not able to get out during the day today so i shot a few frames
of my youngest daughter playing around with some christmas
wrapping etc -

being the last friday before christmas it was supposed to be very busy
for us and it started out that way. i think there must have been lots of
businesses having afternoon parties though, because our work died out
not long after lunch and just came in dribs and drabs for the rest of the
day. i thought a little about tuning my mind into photography mode and
did get one or two today -

my bike at b2 this afternoon -

just when i wanted to make a conscious effort to update and
post more regularly to this flog, i have let it slip for a couple of
days. no shooting at all and not really anything to report other
than it is so hot here at the moment that doing anything at all
is quite tiring. the last couple of days at work has been very
draining and difficult to say the least. a cool change would be
very welcome.

i've been thinking a bit about my camera gear lately.
the truth is that i doubt that i would ever really need anything
better than my Canon 10D. the lenses i have cover pretty much
the complete range i need although it might be nice to have the
24-70mm f2.8L. what turns me off it a bit is it's size and weight.
for everyday use i carry the Canon S45 with me everywhere and
i feel that it was a very handy investment. the size is right and
picture quality is very very good. i just wish that i could shoot
shallow DOF with it (which of course i can't).
i am curious to see what the panasonic version of the new leica
digilux2 will be like. it's called the DMC-LC1 and will be quite a
lot less expensive than the leica. of course it will only have the
2/3 sensor so still no shallow DOF but it has a fast zoom which
i believe will be of excellent quality. at the right price it might be
worth some thought for those times when you don't want to lug
around an slr and a few lenses.

yesterday i was shooting in very harsh sunlight so everything
was shot half a stop under. my 10D has a habit of blowing out
the highlights in these conditions so this worked quite well.
it's just a matter of adjusting levels in PS to compensate and
bringing up the shadow detail a little.

various weekend shots -

i have managed to shoot quite a bit over the weekend.
i'm in the process of going through them and i will post a few that
i like tomorrow morning.