So today, I finally got talking to a tutor. I am starting to get my survey questions drafted, which I will not deny, took me a good while to do. After speaking with my tutor, I realized that  I was still being too broad with what I wanted to ask, and have to bring the whole project back to what I have been doing, mainly all  about money. 

So, I am  at the moment, toying with the idea of creating a  book, website , leaflet or what not.  On finance and money issues with students. Possibly creating  a themed looking book, leaflet, website or what not. 

So, once my tutors check over my survey questions, it will then go out and I will get real experiences from other students, as tips and advice for new/future  students.

I also went on a hike today, I attempted to take  more underwater images. This time at the beach, rather than rock pools. Most images  weren't successful, however I did manage to get a few  good images.

I plan to continue on with this theme, just as experiments. I  am hoping to do get more and more successful images. As at the beach, I did find it very difficult to  get many images to work. I also feel I need to invest in wellies. 

That's all from me today

So today I have been mainly focusing on my ViewBug projects . I have been looking back at my most recent underwater images:

So, these are just a few of the images I took. I have to  admit the paddling pool was a little disappointing. I  didn't really have anymore space that I had before when doing the last underwater images in the kitchen sink.  I really need something deeper,  I am going to start aiming  for doing underwater photoshoots in the summer. I think  this is more in reach of the kind of ideas I want to do. I also think it'll be more fun. Here is the final image I have chosen for the underwater portrait challenge. 

I really like ho trippy this image is, and how surreal it is. I also really like how the colours are almost dream like. I also really like how my hair has almost made a slight heart shape under the water.  

I have also finished another challenge, although my final for it was very unusual for me. It was a bit of an experiment.  I think I had mentioned it before, when I went out to photograph the stars. I got the idea from my "assistant" as he was making shadows  in the torch light on the forest. So as I hadn't really made it out to photograph this for the past few nights, I improvised. 

So here are a few of my hand shadowy shapes. I then drew out a wood scenery, but I felt it all looked a bit too illustrationy, rather than more of an illustration and photography mix. So I got an old photo I previously took at a forest a few months ago and photoshopped my animal shadow shapes into it. I then decided to make the whole image Black and white, so the shadows would fit in a little more. Below is my final image for the ViewBug challenge, playing with light: 

Thats all from me today, tomorrow, I will  hopefully get talking to a tutor about my main project and see where it is going.

So today, I got a few more bits and bobs done.  I finished off the heart suit within my deck of cards project. I also got started on the spades, within my deck of cards project. I only have 4 more designs to do, I am hoping to get them all done tomorrow, so I can move on. Here is my King Of Spades:

I also finally got experimenting  with doing more underwater  photography,  below was my set up for doing so. I however  I'm still to edit the images, so I don't really have  any to show for now.

I also went to a lecture this evening held by Iain Stewart, on his latest TV series "Planet Oil" It was very interesting. I don't normally go to such lectures, but I was invited by a flatmate, so I thought, why not.  

That's it for me today, hopefully more to talk about and show tomorrow.

So today I decided to try and take portrait underwater photography. As I don't currently have a bath, I used the next best thing..... the kitchen sink. We have an old Belfast sink, so I thought this will be deep enough! and be all very wonderful and magical. I started looking up some underwater portrait photography  mainly just of people's faces, and even close up.

................ Of course they make it alllll look so easy! I had this to work with:

I absolute cleaned and scrubbed this sink within an inch of it's life....... it just wasn't  getting any prettier.

Filled the sink up with lukewarm water.... or a few degrees below lukewarm was what it felt like. This image to the left was me testing the camera out,  looking slightly worried as at the last second I wasn't sure if I had put the waterproof camera locks on. And a bit of algae floated to the surface from my camera..... so there goes the theory of thinking I had rinsed and cleaned it properly. In the  beginning of actually putting my face and head into the sink, I did start to panic and thought I don't like this, I then quickly felt that the sink, really wasn't as deep as I had initially thought. So I eventually just went for it, same feeling of jumping off a diving board into a swimming pool. But just your head, and in the safety of your own home.... I got a few random results some that I prefer more to others.

Also have to admit once I finally put my face under the water and started to take photos, I was  too afraid to open my eyes and it was a lot of effort to actually keep my face semi relaxed.  There were only two images from today experiment that I really liked. I also think that one of them will end up being my final for the ViewBug challenge underwater portraits. 

Although I researched images of underwater photography, I was weirdly surprised at how the image mirrored it's self on the water.  Rather pleased with these. Tomorrow night I am hopefully going out to do some star photo's. I think I will actually cry if it's cloudy or raining. But I am going to try my best. That's all from me for today.

So today was horrendous, the weather was one word. shite. I really didn't think I was going to manage to get photos. So I opted for a slightly different option. I took photos within my parents small pond in their back garden. There is already frogs spawn in the pond, so i hoped to photograph some frogs too. 

As you can see the water was really murky and rather creepy looking. I also experimented a little bit  with the flash on. It didn't really do much and I ended up preferring the images without the flash. I then decided to run the garden hose into the pond, in hope that it may make the water clearer to see through and even just healthier for the frogs.  My parents also own two dogs, so the garden was filled with "land mines" So taking photos of the pond was a little bit like an obstacle course.

This really worked! YAY!, I also saw I frog, however it was too quick for me to photograph, it's head bobbing above the water looking at me.....  made me jump to be honest.  Also  algae  got absolutely everywhere, so many images taken where the algae  had stuck to my camera lens.  As  you can see the image of my boots has algae firmly stuck to the lens.  I plan to take more images of the pond tomorrow, as I have spent the rest of today cleaning dead leaves, little toy boats  and even pipes that have fallen in to the pond over the years. Really got my work cut out for me I think. 

I have also been thinking about my main project, however, because I am home this week I haven't  been able to do the research I want. As I would like to see what is available at my university for students and then start to really develop an angle to what I will start to create, also not going to lie, the project has started to bore me a bit. So I really feel I need to find a way to make it more interesting to me

I also got an email today about the Belfast Photo Festival. They want a range of images from  the same body of work. The deadline is the 17th of March, which is just short of next week. I am also hoping tomorrow to go through all of my images and possibly even re-edit old photos. I am currently thinking of uploading the paint images I took roughly five years ago. I am still not too happy with how I have edited them since. So I am hoping to go back and re-visit them. If I had of known about the festival a little earlier I would have started a new body of work for it. As I have recently gotten a new shipment in of powder paints. So I am starting to plan what I want to do with them. 

This is my main image from the paint photoshoot. "Model Envy" there are other images from this series. 

"The theme has been left open to remove any restrictions; submissions must be photographic or lens-based but can include incorporations of other art forms with the photographic medium (i.e. performance, painting, sculpture, music, literature etc).
Individuals and collectives are welcome to apply; individuals should select and enter between two and six photographs from a particular series or body of work AND/OR submit their Photo-book for exhibition by uploading a single PDF (no image limit).

(Note: You can submit both a photo-book and photographs of the same project, but a fee will need to be paid for both. If submitting only a Photo-book and not photographs, it will be your photo-book that will be selected for presentation and not photographic prints for exhibition)

Collectives are also welcome to apply; as a collective, you can submit up to 10 photographs (a £15 submission fee will apply for every 10 images submitted)"




This is just a little  snippet from the rules and requirements of the festival.  I have to admit I am not happy about having to pay the fee of £15, again I would have loved to have photographed something specially for this festival. Although there is always next year. Just excited that this is festival is coming from home.
That's all from me today, here's hoping I will have something more interesting show tomorrow.

Just a quick post today.  I finally went out with my camera and took a few images underwater! They aren't amazing, just images taken within rock pools:

These are in preparation for a ViewBug  underwater  portrait challenge .  I have to apologize because there are so few... my hand was sooooo cold I thought I was going to get frost bite :(  frozen hand!  aaaahhhhh! but yea, i am really surprised with the outcome of these and I actually cant wait to do more!  I will be rook pool hunting for crabs and such now, it look like it....... this is  definitely  going to be a challenge and a half.