Browsing category : Photography
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Phayun Beach Condo
Posted onMy Paradise Abandoned project returns, but in an unusual format. A couple of weekends ago, I flew up to the quiet Phayun Beach area of Rayong province, just south of Pattaya, Thailand. It was something of an odd variant of urbex, in so far as it bore a closer resemblance to urban warfare than urban exploring. I was there for an airsoft event.
By Ben Reeves
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7-Day Black & White Photography Challenge
Posted onI was recently set a challenge by my friend and colleague, Stephan Audiger. Ordinarily, I don’t partake in these kinds of Facebook activities. They’re essentially the same as those old chain emails from the early days of the internet, where you have to send it on to a set number of people in order to secure good luck or prevent being murdered by a vengeful spirit. It was only really the photography aspect which made it interesting to me.
By Ben Reeves
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Phuket Country Lodge
Posted onThe story goes that some ambitious soul heard that Phuket was finally going to be connected to the rest of Thailand by rail. As it was (and, spoiler, still is), you could only take the train as far as Surat Thani and, while the line continues south, it takes a hard left turn there and proceeds towards Pattani and, eventually, Malaysia and Singapore. Passengers for Phuket have to change onto a bus, which takes about three and a half hours to cover the remaining 250 km. Why the rail link has never been made is unclear – perhaps the cost, possibly the fact that much of the land between the two points is in national parks, or maybe just the fact that quite a lot of it is rather mountainous. Either way, despite frequent promises, the last 250 km of rail has never been laid and, in all probability, never will be.
By Ben Reeves
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Phuket Peninsula Spa & Resort
Posted onLocated just a few hundred metres along the coast from the Phuket Marriott Resort and Spa, Nai Yang Beach, the Phuket Peninsula Spa & Resort (hoteliers and not noted for their imagination when it comes to thinking of property names…) is one of the more complete of the abandoned hotel projects around Phuket. I haven’t been able to find too much information about it, but what I did learn suggests that the construction work was nearing completion when a fire damaged part of the building. During the ensuing investigation by the local authorities, it was discovered that the development had encroached on national park land – something which the Thai authorities take rather seriously. As a result, building work was halted immediately and indefinitely.
By Ben Reeves
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Week 33: Hot
Posted onThere are certain aspects of this photo that I really like. The motion blur in the chef’s utensils was created by using an unusually slow shutter speed. Below about 1/60th, there is a danger of the whole picture becoming blurred by the camera movement created just by trying to shoot freehand. However, I seem to have managed to get away with it here. This slow speed was partially an intentional effect and partially a result of my not wanting to raise the ISO any further. I am beginning to notice that my Canon 7D does not perform well at ISOs above about 800 so, unless I want a grainy effect, I tend to stick to below that figure.
By Ben Reeves
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Week 32: Soft
Posted onAirsoft is probably the most misnamed sport around. For one thing, most modern guns use electric motors to propel their ammunition, not compressed air. Furthermore, with said ammunition being 6mm plastic ball bearings, their impact is far from “soft”! A lot of people are put off by this fact. Many of my friends, on discovering that I was taking an interest in the sport, said that they had tried it once, but found getting shot too painful to keep it up. Fortunately, I am rather less skinny than most Thais and the force of the impact is significantly dampened by my slightly excessive body fat. The only thing that caused enduring pain was the extensive exercise to muscles unprepared for it, causing my legs in particular to ache for several days after.
By Ben Reeves
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Week 30: Colourful
Posted onThe theme was “Colourful” and I was fortunately back in Phuket, where colourful streets are the norm, particularly in the older parts of Phuket Town. The city’s old Sino-Portuguese architecture and brightly-painted streets mostly hail from the 1850s to early-1900s, during which the island experienced a major economic boom as a result of the tin mining trade. A minor side-road off Phang Nga Road presented this lovely line of multi-coloured terraced shop-houses. I nipped down there during my lunch hour one day and literally snapped just three photos. This is the third.
By Ben Reeves
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Week 27: Patriotic
Posted onTalking technically, I am very pleased with how the shot came out. I boosted the clarity in post-production, which brought out the grime and damage of around four years of abuse the helmet has taken, but the colours shine through regardless. The lighting effect, while very cool, was entirely unplanned. It would have been better had the metal roof in the background not been exactly the same colour as the cloudy sky, but there wasn’t a whole lot I could do about that (other than use a different background, I suppose).
By Ben Reeves
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Week 26: Haze
Posted onI actually legitimately like this photo. I think it is quite striking, particularly after I elevated the clarity in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. Shooting into the sun was a little awkward because it meant that I also had to boost the shadows and that can make things look kind of odd. In this case, I got pretty lucky and it created a nice effect. I quite like the [sadly unintended] effect whereby the hotel ruins look really stark and kind of colourful while the paradise of Nai Yang Beach beyond looks almost hazy.
By Ben Reeves
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Week 25: Food
Posted onWhen it came to Week 25, photographic assignments were very thin on the ground because the weather was absolutely rotten. We had something like a solid week of rain or, at the very least, blanket cloud cover – not particularly good for taking enticing travel photos, though hardly surprising for this time of year. It’s called the rainy season for a reason! Anyway, as a result, I had to quickly find a restaurant to review on deadline day so that I could get my “food” photo.
By Ben Reeves
