The Adelaide Fringe has descended upon Adelaide once again for 3 and a bit weeks of whacky entertainment. For some of us, its a chance to get out of the house and catch a play, concert or a dance performance. Then again, on a balmy night like tonight, its fun to just let the Fringe blur by and let it sweep you along.

The opening night of the Fringe kicked off with a parade through the east side of the city. With over 1500 performers, it was fairly easy to find something to point my camera at, even if it was at the 80,000 plus spectators. The performers were really full of life tonight. They put so much into playing their characters, and I think their passion shows up in these pictures.

When I arrived in the city last night with Kurt and Dene, I opened my bag to get my camera out, and of course I had forgotten something; my R-Strap! So, I stopped off at the camera store, got a replacement strap, and $35 bucks lighter, I headed out into the street. I really didn’t want to walk around the streets without my camera being securely in my grasp: 1) because the weight, 2) because there was so many people I was getting knocked around and 3) because I didn’t want it stolen! It paid off, because later in the night I had my flash attached, and that would have been a nightmare to carry around without the strap.
The boys and I arrived at the bottom of Rundle Street, and the parade was already in progress. There was a huge crowd. Everyone was in good spirits, so I wasn’t too annoyed at not having a prime position to shoot the parade. I ended up taking shots of the crowd, and individuals jostling for prime vantage points. There was the standard kids on dad’s shoulders and a few girlfriends on partners shoulders, there were even people who were wandering around wondering what had happened to the street. Obviously they had no idea there was the worlds second biggest fringe festival beginning in their own city.

The best thing about being late however, was that while everyone was watching the parade, no one was buying food, so I had zero time waiting in queues when my stomach inevitably called out for food. It was also fresh! While hanging around I was able to say hello to some Japanese people and surprise them with a customary greeting in their own language. They of course were excited which is what is great about most Japanese people. After this, I found a descent place to park myself with the guys and shoot the final stages of the parade.

Most of my shots were taken from my new position and I even had some real delightfully crazy people pose for me. Well, I feel like it was for me, however there were a ton of photographers with a range of pro gear sticking in the faces of the performers. I was amazed at how many people actually have SLR cameras these days. It’s great to see that people from all ages really enjoy the art of photography.

In the dying light of Adelaide, and the pushing crowds, it was fairly difficult shooting the Fringe parade, but it was a challenge I felt, possibly for the first time, 100% comfortable with. I was happy trying out various settings on my camera to get the best depth of field, blur and so on. I didn’t feel, like I often do, pressured that I would miss a shot. I felt comfortable knowing that, if I chose a particular setting, I could either make it work for the next shot, or I would have time to change it before the next performer. It was fun, and relaxing to just shoot and I was impressed with what I came away with. Sure, some of my shots were taken while on tippy toes, camera in air shooting over the crowd, and because of this, yeah, a lot were too blurry, or needed some re-cropping, but it did not deter me.

Photography is not always an art form you have full control over. You can’t always instruct you subjects and you definitely cannot instruct the elements. When mother nature wants to rain on you and spoil your “parade” she will, when the lights fade, she is telling you its lights out time. You can’t change that. So don’t bother to try. Live with it, and shoot on. Enjoy it. And that is exactly what I did.

I came away from the opening night of the Fringe with a ton of unusable pics, but some great shots as well. I felt comfortable shooting, and I feel so eager to get back out there over the coming weeks and shoot as much as I can. I want to focus on the people, the unique culture of the Fringe. I want to capture how the city of Adelaide really does change during this period. I think it is a wonderful chance to have almost 4 weeks of festivities, right in my own backyard. Talk about lucky!

David duChemin writes in his nice little pdf book “10″:

There is a tendency when you frist start out to shoot everything in sight. Do it. Shoot it all. There are shots we all need to take to get out of the way; they help us learn the basics and go towards the first 10,000 frames that it takes to get better at this craft. But eventually most of us have to slow down, take a breath, and get picky.

I have had an SLR camera for a couple of years now, and I think I have pretty much done what David says in the above quote. I was gung-ho in my attitude to shooting whatever I could, especially when I was living in Japan. Everything in Japan looked new and fresh to me, whether it be a child walking to school, the temples, the food, the vending machine, a pretty girl talking on her phone, or a monk praying. I wanted it all. I shot it all. I wasn’t too picky. I wasn’t very skilled. A large percentage of my pictures are “happy snap” ready that can be put in a photo album. A low percentage however, are hangable.

While I enjoyed every moment clicking away at a furious pace, I didn’t always get the results I wanted when sitting back home in front of my computer at night. And it is obvious now, that I didn’t always focus on what was important in the shot. All of the subjects I shot had their own unique attributes and an importance, but I didn’t spend the time to find it within them. Of course, as my year in Japan progressed, I had taken hundreds of shots of shrines, and some of those shots got better as I discovered better ways to capture them. I think I also started to capture the distinct differences of each shrine, especially when I realised my time to go back to Australia was around the corner. I had to get pickier. “Get Pickier” is part 1 of David’s book.

This year, for me to “get pickier”, I am going to spend time focusing on one photographic subject before moving on. When I say focus, I don’t mean master it. I mean discover it again. Play with it. Find out whether I enjoy that subject and working with it? Then move on. Once I have found out what really motivates me, I will tighten my focus on that subject area.

What subject areas do we have? Well, there is portraits, landscapes, architecture, still life, sports, wildlife, night photography and many others. I have always enjoyed candid street photography, so I am going to start there.

The above shot is a candid street photography shot taken in Izushi-Cho, Japan.

More to come.

I have been using Aperture 2 since its release and have been extremely pleased with its power and speed at cataloging and adjusting my images. When Lightroom 3 Beta came along I heard a lot of hype, mostly from those with connections with Adobe, and thought I would give it a try. Now, as I have said in earlier posts, it is a nice piece of software, and I have only tapped the surface of what the software can do, however I started to think to myself; Why am I changing from Aperture. What am I getting?

Each of these software packages are amazing and are backed by two of the best software companies out there; Apple and Adobe. Each of the packages have their advantages and their disadvantages, But the question remained, why was I bothering to look at Lightroom 3? I believe now, that it was just hype and talk. A lot of people have been unhappy with Aperture for the simple reason that it has not been updated in over a year. People on the internet have been threatening Apple from the safety of their mother’s basements that they will walk away from Aperture if an update is not presented to them immediately. Now, I like to play with new software, hey, I tried Lightroom 3 Beta for crying out loud and thats not even stable! But is there a reason to walk away from a program that WORKS?

Aperture is by far the best application for cataloguing your images, and it is fine for the amount of adjustments I want to do to my images. For the couple of times that I have needed more power, I send the image to Photoshop or Pixelmator, just like Lightroom users do. What I missed most from my time working in Lightroom 3, was the beautiful, not in your face, user interface that most of the professional apps Apple creates. Aperture is uncluttered and it looks elegant. Images open up in true full screen mode, unlike Lightroom 3, and the speed! Oh, Aperture is beautiful. I can swish through tens of thousands of pics in seconds, in Lightroom 3, it would grind to a halt. I also like the Photobooks that can be designed and printed right from the Aperture application, something that Lightroom does not offer.

So to cut it short, I am just happy being back in Aperture 2 and will stick here until the urge comes along to try out Aperture 3 (I hope). But, I will not be sucked into hype and I won’t be unhappy with a perfectly running application, simple because it has not had a major version update in a year. I am happy to sit here and dig deeper into what Aperture has to offer.

I have added a couple of photos of Miyajima to this post. Again from wonderful Japan, Miyajima is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, and I had the fortune to visit here numerous times during my time in Japan in 2007.

Following is a little info about Miyajima in both Japanese and English:

宮島は広島湾からフェリーで約10分ほどの所にあります。島の名前は「神社のある島」という意味で、日本三景の一つです。厳島神社は満潮時、大鳥居が海上に浮かび、特に日没時は見事な眺めです。神がまつられる島内では、鹿や猿が自由に歩き回り、葬送や出産は禁じられています。
Translation:
Miyajima is just a ten minute ferry ride from the shores of Hiroshima. It’s name  means “Shrine Island” and is one of Japan’s three most scenic viewing locations. The Itsukushima Shrine and the large wooden torii stand in the ocean during high tide and make for a spectacular view especially at sunset. Deer and monkeys freely walk around this island and it is said that no person may die or be born on the island.

Once again, I dragged poor old Dene out to do some photography in the Alleys of Adelaide at night. Also had another friend tag along as he just bought himself a new Nikon D700 and 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. We have the same setup, so thought it would be a good idea to play with these crazy / expensive tools together. Hey, boys and their toys right? Then again, I know the girls like this stuff too so, let us have our fun! :)

It was fairly difficult taking shots that balanced well on the night. The ambient light of the city and the “near” full moon light was enough to take shots hand held at high ISO’s, however we were not always happy with the colour output. There was a mixture of fluorescent and tungsten light around us, with the before mentioned full moon. Hey, we even started to add the SB-900 to the mix to make it even more tricky.

One thing I love about the SB-900 system from Nikon, is the ability to put gels on the flash which are recognised by the sensor and adjust the white balance of the shot accordingly. Unfortunately, the sensor does not automatically work out what gel is on if the flash is firing in commander mode. More unfortunate for me, was that I forget this important little fact for about 5 minutes and stood there scratching my head.

Either way, I had another enjoyable night firing away at Dene in many spots around the alley. I don’t think it was fully fair for Dene however. As you could imagine, the area didn’t really smell that well. I tried not to think about what we may have been walking through.

Since reading on Scott Kelby’s site that Lightroom 3 Beta was available from Adobe, I thought I would install and give it a go. I have been using Aperture 2 from Apple for almost 2 years now and have been very impressed with the application and it’s speed. Over the last few months, I had read some very strong reviews of Lightroom 2 and it’s Adjustment Brush, something that is lacking in Aperture. I have been hanging on, hoping that Apple would push something through it’s development doors to the diminishing Aperture user base. Alas, nothing has come. Anyway, to cut to the chase, I downloaded Lightroom 3 and copied my library over in the DNG format. To be honest, the first thing I noticed after copying my files across (around 20000 pics), was how SLOW LIghtroom is in comparison to Aperture. In both browsing photos in the libraries, and editing photos, Aperture was many times faster. However, the few items that kept on drawing me to Lightroom was that damned adjustment brush, and the ability to work with watermarks more fluidly. In any case, I will be sticking with Aperture for now, and using some of the unique features of Lightroom 3 when the need arises.

The following is a little about Nikko in Japanese and English. It is one of the first photos I have post processed in Lightroom since installing. This pic is also featured on my whereinjapan website. Check it out if you are interested in Japan and learning the language.

日光は、徳川幕府初代将軍である徳川家康を祀る日本で最も精巧に建造された東照宮で有名な小都市です。また、何世紀にもわたり神道と仏教の山岳信仰の中心でもあります。
Translation:
Nikko is a small city famous for the Toshogu, Japan’s most lavishly decorated shrine complex and mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate. Nikko is also a centre for Shinto and Buddhist mountain worship for many centuries.