This is the building where the offices of The Oxford Preservation Trust reside. This is all that remains of the original

St Ebbes area before the area was cleared and people were moved to a new housing estate on the edge of Oxford.

As you can no doubt see the door is slightly higher than the actual pavement, which probably means the pavement is not

at it’s original level when this sort of house dominated the area.

This is at the end of a row of similar houses (which are largely populated with students, rather than

office space for the trust). They are pratically on my doorstep.

9th of October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings -
Exposure: 0.005 sec (1/200)
Aperture: f/7.1
Focal Length: 70 mm
ISO Speed: 200
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode: Program AE

I do have a particular weakness for squirrels. This shot took a lot of patience partly because squirrels don’t like staying still for too long when they

know theres an odd human with a camera stuck on a pole chasing them and also because i was getting used to shooting with a monopod.

I saw this scene several times over in the last month in Christ Church Meadow, this may or may not have been the squirrel that eluded me on several occassions throughout October. I like this photograph because it shows off a squirrel’s natural behaviour during the Autumn.

8th of October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings -

Exposure: 0.008 sec (1/125)
Aperture: f/5.0
Focal Length: 190 mm
ISO Speed: 100
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode: Program AE

Not the most attractive photograph I’ve ever taken. But I do get quite amused by dogs and the way they behave around other people and

things like ducks. It wasn’t a very good day weather wise. Not much else i can say about this photograph as i think it’s quite obvious what the

dog has been upto in Christ Church Meadow.

7th of October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings were as follows -

Exposure: 0.006 sec (1/160)
Aperture: f/5.0
Focal Length: 190 mm
ISO Speed: 200
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode: Program AE

So what does Kevin do when he’s stuck inside due to the rain ?

He grabs whatever he can find and arranges it into a still life style photograph.

Which meant i had several magazines, a lens cap or two, a camera body cap and some battery covers, and a little bit of

natural light to play with (the sun was poking it’s head through the clouds).

So i arranged it into something random, and tried to capture the best light using my Canon EF 50mm F/1.8 MKII lens (it’s plastic but

fantastic). I tried to only have the lens cap, body cap and battery covers in focus while blurring the magazines. I then converted the image

to black and white to further enhance those elements and it also allowed the weak daylight to shine through a bit more. This took around 20 minutes or so from start to finish. When i develop an idea i can sometimes get the shot taken and then processed within a short amount of time.

6th October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings were as follows -

Exposure:  0.033 sec (1/30)
Aperture:  f/2.2
Focal Length:  50 mm
ISO Speed:  200
Exposure Bias:  -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode: Program AE

It’s not unusual in Oxford to find this kind of traffic mixed together.
On the one hand you have a bus preparing to head off towards George Street, while you have a cyclist heading out
of Broad Street, presumably headed in the same direction. Then you have a pedestrian chatting to somebody who
is hidden behind the white van, that part of Broad street is a pedestrian area most of the time.. I took this shot just in front of Debenhams department store, this allowed me a view into broad stret
and also a view of buses passing on the way to George street or to the bus stops along the road that Debenhams resides in.

A simple monochrome conversion was made using Canon’s Digital Photo Professional, with a few tweaks to the contrast, highlights and shadows.

5th October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings were as follows -
Exposure:      0.006 sec (1/160)
Aperture:     f/5.0
Focal Length:     190 mm
ISO Speed:     200
Exposure Bias:     -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode:      Program AE

As the title says the photograph contains swans in reflection on the surface of the River Thames.

I like the photograph mainly because it has two swans offering two different perspectives.

The Swan in the forefront of the shot just has the start of the reflection of it’s long and graceful neck, while the other

swan shows the full reflection all be it in a slightly blurred fashion. I also honed in on just that patch of the river to further isolate

both swans from the rest of the scene from the River bank in Christ Church Meadow which faces the Thames.

As for post processing, i did a few contrast tweaks along with a few tweaks to improve the colour’s tone and overall look.

Again i used Canon’s Digital Photo Professional. The reason for that ? I wanted to restrict myself to basic tools to try and stay as truthful to the image captured as i possibly could without the added temptations of Photoshop’s bells and whistles.

4th October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings were as follows -

Exposure:      0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture:     f/10.0
Focal Length:     214 mm
ISO Speed:     200
Exposure Bias:     -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode:      Program AE

This is a photograph of one the many butcher shops to be found in Oxford’s historic Covered Market, taken for the “A Month in 31 Pictures” flickr challenge. In this photograph i wanted to show off the butchers various joints of meat from a lower viewing angle, which puts the various

products front and centre with the actual butchers and shoppers in the background, as to not distract from the display. I also decided to not use flash and just the light that was available (a mixture of artifical light and daylight coming in through the glass in the roof of the market).

Again i decided to convert this to a monochrome image as it allowed me to bring more detail out using various methods in

Digital Photo Professional.

3rd October – A Month in 31 Pictures.

Camera settings were as follows -

Exposure:      0.02 sec (1/50)
Aperture:     f/4.0
Focal Length:     70 mm
ISO Speed:     200
Exposure Bias:     -1 EV
Canon Exposure Mode: Program AE

Taken on the 3rd of October 2009.

Image processed in Canon’s Digital Photo Professional using Picture Styles and the RAW image file format.

For more information about the Oxford Covered Market follow these links -

Wikipedia entry for the Covered Market.

The Covered Market website.

This is the second photograph from the challenge “A month in 31 pictures”.

The Photograph itself was taken at the entrance to Magdalen College that faces the High Street and captures  a unique moment time.

I had just been through Christ Church meadow and the Botanic Garden and spotted this scene. It took

several attempts to get the shot as i had it in my head. A simple conversion from colour to monochrome made the shot work better than it

did in colour. I like the fact that I have caught several people in mid conversation while another person walks into

Magdalen college with a suitcase on wheels. It’s a snapshot in time, which is the essence of photography at the end of the day to me

at least. Candid photography is a particular favourite of mine. I like capturing people as they go about the usual hum drum business of daily life.

Sometimes it captures some unique points of view, other times people spot me and give me funny looks. There is an art to candid photography and it’s something I’m still trying to master.

The shot itself was taken using my Sigma 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens set to 190mm, with an exposure time of 0.005 secs (1/200), with the ISO set t0 200, and the aperture was set at f/5.0.

More details about the shot can be find via the properties link on this flickr page.

Photograph taken on the 2nd of October 2009.

I took part in a flickr group’s challenge to take one photograph for everyday in the month of October.

Which was a bit of a challenge. This is the first image taken for the challenge.

It was taken in Oxford University parks. I aimed my camera at some tree branches with the auto focus switched on and

waited until i heard the camera beep to know that it was hopefully focused and then pressed the shutter button.

This photograph was the result, it required a bit of post production work in so much that i changed the picture style to

monochrome and played around with the options in Canon’s Digital Photo Professional. I only really use photoshop if i have something

specific in mind that requires layers and filter effects.

I chose this image as it jumped out at me as soon as i saw it on my monitor after i’d got in and started the long process of picking my way

through that days shots.

Is one of my favourite places in Oxford. It’s only a short distance from the main hustle and bustle of

Oxford. Though once inside the confines of the meadow you can at least for a little while enjoy the notion that you are in the countryside and not the urban chaos of Oxford.

The actual meadow is fenced off, but has a long path that winds it’s way around the meadow. A tree lined avenue leads you towards the River Thames, where you will discover benches to sit and a variety of birds that compete for your attention and lunch. You may also see from time to time, students rowing on the River for their respective Colleges.

In the photograph you can see that a group of women are having what looks to be an Alice In Wonderland themed tea party, in the distance you can see the fenced off meadow. Which usually contains Christ Church Colleges prized herd of cows.