Timelapse experiment 1

While charging around one night, head fizzing with picture and timelapse ideas, I stood in a shadow and broke a bone in my foot. This has put a damper on any timelapse experiments- and thrown the standard daily round here into a strange perspective.

Hobbling about, and limited to a 16Mb card on the camera, the first few attempts at timelapse have been fun, anyway.

Playing with a new toy: a 'powershot' A460 canon digital camera- plus CHDK (the canon hack development kit)

Been wanting to do some timelapse photography since last winter. I have a few projects in mind, including one of Awakeri at anchor, titled by cyber-friend Merc "The Season of the Boat." Ideally it'll be tide in, tide out- and, ahm, again. In all sorts of weather, with a lot of fast-moving clouds and some mood music. It may never work out, but things are looking better than last year. Last year, after extensive research, I bought a Nikon 'coolpix' 8400- which turned out to have dropped the timelapse feature of the 8000. Poppy is enjoying the Nikon... And I'm fascinated with the A460. CHDK is a sprawling project that uses software hacks to tap the full potential of cheap canon 'point-and-shoot' cameras. It's been developed by an unruly collection of enthusiasts- there are gaps and maddening frustrations- but also a remarkable collaborative success. So 'raw' unprocessed picture data is possible- all manner of bracketing- and the ability to over-ride, tweak and automate a whole range of features. Mostly I'm intrigued with the possibilities of time-lapse, and very long exposure times at night. But very fast exposures- and motion-detection quick enough to capture lightening- sound cool.

The Dankest Winter in Living Memory

We are beset with under-runners and foul weather. Only the hope of a week or two living on hard-tack and hiding out from swine-flu keeps our spirits up. Awakeri has an itchy bottom, due to an infestation of crabs (and barnacles.)
There's now an 'add video' button on blogger: this seems dangerous.
I'm going to try it...

this is a video I made recently. Compressed in the fancy-schmancy h264. Hey ho- it seems to work!

Summer at Windward Farm

Took one of the HD cameras from work home and got a chance to shoot a few scenes round the farm.

Blogger won't let me embed it- or I don't know how to get the html right. But it's here: Windward

Marching through March, angsting through April

There are paces in life, sometimes steady and measured, sometimes disciplined and militaristic, sometimes a long slog.
Or you can go loopy-loo and skip through the daisies one minute; loppy-la-la swung through the trees by your hair the next.
I dunno what the rhythm is at the moment, feel like I'm slouching out of step. No plans or dreams on the boil; a sort of sleep-walking with banal vistas interupted by odd forays into the bizarre.

Ruatoki Revisited

The Ureweras

In 1963 the Stowells- Bob, Anne, Laurel and I- moved to Ruatoki for a year. Dad had a job teaching English at the high school, run by a straight-backed former Major of the Maori Battalion.
We'd been in New Zealand for about a year: at Beeville commune in the Bay of Plenty, a few months in New Plymouth, a taste of Northland. We'd left the US- the farm in the woods of Vermont- looking for a better life, away from the madness and hysteria of cold-war, prosperity-conscious America.
I was just three: a white-haired kid floating a jandle down the Ruatoki River with his mum.

I can't remember much, and there's a level of family myth about the stories that remain which veils the reality. As if myths are not real...

In 1993 Penny and I were at a family wedding in Whakatane, and we drove up to Ruatoki. I wanted to find the house on the rise above the school we lived in for that year. Ruatoki has hit the headlines; balaclava-clad commando figures that do not look like police; road-blocks and rumours; a secret army training in the hills; moko and myth.

I needed to take another look at the house and the place. Here are some stills culled from casual roadside vhs video taken in 1993.

This is the house we lived in in 1963.


The blue house was next-door. I remember the two as twins, sitting on the hill- but now there are more houses, and these two are not so alike.

The Ruatoki River.

Once upon a time, this house was a vibrant new pink.

There were several marae in the area. This is not the main Ruatoki wharenui.

Horses grazed the roadside freely.

A church at another marae.

We didn't see many people, and I was shy with the camera. I'm glad I recorded at least one person.

"Mt Somers Day hath all too short a lease..."