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Two years ago I took this photo of the Albury railway station:

However the version I submitted in the May competition at the camera club was the result of a few hours of processing, the most processing I have ever done to an image:

I first took the image out of Lightroom and into GIMP where I “corrected” the perspective. You know, to make the verticals vertical. I also stretched it vertically because it was looking a bit squashed.

Once back in Lightroom I began to liberally apply the spot removal tool to remove the parking signs and one of the chimneys, the goal being to make the image symmetrical. My final changes were to add a gradient to bump up the exposure of the bottom half and an overall change to the levels.

I entered the image as a print, which the judge awarded a highly commended.

I also recieved highly commendeds for two other images, both from the Perth road trip and both entered as EDI. First was this image of the red earth and blue skies near Marvel Loch:

Second was this image of water pooled on some rocks in the desert:

This second image was also modified from when I first posted it to Flickr, it is a different crop, contrast has been increased and a gradient applied to the sky to bring out the clouds.

My final image featured the regrowth on the trees near Marysville, burnt in the Black Saturday bushfires:

This morning I went for a bicycle ride from home to the Caulfield campus of Monash Uni and back. At a trip distance of 10km each way (not the exact same path) I was surprised that I got there in just over 25 minutes, with the entire round trip taking just over an hour.

As I currently work at the Clayton campus, why would I ride to Caulfield? Because they will be renovating our building (yes again…) and this time they want 100 people to move to space in Caulfield for the six months the renovations will take. Although we were told late last year that they wanted to renovate the building, it was only a few weeks ago that they dropped on us a deadline of construction “starting” in June. After much discussion within our team, we finally decided to say yes to moving.

At Clayton we are not in the main campus, we are out on Blackburn Road which means that on the days I don’t ride my bike, there is free parking on the street a short walk away. At Caulfield the parking is much more limited (there is also a large railway station next to the campus) which changes my transports options to bicycle or public transport.

After extensive review of online maps and aerial imagery, today was a test and this is the path I followed:

The route is what I determined to be the most direct, while still avoiding hills and busy roads where possible. The route back is different, significantly in that I will not return via High Street Road as a big downhill would turn in to a painfull uphill stretch. Just look at the elevation profile:

Breaking the ride down it is:

• Along High Street Road taking advantage of the downhill to maintain speed
• Onto the Gardiners Creek Trail, including crossing under Warrigal Road
• Loop onto the footpath and then follow Argyll Street that parallels the railway line
• At the freeway join the western end of the Scotchmans Creek Trail to get to East Malvern Railway Station
• Through the station carpark and then out and along Waverley Road.
• Leave Waverely Road for the parallel side street of Ardrie Road
• Onto Burke Road for a short distance and cross over Princes Highway at the lights

The route home is the reverse of this until nearing Holmesglen Railway Station where I enter the station carpark and then use the pedestrian bridge over Warrigal Road where I follow the railway line until Mount Waverley Railway Station. The benefit of this change is that instead of climbing the hill up the busy High Street Road, I use a mix of off-road paths and side strees.

Variations include:

• Heading up to Mount Waverley Railway Station and following the railway line on the way in
• Keeping to the Gardiners Creek Trail and getting to East Malvern Railway Station from the other side of the freeway
• Following Gardiners Creek Trail further until Winton Road and then using side streets on the north side of Waverley Road

Of course there is one other variation that I wouldn’t plan on using, but is handy to have: using the train between East Malvern and Mount Waverley Railway Stations.

It is not yet final if we will move to Caulfield during the renovations (keeping the team together is one of our conditions), but now I know that cyling is a realistic option.

For the April competition at the camera club I submitted this image of the old pilings at Princes Pier as an EDI:

The judge did award this a merit, but after seeing it as a square thumbnail, I tried changing the crop to square:

I much prefer this version of the image and I wish I had submitted it this way. As I am planning to enter images into the Warrigal National this year, I will submit it to that (and the Pakenham National) as the square version.

On the other hand I am happy with my other images I submitted for the monthly competition. The two prints were both from a road trip up to the Snowy Mountains and are both photos of the road:

My other EDI entry was from another recent road trip, specifically Wreck Beack on the Great Ocean Road. To shoot the sunset from the beach you do need to climb back up three hunderd and sixty six steps.

By the way, expect to continue to see a number of road trip sourced photos, because that has been where I have actually been taking photos…

While there are no set subjects for the monthly competitions at the camera club this year, there are two competitions where the entries must be submitted in monochrome. What this ends up meaning for me is that I look through my photos for ones with textures or patterns, and then convert them to monochrome.

The first of these is a version of an image that is currently up on my wall, one taken at the old Spotswood Pumping Station. I tried to bring out the patterns made by the brickwork and also brightened the dial as it was looking washed out.

My second image was from a day trip down to the Mornington Peninsula on ANZAC day last year, a day where heavy fog covered Melbourne and the surrounding area all the way to Hastings. This foggy image was almost monochrome to start with.

My third image was from my recent trip along the Great Ocean Road over the Australia Day weekend where I captured the silhouette of a bicycle rider. It is the perspective that makes them seem out by themselves, and I hoped to enhance the textures in the clouds in monochrome.

My final image (which recieved a merit) was taken of an old shack in Jamieson (near Lake Eildon) and much of the processing was done while experimenting with Snapseed on another club members iPad.

Earlier in the week I posted about the first of the monthly competitions at the camera club for the year. After which I realised that I had not posted about the August, September and October competitions from last year.

Of my ten entries, these are my favourites:

On the last legs of the Perth road trip we arrived at the Ceduna jetty at exactly the right time for this long exposure image that was awarded a merit.

The Easter break included a day trip down the Mornington Peninsula on a day that fog covered all of Melbourne, even down to Hastings where it began to lift.

While keeping an eye out for timber structures in interesting shapes I looked at the scenic railway during a club outing to Luna Park, this was awarded highly commended.

The final topic of the year was “sports action” where I returned to stereotype by setting up a scene involving lego (to get a highly commended).