sunrise

March 2019

Posted by robeanne

On the first day of the month, we made a last minute dash to see Eddie Izzard’s show, Wunderbar. Despite a horrendous jourtney up ther, we had a great night.

Still summer – breakfast on a sunny Saturday morning in the garden.

A chance for a long overdue catch up with a friend. Our conversation on that morning was a topic that warned of tragic events that happened later in the month.

Summer evenings in Kirikiriroa. Making the most of late summer. The changing face of the view from the trig – earthworks for the new road layout at Cobham Drive.

Only in Aotearoa….

Ararimu – working with a new school so I like to have some photos of the landscape to get an idea of the place where their feet are. Ararimu means ‘pathway through the Rimu trees’ – it seems that there was no Māori settlement here but it was on the road between Tamaki Makaurau and the Waikato. The documented history here seems to start with European settlers.

The Mighty Waikato river – evening trailruns. Enjoy them while they last!

Tap takeover at @Crafthamilton. A smorgasbord of Garage Project beers with accompanying food tasters. Ended up being a bigger night out than we had planned! The dangers of wearing an ‘iconic’ Garage Project Tee-shirt when the brewers were in the bar!

Early morning on the Waikato river – the Kirikiriroa marathon is run by some friends of ours and so I spent the day volunteering as a marshall.

The nights are starting to draw in and card games and whiskey seem to be in order! This evening Victor Hugo seemed to get turned over more often than usual. Quite serendipitous for my hand this time!

Autumn skies

View from a teenager’s bedroom door…….

It’s not often my 19 year old will come out for a walk with me – especially at midnight! But I needed some fresh air after a long day at the computer and Nigekl was in Oz. So, we took a football and played footie on the way – maybe it;s not often that a 56 year old Mum will play footie with her 19 year oild son?!

Values….

“The darkest day…”

We were travelling down to Taranaki to the WOMAD festival when we heard about the events in Christchurch on the news. We were in shock as we listened to the radio. All around us was the beauty of the New Zealand landscape. How could such a thing be happening in Aotearoa?

Campervan life – got to have a tea cosy!

Aging hippies!

Aonghas received a parcel in the post….. a trophy! Something to do with his online gaming – signs of a misspent youth!

I had the pleasure of attending a meeting about the Tainui Education Plan (Kawenata) at which Ann Milne spoke. Inspiring and challenging.

Technology projects at schools in NZ…. design thinking, authentic contexts, problem-solving. Some way to go methinks!

Full moon at Ohope beach. This time on Saturday we’ll bve walking along here on our penultimate leg of the Oxfam 100km!

One week on … #headscarfforharmony. There has been a lot of kōrero about the rights and wrongs and appropriateness of this gesture and Jacinda Arderns’s choicve to wear one in the last two weeks, but at the time, it seemed like the right thing to do to support our Muslim community. I still think it was the right thing to do.

Those stop banks! Much easier in the daylight and they had been mown! But there was some long grass and uneven ground for us to wade our way through – this was about 30km into our 100km walk for Oxfam.

We made it! It was a long last leg; we were hurting but we kept going and made it home in well under 20 hours. For a while, we thought we might make it under 19 hours but it wasn’t to be!

Back to work with a bang!

Sunrise.

This week we have been running Local Curriculum Workshops for Principals. Fascinating conversations. Love my job!

Three Beer Thursday at @CraftHamilton

Caught the cat just sitting there …. Autumn nights.

It was one of those gardening days at the end of the summer – tidying up the overgrowth and came across this – rose thorns on steroids!

Last minute prep for workshops tomorrow! Looking forward to the kōrero with a group of Principals.

Week 26: Creative – High or Low Key

Posted by robeanne

What does this mean? A Google search led to this website which tells me;

A low-key image is one that contains predominantly dark tones and colours. A low-key image is usually dramatic and full of mystery. Low-key lighting creates striking contrasts through reduced lighting. Shadows are now the primary element of the composition.

High-key images convey atmosphere and mood. A high-key image feels airy and light, it over-lights the subject to reduce contrast. 

So, how to go about doing this? Which opportunity might present itself first as I go on my adventures?

Early morning and a sunrise might seem to be a good opportunity to get interesting light on a subject. I was in Rotorua last week and thought about going back to bed after dropping colleagues off at the airport but decided it was too beautiful a morning to be inside. So, I went for a walk along the lake front and was rewarded with a beautiful sunrise. As the sky lightened behind Mokoia Island, the swans, geese and ducks started to awaken and come to shore. I tried to capture them with the light behind them as they swam in. There is a beautiful story associated with Mokoia which you can find here.

two swans and a duck swimming into shore with the sun rising over the horizon
I took this photo in a great wee bar in Hamilton called the Wonderhorse – I think I may well have posted a photo from there before – Alex, the barman, is a joy to watch as he mixes cocktails. As you might imagine the place is dark and so snapshot photos are often grainy so do require some editing.

A cocktail maker at work pouring the concoction through a sieve into a glass.