Lazy Robot

114/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Sitting by the pond, eating an ice cream and enjoying doing nothing for 2 minutes.

113/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . My cousin Andy shortly after marrying Ali in Manchester town hall.

112/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . High speed shot of an illuminated fountain, capturing the motion and blocking out the background. Makes for a nice artsy shot.

111/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Sun shining between the trees in the Derwent valley on a warm bank holiday Friday.

110/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . That lovely time of the evening when the sun is low in the sky, this evening mist is just starting to rise, and the world takes on a golden glow.

Loxley , a set on Flickr. I decided that to relax I should go for a walk. Where better than the very same valleys in which I spent my childhood? I arrived at Rowell Lane just in time to capture a beautiful early sunset, and headed off down the river toward Malin Bridge before returning to Rowell Bridge.

109/365 , originally uploaded by craigand .

108/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Bicycle vs Taxi on West Bar roundabout. Who will be victorious?

107/365 , originally uploaded by craigand .

106/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . None of this namby-pamby, over-protective nanny state we're living in. If my kids want to climb a tree, they climb a tree.

105/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Dead Like Harry played an intimate gig (50 tickets) at the Yellow Arch Studios in Sheffield last night. It was amazing.

104/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Dad's birthday chocolate. Mmmm

103/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Easter is coming, so I have Creme Eggs. I see nothing wrong with this. This is a bit of an experiment. The egg is sat on a piece of plain A4 paper leaning against a wall. A single strobe flashes to the right, bouncing off a white wardrobe door about 12" away from me, and back onto the egg. Seems to have worked pretty well, considering.

102/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . A picture of me with my camera and a funky flash effect. Well, if you can consider a dirty mirror a "funky" effect. I didn't realise until seeing this picture how tiny my camera is. Or how massive my hands are. Whichever. Could explain why I have so much trouble using teeny weeny compacts.

I'm having a crisis of sorts. Finally after some significant time and heartache I have the camera gear that I have been aiming for for some time. I've practised and somewhat mastered, or at least got the hang of, various aspects of photography, from portraits to close ups, from shallow depth of field to live music. But there was something ... missing. And I finally figured out what it is; I like manual focussing. Way back in the mists of time, or last October to be more precise, I finally got round to digging out my lovely old Zenit E and took some lovely Autumnal pictures . The Helios 58mm f/2 prime lens made me realise how good a decent prime can be, after years of struggling with slow kit lenses or crappy compacts. It has ended up being very much my standard "out and about" configuration, albeit with some slight modifications. Moving on a little, I got my hands on the Nikon 50mm f/1.8 prime and took some more Autumn pictures. I raved about it, that moment of...

I've hit two milestones this week. The first, as some may have noticed, is that I've hit triple digits in my project 365 attempt. In fact, today is day 101. The second is that I shot my 6000th exposure on the Canon EOS500D, which is not bad going considering I've only had it 5 months. For my 100th and 101st pictures in 365/2011 I wanted something artistic, and something stark (to go with the theme of room 101). For picture 100 I actually revisited a subject I already photographed once before ; blossoms on the trees. This time I wanted to make something high key, close up and fully making use of background blur and washed out colours. I think I succeeded. 100/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . For 101 I took a picture of some metal stairs running up the side of a hospital building. By making it black and white, and aligning it so the sharp diagonals zig-zagged down the image, I think I got what I was after. I toyed with the idea of boosting the contrast to make ...

101/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Lots of lovely diagonals in this one.

100/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . I know that technically I've already taken a photo of blossom this spring, but frankly compared to this one it was poop. Flickrblog had a few samples of other people's images like this and I figured I could do as well as that, so here it is. I love the painted effect caused by the washed out bokeh, almost like a wash of water colour. This was assisted greatly by the previously mentioned FD mount Makinon 28mm f/2.8 I got the other day. This picture alone makes it worth the £10 asking price. This picture is dedicated to Emma.

099/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Closeup of some FIRE. In spite of the apparent heat in this pic, I could get pretty close without burning myself or my camera. Sexy FD mount 28mm.

098/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . I saw this striking shadow outside the crown court here in Sheffield. It's a large runged thing outside the main entrance, and I thought the way the shadow interacted with the rounded elements was pretty cool. Also, used my all new, all manual second-hand FD mount 28mm f/2.8 just for kicks.

097/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . A sculpture near the office, handily taking the form of an (almost) golden ratio.

096/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Complete with interesting clouds.

095/365 , originally uploaded by craigand .

094/365 , originally uploaded by craigand .

093/365 , originally uploaded by craigand . Who's there?