TwinGuard Photography

Selected images from an amateur photographer, comments and advice welcome. This work by TwinGuard Photography is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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Colourspace Clapham Common, a musical glimpse into a possible Dome Colony on Mars.

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Milky Way rising over Fantasy Canyon, Utah | by Derek Sturman

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This is an amazing shot kudos to the original photographer for catching it

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Being a tourist in a place that you know well always brings out a different perspective.

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Life gets hectic, you get tunnel vision and forget about the bigger picture. Taking time for yourself, with someone who can help you find the perspective you need is important. Having breakfast in a rooftop restaurant with a stunning view also does wonders for your ability to make sense of the world.

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I spent some great days in the alps with some old (and new) friends. Despite leaving my camera behind I got some some nice shots on my phone. I promised one of these friends first dibs on the images. I'll see if he leaves me any more to post. After a fabulous few days the sun was finally setting. It's always a shame that these happy, chilled days are so fleeting but however brief they are it is nice when they offer you such a parting gift.

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Gremlins & tumblr

These are gremlins of my own.making. I've been relying on my überswish tech for too long and am now having access issues.

There are images I want to edit and update. Once I get these sorted there will more posts, I.gov then please bare with me.

TwinGuard

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Travel is important. It changes the way we relate to the world, and in some way to ourselves too. But with so much travel we focus on the destination, what we will see, what we will experience. There is generally little thought given to how we get there. This is generally down to the fact that travel has become so accessible these days that we pay the journey little heed. At one time the very journey once held us in a state of wonder, the very idea of flight captured our mind. I recently took a flight sat next to someone on their very first flight, the day was grey with low cloud and my co-traveller was disappointed they they wouldn't be able to see the world from above as they had imagined. I chose to make sure they would have a memorable, unique and wholly unimaginable experience (for one that has never flown) and made them focus their attention outside the porthole. The look on their face was one of confusion and sadness as Althea saw was grey cloud and rain at close quarters. Quickly this face transformed in to one of wonder and amazement as the plane broke through the clouds and was bathed in sunlight. They where speechless, seeing a cloudscape from above for the first time. This image was taken on a different journey, but it reminds me of that flight when I rediscovered the wonder of travel through the eyes of a complete stranger.

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Travelling can be a nightmare. Early mornings, late nights, long delays and missed connections.Some train journeys, though, are easier than others, especially when you get this out of your window.

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Earlier this year I took a little stroll through the UN quarter of Geneva. The day was grey, and dull, and cold, I hadn't slept all that much or that well but I took a stroll, half to wake up and half to see the city. I've travelled through Geneva quite a bit in my life and have rarely stopped.

The UN quarter is an interesting place. Not the prettiest, not the busiest (especially on a cold day), not even imbibed with the moral authority one might associate with that organisation. It was empty. Almost hostile. As if the physical cold had been carved into the marble and sandstone blocks that make up the buildings.

And in a corner this gently rusting field gun. Placed on a spit of grass, aimed at the old League of Nations building. It's muzzle knotted and holding up a wheel. A fairly unambiguous symbol of the UN's goal to end conflict.

It has a way to go before it achieves this, but at least it's ambitious. That gives me hope.

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As I’ve said before, phone cameras have made casual photography very easy indeed. The only issue is that they tend to be optimised for landscapes and street scenes as they usually have a large depth of field.

The flip side is that the software that controls them easily rivals, in my opinion, that found in DSLRs. The white balance my phone chooses is generally better than my DSLR.

Slightly handier to lug around too.

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An other mobile phone shot. I recently upgraded, nothing to do with the camera in the phone, the old one just wasn't working properly any more. I have to say that I am surprised by the quality of image these phones now produce, the richness of the colour and the level of detail that they can capture. just wish they where easier to use. Have you ever tried taking a photo when your fingers are about to freeze off?

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An excursion to Oxford brought my into contact with a friend of mine. As I have the habit of doing these days I had my camera with me as we went for a stroll through the town. The image above is a result of a bit of self-indulgence in street photography, I toyed with the idea of making this a black and white image but there is not enough contrast in the scene to make a good black and white photograph. Someday I'll crack that particular egg.

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I'm lucky to have understanding friends, they put up with my constant snapping with relative good humour. At times I can persuade them to pose for me, but often I prefer to capture a candid moment, a time when they feel less self-concious and their personality comes through naturally.

There are times though that serendipity works in our favour. Here I got the white balance setting completely off, hence the blue tint of the image, this is because of my haste to take the shot and not lose the moment. As it happens it was a cold day last November and the tint works well, in my opinion, contrasting with the half-hidden smile behind the scarf.

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Snow is wonderful, it's produces do many textures. In terms of sound, temperature, dispersion of light. Mountains are a fun place to be with or without a camera. I'm going to sort through the shots I took a will be posting more in the near future

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I started taking pictures, as in really thinking about the image I was trying to capture rather than just snapping away at anything and everything in sight, about 18 months ago. This is one of the first. I'd unearthed my father's old 35mm and found a treasure-trove of lenses to go with it, and pretty much decided on the spot to see what I could produce.

This was to be a training experience, one that is still ongoing. I bought myself some cheep (as in dirt cheep) film from a local chemist, and went in search of "stuff" to photograph. I can't even remember the type of film it was, or the ASA rating it had, but I got (what I consider to be) some nice shots. And some not so nice ones. I may post a few of those in future, to try and understand what I did wrong.

Though I rarely take that old 35mm out anymore I still want to go back to it, there is something about the feel of the camera, the film, the lenses and the images it captures that feels richer.

Then again I may just be deluding myself.

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Always nice to shoot a hot subject. A bad joke but I couldn't resist, like the chives posted earlier this was an attempt to learn how to play with the depth of field on my digital camera. I need to do a lot of work to understand how to use it to it's full potential mainly in terms of playing with the white balance but that will come with time.

Any pointers or suggestions are always welcome.

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I have a confession to make, I really want to get into portrait photography. That may surprise a number of you given that most of my subjects are land/city scapes. I have difficulty in approaching people for amateur shoots, I'm just going to have to get over it really, until then I'll do what I've been doing for a while now, practicing on those who won't tell me to get lost.

Thank-you Ma Nature