Ramblings » Ronan Palliser Photography

The €30,000 photography controversy

Feb 162012

I was not too surprised to see the media (and some politicians) kick up a bit of a fuss over the last few days about a €30,000 spend by the Department of the Taoiseach for photography services over the last year. A negative public reaction to this at a time when the economy is in serious distress is not unexpected. I too had issues with the revelation, but not in the way you might think. Because it sounds to me like €30,000 isn’t enough. Let me explain.

Update: I’ve embedded a 20 minute excerpt from a PBS documentary about the work of the US President’s photographer half way down that might help explain the role

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Finding Hipstamatic again

Ramblings, Street 1 Response »

Feb 142012

iPhone photography seems to be all about Instagram these days – a social media based photo app that adds a vintage look to your photos through a series of images and shares the results to the web. It’s like Hipstamatic, only connected to the world. And to be sure it is possible to create some nice images with it. I tried it and personally didn’t like that it was so open about sharing your images – maybe it’s not the case anymore, or maybe I had it set up wrong, but when I tried it I didn’t like that it automatically published your photo to the web. I especially didn’t like it when I already was using Hipstamatic, another photo app to add that vintage look to images, but without pushing everything online. And so while much of twitter has adopted Instagram (due, I suppose, in part to that social media integration that I dislike), I have been happy to stick with Hipstamatic. Although, truth be told, me and Hipstamatic drifted apart there for a while.

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The priest, the photographer and the kiss

Ramblings, Wedding 1 Response »

Feb 062012

Meet Father Harry Bohan. He’s the parish priest in Sixmilebridge, in County Clare, and I met him for the first time on Saturday. He’s well known around Clare, and further afield, for his work in the community, as the founder of the Rural Resource Organization, and for his involvement with Clare hurling, including as manager of the senior inter-county team in the 1970s. He is also not only a very nice man, but blessed with a sense humour. I know this from personal experience, having met him for the first and only time on Saturday at about 1pm. I introduced myself to him in in the sacristy of St. Finnachta’s Church, where he was about to celebrate the marriage of Sinead and Diarmaid. Having reassured him that I wouldn’t get in the way while photographing the marriage ceremony, I asked about his approach to the ceremony, and whether or not he invited the bride and groom to exchange a first kiss after the vows and exchange of rings. At least, that’s what I meant. What I actually said was, well, open to misinterpretation…

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The importance of a photograph

Ramblings 2 Responses »

Feb 022012

How many times have you said to yourself “oh I should have brought a camera”, or maybe “I should really take a photo of this”? My advice – bring the camera, and take the photo. Whatever it is, and however bad it is. The camera can just be your phone, which probably means you have it with you anyway, and the photograph need not be an award winning shot, it need not even be particularly interesting. But whatever it is of, and no matter how good or bad it is, it will be a historical record, a document of that moment in your life. And at some stage in the future, you may be glad of it. Or perhaps even more importantly, someone else may be glad of it. Someone who wasn’t there at the time, for instance. Possibly even someone who hasn’t been born yet.

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Roger and the giant pear

Ramblings 1 Response »

Jan 242012

My favourite maths teacher in secondary school introduced me to the concept of a mnemonic. For those of you who don’t know, a mnemonic is basically where you use an easy-to-remember word or phrase as a prompt for something harder to remember. I think one of Mr. O’Brien’s ones was “Soh Cah Toa”. (Can you tell what it is yet?). I’m sure he didn’t invent that particular one, or indeed any of the ones he told us about, but as the person who introduced me to the whole concept, I’ll always think about him when I come across a mnemonic. Which is why, during a photography seminar last Sunday, Mr. O’Brien popped into my head. Which brings me nicely to the question I’m sure you’re asking: “Who’s Roger, and what’s this about a giant pear?”

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