Kathleen McGivney

The Vegas Experience

Holy crap, how did I end up in space?, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

My husband's birthday is the day before mine (his is August 11, mine is August 12). Last year, we went to Las Vegas and celebrated our birthdays with Team Leo (you know who you are!) and also got engaged; this year we decided to reprise our Vegas birthday adventure and headed there for a long weekend. Our plans included eating at Nobu (where Atom popped the question the previous year) and playing poker. Nothing too fancy, just a weekend in Vegas with our friends.

We stayed at the Las Vegas Hilton for a couple of reasons - Hilton points, their poker room, and easy access to the monorail. We will not be staying there again, for a couple of reasons - the room was pretty crappy, they removed the poker room, and they are no longer going to have the Star Trek Experience, which included two fun motion-simulator rides and a space-themed casino. The lack of poker room and rides, combined with the poor quality of the hotel rooms, leaves the hotel with exactly zero draw for us.

We did have fun while we were there, and I shot a few photos with my trusty Nokia N82. The photo above is of the Enterprise that is hanging from the ceiling above Quark's restaurant and the entrance to the rides. There are a few more photos after the jump.

Raging water

Raging water, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

I have blogged a few photos that were taken using a Lensbaby before. As I mentioned in this post, the Lensbaby is a hybrid of a tilt-shift and a bellows lens that allows a photographer to create a selective focus effect. With a traditional tilt shift lens, you can create focus on your desired subject and have the other areas of the image out of focus, which makes the subject really pop out from the background. This is achieved by creating a very shallow depth of field.

What the Lensbaby does that's a little different is adds a blurry effect around the center area of focus. As you can see in this image, the flowers and foliage surrounding the water that I was focusing on look streaky, as if you took a watercolor brush and dragged it away from the subject. This effect happens when you focus the Lensbaby, which is done by pushing down on the bellows until your subject is in focus. The flexibility of the bellows also allows the photographer to concentrate their area of focus at any point in the image. So I could focus on the upper right corner, for example, and the rest of the image would have that streaky, soft-focus, watercolor look. I especially like to use this lens for high-contrast or difficult lighting situations, because the Lensbaby allows for some incredible ways to play with light and color.

On our last trip to Ireland, I used the Lensbaby much more than I did our traditional lenses, so I'll be posting some more on the artistic possibilities that can be achieved with this lens, which has a very attractive price point, just $150 USD for the Lensbaby 2.0 (my preferred version). It's a good way to take a step towards expanding your creative vision with your photography.

To really see the full effect in this image, it's best to view it larger. Bigger version posted after the jump.

A friendly horse

A friendly horse, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

I have been to Ireland a number of times and always love exploring there. It's a beautiful country and in case you couldn't tell from my name, I'm of Irish descent, so visiting Ireland has special resonance for me. So it was with great delight that in 2006 and 2007, I spoke at the Irish Lotus User Group meeting in Dublin, Ireland. In 2007, my husband (then boyfriend) and I brought his parents with us and had a little vacation before the conference. One of the places we visited was Inis Mór, one of the Aran Islands off the coast of Galway.

While we were exploring the island, we came upon this little horse, grazing in a field behind a stone fence. She was very friendly and interested in us, allowing people to pet her and sniffing at us with curiosity. She was much more reluctant, however, to let us get even a glimpse of her foal, who she was quite determined to protect. Two more pictures of the friendly yet overprotective mom are after the jump. You can barely see her foal hiding behind her in one of the images.

Flowers from Belgium

Flowerpots, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

One of the subjects that I like to shoot often are flowers. That sounds awfully girly, but I like them for the same reasons I like shooting landscapes and people with pink hair and architecture and crazy dudes walking down Park Avenue in a bunny suit - because something about them catches my eye. Sometimes it's the color, sometimes it's the texture, sometimes it's the novelty, and sometimes it's the juxtaposition of modern and ancient, like an office building in the same shot as a Roman ruin. With this image, it was the bright yellow of the flowers contrasting with the muted colors of the windows, flowerpots, and bricks surrounding them.

I took this while we were exploring in Bruges in 2006 on our annual Thanksgiving weekend trip to Europe. Bruges is a really romantic and lovely city - lots of old brick streets, beautiful buildings, and many, many chocolatiers. Of course, because of that, pretty much all of our friends and family got Belgian chocolate for Christmas that year!

More photos from Belgium here, and more will be added soon. We're moving our photo archives from all of their many disparate storage locations to a centralized 1TB shared drive, and finding lots of photos that we thought we had lost. I'll be sure to share them with you soon.

A tower that leans, you say?

Leaning Tower, Pisa, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

While we were on our honeymoon, we took a day trip to Pisa to check out the Piazza dei Miracoli (Square of Miracles), which contains the world-famous Leaning Tower. We didn't have time to climb up the tower as there was a 6 hour (!) wait for a climbing time. They only allow a set number of people up in the tower at a time due to its, er, structural issues, so we decided to pass and instead took photos inside the Baptistery (one here) and the Duomo (cathedral).

Many efforts have been made over the years to stabilize the tower and keep it from completely falling over, but it still leans and offers a great opportunity to play with perspective. I shot this with the Canon 5D and a Canon 17-40mm f4 lens at its shortest focal length. The wide angle at 17mm causes some perspective distortion. This, along with the direction that I was pointing the camera, makes the bottom of the campanile look larger while making it look like the tower leans much more than it actually does.

More from the Monument

Untitled, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

Yesterday, I posted a photo of The Monument in London, which commemorates the Great Fire of 1666. While my boyfriend at the time (now husband) climbed its 311 steps on the day I took these photos, I walked around the area, taking photos of whatever caught my eye.

This image is from a carved relief on the west side of the base of the monument. It is quite large, as you can see in this photo on Wikipedia. I captured this using a Lensbaby on my Canon 5D.

To get the full effect of this image, you really need to see it larger, though. A larger version is posted after the jump.

The Monument, London

The Monument, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

The Monument to the Great Fire of London is exactly what its title says it is - a monument that commemorates the Great Fire that happened in 1666. Built in 1677, it is 202 feet tall and stands 202 feet away from the point where the fire started. You can climb to the top of the monument up a steep and narrow winding staircase. It is 311 steps to the top - quite a feat, but well worth it for the views from the top. You even get a little certificate when you climb it.

I climbed it in 1999 on my first trip to London, but can't find the photos that I took with the point & shoot film camera I borrowed from a friend (I've come a long way, baby). This is a photo of the base of the monument taken in 2005. Normally it's surrounded by tourists checking out the sights or locals walking to or from work, but on this day I managed to capture it with nobody in the frame.

Basilica di San Vitale, Ravenna

Basilica di San Vitale, Ravenna, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

During our trip to Italy, we took a day trip to Ravenna, which is not too far from the Adriatic coast. Ravenna was a prominent city in Roman times, and after the fall of Rome and a few changes in rulership, eventually came under the control of Justinian, emperor of the Byzantine empire. Ravenna then became the seat of Byzantine government in Italy.

During Byzantine rule, the Basilica di San Vitale was completed (though much of the artwork was completed during the period of Gothic rule). It holds some amazing examples of Byzantine mosaic art, which are considered some of the most important examples of Byzantine art in western Europe.

The photos we captured there do not do justice to the beauty and colors of these mosaics, most of which are over 1,400 years old. They are absolutely stunning.

More photos after the jump, including a detail shot. Keep in mind that the entire apse and surrounding arches are all decorated in mosaic pieces smaller than my fingernail. The ceiling in the main part of the church is painted, however.

Under the Bean in Chicago

Under the Bean, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

As anyone who has ever been to Millennium Park in Chicago knows, the park is filled with fantastic examples of art and architecture. One of my favorites, affectionately known as "The Bean", is Anish Kapoor's metal sculpture, Cloud Gate. It's beautiful when you approach it, as it reflects the sky and surrounding buildings and people, and it's also fun to wander underneath and see the swirling abstractions created by its curves.

This photo was taken underneath the bean with a Leica D-Lux 3. More bean photos can be seen in my Chicago set on Flickr.

Chinese Garden in Vancouver

Lantern, originally uploaded by kmcgivney.

Last year, we visited Vancouver for a friend's wedding. I'd been to Vancouver once before, but only for business, and hadn't really explored at all. We got a chance to do a little exploring while we were there, but the highlight was at the wedding reception venue - Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden.

The garden is the first complete classical Chinese garden to be built outside China (and, we were told, the only complete garden of its kind in North America). It is a re-creation of a Ming Dynasty-era scholar's private residence. While we were at the wedding reception, it was too dark to tour the entire space, but the woman who runs the garden asked us to come back the next day for a private tour. She showed us around the garden and explained the different elements that are present in the garden and what they represent. She also gave us a colorful history lesson about life in China in the Ming era. It was an interesting glimpse into Chinese history and a beautiful, calm space to spend time in.

You can find a few more photos of the garden here.