Transitions, Transformations and a Little Photography
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Seasonal Changes
The last week I’ve started to feel the shift in the seasons again - that slow realization like the soft tick ticking of a clock that slowly worms its way into your consciousness. That’s how spring has felt to me - watching the sunrise coming earlier each day by 1 - 2 minutes and noticing the sun sink behind the mountains a little later each day too. Those minutes are stacking up and shifting our daily routine just slightly each day.
I’ve also noticed that the quality of the light is changing as the days get longer - the duration of the sunrise and the sunset seems to extend longer to bookend each day - like it can’t wait to get started and then is loathe to let go and fall into slumber.
The warmer temperatures are melting the residual mounds of white stuff and any new snow doesn’t seem to stick quite as long on the ground.
Photographing exotic locations aka my backyard
The title of this post is a bit tongue in cheek, but I got to thinking about this as I was debating about planning a trip to some wonderful location for photography and while I think that there is nothing quite as exciting as capturing images in a new location - a trip just didn’t seem to be coming together. I either didn’t like the timing or the itinerary or something else just didn’t seem quite right.
Lately I’ve been going through my old photography catalogues and looking for images that I overlooked for one reason or another and it’s interesting to note that I have been finding all sorts of great images and a lot of them are from photoshoots close to home. This makes sense as the majority of my images are from locations close to where I live and it also makes sense that I should be seeing progress over time and this would be reflected in the locations I shoot frequently.
Revisiting old photography files
I find that when I do a photoshoot I tend to process the images within a few days - sometimes even right away, but I’ve found that recently I’ve moved away from doing this in order to gain some perspective (ok full confession - I was forced to do this recently when I forgot my card reader when travelling and so I couldn’t download images until I got home).
I’m thinking that this is a good thing to do though because if I have an exciting shoot and either capture some bird or wildlife or scene that I didn’t expect or the light or conditions were amazing - I can be too emotionally tied to the images and not able to really assess them effectively.
Curiosity
A recent visit from Kory’s mum, Anne was a great opportunity for us to connect in person and also to share new experiences as well as favourite traditions. I have to admit that growing up I never heard of the Bonanza - A Ponderosa Christmas Special (trust me this is old with Lorne Greene and Michael Langdon - search YouTube if you’re curious to know more), but it was a tradition in Kory’s family and so we listen to it each year which is fun.
This year we introduced Anne to a new tradition - Ted Lasso. I may have mentioned that I have a bit of an obsession with this series - I really appreciate the subtle leadership nuances and team building as well as gratitude and just feel good moments (ok and Roy Kent’s fruity language). I think that Anne is hooked now too as we watched several episodes most evenings.
Wordplay
I have always loved language and words - one of my earliest memories was sitting on my dad’s knee at the breakfast table picking out words in the newspaper as my mum cooked breakfast. She was always playing words games with us when we went for walks - memory games where we’d have to remember long chains of words or come up with definitions. This fed my innate love of words.
Confession time - my love of words, reading and learning new things led me to read the Encyclopedia - does anyone remember those huge volumes of information? They were the first place we went to when researching term papers for school. I used to particularly enjoy learning the meanings of new words or rather where they came from. It is still something that tickles my grey matter.
Persistence Pays Off
I was lucky enough to have a second shot at photographing snowy owls this year after doing a return road trip with Kory’s mum, Anne. She’s such a great co-pilot and the eight hour drive goes by so quickly with our entertaining chats. One of the perks of coming to see her is the ability to do snowy owl photoshoots at this time of year.
When I tried before Christmas I wasn’t very successful due to weather issues (snowy owl blog post), but I did get to see a lot of amazing wildlife and landscape scenes. It was not a disappointment at all as I’ve come to learn to manage expectations and not count on things like birds, weather or even my abilities coming through when and how I want them to. I try to enjoy the time that I spend looking for these amazing owls and if I get any images that excite me then I’m happy.
Growing Mushrooms
I have been an aspiring gardener for some time now, however the results have not always reflected the effort. I think that when you live in a location where the growing season is very short and unpredictable it can either frustrate you into giving up, or make you dig in your heels and try your hand at anything (I’ll leave you to guess which category I fall into).
For example, when I lived in Southwestern Ontario (the banana belt of Canada) it was easy to grow things - I grew trees from maple leaf tree keys, I split plants on a regular basis and exchanged varieties with other gardeners and I even inadvertently led to the expansion
Recent trip to Saskatchewan
There are two things that happened serendipitously within the month of December and I am so grateful for having these experiences. My mother in law and I did a road trip together as I traveled to pick her up with the idea that I’d also get an opportunity to photograph snowy owls as I’ve done in the past (snowy owl blog post and gallery).
I also had an opportunity to meet David DuChemin during his recent talk in Calgary. He is a dynamic speaker and really hit home with some good photographic truths accompanied by some amazing images (new book - Light, Space & Time) and he summarizes some key points in his recent newsletter.
Mood Photography
Photographers often ponder questions like what type of photographer they are, what genres do they shoot, or what is their style and while these are logical and interesting questions, they are not ones that I’ve spent a lot of time agonizing over. I have rather let my preferences lead the way and over time I have found the types of images that I enjoy making as well as the feel or emotion that an image conveys during the editing process. I find that this gives me a lot more flexibility rather than pigeonholing me into only taking certain types and styles of photos. In addition, as I’ve learned more and tools have changed - there has been an evolution to the way my images look.
Freeman Patterson Photography Retreat - 3 Months On
It’s been just over 3 months since I was in New Brunswick at St Andrews by the Sea for a photography retreat hosted by Freeman Patterson. There are times when an event or book or movie is very impactful and for me this is one of them - I find myself thinking back to that time quite frequently and recalling some very significant moments.
The other participants also had a profound impact on me and I have stayed in touch with three of the five group members (a bit surprising that I have stayed in touch with so many) - several of us have even talked about meeting up for another photography event.
Everybody’s got a story
This song has always resonated with me because I feel that we (let’sy be honest - I) often make assumptions of people based upon first impressions.
I make judgements based upon the way people look or act or talk - I know it’s cliche, however the saying don’t judge a book by its cover still rings true today.
I’ve mentioned before that I’m a strong introvertand people often interpret my demeanour as standoffish or cool, but it’s actually shyness mixed in with a preference of getting to know people slowly before diving in and interacting.
Seasonal Transitions
This transitional time is my favourite time of the year - while I love to watch the world wake up from the frosty cold of winter, I often find that changes happen too quickly in the springtime - the temperatures and precipitation can yo-yo and leave me feeling caught up in a whirlwind of changes. The summer has its warmth and lazy hazy days, however I find it almost too vibrant - too green. When the days start to shorten and the leftover heat of the day cools down, the air takes on a bit of crispness and the leaves on the trees start to take on their autumnal colours - this is my time of year - this is when I feel grateful to be able to spend time outside and soak up the lingering warmth of the season.
Photoshoots in Halifax
It’s always interesting and exciting to do a photography shoot in a new city or location as there is the unknown element of what you will find to shoot, what compositions, what the light will do etc. In the same respect there are also the downsides such as will you find anything interesting to shoot, will you find compositions, will the light be interesting and will you get to the location in time to find and take advantage of these elements.
It often takes multiple visits to a location before you have enough knowledge and understanding to really optimize these factors,
Evenings with my backyard visitors
I know that I’ve mentioned it before, however this move to the “country” has had a significant impact on the way that I’m spending my time. I hadn’t envisioned that I would be spending quite as much time as I do outside - I mean I thought I was outdoorsy before, but now a huge portion of my day is spent outside - and I keep looking for more reasons to head on out the door.
Wandering around with my weed digger doing my weekly rounds is a great way to survey the yard and see what has changed since my last check in.
Expanding Creativity - Inspiration
This is a question that I have wrestled with for some time. I can recall being very creative and artistic when I was growing up. My mother (a fine arts major and fine artist) fostered an environment of self expression and creativity when I was growing up. I learned to knit, crochet, embroider and other needlework crafts as well as creative writing, painting and a rather unfortunate phase of play dough sculpture (no one mentioned to me at 7 years old
I did a podcast
When I started out wanting to learn photography with my Nikon d5600 DSLR camera and 18-55mm kit lens purchased with points, I had no idea where it would all lead. I got that camera about 6.5 years ago now and it was a great camera to learn on. I initially hired my wedding photographer to spend an hour with me teaching me the exposure triangle and how to use the camera - it was a great starting point and got me going.
The Khutzeymateen experience through a smartphone camera
A recent trip to northern British Columbia (Khutzeymateen Grizzly Bear Sanctuary Blog) was an amazing experience from a wildlife, nature and photography perspective. I took my full frame camera along with my 600mm 1.4TC lens and I was able to capture the bears and whales with incredible detail even when we were not able to get right up close and personal.
Kayaking Trip - how it went
I’m a planner - I think that anyone who knows me or has read a few editions of this blog will know that. I mean I have an app with photos of all my clothes which I use to make detailed packing lists for trips - as I said I’m a planner.
This trip - I was not a planner - in fact I was so out of sync with my usual approach that when asked where we were going a few days before our vacation - I struggled to articulate anything beyond Northern British Columbia and inland passage. Our friends actually pointed out to us where we were going. This is sooooo not like either Kory or me.
Follow up on photography retreat
Well I’ve been back from my photography retreat in New Brunswick for a few weeks now and I’ve finally gotten around to writing about how it went. Meeting up with someone you know primarily from an online space can sometimes be challenging, especially if either or both of you are presenting a “perfect” image of yourself, however I was pretty sure that Heather and I would get along well and not have that awkwardness associated with figuring out what is real and virtual about another person - we’re both rather down to earth and direct people which is refreshing to encounter.
Wildlife and birds in Iceland
It has taken me a while to finally get through all of my Iceland images, but I didn’t want to rush through them and there have been a few distractions since then (moving blog). It’s hard to believe that I went to Iceland back in April and that almost 3 months have passed since I returned.
I have been posting blogs about different aspects of my trip (Iceland macros, Iceland trip review, Iceland abstractions) and I have finally decided to write about the wildlife and birds that I saw and photographed. This is my passion and I couldn’t resist spending time capturing the rich diversity of wildlife that I don’t usually see in Canada.