Fáilte go gConga...

Just like someone waking up from a dream, I can't believe that I'm already on my 10^th day in here and only 3 days are left till I move out and head to Dublin.
I'm checking things right now for a possibility to visit Inchagoil island, which might take place on Sunday or Monday. Because of the pressure somewhat here, I've canceled my plans to visit Brigit Gardens. It is a nice place but I do need some time to enjoy the nature around the Waterfront B&B too. I do need time too to put my tools down and arrange them in order to fit it all inside my suitcase before heading to the station.

Today, I've headed to Cong town, in Co. Mayo, to the north of Oughterard (which lies in Co. Galway itself). The town is the location of Ashford castle, which is now a 5-star hotel, and Cong Abbey. Thus, in the beginning we headed to the castle.

On the way to Cong

Things had changed a bit since 2009. Apparently, there is now a gate before the golf course and to cross it there is supposed to be some sort of payment. Anyway, we passed the gate without paying anything. My first target was the main fountain in front of the castle, and there I've placed my stuff to do a panorama. It was a fast rhyming panorama because the sun was shining today. After that I've started to search for that mysterious pathway around the premises which I've went through 5 years ago. I remember this path had a name,  a very specific name containing the word "Lady" - but this year I didn't find this sign; it was all entitled as "The Walled Gardens".

On the top of the entrance of the path.

Now, I think this path is supposedly to go around the "monk's fishing hut" or something like that, but I'm just going to call it "the path". This path also leads or circles the Falconry school in the premises. I have to say I kind of got lost there trying to find my way to the old path I've encountered before 5 years ago. I went back and forth until I've encountered a gateway which I remember clearly that it lead to the gardens and the path, and some of the details there which I didn't catch back then are now into my camera! Once I've found the way, I've encountered a shaded path made of tree branches which was the perfect spot for some shots; and specifically IR shots.

After taking few shots for this short pathway with my Rokinon 8mm fisheye, I switched to my 15mm fisheye lens (as it is the lens I can use infrared filter with). Unfortunately I didn't have the time to cut a little piece of the infrared filter slide (which I have in my bag) to fit my Rokinon 8mm. Maybe I would do that any time now or maybe I should leave it till I get back home!

Infrared shot for the shaded path.

Now, to take this infrared shot, I was supposed to expose for around 12 minutes. I was somewhat in a hurry and urging to move forward, specially that this spot was in the midway and I was expecting people passing by (the passage is narrow and I was blocking it). Thus, I've decided to shoot it at ISO400 instead of ISO100, which reduced the time from 12 minutes to 3 minutes only. And, they were really long minutes! Another infrared shot was made later in a different position, but at ISO500 to make it even a bit faster. That one took 6 minutes to be done! Those trees surely do provide a good shade.

Going back to the beginning...

On the way I took various shots for the forest and the path in different lenses (mainly the 8mm Rokinon fisheye). In general though, I think they are quite the normal shots like those I've done 5 years ago. In fact, they are even less in number. And here comes the problem which I will talk about briefly later.
After finishing I've just headed to the cab and since I was tired, I asked the driver to just skip the abbey. Thus, no pictures or panoramas from there, despite the magnificent architecture of that abbey. Even when I got into the car, I've left my camera at the backseat and didn't keep it with me to take pictures on the way. I was so tired, not only physically, but also emotionally.

It seems that I'm pressuring myself just to take pictures because everyone was expecting me to take a lot of pictures. This stress, probably, lead to my brain to switch off and I couldn't notice the beauty that I was hoping for like when I was a freshman to this area 5 years ago! I think I've missed the point big time and it is time for me to just enjoy my vacation without thinking about photography - and this is something I'm planning to do soon, just before I leave this place. As for now I've canceled my plans for Brigit Garden, and maybe I will do one night photography in the coming few nights for me here just before I leave…

What is "Sleep"?

I can't believe it! I'm seriously typing this blog now not because I have to, but just to pass the time and leave work in around one hour from now. Not much was going on except that I've been going around images, old images, and can't find anything new or any idea to start on with with my camera! Besides, I'm having sleeping problems galore. Mostly, as I think, because I can't keep myself awake after getting back to work. It is something that I needed to master in many months of hard work and, of course, coffee drinking. Now? Because of fasting, I can barely walk when I get back home. I tried so hard to keep myself awake by playing games and working on some photos, but the problem is not in being tired at all, as for the thirst or hunger, I've seen worse days in the past when I used to fast in mid-summer with a long period of working hours more than it is now in Ramadhan. The main thing is psychological. Working or playing, I just need something to release my stress with, and that is usually a drink, or some snacks.

On my games list now I have now a queue waiting, as well as on the books that I've downloaded, I can barely read something. I noticed that I do read PDF magazines better, maybe mainly because of the design and the layout (and the many ads!), and mainly, if there is some topic I'm not interested in, I just skip it and that's it. On the games side, I'm currently playing "Delaware St. John, Seacliff tragedy, volume 3". An adventure game, which unfortunately I didn't play it from its beginnings, but apparently it is about someone with some psychic ability and keeps seeing visions. Seems there is a side-line story about his life and history and where did he come from, but all, I guess, would be present in the previous volumes that I didn't play.

Generally, the game looks nice with a spooky theme, but I believe the controls are somewhat weak. Sometimes it is a hard task to find an object in some scene, and hence I've been using the walkthrough a lot. The graphics are moderate I would say, still, it is nice and not too lousy. I'd give 4 out of 5. Other games now on the list are the Dark Fall 2, or which was renamed "Lights out". One of the creations of Jonathan Boakes. Despite the fact it is relatively and old game (made before the amazing Lost Crown), but I didn't get the chance to play it still. I've downloaded it for now, and kept it on the queue to play with it after Delaware St. John, or, I might take a break with some hidden object game, like "The Haunted Hotel - The Lonely Dream".

As for my work with images, specially those taken from Ireland last year of course, I've noticed that now, I'm less dependant on the HDR capabilities in forming my images. I still use it though, but not as frequent as before. This perspective was also pushed forward with strange erratic behavior from photomatix and photoshop, which produced some weird noise over the windows that I could barely see the images displayed or the controls and sliders, but in Photoshop it was there, but less problematic because it all concentrated on the upper side of the window. Now, the problem had gone suddenly without doing a reboot, and I remember I've turned off something from the "processes list". Yet, I can't remember exactly what it was.
However, I'm trying to find those shaky images and, since I've taken triplets most of the time, I try to take the most stable version of those and work on it hard with the RAW converter to make a suitable one. If all fails (or sometimes without it being a failure), I just flip to black and white and enhance the contrast then.
One of the images that I've re-worked and unfortunately, was not accepted for the second time now, is the arched wall of Cong's Abbey, which the chromatic aberrations took the best out of it. On the way of Jonathan Boakes here, I've tried to make a vivid image out of it by converting it to black and white, yet, it was not accepted still in stock sites I know, but some people liked it, and I guess mainly because, as I think, they could see the minimized version only which almost hides those noises.

Cong's Abbey Arch (vertical panorama, originally in HDR)

Other than this image, there had been lot of photos that I've been working with. Some of them I've even discarded without saving the file, and some were only uploaded to my Photobucket. One of the images however, that frankly, I didn't expect stock sites to accept it, is an image I've called "Valhalla". Valhalla in Norse mythology is the court of gods or the place where gods live. Something like mount Olympus for the Greeks. I don't know why I thought of this paganic name (because I do hate to use such terms), but the clouds were so gorgeous here.

Valhalla

The scene was taken afternoons. It was not a storm, nor it was rainy or anything, but simply clouds passing by in various colors over Lough Corrib. I expected this image to be refused for many reasons, but well, I think I was lucky! This image was composed already by HDR, but I tried my best to show the details of the clouds and not make them plain, while in the same time trying to keep a somehow natural look. The tree and the far-side shore made a problem with the noise level in these areas when the RAW file was edited alone which made me think of making it a silhouette scene. Yet, with HDR the problem was almost solved, but with some minimizing to hide the artifacts! HDR itself produced me a problem when some banding in the blue color in the topmost portion of the image persisted. I had to choose that portion and go with gaussian blur as minimum as possible to hide this banding. Isn't it gorgeous? I remember myself literally raising my hands up feeling like I'm touching the clouds with my bare hands. I do miss Ireland already...

Another image, single RAW this time and not HDR, was the mushrooms beside the oak tree in Brigit's gardens. I took a triplet of those, but they were mostly shaky with one being stable somehow. I needed excessive sharpening to get it, somehow, into normal.

Yet, I didn't feel quite satisfied, so I went along and converted it to the typical mysterious black and white version. Gives me an impression of witchcraft on the go...

Both of the images above were submitted to stock sites. I've noticed recently though that I'm just too lazy to add a watermark on my images. I wonder if this is... right? or wrong? I don't know. But it is there on the mushrooms anyway. Some people said to me directly and openly that they are downloading my images after viewing them in Photobucket, but anyway, I don't mind since most of them are watermarked.

Well, time for me to pack things up and leave this place at once. I need a real shower today!!!

Cong, Co. Mayo.

Today, after breakfast, I traveled along within a taxi to another county: Mayo. I headed (with the taxi of course) in a long journey that almost took one hour of driving to a village called Cong, on the north of the Loch Coirib. This long way was supposedly to be shortened (with lesser expenses) by a ferry, but since the ferry stops at the end of the September with the end of tourism season, I had to take the hard way. Not only that, but a ferry would take you into the lake to an island in the Corrib, named Inchagoill, where a grave stone of St. Patrick nephew is supposedly to be there with a church that dates back to the 5th century, and also a 12th century's Romanesque church. However, today I went to Cong, and tomorrow, if the weather was nice I shall be heading to Inchagoill by boat.

There are three main sites to see in Cong, but I saw only two of them since I didn't really care much about the third! They are: 1. Ashford Castle which has been turned into a luxurious hotel, 2. St. Feichin Monastery which dates back to the 6th century, 3. A museum, which was the house where a movie was shot, named "The Quiet Man."

1. In Ashford castle, tourism was much still alive and people were going in and out, either for picnics or to play golf in the wide green fields around the castle. I took many shots around the place and I had a long walk in the forest behind the hotel (the castle). We were thinking that the monastery is somewhere around the castle but we got it wrong. Anyway, I really loved the trees there, and some of them were giants and obviously hundreds if not at least one thousand years old. On the way out of the place, we asked a valet about the monastery, and he guided us to it. It is in the village itself and not near the hotel.

2. We got back to the village and found the monastery. Frankly, I don't know if it is St. Feichin monastery, but it was Cong Abbey, or "Ministreach Chonga." It was a national monument as the signs in the place denoted and from the design and the hard rocks it was obvious that it was a medieval building. The graves were every where and I was trying hard not to stop on them. The dead deserve their respect. The graves were marked by a grave stones sometimes but lot of times they were marked by a Celtic crosses. The abbey had a second floor which was exposed like a roof, and I tried to take a panoramic shot up there. The building was magnificent, and after the castle of Aughnanure, this is the second time I see a real medieval building with religious significance. The castle itself was not completely medieval as it was obvious that it had been renovated to be in shape of the hotel that it is seen today. The abbey was unique with its ruins. Upon my way out, I snapped the gate of the abbey as well;

3. On the way back from Cong, I had a nap in the taxi, as the long drive to Cong actually made my stomach a bit disturbed. On the way though, I couldn't help to stop my camera from snapping but this I had to make fast shots with no HDR intention (3 shots with different exposures and blah blah blah). There were many spectacular views for Connemara hills and the Corrib lake with the road being up and down all the way, but I had few shots that were good enough, specially with the problem with the light source and the speed of the shutter;

Tomorrow, Hopefully, I'll be heading to Inchagoill, and only 4 days left to get back to Dublin, and on the 5th day then, I shall fly away back home!