Ave…

The weather is getting colder here, as well as my heart along the way I presume. It would have been such good news and feeling, if not for the passing of a dear online friend that suffered from a long battle against diabetes. Though we never met really, but we still shared all the jokes and laughter together and she was quite fond of my photos. She dreamed that one day we might meet up in Ireland and even do some photography in front of her. She made me feel as if my photos from Ireland made her re-discover her homeland; As if she was not Irish already, living her final days in the US.

Rest In Peace, Paula Doak

Mearcair

Last week the news were out about a transit of Mercury over the disk of the sun. Not a rare event but it definitely is not the average event that would happen every year. I think the next transit for Mercury of this sort might take place in 2032 or sometime around that if I'm not mistaken, and I'm not sure even if it would still be visible in the sky here. Rarely even more than Mercury, are Venus transits. I think the next transit won't be happening in my life time at all!
Anyway, the adventure was set on Tuesday. I had a very limited time to prepare for the shoot as the transit would occur only at about 3:30 p.m. local time, and then in about one hour the sunset would officially start. To gain some time, I've actually prepared my gear the day before and made everything ready, so all I had to do is pick up the gear and head to the roof of my house. I still had some fears back then that some objects would block the view as the sun goes down in the sky but luckily none of that happened. So, in a nutshell, my gear was composed of:

• My modified Canon EOS 7D.
• Solar filter.
• Rokinon 800mm Mirror Lens (fixed at f/8).
• Flexible cable (will explain why below).
• Cable remote.
• Tripod of course, with ball head for easy and quick movement.

I had to refer back to my old tripod which I didn't use quite a while mainly because it extends quite high compared to my other most-used tripod, without needing to raise the central column or the neck.

The gear I used and you can see the cable around the mirror lens,
while the clips hold the solar filter over the lens front.
The shot was out of focus because the flies were really, really, really annoying.
Yes, that much annoying that I couldn't focus properly with my phone.

I was reluctant to use my old mirror lens with its cumbersome control mechanism; Just a complete manual lens with a primitive telescopic design crammed in a small volume. However, knowing that Mercury will be such a small dot over the sun disk, I've realized (and I've done my own research as well) that I do need a very long focal length, and here I had two choices. Either:

1. Use my Sigma 70-300mm with teleconverters, OR,
2. Use my Rokinon 800mm Mirror Lens.

Rokinon 800mm Mirror Lens f/8

Comparing the two, the scale tilts towards the Mirror Lens further. Because using teleconverters would reduce the light quality further (beside using a solar filter here) and this might not be such a good idea and the overall size of the whole lens/teleconverter combination would be too long and I'm sure it would give me some hard time in movement (specially with my external telephoto lens sleeve which is not quite as flexible as a regular sleeve on a real telephoto lens). Adding one teleconverter to my Sigma lens at 300mm would extend the focal length to 600mm. Adding another one would make this jump to 1200mm. Juicy! However, my previous experiences in shooting the sun with such a long focal length were quite cumbersome specially when it comes to moving tiny amounts of degrees to follow the sun (remember: the more you zoom in, the faster the celestial body will virtually move). So, imagine here that I'm jumping to 800mm with a single lens only and without much light quality loss; As simple as that.
Now, we come to the story of the cable. Since the focusing with such long focal length and cumbersome mechanism would prove to be a challenge, I got myself these multi-purpose bending cables or wires long time ago solely for this purpose; To wrap them around the focusing ring of the mirror lens and use it as a level to move the focusing ring gently. It didn't stop the shake though but it was quite useful nevertheless.

Mercury, after processing the image (cropped).
The lower right line is just some dirt.

Anyway, my main aim was to shoot a series of shots of Mercury crossing the sun disk but unfortunately after one hour of shooting or so, I just got plenty of images with the position of Mercury almost not moving. After being attacked by flies and sweating waterfalls I had to get inside and stop the whole thing (at that point it was past 4 p.m., and still didn't have lunch then!). So, technically, despite the many many images I've shot, I didn't quite get a serial sequence after all. Probably one of the mistakes that I've committed here is that I've focus on the sun (by checking the edges of the circle on LiveView of course) thinking that because of the great distance between Earth and the sun, Mercury would virtually be in focus as well. This seems to be not the case here though! When I've edited the images, Mercury was not quite that sharp dot on the disk of the sun, but more like a blot of ink!

100% Crop of one of the images. Mercury is the small black dot,
which I think it could have been more in focus. In some images, Mercury
completely disappears.
(click to enlarge)

What amazed though is the presence of dirt and other artifacts. I thought first that those are only on the solar filter from the outside but it turned out to be they are sensor artifacts. This is despite cleaning the gear (lens and camera) the day before and making sure all are clean (and using the loupe to check the sensor specifically). I'm not sure how this got in, but definitely I need to check and clean it later. Didn't have time to do so yet.
At this point, my little "silly" adventure with Mercury transit was over and I'm still checking the images Ivé shot (counted more than 2400 images) to see if I can do anything artistic about them! We'll see.

Finale

The departure of a friend, an online friend, is not in any way less drastic than a real physical friend's departure; Whether met or not. This departure was sudden to me, because she was supposed to be coping well with her new condition after amputating one of her legs because of some blood problems. Such a drastic and sudden change of events.
All these feelings actually are pushing me to write emotionally from the first moment I've heard the news, and typing an eulogy on her feed on Facebook. Now, I feel the urge and the necessity to really focus to write one poem at least for her sake.
All these ideas seem to clash now in my head though. I do have other tasks and other ideas of photography that I want to work on. One might consider typing or writing a poem is easy but that's not really the case at all. It needs dedication and time, and foremost, an immersion into your own feelings. Now my feelings are there hovering in the air as well as my words, but I have to turn my mind into a lens to focus these into proper and rhyming words on paper (or monitor that is). Goodbye Paula. May we see each other one more time, in peace…

Sláinte...

I'm here now, typing this from the Travelodge hotel in Ballymun, Dublin. It's kind of weird here to live without AC but only a heater - while the window doesn't permit much cold air in, and permits lot of noise from the main street. Anyway, it is just one night and I'm off.
I think I will be heading to the airport early. My flight is around 11 a.m. but I will check out from here around 8 a.m. and who knows what kind of traffic jams waiting on the road anyway.
As soon as I arrived here I had to get some deodorants from a pharmacy adjacent to the hotel (lucky me!), as my socks and shoes and about everything in me just sucks big time after yesterday's adventure! I'm going to use those deodorants with them and hopefully it will work, temporarily at least.
Tomorrow is the goodbye day to Ireland...

Slán Éirinn, beidh tú a mheabhrú i gcónaí

Goodbye Kuwait, Fáilte go hÉireann...

Well, this is my last blog post before traveling by next Monday, in the early hours of it. As I'm typing this I'm just checking the latest arrangements specially that I'm planning to take my camera bag with me on aircraft (usually I stash it within luggage itself), and I'm not quite satisfied about it despite assurances from some people who said they did take their cameras too and it's all fine - but I doubt they had a camera plus more than 6 lenses and filters too! I've been calling the airlines offices for inquiry but to no avail. Seems I have to do it anyway and wish for the best with hassle as less as possible.

The plan for now is to settle in Dublin for one day to rest, then moving next day to Galway by train and rest for one day there too, then next day I'm supposed to head to Oughterard where I'm going to stay for 14 days. Meanwhile, I will try to post something in this blog as much as I can, but since I'm planning for long walks in the countryside with heavy equipments I might be so exhausted to the point that my fingers won't work at all on the keyboard! Well, we'll see about that in time.


Goodbye Kuwait, Fáilte go hÉireann...

Through Negatives

Dublin, again... Goodbye Ireland.

Here I am, in Dublin again, getting ready to get back home by the morrow. I'm in the usual hotel, the Travelodge in Ballymun. Today the connection has been awful, or should I say my laptop had been awful. So I better wrap this as quick as possible.

I couldn't post yesterday because I was in Cahir House Hotel, and the connection is only available in the lobby and not in the rooms. However, I had sort of a busy day yesterday in Cahir. Once arrived I didn't spare a minute and went on directly to take out my stuff from the luggage again and the backpack. The camera, tripod and the VR-head. I was planning mainly for 2 panoramas only but then I found myself taking 3 panoramas and more single images. Some little panoramas were added later on even, when I got out of the castle.

The stairs inside the castle were about to suffocate me. Despite the fact that I went there in this chilly weather, I decided not to wear my jacket just to make my movements a bit easier inside the tunnels there and on the narrow stairs. Well, this did work a little, but never the less, walking around with a backpack and a tripod and VR-head was not easy either, adding my camera bag of course. On the top of the castle I took a 360 panorama (not spherical, only horizontal line) for a general view of the town from there. Although I raised the pole of the tripod to the max, the edge of the wall was still obvious in the view. I think I will have to accept it that way and then cut it out when I stitch the panorama together, hopefully.

I'm so concerned about the extra weight of my luggage and I'm thinking of reducing the weight significantly, but unfortunately, seems this is not possible. I'm afraid also to remove the gifts (that weigh maybe 1 kg in total) to my backpack and make some problems for myself before boarding. I was thinking of getting a new case to divide my stuff in between the two, but anyway, no shops for such things near by so I have to get a cab or a bus and I'm totally exhausted now. All I want to do is close my eyes and wake up at morning and be ready to take off. Seems no escape from paying extra for the extra weight.

Coat of arms, on the walls of Cahir Castle.

Goodbye Ireland. Hope this won't be my last time here. I will take off tomorrow, by 11:20 Irish time, that is 1:20 noon in Kuwait. And will arrive technically, after 12 hours! Tiresome day is awaiting... . Bye!

Slán Agat

Well, this might be my last post before leaving Ireland 2 days ahead. I'm packing my stuff, and checking my stuff, and by tomorrow I will head to Galway railway station to head back to Dublin. I will stay one night in Dublin and by the next morning I shall head to the airport to fly away.

Hopefully, I will be back to fill in this blog when I get back to Kuwait and with the old routine, and the Ayvarith and Alexander's story!

Slán agaibh, slán ó hÉirinn...