End. Less. Summer.

Rain stopped play so the train beckoned. On the way through Torre, I saw a lovely chalk wall and struck these McVicar portraits. A good few days away and nice to test the camera. Job is a good un' though Scott looses points for smiling....

Delightful Devon....KEEP OFF THE ROCKS....

Day two down South and more tomfoolery with the GF1 camera. The day started with a little bit of urban ex. of which the light was good, too good really and would have preferred to shoot there late afternoon with the low autumn sun beating through nooks and crannies. Still, another place on the radar. I used the GF1 in macro mode, wide aperture mode and intelligent mode. Circular bokeh reminds us of what a quality lens the 20mm is - sharper than a Nuns crutch. Once again it made taking photos a breeze and was just great to use as I knocked out a few decent photos. Urban ex. photos love lightroom. Loads of contrast and detail - push it as much as you can say I....

I cant explain why, but I love photos of nothingness....

Good use of triangulated light. Furthest point is the brightest.

And what ever your camera, make the light work for you. That is the key.

Moving on we hit the coast and ended up going to Slapton, Beesands and Start Point.

Slapton Sands is a sad place. Nearly 1000 American service men lost their lives there in the build up to D-Day. Allied forces were using the expanse of coast to try out live ammunition trial runs as geographically, it mirrors some of the beaches found on Northern France. However, and somewhat sadly, German reconnaissance became aware of the movement and U-boats were despatched to sink a flotilla of boats of which several sunk, trapping live men below deck. It is suggested that more American soldiers died at Slapton than on the actual D-Day landing which is a real tragedy. Naturally, there are some memorials to the deceased and interestingly, a Sherman Tank dredged from the water in 1984 sits on the coast line to remind visitors of what happened there.

Moving on we hit Beesands and found a gorgeous open Church in which we sheltered from an 'almighty' downpour. We thanked the main man when we left. A lovely place and again, a nice location to shoot wide open with the GF1. We stopped for some downright lovely fish and Chips at the Cricket Inn. Beesands is a great place to wander with a camera, thats for sure. I went into 16:9 Hitchcock mode and snagged a couple of nice film-esque images with a washed out colour palette -

Managed to snag a classic shot of Scotty on the pub pooper here, but was just not tall enough to 'nail it'....ha ha ha.

Lastly, we hit a fantastic place called Start Point. A real place to behold, even though it was brassic cold, the light and cloud that allowed for some cool 'Grab-scape' - as I like to call it.

Scott upon the hill with his D3 / Tripod combo....

I am not sure how I came to be dressed as Matt Bianco on a wind swept cliff top, but that is the life of an eccentric for you......and I was 'at the beach..!'

Hard light, high contrast, IKEA styleeeee....

Preddy rainbow...!

An elderly lady on a mobility scooter braves the wind and rain...!

Lock, stock and one smokin' tripod....!

These last few sum up how cold and wet it got and how it starts to get into your bones....nice hard processing.

Overall, another cool day down in Devon. Back to Bristol tomorrow with what feels like a touch of the old man flu.

Unravelling the GF1 is fun but here are some things to note;

1. The camera likes to ebb on the side of under rather than over, so a sneaky 3rd here or there will help with a clean exposure. Keep your live histogram on and push to the right and make those images pop.

2. The creative art modes are superb - BUT, if you shoot in RAW the processing software reverts to its native algorithm, thus negating the effect. This of course leaves less tolerance when processing JPEGS so I would hope that this may change in the future. Further more, I don't think/cant find spot metering in the art modes. Stands to reason, but would have offered a tad more control to the photographer at hand.

3. Remember what aspect you are shooting in as some work, some don't. I don't buy into the dogma of 'disciplined photography' - photographers who spend a year of their lives shooting in style. Obviously 1:1 crops work great in certain situations, 16:9 in others. We are photographers and we are aware of that so why restrict it? Just note cropping 5 x 7 back from 16 x is not ideal.

Overall, minor grumbles.I keep saying it but I really love this camera, really I do and I cant wait to shoot some real docu stuff on it of which typically I have irons in the fire. What I can say is that I have often said I wanted a camera that allowed me to focus on photography and to paraphrase Mike Jackson 'This is it...!'.

Little boy.

Ironic that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was called little boy. So much power in something so small. A strange parody, but something to compare the Panasonic G1 to I suppose. I am amazed at the quality of this machine and the power under the hood. I have said before, but it really is a DSLR in the pocket. F/1.7  glass, a nice sensor with loads of features to boot. Of course, the proof is in the pudding and today I took the train to Torquay from my abode in Brizzle to wander about with the camera, visit my friend Scotty and test the camera in a studio with Bowens heads (Scott's place) and have a nice chilled few days down on the coast. To start, the camera is fantastic pocket snap camera -

Once into the studio it was interesting to unleash the camera with some static quality light. I set the camera to a classic F8 @ 1/125th and started shooting. No problems, quality photos though naturally, the 40mm lens was a little tight for portraiture, but evidence again that the camera cuts the mustard. To me, final output is now the be all and end all of an image and frankly, as I have said before, as I shoot for fun now, most stuff ends up on flickr of which I cut to size in photoshop and set the dpi at 240 to expedite uploads. Working in RAW allows me to store images and work big if I want to print them.

The camera stacks up nicely as a docu camera too. 

Nice black and white high contrast mode. Lovely.

Things got silly when we found a wig. Love it. Think Blue Steel !!!

After calling it a day in the studio due to tears of laughter, we headed out where I got to work on some street photography. Being honest, there was some nice Autumn light falling today and you cant really go wrong. Look for pockets of light and snap away. I still ask people for portraits - less than I did, but the GF1 should see that figure increase as it is far less intimidating than a big old DSLR such as the D3. This is akin to film, in that you can snap and move on. That said I asked an old boy for a snap today and he told me to 'Fuck off'. As I have said many times, crack heads gravitate to the seaside, so screw him...!

After taking a coffee break, we headed down to the harbour where again the camera stretched its legs. I used AI here and also used the preset landscape scene. 

Nice photos. Nothing radical, but I dont like processing photos, I just like taking them more. Overall, a great purchase and a really enjoyable day taking pictures without a dead weight around the neck. I have concluded that the camera cant replace a DSLR - especially given the incredible resolution available now, but it can sit alongside a pro DSLR set up and compliment it perfectly. To some photographers it is a fine stand alone purchase. Nice! The great thing of course is the AI mode which can become a clever macro camera, a portrait camera, a landscape camera in the turn of your head. 

You can see a full set of photos here.

Quick stroll with the GF1....

Literally a quick stroll. I had a quick drive to Exeter to pick up some stuff today, got back to Bristol, parked up and took a 5 minute walk with the GF1. Simple examples of how the camera is in effect a DSLR in performance, pocketable in size. Nice results.. I pushed the contrast on a couple just to make em' pop. I used CS4 for ease of use and gave them an unsharp mask around 100 - but the key here is that the park in question was rammed full of Bristol City fans milling around before kick off. The GF1 drew no interest due to its size. More than happy.

Big box, little box....

It did not take me long decide which replacement camera to buy now that my DSLR kit bag has been despatched to pastures new. In fact I had concluded that the Panasonic GF1 was going the be the camera of choice for me a couple of weeks back, as I mulled over the decision to sell kit on. I had considered the G11 but the distortion of the lens on the G10 put me off and the S90, Canons supposed LX3 competitor is nothing more than plastic in my eyes and in my hands. So, when the GF1 became available I decided that it would be my 'new toy'. There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, I adore the LX3, but I did write about how awkward the camera is in manual control and of course the fact it is all electronic. But, picture wise, the LX3 was and still is the first camera in compact guise that I had seen take pictures of SLR quality with good tone, detail and geometry which bodes well for the GF1. Further inspection reveals a pocket rocket; a small compact but super quick body with dual focusing options and stylish looks that compliment what is in effect the dearest compact I would likely spend money on.

Stand alone, the GF1 has all the boxes ticked. Great optical performance with fast aperture telecentric lenses for great geometry and corner performance. Also, the one thing I constantly talk about when I teach or in the least advise people is perpendicular shooting where you stay flat to your subject, thus givng excellent compression and importantly, with a 4/3rds chip set, great off centre resolution should you decide to print big. I have mentioned this before but it is worth noting that Olympus came up with the concept of 4/3rds way back in 1994. Chief engineers foresaw the problems that a 3:2 chip set would throw up regards barrel distortion and pin cushion and the fact is that if we took side by side photos of lamp posts running along a street, then the 4/3rds system will trump everything, right up to and including cameras such as the 5d2, D3 and D3x et-al. To me, the only company currently addressing the issues the modern SLR face are Sony who are looking at ways of flipping the sensor ala its compact cameras and creating new high pass filters and glass to combat all of the afore mentioned problems. The interesting thing is that a cameras filter and sensor is not actually flat. Film of course was, but the DSLR sensor is a mass of ridges and valleys of which light can and does get trapped in thus creating dark corners, poor geometry and distortion as it tries to 'bend the light'. To put it simply, the GF1 catches light at right angles and simply works. Oddly, in certain situations the telecentric performance renders the camera as a mini tilt and shift piece of kit, which is nice. Historically, Olympus, Pentax and Konica Minolta often changed the goal post with invention, namely 4/3rds, dust cleaning, pentaprism and image stabilisation but in the West poor marketing and sales has seen Canon and Nikon taking pole positions and often lets face it, tipping a nod of thanks to the three aforementioned camera companies as they go onto implement technology into their cameras and lenses.

Of course, I am aware that there are compromises and I bought this camera more than aware of the issues it may throw up. Slow refresh rate in dark situations, average high ISO performance but all of these things are rendered moot when you consider the fact that I no longer have to carry or consider carrying a DLSR out.

Build wise I love it. Classic piano black finish with a real quality feel and some easy to navigate menus and options. In camera processing is superb and I will look at JPEG over RAW in the coming weeks if this helps expedite processing. It has all of the usual pseudo menus such as portrait, night mode on board, which I will also look at but my main port of call will be aperture variable due to the fast glass.

The 20mm F/1.7 is a lens reminiscent of days gone by. With a working focal length of 40mm on the 2 x 4/3rds chip set it is endemic of the classic range finder focal lengths of around 35mm-40mm before the 50mm and then the 85mm lenses became more prominent in the 1950' and 1960's with famous London portrait photographers such as John French and David Bailey favouring the 85mm due to its flattering perspective. In my eyes, 35mm-50mm is the ideal street lens though the 7-14mm lens from Panasonic also appeals for 'walkabout'.

Overall so far, I cant stress how much I rate the GF1. It really is uber compact and I feel that it will allow me to take some brilliant pictures in the coming weeks, of which I will share on flickr and on the blog.

In conclusion, bear in mind that since 2005 I have had 2 X Canon Mark II N, 5D, Mark III, 5D Mark II and Nikon wise, a D300, D3, D700, this camera enthralls me like none of the above and to sum it up, I think Panasonic have out Leica'd Leica and that quite frankly, is incredible.

Changes afoot....

Some may have seen this coming, others not but this week, I feel like I reached the end of the line regards my photography - for the moment at least.

The simple fact is that I really have stopped enjoying it and cant seem to kick start it despite having bought and sold serious amounts of kit over the last few months.

But, naturally, I am happy to admit that whilst I am going to take a sabbatical from DLSR work for a year, maybe longer, I will be continuing to shoot with a compact camera of which I am yet decided, but I simply want to find the joie de vivre that I had when I traversed Australia armed with nothing more than a 3mp AA powered compact camera. Now don't think, that bloody Pete, he is at it again as this time I am serious and it is my intention to get some top drawer photos with a compact camera over the coming months, so do keep looking in. If you go back to the start 0f 2009 on here, I said that I intended on shooting less and less and that has happened, but I have surprised myself with how little I have shot based on previous workloads and previous stock. Of course, I work in a very busy camera retail outlet and perhaps that has not helped, but its a job and I need the money and I 'think' I know my lemons. The truth is that when I found myself taking photos of my tea for a one a day shoot set, I knew the game was up.

So there it is, going out on a bang with the recent stuff shot and to be frank, the money is going to be better spent elsewhere. Before deciding to move kit on I was thinking about buying multiple speedlights, but three SB900's cost a whopping £1200.00 nowadays and thats just silly money which ever way you look at it. Personally, I want to spend the money on my cycling as this has been a massive boon against my ongoing fight with depression which I actually feel that I am winning due to my love for being out on my bike. People who know me will understand that in my life, I am a boom or bust guy, thats how it has always been, but I cant stress how getting out on two wheels is literally saving me and making me happy. Heck, other people notice it and in perspective, I am a different guy when I get some miles in.

I will leave you with this image which I think is top notch, really I do. Bailey eat your heart out. The irony is that photography is very much like riding a bike...you never forget and my OM2n has a roll of black and white film locked and loaded....

Kent High School; The Young Americans.

Photo shoot back at the WISE Campus today as the first Global Bowl between Filton Pride - UK and Kent High School - US took place.

Typical transient British weather greeted the young American team to the South West and with an AM walk around Stonehenge and a trip to Bath, the Kent team and staff arrived in good spirits to face the best of British.

Result wise, the US team ran out 27-6 winners, but the British upstarts more than held there own and the scoreline could have been better had the defence held up slightly bettter. But and it is a big but, from small acorns grow and this is the start of an ongoing process for all concerned. Playing the Americans at their game in your back yard is a buzz only these lads can describe. I wish I could turn back the clock....

I do like it when the WR drops out of the shot at F/2.8 - gives it context as the QB looks long.

Setting the scene.

Half time portraits.

Good use of wide aperture.

"The inches we need are everywhere around us..."

On a photography tip I have not shot a live game of American Football for a long while. Its not overly hard. Armed with a 400mm F/2.8 lens you cant not get decent photos. 15 stone units steaming down your lens is a photographers dream - but knowing the sport can help. Football at this level usually played in the ground with the teams running 90% of the ball, but the occasional throw can add spice to the game. Editing wise I am never one to crop around the photo as I like to work in arbitrary shapes and sizes and on this occasion I stuck with 5 x 7 and 8 x 10. All images were shot at F/2.8 with ISO applied to shoot the changeable weather.

Some great but variable light.

The local boy done good...!

44 runs in the Filton TD....

So, there we have it. The first Global Bowl a resounding success!!

Full set of images here - click -

Congratulations to all concerned - looking forward to the return leg in the US. I have my warm coat at the ready...!