How the camera lens works

When talking about camera lenses it's helpful to use the analogy of the human eye. Eyes and cameras work in    pretty much the same way, with light going through an aperture (pupil) then through a lens onto a recording surface (retina). As the pupil of the eye contracts to deal with varying light conditions the lens of a camera bends and curves in order to focus, depending on the distance of the subject.

A camera lens is basically two conjoined prisms and because prisms refract light, the rays are bent inwards to meet with each other at a focal point. The point on a vertical surface where the rays meet is the focal place which is where your film or (more likely) digital sensor is placed to capture the image formed by focusing the rays.

Again, I hope you found that interesting and, yep, the photos weren't taken by me...

Up close and personal with the Scottish bluebell

 More bluebells from Kinclaven...you'll probably get
a bit sick of seeing these after a while! Feel free to
comment because I'd love to hear any tips or constructive criticism you might have for me!

Here's something you might find interesting:

The true Scottish bluebell is under threat from hybrids, created through the crossing of Scottish bluebells and Spanish bluebells. These hybrids don't have any scent and out compete the native plant for space etc. So, if you're in to plants you can order a packet of native bluebell seeds and plant them in your garden to help save the British bluebell!

Flames

Burn baby burn! I took this because humans seem to have a fascination with fire, and I'm no exception. Flames can make suck interesting shapes so when you point and snap you can be certain every photo will be different. Then, it's just a matter of picking which one you like best.

Canoe on a perfect day

I just googled canoeing poems and came up with this which pretty much described the above photo and how laid back and enjoyable my Duke of Edinburgh training expedition was!

To hear the breeze in the trees, 

I slowly paddle the oars.

I take my time to breathe, 

to land on the island shores. 

(Jay W. Allen) 

How light works

I've just started the higher photography course at school and I thought I'd share some of my recently gained useful photography know how with you all...

Light waves come in different frequencies that relate to the energy of the wave. As humans, we can only see the visible spectrum which sits in middle part of the frequency table; so we can't see things like gamma rays because they're too high a frequency and we can't see microwaves because they're too low a frequency.

Focusing on the visible spectrum what happens to light when it hits something depends on three things...the frequency of the wave, the strength with which atoms in the material hold on to their electrons and the energy of the light wave. This can create a few different effects:



Reflection:

Like in mirrors. Light rays don't penetrate the object deeply and electrons holding the energy pass it straight back out at the same frequency. 

Transmission:

Objects like glass seem transparent because the light frequency is too high to make the electrons vibrate so that the light rays aren't captured and pass straight through the material.










Refraction: 

Light rays are slowed down and bent, creating a glittery effect like water on a brilliantly sunny day or diamonds.




Absorption:

Electrons are absorbed so rays don't bounce back and materials are opaque like wood.



Scattering:

Light rays are thrown in loads of different directions by a rough surface like that of paper.






I hope you guys have found this if not helpful, a little bit interesting and by the way, the images on this post aren't my own!

Run Balmoral 2013

These are a couple of photos I took when I took part in Run Balmoral 2013. It was a brilliant event and I'm recommending it to everyone who enjoys running (and even those who don't!).  I completed the 5k course in 27:04 or 06 and raised 104 pounds for Cancer Research UK and an additional hundred for the Blairgowrie Lyric Choir. I hope to beat my time for next year and I'm pretty positive that I can do it as well.

 

The picture below is of some of the secondary kids unwillingly taking part in the most hilarious warm up routine I have ever witnessed. Basically you have to copy a bunch of ladies dressed like tomatoes as they bust warm up moves to pop music. I took part in the warm up for the 5k mostly because I found it so funny.

Plastic surgery

I've been really annoyed lately because since one of our laptops was upgraded to windows seven, I can't edit photos because there is no more windows live photo editor!!! The only way I can edit them when I want to is by putting the computers on my mum's laptop. When I do this, I have to delete the photos afterwards because she doesn't want them slowing down the computer. I only recently discovered I could edit stuff on mum's laptop as well...this was after I'd downloaded Gimp onto the other laptop which slowed it down sooo much. It's a good thing that laptop is on its way out anyway, otherwise I probably would have got a row!

Here are my edited photos which I went a bit mental with!

Yeah...this is like giving photographs plastic surgery

 I tried to make this one as creepy as I could...

The carving was pretty faint so I just spruced it up a bit :)