Botanical B-Sides

Some previously unreleased photos from a visit to the gardens earlier this month:


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NIE

A couple of unrelated photos from the last few weeks that have been sitting forlornly on my upload queue...


1 - interesting clouds above one of the hills overlooking Oriental Bay


2 - a vertical macro/pan of some particularly colourful tree bark

Staff Christmas @ The Backbencher

A salubrious lunch to celebrate the headlong rush of Christmas onto the scene. A few more photos here if you're interested...

Twilight Views

A couple of views off the balcony from last night. I only had the 50mm lens, so getting wide vistas into frame proved a little challenging.


1 - note the waxing crescent moon (14% of full) in the top right


2 - you can see the South Is in the distance

Lithuanian Dinner (and a huge dog)

Bondis in repose

A most enjoyable Lithuanian style dinner at Audra's place - see the rest of the photos here

WopWopWopWop

A pair of No.3 Squadron RNZAF Bell UH-1H Iroquois in Wellington, on exercises with what appeared to be members of the Police Armed Offenders Squad


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Step Outside

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Triffid Hunting

I went on a garden raid with the macro lens over the weekend. It was dangerous work, but I managed a few captures...


1 - watch out for the vortex of doom!


2 - ...and the spikes of instant blood loss


3 - not to mention the bee of humourless disposition


4 - you can't see the eels, but they're coming for you...

phi

I'm probably overdosing on floralisms this month, oh well. The subject line is in homage to the golden ratio.

Completely off-topic, fans of the celtic-ish singer Loreena McKennitt will be pleased to know she's finally put out a new album. Check out the video and watch out for the Hurdy Gurdy instrumental. Coooool...

Wellington Santa Parade 2006

Sunday featured the 2006 edition of the Santa Parade - proof at last that Christmas is indeed looming in a most monstrous way... I was at uni backing up my photo files, so it seemed worthwhile to take a few shots.


If there is any more bad weather, I'll know to blame the Hon Marian Hobbs (Labour MP for Central Wellington)


In hot pursuit of a runaway gingerbread man


I guess stormtroopers like Christmas too...


Say 'Arrrrrrgh...'


One of the cultural club things (I think), but mostly I just liked the composition


On the lookout for spiders...


The Santa Parade thing is most definitely for kids, I think

ANZIBA Conference

I've had a few days away from blogging courtesy of the ANZIBA (Australia and New Zealand International Business Academy) conference. I had the honour of providing the photo for the cover of the conference programme and proceedings CD (see the original here) as well as being the official photographer for the event.


My other piece of flair appeared on the official banner - the Nikau palms to the right of the banner were cobbled together by Tony and I from this photo which I took back in January in a momentary state of precognition.


Of course, I had to wear my academic hat at the same time, and in quite a surprising turn of events I was the co-winner (with Susan Wong, on the left) of the Research Students' Colloquium 'Best Proposal' award. We're photographed with Elizabeth Rose (ANZIBA president).

Following my usual strategy for people photography I lurked about in the shadows with a 105mm lens and avoided using a flash. The photos aren't terribly interesting if you're not in the field, but here are a few:


The Research Students' Colloquium featured (as you would expect) a number of PhD and Masters level students...


...as well as some eminent speakers including Professor Peter Buckley - 22 books and 140+ journal articles (left) and Professor Peter Leisch (right)...


... Professors Peter Dowling (left) and Hideki Yoshihara (right)


...and Professor Kiyohiko Ito (University of Hawaii)


The main conference was kicked off by Professor Pat Walsh (Vice-Chancellor of Victoria University of Wellington)


Friday's keynote presentation was by Peter Buckley...





Saturday's main event was Hideki Yoshihara's presentation





Yoshihara sensei was very interested to hear that I was taking photos at ISO 1600, as he never goes above 400. Ah, the wonders of digital photography.


Yet another probing question from Howard


Professor Sid Gray (University of Sydney) in discussions with Susan


International business as usual for Cruise and Audra