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Australian “teen-pop hit sensation”, The Veronicas, stopped off at work yesterday to kick off the launch of their new kids and teens clothing range. Being the opportunist I am, I had my camera ready. Of course, it was a bit of a shit fight with all of the press and photographers to try and get the shots..

The Veronicas at Target Miranda on flickr
Check out all 70 photos from the Veronicas visit to Target Miranda on flickr.

Note: Personally, I am not really a fan of them.

So I disappeared for a few days earlier on in the week (Monday – Thursday) for a bit of a holiday down to Berry. Photos? Of course.

On the trip down the coast..

Great landscapes

Star Trails

A fun “photo shoot”..

Lots of fun..

Everyone loves a leafy, everyone loves a leafy, go leafy go!

I like the colour in this photo I took yesterday – it’s not your typical plantish green, but looks nice. Also my current wallpaper.

So I was away from the 16th until the 26th on the yearly holiday down at Lake Conjola. The perfect opportunity to put the new camera to the test.

Unfortunately we had some problems with our boat. (I believe it’s called lack of use and neglect from its owner) However, that didn’t stop those that wanted to wakeboard from wakeboarding and getting up to mischief on the water.

View 293 photos from Lake Conjola on my flickr account (Out of approximately 2,000 which I ended up taking)

Uhhh, oops?

Last January I mentioned that I was feeling the limitations with my old Sony “point and shoot” digital camera. A whole year went by with me thinking of buying a Digital SLR camera (Originally the Canon EOS 350D) but never getting around to do it.

New years day I completed my order for a brand new Canon EOS 400D DSLR camera (kit with 18-55mm lens) as well as a Canon EF 90-300mm USM lens, 2gb compact flash card, tripod, extra batteries and a DigiMate II-plus image tank (for which I ended up buying a 80gb hard drive for).

The Canon EOS 400D camera and 90-300mm USM lens
After the payment went through and everything it was shipped to Australia (from Hong Kong) and was stuck in customs awaiting clearance (I needed to pay the 10% GST on it – $174.00, before it was released). Customs were going to take a week or so to clear it which didn’t work for me as I’m leaving for my holiday on the 26th. I went to a Customs Broker who, the same day, cleared the item (albiet, I had to pay them $125 to do the clearance for me as well as the initial GST and a Customs service fee). I picked the camera + goodies up today from the Australia Post Internation Gateway Facility.

This camera is awesome.

Though I have a fair amount of knowledge about focal lengths, aperature sizes, f-stops, exposure and all of those other terms associated with an SLR camera, I still have a lot to learn on how to get the best possible use out of the camera. A good learning experience will hopefully be whilst I am away – hopefully I’ll get some great action, landscape and portrait shots.

Anybody have any good tips? I’ve read a few books, visited a few sites (the URLs of which I’ve completely lost) but I’m after any tips others may have (Michele, I’m looking at you too).

And now I’ll leave you with a few new photos on my flickr account from the camera. Hopefully I’ll make better use of my flickr account now too.

Tia, quite possibly the most awesome puppy in the world.

But also quite possibly the hardest to take a decent photo of.

Testing out the zoom on the 90-300mm lens.

… and for something completely random..

So the midnight-9am shifts are finally finished and things start to return to normal for me.

It was time for a bit of a break from everything and away from everything we went! My family as well as another family went away for the weekend (Saturday through Monday, though Friday for some of the lucky ones) down to a “farm” down in Berry which is 115km south of Sydney.

It isn’t your standard farm, more like a luxury getaway. Take a look at the photos.

Myself, youngest brother and the old man

Meep, meep. Uh, the sun was in my eyes and really getting to me – good work on the photo, Mum! :<

Awe, cute Tia.

One of the bedrooms

  
The northern outlook

Today I attended TechEd 2006 Student Day where Microsoft showed off their latest technologies (Windows Vista, Microsoft Office 2007 and Expression Web Designer, Live Anywhere, IPTV, DirectX 10, Xbox 360) and how they’re going to make student life more productive (well, some of them).

Speakers also covered employment opportunities at Microsoft (what they look for, requirements and programs such as interns or MACH) as well as what I’d describe as a bit of Intel promotion.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Long Zheng who I’ve known for a while, just never actually met. Long gave a demo of Office 2007 with Microsoft’s Frank Arrigo. These guys covered what students will be looking forward to with Microsoft Office – adding style and creativity to their documents, spreadsheets and presentations all in a few clicks.

During the Windows Vista demo, I noticed they were running an RC1 branch, build 5700 which should no doubt be making its way to CTP customers soon (which I’m looking forward to). The build, from the bits we saw, ran faster and had been cleaned up a bit. Long took the following photo of the build number:

We were then given the opportunity to enter the expo halls (only for an hour). Basically, a few stands, heaps of Xbox 360s (including those connected as Media Center Extenders) and lots and lots of demo PCs available for use including two hands on labs.

You can view the rest of my photos in my TechEd 2006 photoset.

There’s also a bit of other coverage on the web you can check out:

• Long Zheng – TechEd Day 1 – Student Day
• Jeff Alexander (Microsoft) – TechEd 2006 – Day 1 – Student Day
• Frank Arrigo (Microsoft) – TechEd Sydney Student Day

So this semester at College, we’ve had to produce a 10 minute documentary or other video as part of our assessment. In a group of three, we drafted a television show which is a take off of Australia’s “Today Tonight”, called “Today Tomorrow”. In the show we take a look at the safety (well – insecurities) of MySpace.

Last night we got around to shooting the studio shots with our presenter. We’ll be making use of the green screen to use a technique called chroma keying to replace the background with a shot of Sydney for the final product. The studio was constructed in a class room with the green screens, a three point lighting set up (a fourth was added to help remove shadows from the screen), the camera and laptop – to record/pass through audio.

A couple of photos from the night: