itmpa's photostream  

An architectural historian, born and bred in Edinburgh.

It won't be any surprise that I'm particularly keen on architectural shots, or at least shots that include a building of sorts... Buildings, and scenery... that's about it, really.

Slowly, but surely, I'm trying to improve my shots. And Flickr's just great for seeing how so many others do it better than you, and just forcing you to try just that little bit harder next time! Yay!

I don't do much post-processing in any of my pics. I only have Gimp, and don't even have the patience to use that properly (and end results often look worse in my opinion), so I avoid as much as possible! Also started using Aperture, but resisting the urge to use that to excess. Much more fun to play about with camera settings when out and about, I say... Not much fun cleaning dust from sensor, though... So removing dust spots is an unfortunate necessity at times.

I was tempted by HDR for all of about five minutes before I accepted that about 99% of the end results are horrible - even 'realistic HDR' pics look horrible to my eye. No, no, no. Wee bit o' dodge n' burn maybe, but what is the fascination with making things look like they are CGI from circa 1994? Oh, OK, it can be useful/acceptable if you are an estate agent...

Whilst almost all pictures on my Flickr account are low-res they are on a creative commons licence (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs). I can also supply high-res copies of originals (mostly RAW) on request.

Slowly, but surely, I'm adding a selection of my photos to RCAHMS' Canmore database, which uses Flickr to store contributions: you can see mine here.

It must also be pointed out that any opinions that I express on Flickr (and there are a fair few!) are purely my own personal opinions and not those of any other party!

tom [at] itmpa.co.uk



If anyone wants to be truly thrilled and entertained for an hour, you can watch me on the 4th plinth...

Or, if you're really interested, a few of my favourites are on RedBubble!