Ice Cream Ireland

I had my first opportunities to play with my new toy - the Nikon D300, which arrived promptly from Conn’s Cameras in Dublin. I took the photo above for Food and Wine, who will have us as part of their “Hot 100″ in next month’s issue, without hardly tinkering with the settings. Not bad for a camera straight out of the box!

The thing I noticed first off is its ability to render colour accurately and dramatically. The reviews I had read pointed to this, and it really does seem to be excellent.

There’s much more punch to the colours than I had with the D80, and it also seems to reproduce subtle variations and shades with much greater accuracy.

Of course, one of the first items on my agenda was running over to visit my little niece, Una, who (along with her brother Conor) has to put up with an uncle who keeps pointing a camera at her.

I think the photo on the right is a good example of what I was talking about above - there is good colour detail on her quite pale face, with lots of pinks and whites, while at the same time her dark blue of her eyes look as they do in real life - not under-exposed.

Chances are with my previous cameras, the face would have been over-exposed or the eyes too dark.

I should point out, as well, that all of these photos had only very minimal adjustments in Photoshop. I hope do be spending a lot less time tinkering on that particular program!

The final test was to see how it handles very low light. I had heard that the D300 is much better in low-light situations (although naturally not as good as the D3, which is meant to be astonishing).

Low light is a big issue here in Ireland, since so many of the days are positively murky, and I love using natural light if at all possible.

I took this photo of Gatsby, the ice cream cat, at twilight using 1000 iso, and the shot is perfectly usable. There is some noise, but not nearly as much as I would have expected.

 All in all, I’m very impressed with the camera, and I can’t wait to play some more. I don’t think I’ll have any excuses at all if my photos don’t improve!

Technorati tags: Nikon, camera, D300, photography, review

 Maybe it’s the lack of any kind of Spring this year here in Co. Kerry. Maybe it’s that the daffodils are dying among hail showers and North winds. Maybe it’s that it’s colder than it should be. Maybe it’s that every time the sun comes out, an astonishingly heavy shower is soon to follow. Maybe it’s simply that I’m tired from a long winter, finishing the book, and a busy Easter in the shops, but I have been feeling in dire need of an inspirational lift.

What did I do? Sun holiday? Yoga? Weekend retreat? No! I recklessly whipped out the credit card and splurged for a Nikon D300. The reviews have been so great and the people I know who have one so happy, that I couldn’t help myself. Hmmm. I’d better keep repeating that!

Sometime next week I’ll get a package worth drooling over, and hopefully you’ll see some good results here once I get the hang of it.

By the way, I ordered it from Conn’s Cameras in Dublin, who have a good reputation and fantastic prices on certain items at the moment. There has been some grumbling in the press about Irish businesses not passing on the benefits of the fall in Sterling, but Conn’s Cameras has done so in a big way on certain cameras and lenses. They have some real bargains. Hmmm. I’d better keep repeating that!

Technorati tags: Nikon, camera, D300, Conns Cameras, photography

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If you want to know how ice cream can be made quickly and easily, here’s a video of my brother Sean teaching his son Conor. (Of course, short cuts can come with their perils).

I hope you enjoy it!

Technorati tags: YouTube, magic, ice cream, blog, video

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Virtually every recipe I have written for hot chocolate, chocolate ice cream, or chocolate sauce involves making a chocolate emulsion. An emulsion is simply a mixture of two liquids that don’t normally mix, such as oil and water. Chocolate can be a bit tricky to work with, and consistently getting a smooth, glossy final product is not always so easy. In fact, I struggled with it before going off to France for the Valrhona chocolate course. There, I learned a very simple trick that’s shown in this video - adding warm liquid to warm chocolate in small parts, mixing all the time, until you have a very professional looking product.

Anyway, here’s the video! I hope it’s helpful. Here are recipes where it might come in handy:

• Hot Chocolate
• Winter Hot Chocolate
• Aztec Hot Chocolate
• Chocolate Sauce
• Hot Fudge Sauce
• Chocolate Whiskey Sauce
• Chocolate Ice Cream
• Chocolate Whiskey Ice Cream

Technorati tags: hot chocolate, chocolate, emulsion, sauce, video

 I’ve been trying to take a photo of an ice cream cone for the front cover of our upcoming ice cream cookbook. I think it’s the hardest thing I’ve tried to photograph, especially since we want it to be melting slightly, which we think makes it look less static. There’s so much humidity in the air that the ice cream tends to frost up before it melts. Anyway, here are a few attempts. The last one is from a few months ago… Now I’m off to the All Ireland. Chiarraí abu!!!

Technorati tags: cookbook, cone, ice cream, photo, melting

 My brother Sean and Cian, our temporary Dingle Shop Manager, decided in a moment of madness to bring ice cream into space.

Well, maybe not space, but about as high as you can get in Dingle.

At the moment, we have this crazy bungee contraption in town that basically hurls you a hundred meters into the air.

Credit to Sean, who is afraid of heights. Not only did he muster the courage to do it, but he sweet-talked the ride operator into letting him bring along ice cream.

There were a few mishaps, but perhaps it’s better to show it than explain it because there is video footage of the event, and I’ll post it just as soon as I can. It’s pretty funny…

I’m kind of jealous and might have to have a go myself this evening…

Here’s the video:

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Technorati tags: bungee, Dingle, ride, space, ice cream

 This is probably getting a bit boring, but I’m going to talk about my new flash and lens again. I can’t help playing with new toys, even though most of my time has been spent scooping ice cream in the shops! Once I get my head around how to use the system to its full potential, I should be able to get some very cool photos.

It’s such a handy thing to have photographs of the various tasty treats that we sell, and a benefit of taking pictures myself is that I love the subject! Now I just need to get a little more professional about it.

One of the most exciting things about a flash system is that you can take high speed close-up photos, and I managed a few of espresso. It’s a bit awkward to get the lens into a position to take the shot, but I think these turned out pretty well…

For anyone who is interested in flashes and lighting, there is a fantastic blog called Strobist that has a wealth of information…

Technorati tags: flash, camera, lens, R1C1, Nikon, espresso, photography

 As per the last post, my new lens will be very useful indeed. I also managed to work out the flash system without any trouble at all. It’s actually super-easy. The first cool thing about it is that the flashes are remote, so you can move them at will to get the effect that you want. The second thing is that you can use the command unit, which fits to the camera, to increase or decrease the amount of flash between the units so you can get the lighting balance right.

In the photo above, I took the shot in the courtyard of our shop. There was enough light without any flash for the ice cream, but the backdrop was coming out too dark. So I took one of the flashes with a soft filter on it and lit the logo.

In the photo on the right, I simply dripped chocolate from a spoon onto a blue plate. The effect comes from shining the flash across the plate from the bottom left, and I used the second flash, with less intensity, on the bottom right to remove most of the shadows…

It’s going to be too busy, coming into the season, to play much with this. I’ll be scooping ice cream. Maybe it’s for the best. I could spend weeks fooling around!

Technorati tags: flash, camera, lens, R1C1, Nikon, d80, photography

 Trying to take photos of ice cream and ingredients without a macro lens has been quite frustrating, so I talked my brother into letting me spend some ice cream money on my Nikon D80. After all, there is the possibility of an ice cream book, and one would want it to look well.

After much research, I decided on a Nikkor 105mm micro lens as well as Nikon’s close-up R1C1 flash system.

I have to say I’m already in love with the lens. I unpacked the lens and took it straight into the garden. The fuscia above and the bumblebee are the result.

I can’t wait to work out the flash system and try it out on food!

Technorati tags: Nikkor, camera, lens, 105mm, Nikon, d80, photography

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Here’s a video Sean and I made as a follow on to Ice Cream Magic. You’ll hear about the brown bread ice cream and see production as well as the Dingle and Killarney Shops!

Technorati tags: YouTube, magic, ice cream, blog, video