Good Weekend

It’s been a great photography weekend for me.  Friday night I decided to do a bit of humorous still life.  A little while ago my wife had been rather enthusiastic with an old hammer, and now it was in two pieces.  Rather that throw it I squirreled it away mumbling something about it being useful one day.  Jane was out for the night.  I flash of inspiration hit me and I spent a few happy hours creating a themed image of how I thought she might feel in the morning.  It is a little over exposed, and the masking is a little amateurish, but I feel it is a fun picture.

Saturday saw me crawling, lying, crouching and tiptoeing around the garden looking for minibeasts so I could invade their privacy with my macro lens.  There wasn’t a great deal about, however you can always rely on ants and spiders to make an appearance.

Sunday I was compelled to go on bug safari in the wild.  Well oh in the actual countryside rather than my garden.  Again there were many spiders, and not much else in the heat, but these two amorous bugs caught my eye.

 

In the afternoon, I just had to watch the bees buzzing in and out of the birdhouse.

And what finer way to round off the weekend than to put the younger kids to bed, leave the older ones in charge, then head off to the park to regress for half an hour.

All in all a great weekend.  Hope yours was too :)

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Bees in the Birdbox

Bees in the Birdbox
Originally uploaded by Rob Johnstone

A couple of years ago we put up a bird box on the corner of a shed. The first year we had bluetits nesting in there, and were very excited when they laid, hatched and fledged a few chicks. One summer we sat and watched as the new birds flew the nest. It lay dormant, and this year the nest box was moved when work was done on the shed. We moved it to another shed, and were not expecting new residents as the box now faces north. To our complete surprise the bird box now does have some flying residents, but not birds. Bees have decided the box makes a might fine home. We don't really want to evict them as bees are having a hard time in the UK at the moment, so we will have to learn to co-exist. I'm not sure such a small space will accommodate a hive for long, however we will watch them over the summer to see if they stay.

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Gladiator

Gladiator
Originally uploaded by Rob Johnstone

It's a quiet Wednesday evening. The missus is out for a run, the kids are watching some dull teenage vampire film, what's a grown up, mature, middle aged man to do. That's right, get the Lego mini figures out. Armed with some water stained mdf, and some old kiln pot stands, I fashion some gladiators out of a couple of Tarzans, Eval Knievel, a medieval knight and King Neptune, and head off to the arena for some plastic related photography fun. I can hear fetishists ears pricking up all over the place. In a battle to the death a bored legionnaire looks on from a distance. He's seen it all before. To be honest, he'd rather be watching the midweek Christians vs. Lions local derby, but he is due to be dispatched to a distant damp gloomy place up north in the empire, full of mud huts and standing stones. Typical.

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Jumping Ships

Jumping Ships, a set on Flickr.

I wasn't really in the mood for gig photos tonight. Lucky I don't get paid for this!