Kelly's World

My little girl, Missy, when we went to the park to play ball recently.

I was on life saving patrol over the weekend, and the beach looked pretty darn gloomy! I blame the overcast weather and the storm in the early hours of the morning.

During the recently Rugby Union World Cup, C hosted a group of friends to watch the Australian wallabies unfortunately fall prey to the New Zealand All Blacks. During the night, we had a few shots of these to keep things ticking along.

At the start of this year I became a lifesaver, and thanks to my inability to keep my mouth closed the club captain found out that I like to dabble in a bit of photography. To be absolutely clear, I’m an amateur. I play around, but I don’t proclaim to be anything special and told my club captain as such. He still suggested I look at becoming a club photographer so that I can photograph some of our events from time to time, and after hesitating a bit, I agreed.

This weekend was my first attempt at photographing a carnival, and I’m a little mixed on the results. It wasn’t the best weekend to familiarise myself with sports photography, as the conditions were pretty challenging. The first day was cold and wet, and referring back to the comment about being an amateur, I don’t exactly have wet weather gear for my camera. I don’t even own a lens hood! Thus the first day of the competition was spent standing on the beach in a dryzabone coat, getting the camera out only when the rain eased off enough that I was sure I wasn’t going to ruin anything. The second day was a lot better with the sun poking out, however it still provided some challenges in getting my exposure levels right.

At the end of the weekend I came out with some shots that I’m relatively happy with, though I know I still have a long way to go. For a first attempt I don’t think I did too badly though, and realistically I’m not going to get any better without practising!

Here’s a couple of my favourite shots:

Mitch and Scott send the nose skywards over a wave

Ben and Kane get some air time

I thought this was a nice clear action shot of Kane

Some of the team from the surf club

To see all of the photos in the collection, head over to my Flickr set.

Yesterday at approximately 2pm I heard the magical words echo up from the front desk “I have a delivery for Kelly?” I couldn’t get to the front desk quick enough, and in fact, beat the receptionist to the front desk before she had a chance to dial my number. Jon and Ashley waited in anticipation as I ripped the package open, and they cheered with me as I confirmed it was my brand new Canon 550D DSLR. I think they were more relieved that it meant they wouldn’t have me dancing around the office impatiently crying “why isn’t it here already”.

I went out yesterday and took some pictures and played with the settings, but then today I did what probably no self-respecting geek ever does. I read the manual.

I did what probably no self-respecting geek ever does. I read the manual.

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I had listed on my resolutions next year to buy an SLR, but courtesy of a Punter’s club that Mat and I are members of, my dream came true early. After Mat had taken his share for some spotlights, I was left with enough money (plus a teeny bit of savings) to buy myself a Canon 550D.

My new baby!

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Next year I am planning to travel to Melbourne for Easter, to catch up with some friends of mine that are moving to Melbourne in January. I have only ever been to Melbourne once, and that was with members of the family on a “Golden Girls” trip (basically, when the females go on a big holiday together). I’m quite excited to show Melbourne to Mat, as he has never been there, and it’s something I know he will definitely appreciate.

Though the details of the trip haven’t been finalised, I don’t think there will be time to drive along the Great Ocean Road. It is a beautiful, scenic drive which I would highly recommend to anyone ever planning on holidays in Victoria, whether you’re new to Australia or not. I have very fond memories of the Great Ocean Road, one of which I would love to share with you. However, to get your attention, let me just show you a photo that instead of representing a thousand words, it requires a thousand words to explain. But I’ll try to keep this brief.

That got your attention, didn't it!

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