November/December Flickr Meetup: Fun Time!

Well, yesterday was a little short. Picture wise. The reason? I wanted to end the week with a bang. A few drinks, everyone settles in, and *POW*! Flashes and cameras going like mad. Okay, MY camera was doing it for a bit. And these are my shots. Nothing like a bunch of photo geeks having fun.

November/December Flickr Meetup

It was back to the Victory Cafe for this one. We were there back in the spring, but I wasn't going to complain. They have a good micro-brewery selection of dark beers and stouts to choose from. This was the last one of the year and a combination of two months. Christmas parties and holidays are enough to throw anyone's schedule off. So I headed out looking to see old friends, new ones, and talk shop. A good night I think.

March Toronto Flickr Meetup: Techniques and Stuff

One of the fun things about these meet ups is learning new tricks. For some of the more experienced, it's nothing. For those of us just starting out, it's a whole new world. At the last meet up some one demonstrated an interesting technique called the "beer filter". Essentially what you do is hold your pint of beer in front of the flash while taking a picture. Here are two samples I did that night, the beer I was drinking at the time was called "Hockley Valley Dark Ale", very nice flavour and a great colour too.



Well I was sitting at one of the tables, Sui Gen picked up my camera and started taking pictures with it. I was curious to see what he was doing, but I was patient and waited till he was done. The next couple of pictures were what he took.


What he was doing was creating a blur of lights on the camera sensor and using a combination of slow shutter speed, flash, and pulling the zoom all the way back in at the same time. He demonstrated once more and then gave me the camera back to try it. Here were my two attempts.


Originally I didn't think anything happened in the first picture. You have to look closely at the bottom left to see anything, as well the picture has to be a bit larger.

Keeping your eyes open was key too. This is nothing about technique really. Some one said "Oh, that girl in that dress makes a nice match with that picture". Having my camera ready, I asked permission, and took two pictures. You learn sometimes from someone else's eye.



Well that's about it for today. Oh, except for one more picture. This has nothing to do with the meet up really. Just the technique I learned from Sui Gen applied this past Saturday night.

I think I learned well.

Paladin Phil

March Toronto Flickr Meetup

Last week was another meet up of fellow Flickr photographers. I am finding these to be fun to socialize, talk cameras, and talk technique. Quite a few of us there this time. We met up at the Victory Cafe at Lennox and Markham streets, which is near the main intersection of Bathurst and Bloor. Great place to go since you have the iconic "Honest Eds" Store there on the corner.

Here's a few shots today of the people, and the cameras that were there when I arrived a little late.


And the back of the building at night.


Tomorrow will be techniques and stuff that I was shown and learned.

Paladin Phil