+10…

So, a month now since my official request for retirement and until the moment of typing these words, things aren't over yet. On a positive note, I don't have to go to work daily right now as I'm officially off, but I'm still not completely detached from work because I didn't finish the paperwork related to my "leaving certificate". Thus, the month of November just passed me by without a salary in bank account. To add pepper and salt to the wounds, everyone is just working slowly, barely answering phone calls, and what would take a day to be done or even less, takes up to 2+ days to do, if not a week or weeks.

Anyway, away from my ranting, I've decided for this week's post to talk about 10 of my images that had been marked as "Inspirational" by YouPic. This comes after finally having my 20th image marked as inspirational. I've made a post long time ago about my first 10 images, and so this post will be about my second 10 inspirational image, as noted by YouPic. 

+10

So, here is the list and in the order of picking them up as "inspirational". I'll try to be brief as much as possible in describing each image.

1.

_MG_7671

 The first image in the list as you can see bears no title, because, well, I didn't really care much about it and I didn't think of it as something special. It is one shot from a series, when I shot the fireworks during the "Constitution Day" celebrations back in 2012. I was on the roof of Soug Sharg Mall and the location was not special or anything; It didn't provide any good perspective or foreground. Yet, I kept shooting that night and got an arsenal of fireworks shots.

2.

_MG_7773

 As you can see, #2 is like its predecessor and from the same location but with a different focal length, thus more buildings and lights are included. Again, I didn't think of a title for this shot because, come to think of it, it's a series with loads and loads of firework images! I can barely remember my own passwords at this age now (yes, 41 is old). Just to add some "dynamism" to the image, I've decided to crop it at 16:9 as if it was some wide-screen movie scene. Unlike its predecessor, I didn't work quite much on the blacks here to make it lighter. I think the tones weren't helping anyway.

3.

_MG_7751

Another one (and a favorite) from the series of the fireworks which was also marked as "inspirational" by YouPic. I like this one in particular because of the 3D-ish look that happens to be here. I was able to lighten the pitch black sky a bit and like its predecessor, it was cropped to 16:9. At that time I was experimenting with the cinematic looks, so I used this ratio quite often to mimic a movie scene or something. Well, I still do sometimes. One weird thing about this image is that the recorded f-number is f/36, while I'm sure that the max f-number for all of my lenses is f/32!

4.

Peekaboo Building

Peekaboo Building was just a random shot that I've taken in Dubai in 2013, when I was there for some ceremony I was invited to. I've stayed for 3 days but, literally, didn't find much to shoot there during my stay. This place is just not my thing really. Anyway, this is one of the random shots that I've taken as I was walking aimlessly on the roads not from my hotel. Of course, this shot was cropped and adjusted (specially to make the vertical and horizontal lines as straight and divergent as possible). It was uploaded in the abstract section on YouPic even and not in the architecture section. To me, it looks quite random!

5.

Herr Fengus

Then, we have here my little friend which showed up one morning during COVID-19 lock up in 2020, and then disappeared the next day. Well, in our garden some fungi like this show and disappear regularly (I guess they don't stay because of the water force over them). Anyway, shooting Herr Fengus was quite a challenge, because it was taken handheld and getting low. Even the focus here is not quite pinned correctly and I had to do some compromise with the f-number to let in more light. Originally, it was white-yellowish in color, but with post-processing, things flourished!

6.

Abhainn na gCuimhní Binne
(river of the sweet memories)

The next one came to me as a complete surprise. An old shot from Oughterard, Co. Galway, Ireland, which was shot with my old Canon 350D (my first Canon camera ever), back in 2009, during my first visit to Ireland ever. The scene here is quite random but I tried to make something out of it by color grading and dodging and burning here and there. Seems all that work (which I wasn't quite satisfied with) did pay off with being picked for the "Inspirational" section by YouPic. I remember some of these white spaces (the sky) needed some fixes and I'm guessing I've sorted this out by some patching work.

7.

In The Grace of The Cormac

In The Grace of The Cormac is an old panorama shot in my second visit to Ireland, in 2010, and this panorama was the beginning of a series of re-stitched panoramas done from RAW files without resorting to HDR techniques. Also, in this re-stitch of this panorama, I've included a human factor in the middle which I used to remove in the original (and I was lucky to have this lady photographer at the center). Using only RAW in stitching is not quite easy as I thought! The panorama is shot inside McCormac cathedral which forms a compound with Cashel Rock castle.
[Worth noting that this panorama particularly is available in large size for download and printing as a fine art piece from my MostPhotos profile].

8.

Il-Pixxina
(The Swimming Pool)

The next one in the series of re-stitched panoramas (from RAW) comes from the swimming pool of the place where I stayed in Qala, Malta. This panorama was shot twice back in 2015. My first trial wasn't successful and problematic because the light was changing quickly, so I tried to fix that the next day with another shoot with somewhat proper timing. This re-stitch, however, which is made from RAWs, was made from RAW files of the first trial (which I didn't delete). One element is missing from the original (2nd trial stitch done first) and that is the cat which posed for me in the scene!

9.

بَـهْـجَـةُ الـعـاصـِيْ
(Sinner's Delight)

As for #9, we have another re-stitched panorama from the old days when I was "able" somehow to go out on those cold winter nights to the seaside and do stuff with my camera. Like its original predecessor, the RAW-only re-stitched panorama was a challenge in terms of noise and details, as well as exposure. The title of this panorama can be understood in two ways depending on the perspective of the viewer; Looking at the city, this place can be the delight that the sinner is looking for, or considering the isolation from the city, this place can be the delight of repentance that the sinner is looking for.
[Worth noting that this panorama particularly is available in large size for download and printing as a fine art piece from my MostPhotos profile].

10.

يَـحْـمـورْ
(Redness)

The last one, came about as a surprise to me for various reasons. First, it had been a really long time since any of my images was marked as "inspirational" on YouPic. Secondly, the image is actually some neglected test shot done in the summer of 2012. I don't find anything special in this image, and here was the challenge in fact (for me) to create some interest by color-grading and other editing techniques. I'm still thinking, how come I didn't point my camera to the city on the left and take a shot there showing the reflection on water? To add more "strength" to the image (so to say) I've cropped it into a square and made sure that the horizon line is around the center of the image. 

Finale

Now, this is the post for this week. I'm not sure if I will post in 2 weeks time, but I do have some ideas cooking in my head which I hope that they would produce something to post about then.

One of the ideas that cook in my head is to pay tribute to the great Arab tenor whose songs I'm in love with: Sabah Fakhri صباح فخري. This great iconic marvel passed away from our mundane world on November 2nd; An event that poured melancholy into my life further, but c'est la vie. I've did few images back in 2016 probably trying to get some inspiration from the classical he sang on various occasions, but I think those weren't enough. More work need to be done in this aspect and I hope that my willpower is up to it.

By the time this is posted, I'm praying that my status with my workplace is finalized. I've spent the whole month of November without a salary because of that and I'm praying that it won't be another month without it. A question keeps popping up in my head now and then: What now after retirement, TJ? However, I'm trying to suppress my thoughts for the time being and just focus on the rubbish on my full plate with all these stuff related to the workplace and the papers here and there. But if I'm to be honest with myself, I really don't know what is my next step after retirement, except that I need to enjoy my life just a bit. Just a bit…
 

 

Retinol III-IV

Busy busy busy. So busy that I can't even play games! Can you believe that? However, to be honest, the major portion of my time is consumed by bad sleeping patterns. All in all, I'm trying to cope with the daily tasks here as well as trying as much as possible to work with my camera and a little bit with a new venture: Adding educational posts to Pinterest. This is a new thing and probably I won't be doing it often, as other things in my life do already have their own priorities. But I'll try to do it whenever I get a new idea or whenever a friend (who is learning Arabic) might suggest.

Announcement

As promised and as with my previous posts, I'd like here to start with a little announcement for a new batch of uploads to the stocks. This time they are scattered across the usual stocks where I upload.

The new batch

First of all, one of these images (won't say!) was canceled from the upload because of some brand name and it would be such a time-consuming process to remove that mark (stock websites usually don't accept such images). Anyway, photos with faces are typically uploaded to Mostphotos, with the exception of only one which is accepted in Canstockphoto as well. The rest are uploaded across Dreamstime, 123RF, as well as to Canstockphoto. However, 123RF, again, did refuse all 5 uploaded images (most of them were denied for being out of focus!). I'm pretty sure they would not be accepted by other stock websites if they were indeed out of focus - there is something fishy or misunderstood going on.

With this new batch, I'm trying to find time to re-process some of my old panoramas, specially the old ones from 2011 and 2012 and prepare them to upload them to my Mostphotos along with the rest of the large-size panoramas there (with a width of 10K pixels). Issues keep arising here though, specially with the new lock-down and health, but I'm trying my best (with coffee!) to organize my time and priorities (and yes, I'm failing so far).

Retinol III

Then, we arrive at my third image for Retinitis Pigmentosa (this year) - which was actually done in the same day as the previous one in the previous post. It was a quickie idea that occurred to me and thought of working it out right away after finishing Sensing which I talked about in the previous post.

The Seeing Hand

The principle thing was to be simple actually; Just using the sun to shoot something and the rest is to be fixed later in Photoshop, and with the help of a fisheye lens (my favorite Rokinon 8mm), the dramatic impact can be achieved (in terms of sizes and emphasis).
The idea of the shot is about the usage of hands to navigate through our spaces as people with Retinitis Pigmentosa and how we are greatly affected with the change (continuous change or period changes) in the environment around us on us; This is specifically about changing furniture at home frequently. Something that I've often suffered from, and still.
People with Retinitis Pigmentosa, like me, are typically using their body parts and memory to navigate through places and when at home, it is mostly memory that gets activated because things are "supposed" to be in their own fixed places.
Now as for the technical part, the Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens does not have provide such a shallow depth of field, thus it was one of the first things to be done (after the general color editing in RAW first). It was important, though, not to exaggerate the synthetic lens bur here. Next, it was time to fix the eye on the palm, and for this, I've picked an old image from my arsenal (of my own eye). It was a struggle though to let it be as natural as possible as if it was drawn indeed on my palm. Till this very moment I'm not yet convinced that I did the job correctly.
Anyway, the shot was liked by some people specially those with Retinitis Pigmentosa and could relate to this particular problem. Thus, if you are reading this and you do know, or live with, someone who has such disease or any type of visual impairments, just mind the change in the environment around them. It can be just frustrating; Big time.

Kika III - Retinol IV

Yes, you read that right. I'm posting 2 shots from the Retinitis Pigmentosa project for this year into one post, here. The whole thing was actually a coincidence.
As I was planning a shot for Retinitis Pigmentosa in my head (for days), Kika gave out the theme for her 3^rd week challenge: Framing; And this is exactly the "structure" that I had in my mind for my shot about Retinitis Pigmentosa!

RPG: Retinitis Pigmentosa Game

The idea behind RPG: Retinitis Pigmentosa Game is, again, the furniture and the obstacles that we face INSIDE the house. I was actually thinking of more like an "earthly" composition; Things set to the ground. However, after watching Kika's video for the weekly theme, framing, my mind started to (automatically) combining the two ideas and I came up with this framing, with furniture (or something similar that is) - of course with the blind cane as well to deliver the idea. Now the shoot was a bit of an adventure and unfortunately, I didn't take any shots to document the setting.

Air Remote, for wireless tethering.

The idea needed a top-view, and I guess nowhere is better to do such an idea except for the balcony (and we are lucky to have one). The problem here is, though, I am shooting myself with no help from anyone. So, it was a call for the Air Remote tethering tool, which I didn't use a lot since I got it years back simply because it does lack some features and it's quite cumbersome despite the (supposed) ease of use and the relief that it should be providing. This time, it was no exception, because it did disappoint me further. I will talk about that shortly.

Lateral arm from Photek

To shoot the ground from the balcony, it was natural to use the lateral arm to carry the camera and extend it out of the balcony looking downward. Luckily, I had those weight bags which I've ordered 3 years ago or so and never used them till this moment! Nevertheless, the situation was shaky and I had my heart up my throat. I'm blessed to have an elevator (lift) near me in the balcony to go up and down; Otherwise, I wouldn't even think about shooting this. 

The lens of choice here was my Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 because, well, the field of view and the autofocus system. After shooting this though, I realized that I might have done better using Voigtländer 20mm f/3.5, to have a wider field of view and then crop it to a suitable size and boundary, and probably the manual focus of this lens won't be a big problem. After all, I was shooting at f/11, and with wider lenses, the depth of field is forgiving anyway. The main drawback in the whole process, though, was with the tethering.
Actually, day by day, I'm starting to realize that the usefulness of such device is quite limited more than I anticipated in the first place. Here for example and in this situation, I was aiming to capture bracketed images sequence in order to create HDR and be able to achieve the dramatic look by controlling the light in the image at "baking the HDR" level (i.e. tone-mapping). It turned out that because of the timer (10sec) which I've set initially to be able to do my pose, each bracketed image would be taken with a 10sec timer! Of course, holding my pose for 30 seconds is next to impossible, so, I had to go back and just take single images. I'm glad that I could somewhat achieve what I've envisioned using just a single RAW image though. I would have done it properly with an Intervalometer with proper time-delay settings to give me some time to go down to location via the elevator, and that way I would be doing bracketing quite easily, but I still need to check myself on location to pose properly. Maybe next time I will try to combine using both tools, if it was possible (honestly, never tried).
The irony is that every now and then when I decide to use the Air Remote Tethering I do get first a message for updating the firmware and I really don't know how that is done but what I really wonder about is what the update is really about? I don't see any features being enhanced at all; Specially the annoying rotating display which cannot be displayed correctly for shooting in portrait orientation. That's another story for another time and yet, there is another misfortune that I will talk about (hopefully) in my next post when I was about to take the 5^th shot for Retinitis Pigmentosa project.

Finale

Here we are, close to summer again. And yes, I'm not so excited about it. We've gone into partial lock-down here for one month period (ending at April 8^th). Everything will be re-evaluated afterward, and who knows, the lock-down might be extended.
People here are complaining about everything, about all measures and don't get me started with conspiracy theories. Each individual in this great nation is an Aristotle on its own. I just hope my mood swings won't attack me severely in the meantime as it did one year ago, last summer, when we had partial lock-down as well. Not to say it's all gone but I'm coping better. I think the routine of fasting lately beside reading the holy book added greatly to the comfort. I've stopped fasting just recently and strangely I can't stay up late now like I used to do when I was fasting; I'm getting tired easily. Probably because of the digestive operations taking place. Who knows…
Things are a bit awry on the work front, but that's a story for another time I guess. I'm trying to keep my peace of mind as much as possible by trying hard to neglect and forget about these problems. I foresee increasing responsibilities upon my shoulders, and I'm not sure how am I going to cope with these, nor whether I should trust my experience or not (apparently it's not a match, scientifically speaking). From one lock-down to another, things are just spanning and expanding and all there is to hope for form my side is…to stay away as much as possible, until some "right time" comes for a proper resignation.

 

Precautious Selfie (2020)

Meanwhile, as I'm posting these images about this year's Retinitis Pigmentosa project as well as about Kika's photo challenge, I'm still active with my camera but I don't want to post or talk about these images until I finish the Retinitis Pigmentosa series at least. I'm also anticipating working again with my speedlites, with both high speed and stroboscopic, but I'm still puzzled for what I'm going to do. Trying to seek hints from Kika herself, as well as from the work of other photographers I find (mainly on YouPic and YouTube). I'm posting these photos, of course, on my YouPic, but not yet on Instagram. You can check out the link if you like to take a peek on my YouPic profile. But I have to say that many of these images are actually old images re-made or some ignored test shots from the past that have been worked out, specifically to be posted on YouPic. My chores list, surprisingly, is building up and I'm trying to do one thing at a time (including the typing of this blog post actually). There is a lot waiting for me that I've been even postponing playing some games! No time to rest and my body is failing me as usual… also, it is time to think of a new post for my Arabic blog. I think I do need another vacation from blogging at some point, soon…

Retinol…

Busy busy busy! Been a while since I've posted here, and (hopefully) for a good reason. After putting on my last post some 2 or 3 weeks ago, which was a little advertising to my own work on Mostphotos, I've decided to go on and also do an Arabic post in my Arabic blog for the same purpose, and I've spent the past few weeks sharing and spreading the word. Fingers crossed!

That, however, is not all the matter. It is February already, and I guess I've mentioned already in some of my previous posts that I'll be getting ready to prepare some shots related to Retinitis Pigmentosa in this month, since it is the awareness month for this disease and I got into the habit of making related photos since 2016. What happened, though, is that I got into another weekly activity which somewhat ignited my imagination a bit and I really loved to participate, and that is #Kikasphotochallenge.

The #Kikasphotochallenge is a weekly photo challenge (to span over 12 weeks), with a theme proposed for every week. The theme is announced every Thursday on Kotuvakika's YouTube's channel. At the moment of typing these words, it is already week #3. At the time of posting it (Thursday), then we will be already into week #4, supposedly.

I've been trying on both ends, shooting for Retinitis Pigmentosa, and for #Kikasphotochallenge, and for that matter I've already participated in all 3 weeks with images (posted on Instagram of course). However, to keep things short and not to put all my eggs in one basket, I'll go slow and gradual by posting and talking about one image from each side of the stick; The RP project, and Kika's challenge!

Retina I

So, for starters, I'll talk first about the first image I've created for or about Retinitis Pigmentosa. First of all, I actually had to sit and pin down some ideas and also roam Pinterest a bit to gain some insights. One particular thing I've noticed about myself in this process is that I tend to gain more insight from quotes and text rather than from images.
I've pinned some ideas in my note and as I'm typing this right now, I have to say that I did filter some; I've canceled some or reformed some and changed the idea of some. Anyway, that's another story for another day. One of the posts that grabbed my attention on Pinterest is stating some facts about the glasses that we, people with Retinitis Pigmentosa wear and how or what they do (the fact is: Nothing. Glasses don't fix RP). And that was the topic of my first shot.

Visual Un-Aid

I have a confession to make here though. I was/am lazy to get my speedlite gear our (and still). Thus, I had to twist my brain around and try to find some interesting light to shoot in (and that mostly means that I would be shooting during daytime). So, my first shot here (or two shots as I'll explain) was done in, ahem, the bathroom. My bathroom's window casts interesting light in the morning and I admit, sometimes I just go there and switch of the lights just to gaze into that light (without taking any photos though). 

Anyway, as I've stated above, Visual Un-Aid is actually a composition of two shots (apparently). Using 50mm, I've tried my best not to move and to focus properly (using a cable remote of course) and shooting 2 frames, one with glasses and one without. There was a little shake between the two frames of course (tyyyypical) but Photoshop did some good job in aligning them. The rest is, of course, some game of masking to merge two and show the glasses on one side of the face. I won't go into the details of RAW editing; I really don't find any use in that. The trick, though, was to keep the shadows down but not without details still. The moral of the shot is that: With or without glasses, It's almost the same; It's dark. 

Kika I

Well, I've mentioned Kika and her challenges up above so I guess no need to list the whole thing all over again, but let's delve into the first challenge that Kika proposed for the first week: Childhood.
Again, my laziness here really got the best of me (concerning working with my speedlites), but also I really was not quite sure how to represent my childhood. Honestly, I was not that social and at this age I wouldn't be able to mimic the things I used to do with my siblings (like jumping off a cabinet and hitting my head against the chandelier, for example). Thus, I consider my trial quite mediocre, to say the least. 

Childhood Memories

Quercetti's Pallino
My most precious pastime
game during my childhood.

I looked and dug into my memorabilia (which other people in this house consider just pieces of junk) and I really wanted to use one specific toy for the shoot but I didn't find it (apparently lost to time), but I've found my Kinder Surprise toys box. Collected those around the ages of 9 to 10 (just a while before the invasion in 1990). I picked random toys here and I have to say, nothing was quite to my liking in terms of the composition.
For shooting, I've decided (naturally) to choose the sunlight for the task. I've shot bracketed and I did make a comparison between processing HDR and editing a single RAW file. Eventually, I've picked the HDR version but the two images were quite similar. However, HDR has more luster in the eyes and on the hair even though I almost wanted to discard it because of the luster on the skin which I didn't quite like. The perspective is weird a bit, I know. This is because I was actually lying on the ground in quite uncomfortable pose. Adding to my hurdles, the changing angle of the sun as it was rising made the sun beams change direction and strength as they were seeping through the balcony door. I had to work as fast as possible before it would have been blocked by the houses. Converting that image to B&W, though, did produce a remarkable "horrifying" image… which I liked.

Childhood Memories (B&W)

The B&W version though was not posted on Instagram; Only the colored version. Converting to B&W was also somewhat a lengthy process of blending and controlling highlights and shadows as much as possible and in various ways.
At this level I really wanted to stop and not think about doing any further work with this theme, as I was also working with my Retinitis Pigmentosa project. Other themes, though, were somewhat flexible with my creative juices, but that I will keep for other posts in the future.

Finale

In a time when I really thought I should just leave the thing called "Instagram" for a 3^rd time, suddenly things changed with Kika's challenge. Now, I don't know what will be happening after these 12-week challenge are over, but I kind of got into a small community within Instagram, away from the general… stupidity (sorry, couldn't find a better word) of Instagram; With all these posts that show on the exploring page having 1k+ likes and comments, I find myself digging into the lives of people that are closer to me in some way. They watch on YouTube what I watch, interested in what I think is interesting, and on the other hand we have people who suffer like I suffer with Retinitis Pigmentosa and share their exprience. My posts also, specially those about Retinitis Pigmentosa, do attract people and make them interact. To be honest, all I wanted is some Like after all. That was enough to show appreciation. This said, I don't know what or how would I be standing in relation to this platform (which I already despise greatly if not for few users). So it feels like a small bubble floating on the surface of a rampant sea, or rather a murky swamp.

I know what you might think at this point if you are reading this already. "this man is just a snob", but I'm really not. Instagram stopped me from giving Likes twice or thrice some years back because of all the Likes I used to give (thinking I'm just a bot), but honestly, I didn't find anything in return (specially from "friends" in real life that I worked on supporting them) and eventually that lead me to believe that it is just a waste of time. Compared to YouPic's community, Instagram is next to nothing. Saying this while I'm still using my free account there and not being a paying member (which limits me to post every 12 hours).
Another venue to rant about is the fact that hashtags on Instagram are literally useless except for searching for a specific tag; They have no role in spreading your post over the platform or getting it into the Explore page or even to give it a specific order on anyone's feed (if they are followers). This I've found out by experimenting. Unlike YouPic, Instagram does not have a regular or a systematic way of archiving or display new posts that one can explore, regardless of the number of followers the user has or anything else. For this reason, on YouPic, any user has a potential to attract new followers and viewers with every new post regardless of their content/feed and regardless of the (useless) hashtags within the post, and regardless of them being new comers or not. All are equal. This leaves Instagram being just a platform dedicated to businesses of all sorts (and often times users rank up via other methods outside of Instagram itself), and don't get me started with all the Story, IGTV (and the square format). Meanwhile, YouPic is indeed dedicated to photography and photographers WITH the capability of turning it into a business.

Note: I'm not advertising for YouPic nor was paid to do any review. This is purely my own sincere and honest point of view and comparison between the two platforms.

I do have some issues with YouPic myself, like the thing with the nudity content and the blocking mechanism, but nonetheless, the community (generally speaking) is more lenient and into the art of photography. So, if you are reading this and into photography and still roaming Instagram, try finding a place on YouPic and see.

I've talked before in my previous posts about preparing another batch of images to upload to the stocks as well as new panoramas to be offered exclusively on MostPhotos. The work is still ongoing with that but I'm lagging a bit because of all the projects (RP and Kika's) and the challenges that I'm taking the opportunity of to squeeze more juice out of my head. This is beside, ahem, playing some games. I've made a list already of all the files that I will try to upload to the stocks and I will do this on batches (probably 10 images each) and hopefully I will post about them here once they are up.

On the other hand, I've received an email from Trierenberg Circuit (or as we typically call it here: Austria's International Photocontest) inviting me to participate. I didn't participate in 2019 and seems that year the contest was canceled because of COVID (every year the contest start on September and ends on March the next year). Anyway, been thinking about it and I think I will be uploading some of my selfies done with the stroboscopic flash and some of these new panoramas that I've uploaded into MostPhotos already (well, they are not new but processed in a new method so to say). 

Despite not being on the go with my work but things seems to add up and I find myself forced to face the monitor for long hours indeed. Not complaining though. Things are busy this month and I'm hoping that would be a comforting agent to my ever-lasting mood swings…

Rolled…

I was really reluctant to type this blog post and I was going to let it be an off-week again, but then I thought maybe I should talk a bit about some of the old images made anew with new processing techniques. But then, I've realized that there is just a tiny pocket of new images that had been taken in the past 2 or 3 months that I've never posted anything about.
I have to admit that I've been lazy with my camera; No motivation whatsoever to even touch it. Anyway, from time to time I would just pick the camera and take a "snap" shot here and there, just because. So, some of the images that will be posted in here don't have any big story behind them, mostly, but merely snap shots and a story of processing…

Roll

So, in case you read my previous post, you did probably see the "king series". During the make of this series which took a span of several days of course (depending on the influx of ideas into my head), there had been some snap shots here and there as I was trying to grease my mood and appetite for photography, again and again.

سُجودْ
(prostration)

Not surprisingly, many of such ideas occur at or after midnight when everything goes quiet in this house. My sleeping pattern during the COVID-19 crisis had been up and down; Once regular, and many times out of sync. Because of coffee abuse I literally drink one mug and just fall asleep right away. Anyway, in one of those nights, I thought of shooting سَجودْ, Arabic for prostration. This kind of shots is not new really, but I'll talk about the story behind this in a bit. It was shot with my Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens, and as you might have guessed already, there was a lot of crop that had been done beside "coloring" or burning parts in the background to hide them. The reason for picking this lens and not any other wide angle lens (e.g. Voigtländer 20mm f/3.5) is the type of distortion that I wanted to apply here, and also the size of the lens so I can place the camera between my legs as I prostrate (my Sigma DG 12-24mm is bulky for such a job!). Despite being somewhat stable, I was actually planning for some tiny movements and that's why I did lengthen the exposure a bit (by adding +2EV) but anyway, with a fisheye lens, movements can be barely visible and this is natural with most wide angle lenses (talking about small movements or shakes here). The rest of the job is, of course, just a story of processing and converting to B&W, and rotating the image upside down. Controlling the light and dark areas was a delicate matter here.

تَسْبيحْ
(glorification)

The shot above, سُجودْ, is in fact a result of pondering at an older shot, تِسْبيحْ (glorification), which was shot with my Huawei Mate 9 phone. It was a long exposure shot, and in my Huawei there are a number of options that would stylize such a long exposure, besides it's light to use and quick (just needed my mini-tripod to put it in front of me). The resolution of the shot, of course, is not comparable to that of a DSLR, specially that the image is done in JPEG and not RAW. Anyway, some user on YouPic noted that "he" can take that photo with DSLR and started to list his gear and whatever that is. Tried to make him understand that I do indeed have the gear required, but it's something done in a whim; Not everything should be professional and done with hi-tech gear. Well, seems he didn't get the idea anyway. But that actually sparked in me the idea of shooting another shot of a similar type. Still, though, I didn't use ND filters with سُجودْ (as he suggested).

Perspective

Then, there was this shot which was done… in the sink of my bathroom. The situation was shaky, I admit; I feared any water drops from the faucet onto the lens, but miraculously, it didn't. Again, Rokinon 8mm fisheye came to the rescue, and again, of course, the final image needed some crop to remove the unneeded edges here. I've placed the camera on a towel at the base of the sink and I've used that to pull it left and right and shoot. It was hard to put that one image that covers my face perfectly, so I kept on shooting and pulls the towel to one direction just a bit and shoot again, and so on. All shots were bracketed for HDR merging later on, so the one you see here, Perspective, is tone-mapped from a HDR slide in fact. In tone-mapping I tried to be moderate as much as possible and still give that grungy (dramatic) look to the image without going crazy with the sliders! I thought also that the blue tint would give it that "medical" or hospital-atmosphere that I usually see in horror movies (I don't watch movies anyway so I might be wrong here). Anyway, the blue tint serves the mood better here more than a warm tone would. Later on, I've even created some anaglyphs out of the shots.

The fun continued (in some other day) and AGAIN, with my Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens. I guess you can tell already how much I love this lens despite my fail in adapting it to some of my landscape shots when I used to travel! Nevertheless, the distortion it provides, does add such a dramatic tension to the image (well, if used correctly and thoughtfully).
So, I picked this lens again and went on trying to find some interesting venture to shoot, and i decided to do some camera motion (again).

So, nothing really special about these shots except for the abstract and I'm actually thinking now to upload them to some stocks. All what was needed here is to fix the exposure time to 1 or 2 seconds, just enough to rotate the camera in my hand for a full circle. As for the colors here (despite shooting the same subject under the same lighting conditions), this is just a change of the white balance (probably when processing the RAW files). More work was done to fix the exposure actually as the images were originally brighter than this (and softer).

Infrared Craze

Been months now with the lock-down (it's easing now but my schedule didn't really change much here) and I got into the habit of going out in the yard to read a book under the sun in the early morning before it gets scorching hot. I also water the plants and all of that; A daily routine (almost). Anyway, there was a time when I wanted to write a post for my Arabic blog about infrared (part 2) and just needed some infrared shots to explain some aspects about this art. So, after doing the "innocent" stuff for that blog post, I've found myself roaming and playing around with these infrared selfies, and I kind of created a path or a style for me here that I might try on other images (portraits and other).

The general aspects of this style are:

• Raise the brightness (by exposure or brightness sliders or even Fill) but without going off the histogram.
• Raise the blacks just to show outlines (or until it kisses the left side of the histogram).
• Maybe just lower the saturation to near B&W. 
• Outside the RAW editing window, the pupils are kept as black as possible with selective (layer masks) editing techniques.

The rest, then, is just a work of contrast (which I would probably set before doing the above adjustments), beside fixing the white balance and other color issues. So in a sense, it is kind of a synthetic high-key done after the fact instead of with speedlites or strobes in a studio. It is important though to realize that the less shadows are there, the better. I've tried this technique already with some older shots done indoors, and the results were not up to the level, but I'll keep trying anyway and see!

Finale

Well, I guess I better make this short at this point. There are some few shots that I did want to talk about but probably I'll keep them for later for now - along with a probable discussion for another style of editing. We'll see if I get the time to do that post in the future!
On a side note, it seems I've totally forgot to mention this item of news, and that is two of my images had been accepted in 16th PSAChina international exhibition of photography, and I've received some emails to provide the original images for display in the exhibition. That does not mean that I've won any award, but simply that these images did pass the judgement or critique and deemed worthy of display. I didn't get involved in any contest for a long time and probably I will not do so in a long time as well, but this display do give me a bit of spark.

The two accepted images: (left) Anxiety, (right) Houdini.
Worth noting that Houdini was marked as inspirational on YouPic as well.

It seems that, at this point, that YouPic can be somewhat an aid for me to judge my images in the future and see what to submit to contests, though I know this approach is not quite accurate, simply because professional photographic circles do not work in that manner, and YouPic is still, after all, a social media website and not a circle of professional photographers whose job is to critique. You can critique on YouPic but I doubt people there would welcome that anyway specially if not asked for it.
Anyway, after receiving the email about the pick, I was asked to submit the originals (for printing I suppose) plus a personal photo. I did all of that, but now, I'm not sure what's next. Would I receive an online catalog (like most contests)? Are my images considered or classified as Honorary Mention? I'm not sure, but we'll see. I might receive some other email containing the catalog. It's funny though to know that both of these images are actually selfies or self-portraits!
On the other hand, there had been some few incidents with my workplace that I didn't talk about before probably but amazingly I'm discovering new things about my life and the whole thing called "work" at this point and this stage. I've realized that some people are simply annoying or causing problems even more when they are further away (and work online)! i kind of feel sicker of my workplace at the moment despite the fact that I didn't go there for months (except for 2 days back in July). This calls my brain again to find a substitute, but as always, most probably the search end up with nothing and be in vain.
As I'm getting closer and closer to 40 (in less than 2 weeks time), I'm looking back at what I've achieved and what not. Some say I've done a lot, yet I don't really see it. They say that 40 is a new time or a new age, and it's like opening a new page of life, and again, I don't see that coming. Maybe I don't want to see? Maybe. However, I'm trying to keep it as real as possible. One of my simplest dreams was to have my own family and stay away from this problematic house and build myself up as I like, yet, all my attempts failed miserably. And reaching 40 does not make the process or the thought of it any better. In fact, I've already abandoned such an idea already and I think I better be on my own. All what I need for now is a home; A place I can call home.

Oldies Anew…

I was not sure really how to start this blog post. I was thinking seriously of giving myself a little vacation from blogging for few weeks and come back later when my "esteem" gets better, specially that the country is going through a slow opening-up after a long lock-down since last February (partial and total).
Meanwhile, I've been coping a lot with mood swings and I've already started to isolate myself from the so-called social media (which have nothing social about them really). Add some toothache (or gum problems) to the mix and you will be having a blast of stress on a brain that have already been coping with a handful of problems already.
All that lead me to slow down with my camera work and the shooting new ideas. However, this pushed me to work a bit on old shots (directed at keeping the streak count on YouPic) and this kind of helped me at looking differently at some of these old photos that I've neglected - even test shots shot at ISO 12,800 are subjects to this artistic venture.
In between all this mental mess, there is in fact a series of images that I'm working on; Some sort of a story, but I decided not to post about them here yet. Let's hope I get the chance to work more on the ideas that I've already planned ahead, which I've postponed so far because of, well, life problems. So, this post will be dedicated more likely to those work of art that I've accomplished by re-visiting some of the old images. They are many, but I won't be posting everything of course. Just few for now, and some for later!

But First: A Little Announcement

Just before I proceed with my (boring) talk about some of the oldies, I wanted to give a little announcement here about some of my photos, specifically selfies.
Since uploading any photo of any face requires a model release and sometimes there is some hassle even when uploading my own selfies about this issue, there is one particular website which accepts these photos without checking but they make it clear for the contributor that they don't bear any legal consequences for any missing model release, so they just advise the contributors of providing such a release. This stock website is MostPhotos.
Unfortunately, MostPhotos doesn't provide handy tools for contributors like other stock websites (e.g. Canstockphoto), so it was a bit hard to get some banner fixed into my blog. Thus, I'm having a direct link to my MostPhotos account here, in hope that it works. It should lead you directly to the newest contributions I've made on MostPhotos.
Even though, as I've said, MostPhotos doesn't require a model release to upload such images, I did in fact create my own simple model release just to upload my selfies and I've attached the release to these images. So, I think I will work further and try to find some of the 3D anaglyph images (which are not normally accepted in other stocks) and selfies that I've created in the past to upload them to MostPhotos. My main aim for my MostPhotos account is to contain some of the fine art work that I think are not quite useful as a stock, which is commonly dedicated to designers and web-developers.
I just wished that there is some kind of a banner to add as a signature to some of my blog posts or any formal settings instead of sharing a link to my profile like that.

Some of my selfies artwork that are uploaded to my MostPhotos only.

Oldies Anew

Driving With Retinitis Pigmentosa

Starting with one image that is not so oldie, and this one was part of my project to create an image for Retinitis Pigmentosa Awareness Month (February) in 2019. The experiment was a fail in general because of the bright sun and my speedlites not working under the sun (they use infrared and not radio transmission) and after taking some test shots back then I've just called it off and went back home (which is less than 5 minutes walk away from this location).

What's different now, though, is the realization of the artistic potential (well, pushed by the desire to keep the streak of upload on YouPic as well), and while I was thinking of making the shot "whole" as much as possible in-camera when I shot this back in 2019, now I realized that I could work on it in a different way, even though not to the exact vision I've had back then.

This said, viewing the image under the light of some editing styles that I've been reviewing and applying lately, I decided to work on this simple shot and add motion to it (something I was not planning to do back then). In a nutshell, the process involved:

• Adjusting the tones and contrast, and adding vignetting.
• Adding lens blur on various levels in the image to add some depth; i.e divide the image to fore-, mid-, background by blurring to various degrees on each zone (farthest is the hardest).
• Adding motion blur, again, to various zones (closest is the hardest). 
• Adding radial blur to the tires. 

All of this blurring did require a lengthy work of selecting specific areas and be careful with these glass windows. The motion blur specifically was shifted a bit to the right after applying it to keep the blurry lines following the car and not in front of it. Cropping was also due here even before working with the image. Got to say, this work spices up my appetite to editing.

Speeding Light

Another oldie came from the year 2013; Back to the days when I used to go out at night and shoot. This shot though is a bit far from home. It's from Ahmadi (city) which is known typically for its National Day decorations every year. I used to head there with a friend (he drives) and shoot as much as we can. Unfortunately, though, I never made a panorama there. Anyway, I've revisited the RAW files again here and picked one image that I didn't process before and started to do the latest I've learned with it, and again, I've added some radial blurs (no motion blur here).

I have to say though that, despite its simplicity for me, I had some hard time deciding what to do, and how to do it. The image had been cropped to a great extent actually to remove some excess lines that I've seen as distractions. To be honest, its not quite what I've envisioned. I wanted to depict a real camera movement which would make these arches of light zoom in (or out). Anyway, things didn't turn out exactly as I wanted them, so I had to satisfy myself with this at this point. 

Some Night in Oman

The last one for now, is an image that I've processed several times actually, but this time as I've stated before, I'm trying to apply some new techniques in editing (which involve tone-splitting, big time!). The photo comes from Oman, 2015, when I traveled with some group members (back when I was a member in a photography group). The shot was actually a test shot originally but yet it was acceptable with its noise level (when viewed in a small size).

Original first edit

One of the things that I've processed differently, beside the tones and colors in general, is the cropping ratio which I went on "free" mode to crop in the new edit. It might be sound or seem an easy thing to crop an image for some, but trust me, it is a hard task specially if you have a tint of OCD in your personality; Where you tend to keep everything in a specific aspect ratio because, well, this is how to be perfect! So, I can say that during the new edits of old images, I'm trying to release myself from the sense of guilt as I crop. Now, Color-wise, I do like them both actually even though I have to say that the original or first edit of this image from Oman gives a good contrast to the stars in the sky. However, the new edit is more dreamy-like and some people expressed their love for the colors in this image actually. Must add that there is also a B&W version of this image but it's an old edit as well, so no need to put it here.

Finale

I think this is enough for now, but the list is pretty long actually, specially with photos from my travels to Ireland, Malta, and Oman. Moreover, I've been "hunting" for anaglyph images from these old photos. There are many occasions when I've shot successive shots which turn out later to be suitable for 3D anaglyph making because of some minor movement. This, and with the help of StereoPhoto Maker which I've reviewed in my last post, there are better chances even to create "deeper" anaglyphs from such images, as far as I've witnessed myself actually. Things are promising in this field.
This said, now seems my only outlet for such art is YouPic (beside stock websites of course), after ditching Instagram for good this time. Even my other account, which was dedicated for my conlang, Ayvarith, can't be returned after being hacked (apparently). Thanks to the "security" system of Instagram.It seems that my introversion has cast its shadow even on my (so-called) online social life. Deep inside, there are things; things of feelings. Feelings of disgust for all these social platforms. For this reason, I really need to fill this gap in life and time where these platforms used to take place with something more productive, beside editing. I'm currently reading eBooks and planning to do more and more readings if possible. Now I'm starting to imagine what if people, or a group of them, just started a campaign to boycott or simply stop depending on Instagram for their artistic, creative, and marketing needs? During such times of COVID-19 this might sound a bit hard but I do think it can be done (and in a reasonable way). Whatever the solution is, it absolutely should not be under the management of Facebook. At this point, I have to mention that I've even stopped logging (or keep myself logged) on Facebook and I just drop from time to time to see if there is any new comment or message, and to upload a photo to my albums. We, definitely, need a new platform for communication and arts.
My mental status is going through some (harsh?) upheaval lately. People, or community as a whole, is pushing me gradually to get on serious with the thought of living alone, in my own home, if not leave this whole country just to gain some of the peace of mind. I could be exaggerating for one reason or another, but that feeling of opposition wherever I go is just unbearable. I seriously keep asking myself, am I that stupid really or people simply don't understand my suffering, my needs, or even my normal speech? I don't know what the hell is going on with my life but I know one thing: I want to have my own place. How? I don't know…

Na Deich…

This is a special blog post for this week. Some days ago, YouPic picked up my 10^th Inspirational image. And for this occasion, I've decided to make a story of some sort and post it on YouPic. I did that a week or two ago (as YouPic allows to post Stories, some sort of blog posts, for specific users only).
So, I've created a post with these 10 images and a short story for each one of them. Even though some more inspirational images were also picked by YouPic before I even make such a post on YouPic itself, but I didn't include these images that were added to the inspirational list after the 10^th image. In the following lines (next section) you will be reading the post that I've created for YouPic, and in addition to that, you can click each image title to head to YouPic website for that specific image.
So, I hope you are all safe (and home) and I hope this posts adds something to the boring time spent indoors (but it's a must after all!). Hopefully 2 weeks from now I'll be able to make a post about some of the images that I've worked on, and been working on. I leave you now with Na Deich (the ten).

Na Deich

Well, as I received or gained my first 10 inspirational images, as picked by the editors or admins, I thought of doing this "story" here talking about these 10 images and some background story behind them. I'll try to keep it as short as possible (fingers crossed!). Notice that after marking my 10th inspirational image, two or more images were marked as inspirational as well, but these won't be included in this list, as it is only dedicated to the first 10. Since I don't remember the order of picking as "inspirational," I've decided to go here with an alphabetical order based on the image title. So, I hope you like this post.

1. Cinematic Lady Nature 

Cinematic Lady Nature

This is one image in a series of shots that I've been training myself with to create a "cinematic" look, or what is commonly known as "cinematic photography". This is an old image in fact, shot back in 2010, in the garden of "Thornbrook House B&B" where I stayed in Cashel, Co. Tipperary, Ireland, when I visited Ireland for the second time. There were many beautiful settings in this garden and it was a subject for some panoramas as well. I was a beginner back then and even at that time I had more focus on panorama-making rather than single shots (and people know me mostly for my panorama work rather than single shots). Anyway, old shots (even those neglected before) are some good targets to work, for learning new techniques in editing, like this one. I've processed this image in various ways before and called it "Lady Nature," thus I've just "cinematic" to the title here. In processing the image (which involved a lot of work with colors), I've decided to sharpen the statue only and leave the rest with a dreamy look in hope to add some depth and dimension to it.

2. Enlightenment

Enlightenment

This is a full panorama (or equirectangular panorama), encompassing 360 degrees horizontally and 180 degrees (almost) vertically. This panorama was shot inside the Chinese temple in the Scholars Garden of Staten Island, NY. I was visiting the state to meet some online friends back in 2012. Two major things that gave me a headache here: The strong highlight (meaning wider dynamic range) and centering the tripod. Despite the fact that I shoot most of my panoramas by bracketing and then merge the images into a single HDR panorama, yet, the dynamic range here was problematic as I didn't set up the range of the bracketing correctly. Good thing that some details can be observed still through the door, in the outside, but the sky should have been blue in fact. Centering the tripod for panoramas is quite essential if the place bears some symmetry like this one; And of course, I always screw that up. Few centimeters off, and you will be spending hours in Photoshop trying to balance and restore the symmetry of the place. Which I did here, though I'm not sure it is perfect still.

3. Good Morning Kuwait VIII

Good Morning Kuwait VIII

This image dates back to the time when I was more "capable" of going out alone in winter nights and shoot. The shot was taken right after I've finished working on a panorama at that spot; A spot that I've been checking for 3 months to plan for the shoot. This spot specifically was down at the beach and the only way to it was to get down some rocky slope (artificial) and to do that in the dark, with Retinitis Pigmentosa, is a great risk. Also, I had to wait for a proper time since this spot gets covered with water at high tide time, and because of that as well, I had to work as fast as I could working on the panorama to avoid the next high tide time, and the sunrise. I've finished the panorama just in time and the sun started to rise few minutes after I've finished. So, I hated to leave the place without shooting a "memorial shot" here. This shot was also printed and sent as a gift to a friend in the US. As for the title, this is the 8th image in a series of images I've taken in the morning here in Kuwait over a span of some years, and this just happened to be the 8th.

4. Greenery Lines

Greenery Lines

I remember this shot back in 2012, some weeks after coming back from my vacation in Staten Island, NY. I was then a member in a photography group and we managed to go to some mall (the Sharg Mall, a.k.a. Souk Sharg) after getting a permit. Having a permit here is somewhat hard if you are not a well-known personality or something. So, I didn't want to miss the chance. The first thing I did was to shoot a panorama inside the mall, and then headed outside trying to find some targets. This building was on the other side of the street and just behind the marina. It was under construction back then, and little did I know back then, that this building is the new headquarter for the Central Bank of Kuwait. The original shot underwent a critical work of cropping and perspective fixes to get it in this shape.

5. L-Orizzont

L=Orizzont

This is probably one of my most beloved shots. A short panorama done with a telephoto lens (Sigma 70-300mm) from the roof of Dar ta' Żebbi B&B where I was staying in the town of Qala on Gozo island, Malta. It was my last evening there as I had to leave the next day and the owners allowed me to go to the roof. I have to say it is such a magnificent view full of magnificent details. My aim was to capture the sun setting behind the church or chapel but I was not lucky (such shots need planning). The church is supposedly in the next town, either Xewkija or Nadur, but some followers on Instagram saw other images I've shot from that angle and said it is Xewkija. Originally, this panorama was wider, and colorful after tone-mapping from HDR (it had some blue tints in it as well). However, I've made another version which is seen here. I'm proud to say that I've even printed this panorama and submitted it as a gift myself to the Maltese embassy in Kuwait, and they called back to thank me. Originally, the title was "Nżul ix-xemx fuq Xewkija" (sunset over Xewkija) but I had to change the title in order to submit the photo to some contests.

6. Nox Salmiyah

Nox Salmiyah

Just for the records, Salmiyah (or Salmiya) is a city (or an area as we call it) which is mostly commercial by nature. The city overlooks the sea and probably famous for its corniche or plage road which goes up to the capital passing through the eastern coastal line of the country. At this spot many fast food chains reside and I think in this panorama Burger King shows up. It was my first nocturnal panorama ever, done back in 2012. I still remember that cold winter night. I was wearing 3 layers of clothes and because of my bad calculations and estimations, the water level started to rise as I was working and covered my feet completely. The panorama finished in around 2 hours, and the first thing I've done after finishing was to turn on the heater inside the car and point it downward to warm my feet up. This didn't stop me from doing another one later, though. The shoot was done in ISO 800; quite high for my cropped sensor. Thus, tone-mapping and processing this panorama was somewhat of a hurdle. Some stars did show in the dark night sky despite the city light (I did realize some patterns) but they got mixed with the digital noise in the image. Thus, when I tried to clean the noise, many stars were washed away as they were identified as noise grains.

7. The Multi-Tasker

The Multi-Tasker

I have to admit here that I wished I've named this shot "Houdini." This shot (and some others in the series) were made during a mood swing merged with boredom. I had a rest on my recliner and placed the camera in front of me with the a speedlite on its top (580EXII) and started to test the stroboscopic or multi function. I was trying to find some idea to do and shoot using this particular function in the speedlite, beside studying the relationship between the shutter speed, the number of flashes, and the frequency of flashes. I was continuously making shots moving my hands in front of my face or covering my face in a peek-a-boo movement. When I checked the images on my computer, the movement of the fingers looked mesmerizing, despite not being exactly the shape I wanted (I was aiming for symmetry). However, the background was problematic with details. Luckily, my wall is green, so I converted the whole image (and the rest in the series) to B&W and worked on hiding the details in the background by toning down the green tones and other colors. However, a special treatment for the eyes was required; I had to convert them into B&W separately to keep them glowing as they are in the color version (somewhat), because toning down the Red and Yellow tones turned the skin dark as I wished but it affected my brown eyes as well.

8. Toothache

Toothache

Never, ever, in my dreams, did I imagine such a quick selfie shot with a mobile would gain popularity on YouPic, and on Instagram and Facebook as well. It was a hard time for me when I shot this, as I had some nerves issues in my gum. I've covered my mouth with this scarf and shot a selfie merely to be posted on Facebook. I'm not an addict of selfies but I do like to take self-portraits, and I have to say, the easiness in which a smartphone is used is seductive somewhat. After loading the image onto my computer I spent quite a time to process it and convert it to B&W. The highlights and shadows had to be re-built (if I can say so), and the noise or grain level was quite high (and still). Shot with Huawei Mate 9, which is at the time of shooting this self-portrait, was indeed an "old" mobile.

9. Upper Ways

Upper Ways

This shot was taken at the "360 Mall" here in Kuwait; And I have to say that I really, really, hate this place. I don't find anything interesting about its architecture, but yet here is one that apparently people liked a picture of. I shot this after doing a panorama there in the early morning hours before visitors would come in (and yet some people were already doing their "daily" walking routine there!). After finishing the panorama, I didn't want to just leave. Thus, I've made this shot with my then-new modified camera for full spectrum shooting. I shot this using Rokinon 8mm f/3.5 fisheye lens, which is completely manual and has no pocket for for infrared gels or filters at the back or front. I had to fit the infrared gel filter to its back through some grooves in the lens' back. I've placed the camera on the ground and raised the front of the lens using my mobile or some other object and made the shot. I think it was a bracketed shot but I didn't merge it for HDR and rather used only this single exposure after all.

10. Xemx ta' Qala

Xemx Ta' Qala

Another shot from Qala, in Gozo island, Malta, which I've visited only once, in 2015. Visiting Malta was tricky a bit since I'm used to a certain system in my visit to Ireland (3 times), which involve a lot of walking and taking pictures along the way, but this system was challenging with the terrain and with the ups and downs of the narrow roads of Qala. Thus, I usually don't wander far away from the B&B to take pictures, but it was that day that I've decided to really take the leap and wander off towards the seaside of the town. One thing captured my eyes there is the "fields" of cacti. Cacti is really a crop in Malta and not just some random plant growing here and there. I've took some shots at this location, through some broken brick wall I remember and I've lowered the camera down to the ground level. Made some horizontal shots but I didn't like the feel of it so I took some vertical ones, and I had no plans ahead that the sun would be in that position. Bracketed shots were taken and then HDR work had to be done of course. This image was subjected to some critique when I was a member in a photography group and I was asked to remove the sun to keep the focus on the raising cactus on the ground. However, when submitting this image elsewhere, and on YouPic of course, I didn't want to remove the sun because I always imagined the cacti on the ground making a leading line towards the sun in the sky. However, it might appear that there is a contrast and a distracting attention-seeking between the cacti and the sun. Nevertheless, I'm absolutely happy with this shot (and happy that I didn't get any thorns!)

That's it for now folks! I hope these stories added something useful or at least been amusing to read, specially under the current situation and circumstances of self-quarantine and home-stay. I'd love to give my appreciation and gratitude to all of you who appreciated my art, either by liking, sharing, commenting or starring. Thank you.