Hi Folks:
This post has been brewing for a while, but for one reason or another I’ve put it off. Yesterday R.C. Concepcion posted a beautiful poem called ‘Every Moment‘ and I thought maybe it was time.
I’ve been a photographer for so long now that it informs how I see the world. I look around me and see my world in frames of images, colours, nuances of light, shapes, textures… this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes it can be. Let me explain. Continue Reading →
Hi Folks:
Just a quick thought, appropos of nothing really, but I invested a good portion of the day sorting through thousands of old 35mm slides… I started photography seriously when I was about 15, and started shooting digital back in 2005 (a few years later). I still shoot both film and digital and won’t come out in favour of one over the other, but in looking at those images from decades ago it occurred to me that shooting film always involved a leap of faith. There was no live view, no instant review on the camera’s LCD, no histograms. As a photographer one took one’s accumulated knowledge and experience, working knowledge of the camera and film in use and made an exposure or series of exposures based on a ‘best estimate’ – but it was often days or weeks before the results could be viewed. By then the moment had indeed passed and could never be brought back again. In shooting slide film the image ‘in hand’ was the finished product, which put great onus on ‘getting it right in camera’.
I fully appreciate the latitude and the options digital processing offers, but to me there was always a certain mystery involved in shooting film. I don’t think I’ll ever lose that feeling.
Now go out and make some photographs!
Hugs,
Mike.
Swift Current Creek, SK, 1982 (Kodachrome 25)
Hi Folks:
Through the winter months we can get some very high tides (and consequently very low ones) known as ‘King Tides‘. Winter here also tends to involve a fair bit of rain and some really powerful winds. The combined effect isn’t as strong here in Victoria as it is on the west coast of the island, but it can still be pretty amazing. I went out a couple of years ago to try to photograph this remarkable occurrence and ended up with my camera (and me) getting swamped by a rogue wave! Both of us survived the encounter, chronicled here: Photo of the Month – Winter Storm. Continue Reading →
Hi Folks:
Today is the first day of 2013. To start the year off right, we wanted to share this quote with you from Howard W. Hunter:
“This year, mend a quarrel.
Seek out a forgotten friend.
Dismiss suspicion and replace it with trust.
Write a letter.
Give a soft answer.
Encourage youth.
Manifest your loyalty in word and deed.
Keep a promise.
Forgo a grudge.
Forgive an enemy.
Apologize.
Try to understand.
Examine your demands on others.
Think first of someone else.
Be kind.
Be gentle.
Laugh a little more.
Express your gratitude.
Welcome a stranger.
Gladden the heart of a child.
Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth.
Speak your love and then speak it again.”
Have an amazing day and an incredible year!!
Hugs,
M&M
P.S. This is a message we can all send to each other: Israel and Iran: A love story?
Happy Holidays, Everyone! There are so many different celebrations this time of year… The first day of Muharram/ Islamic New Year has come and gone, as has Hanukkah, and we’re sitting on the edge of the winter Solstice. Today is the first day of the next cycle of 13 Baktun – the Mayan Long Count – so how do you envision the next 26,000 years? Christmas, Kwanzaa, Saturnalia are yet to come this month, but whether you celebrate any or all of these or something more personal, we wanted to wish you a safe and happy Holiday Season and a New Year filled with as much love, joy, peace, adventure, contentment, prosperity and excitement as you can handle! Continue Reading →
Hi Folks:
This is a short (for me) and somewhat tongue-in-cheek rant because I always find it amusing when I see people post images they’ve made on the various social networking sites, along with comments that say, “No Lightroom! No Aperture! No Photoshop! No iPhoto! No _____!” as if it’s a badge of honour they THEY do not stoop to post-processing their images. I find it funny because it’s also completely false.
“The moment an emotion or fact is transformed into a photograph it is no longer a fact but an opinion. There is no such thing as inaccuracy in a photograph. All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth” ~ Richard Avedon
Hi Folks:
Update: If you’re looking for 2014 calendars, please click here.
If you’re looking for templates for Lightroom/Photoshop, please see the bottom of this post.
As I’ve done for the past two years, I created a template in MS Word that allows people who don’t have Photoshop, Lightroom or the equivalent to make their own photo calendars. There are usually a number of people who generate templates for Lightroom/ Photoshop as well, and while I haven’t yet encountered any this year, I’ll add them to this post when I find some. I used MS Word 2007 to make the template, but saved it as both a Word 2007 file and a Word 97-2003 compatible file. Basically it’s a series of tables, one for each month, that look something like this: Continue Reading →
Hi Folks: According to Wikipedia, it was 120 years ago (1892) that George Eastman first began supplying Thomas Edison and William Dickson with 35mm film for their movie projectors. Film was around before that, of course, but in a variety of sizes and feeding systems; 35mm film became a standard in 1909, and in 1934 the 35mm film cassette for still photography was introduced.
So, in honour of 120 years a group of us met on a rainy afternoon in November at Ross Bay Cemetery to celebrate a (temporary?) return to film and to the days of B&W. Some had never shot film before, for some it took a while to remember how to work a film-advance lever, and for others film is still in daily use. For the most part there was no autofocus, no LCD screens (“you have to look through the little viewfinder there”), and no ‘instant’ results. Those who had film cameras brought them, and those who didn’t were welcome to bring some film and borrow a camera from someone else. I brought six cameras (five 35mm and one double lens reflex) and loaned out three. For those who just can’t get into film, they were welcome to bring their digital cameras and there wasn’t a bucket of tar nor a bag of feathers anywhere about. More on that in a bit. Overall it was a lot of fun. Continue Reading →
Hi Folks:
Today is our blog’s third birthday, so happy birthday to us!! We originally opened our doorway on this little corner of the ‘net as a place to share ideas, thoughts and feelings and to create connections with others, so ‘Creating Connections’ seemed like an apt title for today’s post.
Continue Reading →
Hi Folks:
I came across both of the articles below on the same day, and both outline similar ideas. If you’re interested in environmental topics you’re likely aware of the process for converting used fry oil into biodiesel, and the process of creating fuel oil using bacteria. But this is something different. Since fuel is basically hydrocarbons, the basic idea is to combine carbon from CO2 from the air with hydrogen from water to create fuel. Technically it’s not ‘carbon neutral‘ because burning the fuel releases the CO2 back into the atmosphere (in addition to whatever energy was required to produce it) but it’s a really intriguing line of research and one that I trust will go forward.
Air Fuel Synthesis
Converting sea water to Navy jet fuel
Mike.
P.S. Speaking of fuel, I was at the office supply store yesterday to pick up a batch of paper for our printer and I noticed they were stocking a paper made from 80% wheat straw and 20% wood fibre. It sounded good to me, and I almost bought a package of it to try until I turned it over and discovered that while the company is based in Canada, the actual paper is made in India. How does the energy and trees saved in using a waste product to make paper balance out against the fuel used to ship it halfway around the world? It reminded me of another article I’d read recently that spoke to the balance between building an energy-efficient house and having a long commute to work every day. This isn’t intented to be critical of any particular company, but it does speak to the challenges we face as individuals, as communities and as inhabitants of a global biosphere in the choices we make to ‘live green’.
For me, I bought the Canadian-sourced, FSC and Rainforest Alliance-certified paper instead.