Cockatoo Island

Yeah indoor shots turned out a bit grainy

How do you guys like what you see so far?

Regardless of how long it took to finish a roll of film, it was nice to use for those ‘Kodak Moments’, capturing candids etc

It’s hard to keep note of what you took last, so you don’t know if you’ll manage to put 2 same scenes next to each other in a photo. Try your luck I guess?

Part 2 will follow tomorrow perhaps