southwold beach huts

went to Southwold today. they did something odd with the beach huts that were there to the left from the pier - some of them were moved to the car park (taking a lot of space) and some of them to the right of the pier. I suspect it means that mean that all sea defense is now installed and to the right of the pier is the proper position for them. Maybe owners of those that ended up in the car park can't be located or something (just a guess, I don't really know).

as a result had to park in the street leading to the car park - which apparently is both legal and free. serendipity or what?

while waiting in the car park

I am not sure what this is - apple? something purely decorative? don't know, but looks good

anemones (anemone blanda)

sorry, I know it's too big, but smaller formats don't look good

anemones are in bloom at the back entrance of Trinity Colledge, Cambridge (UK).

dog violet

clump of dog violet (Viola canina)

there is a bigger clump of those each year, growing just opposite from my front door. but my attempts to separate a part of it and move a section into my own garden were so far unsuccessful, they seems to like the edge of car park better'n a tended flowerbed

spring diagonal

light clouds in the sky make isolation of outdoor objects on white a piece of cake - providing you can find an angle where the object is seen against the sky. up the exposure (maximun +2 is used here), and the background sky will burn. If it doesn't burn completely, call the "levels" dialog in photoshop, pick up the white sampler from the panel and click on the areas that are still not completely white.

link to big version of this on hiero.ru hosting ~2Mbis now gone

wishing for summer

divers alarums

or something

pied piper of hamelin

Timur in "pied piper of hamelin"



I was always puzzled by the "pied" bit. apparently it's quite simply means "multicolored". there goes my nice theory about pies being thrown at the piper at some point

muscari

I also have a pot of muscari at home, and those haven't yet even started to open, whoch is another way round from the usual situation

infinity sign

the light is very mixed, and only a feeble attempt is made to rectify the white balance on the jumper - throwing the rest of the pic into blue and creating "stage light" appearance
boys pics on shutterstock

bird scroll

just playing

this guitar has a very nice wood grain to it and color is beautiful, so left most of the color in the guitar intact

large image is now gone

november in Norway

dunno why I processed this pic today, but there you go. That was taken last November in Norway. Name of the lake I can't recall at all

ranunculus

when florists pompously call those guys "Ranunculus", you can hardly guess it means "buttercup", essentially :)

the one grown as cut flower is apparently Ranunculus asiaticus (Persian Buttercup)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranunculus

this morning condensation

more backgroundy type of pics at shutterstock

maybe I should have left that beard on after all

I don't have studio equipment, not even a flashgun, so I make do with sunlight and white paper for reflectors.


other model-released pics on shutterstock

more crocuses

full format of this file is now gone from hiero.ru hosting

lot more flower images for sale at shutterstock

life cycle of umbrella bearers

- Can I hold this umbrella?
- It's better if I do.
- Why?
- 'Cos I am taller than you.
- When I grow up… Well, then you may be old, say, you
will be dead. That means, you go to heaven.
- And?...
- You know, heaven is far above. Higher than sky. But
you can't see nothing because you're, well, dead.
- And?...
- You know, this is a LIFE CYCLE of us. First you are a
baby,then you are a toddler, then a child, then a grown-up.
And after that you go to heaven. And after that you are a baby again.
- Really?!...
- Yes.
- And?!
- And when I am a grown up and you are a baby again, I can hold the umbrella.


This dialog is old, Yuri was about 6 when it happened. It still amazes me, though

crocuses today in Cambridge

there were quite a lot of people around this little lake of blue, snapping away, small cameras, SLRs, mobile phone cameras, you name it.

when I was getting into my car (parked for 20 mins at the Backs), whet looked like a japanese television crew was getting out of a van in the next slot. wondering if they came for crocuses too

multiplayer chess in fourth dimension

a challenge, for sure

snowdrops

Galanthus nivalis, common snowdrop, flowering on a roadside. My jeans' knees are now dirty :)

fractal feather background

free large format of this image will be available for a week at hiero.ru image hosting. Careful, over 6Mb there

other fractals for sale at shutterstock

instant sunshine

today is quite gloomy here, so a pic from costa del sol with (appropriately) sun in it. Btw, when you fully close the aperture in order to take this type of "star sun" image, what does the number of visible rays depend on? )there are eight of them on this one). My guess is the number of "petals" in the lens, but not sure.

btw2 - not dissimilar picture remains my bestseller on istockphoto site, accumulating over 400 dollars by now. There are pictures with lot more sales there, but they belong to other people, alas)

true colors : photovandalism

almost monochrome image of narrow street in Fuengirola. Was too boring in original shape, so played with it in photoshop and quite like the results :)

perching

Spain, Fuengirola beach. Well, you can't see where it is, you have to take my word for is

full frame at lori

fractal "flying notes"

at lori.ru

another one

at shutterstock

lipsticky lips

it's amazing what Apophysis software can do almost with no input from me



at lori.ru

twisted surfaces

big format on flickr

still snowing

still snowing today. as it is a wrong type of snow (as usual), schools opened in the morning but then closed again.

dragon

I've tried to teach Timur "wet-into-wet-on-limited-area" technique (see example here).
He watched with interest, nodded wisely, said that he understood everything and then produced this dragon - that has nothing to do with the technique, but is very pic in his very own style.

catkins

today's snow

horizontal crop is here

Puzzleball

Yuri completed his Ravensburger Puzzleball

more pics of the same thing - 1, 2, 3, 4

mini-narcissi

there was an image here but now it's gone

since my many photobanks have just one free image per week from millions they have (and some don't have any), I decided to have my own image of the week, and first one can be found here, distributed under creative common license

Job's tears

bought in Cape Town, those were described on the tag simple as "teething beads". I got curious what they were, and found that the "real" name is nice, too - Job's Tears (Coix lacryma-jobi) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Job%27s_Tears

the shop where we bought those is amazing and if you are into beads at all and find yourslef (suddenly, I am sure) in Cape town, don't miss it. Prepare a lot of money :)

and if you do click through to the shop - don't forget to click on the Jeep on the main page. bling-bling car

on the top of table mountain

it really was a cloud sitting on the top of the Table Mountain, from time to time it will become suddenly sunny and hot and next moment it's dull and grey again


and this pic was taken two mins later. spot the difference

diggers

Hout Bay beach. By the time Timur finished digging, his lips were purple, bordering on blue. It was very sunny and sun was strong, but water was cold. We saw a seal swimming inside the herbour

the only gap

when we went up the Table Mountain on the 2nd of January, "tablecloth", the cloud that often covers the top of it, was "on" - apparently uncharacteristically for this time of year (summer).

there were practically no gaps in clouds when we were going up (we could see Cape Town when we started walking, but soon entered the tablecloth). There was one gap in the clouds when we were at the top, and everybody started taking pictures - of, as you can see, some generic bit of ocean with two white boats on it

Acrophobic entry

"I'm not afraid of heights, I'm afraid of depths. I'm not afraid of going up, I'm afraid of coming down"

dunno who said it but they are absolutely right

at wikipedia

llandudno beach

I love those stones.
Seems very odd that this place shares a name with llandudno in wales

Hattifatteners

cormorants really

flowering crassula

unfortunately, on the day we went to the Cape of Good Hope it was gloomy and even rained. But there was a lot to be seen and photographed

Cape of Good Hope

on wikipedia

vineyards in South Arfica

at lori.ru

Lion's Head, as seen from Signal hill

in wikipedia

panic, panic, panic

two more pics (closer up) of those birds are here

winter apples

don't know how, but this tree is still holding on to the apples

same pic on stockexpert

foggy field

horizontal frame at stockexpert

shadows on passing clouds

african grasses

grasses at shutterstock

altocumulus lenticularis

Same cloud at shutterstock