Playing "Catch-up"!

Since getting back from Newfoundland a month ago, I've been playing "catch-up". Not so much on things, more on my 'headspace'. My month on the Rock was about photography, mostly. I didn't go anywhere without the cameras. For the record, I took 9,700 pictures and I kept almost 7,000 of them — a very high percentage for me. I also drove 10,600 km, spent about $1300 on gas alone. Add ferries, accommodations and food and it wasn't a cheap trip.

I had to do it, though. I had to get away. People ask me, "Why? You're retired, you live on a lake in God's Country, you have a nice house, a bunch of toys (ATV, boat...). What are you getting away FROM?".

I know a lot of people who are of retirement age or getting there. You have to understand, I need a purpose in my life. People envy me, that I can choose to go up to Algonquin Park on the spur of the moment, because I heard that there might be aurora borealis tonight, or friends have spotted bears gorging on blueberries at Mew Lake airfield. That I can stay up until 4 am or sleep in until noon (no I can't, but that's another story!).

I remember my dad used to say the same thing before he died. He and mom lived in a senior's home and he used to spend his time working on his financial "bible" because he had nothing else to do. I used to think that would never happen to me, I have too many hobbies and interests, but you know what? It did.

I took up painting. That's frustrating when you don't have built-in talent. I gave up trying to play music, except sporadically when the mood hits, because although I appreciate hearing great music, I really suck at playing. I took a week-long creative writing course at Fleming College in order to re-awaken the desire to write fiction: I've always wanted to and have started dozens of books and stories over the years, and never finished one! More on that later. I have my cameras and computers, they take a lot of my time and are vehicles for expressing myself.

Family and friends? I'm really bad at keeping up relationships. It's easy to say that's something to work on and get better at, a lot harder to do. The bulk of my guilty conscience is related to this but it's hard for me.

As I write this, I'm on the eve of my 71st birthday. I've been living with cancer for 14 years. Who knows how much longer? I have an overwhelming desire to make a mark but I haven't figured out how. Writing this down and especially sharing it, is cathartic, and maybe, just maybe it will spur me into action.

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I was doing a DSLR course this week and we were at the Minden Wild Water Preserve yesterday. This guy landed 10' behind us and wouldn't leave, even though I had only arranged for him to be there for a short visit (when I do a camera workshop, you get more than you expected! LOL ). We got tired of shooting him after close to an hour! We left before he did.

This is straight out of camera with a minor crop for composition. Spot metering and exposure compensation, class!  Great Blue Heron, if you didn't know.

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Did you know that TopazLab's "Studio" is free? 
Do you know what it is?

Topaz Studio is a Photographer's editing toolbox. It works independently of other platforms — you don't need to have Photoshop or Lightroom or... (although it does operate as a plugin within those programs if you want it to).

Studio contains a whole lot of adjustment tools that you can use for free. But Topaz also offers extra full-detailed control of some of those adjustment tools if you want, at nominal cost. You can get some or all of them but you don't need to.

Studio also supports the Topaz plug-ins and they're gradually being ported over to the Studio platform. Topaz Clarity was offered on sale last week and this week, it's my FAVOURITE plugin, Topaz Impression. So you can call up Impression from inside Studio and it will knock your socks off. The Puffin sketch was done in Impression.

Click the image to go to full-screen. Look at the eye. I painted the keylights on the eye using techniques that Hilarie McNeil-Smith taught me many years ago. They were also sketched over but I decided I wanted to see the eye in all its glory so I masked the sketch out (also a little of the blue and yellow areas). All in Impression, called from within Topaz Studio.

If you already own Topaz plug-ins, they'll appear in Studio. Or you can purchase them individually and as I said, Impression is on sale at 40% off through September 29th.

Here are some links for you.

For all the details, answers to pretty well any questions you have, and to download the FREE Topaz Studio platform, go here: https://web.topazlabs.com/ref/32/

For the Topaz Impression plugin (which will also work with your existing platform) at 40% discount, go here: http://web.topazlabs.com/impression/ref/32/

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From the "Sporadic Musings" file. A Rant...

This was prompted by the backlash from a story about how an order issued by a McDonald's manager in Yellowknife forbidding the employees to speak their native language while on the job was rescinded by the franchise owner.

Imagine you lived in a place where you were not allowed to speak English.

I grew up in Montreal. I left there in 1983 (would have been earlier if I could have) because the Quebec government legislated that it was illegal for me to speak my native language — English — in the workplace and indeed that it was only because they were doing a special favour for those who were educated as Anglophones in Quebec, that they allowed my children to be educated in English.

So you can see that I have a strong aversion to any government (or other group) interfering in how I live my private life. I should be able to speak whatever language I wish, I should be able to practice whatever religion I prefer and I should be able to express my sexual orientation any way I want to. It's nobody's business as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else..

A similar policy was put in place at the Senior's home where my mother lived before she died: workers had to speak only English on the job. There was no practical possibility of moving her elsewhere but I would have had one presented itself.

We live in a country that runs under free enterprise. Sure, we lean a lot more left than we did when I was growing up, and we have a lot more socialist services than we had in the past (Medicare and Education come to mind first) but I'll tell you this: consumers in our system are free to choose where they do business. If you don't like the fact that people speak other languages or have other cultural, religious or gender orientations in the restaurant or shop or home where you live, then you are totally free to eat or shop or live elsewhere. Or start your own enterprise. If you own a business and customers start staying away in droves, you may want to rethink your policies, but it's your business, it's your call.

And by the way, you should think about that next time you go out for dinner and eat "har gow" or "maki" or "calamari" or "pad Thai" or "souvlaki" or "schnitzel" or "hummus" or "boeuf Bourgignon"... these are all non-English dishes with non-English names. Think about it.

I'm proud of the fact that I live in a country that celebrates diversity and makes it work in a non-confrontational environment. What's happening on the other side of the border, where the racist right is persecuting everyone who is not a white, straight, Anglo-Saxon male, echoing Germany in the 1930's is downright scary. We should build a wall...

{/rant}

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RECOMMENDATION: 

600A Peak 15000mAh Portable Car Jump Starter

I put a business card in the picture to give you a sense of scale. The unit is 6" x 3" x 1", and weighs about a pound. The battery inside is Li-Ion.

I bought one of these things for $65CDN on Amazon. I have both a boat and an ATV with potential battery issues and although I didn't really believe that something this small (and inexpensive) would do the job, I figured I could always return it if it didn't live up to expectations.

I went down to the boat yesterday after several days absence and some on-and-off rain through the week. My bilge pump runs automatically if water gets in the bilge (my boat doesn't have a cover) and it can drain the battery. That's what I discovered. Trying to start the engine resulted in a resounding "click" and silence.

Long story short, I hooked this thing up to the battery and the engine started right away, as if I had a full charge in the 50lb marine battery. And the old 85hp 2-stroke Evinrude doesn't fire on the first crank, it takes several seconds of cranking with full choke, then close the choke and crank again to start it.

I was shocked it worked so well. The charge on the unit dropped to about 3/4, so it still had lots more juice. I plugged it into the USB in the car and it was charged up full in half an hour.

It looks like this particular one is out of stock at Amazon but there are lots more like it listed. I looked for high cranking amps and reasonably large storage, so 600 amps/15000mAh was what I chose.

Worked for me. It goes wherever I go (car, boat, ATV) from now on. PS, it can also power my iPhone forever, when I use it to drive my timelapse photos for hours.

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Picture Time!

I put this picture up online as kind of an experiment:

I shot this in Trinity one foggy morning. Then in post-processing, I enhanced all the colourful buildings — colour saturation, clarity, sharpness... to my eye, there's something wrong here. The buildings don't blend properly with their surroundings. I put it up anyway.

 Here's my premise: most people don't care about the technical details. They like a picture or they don't. It's only other photographers (or retouchers) who care. And I was right. I got tons of "Likes" and "Hearts" and positive comments both in the Newfoundland FB group and on my own general timeline and nobody commented on the processing.

I took my boat out and went Loon hunting on 12-Mile Lake. Found one!

I went up to Algonquin Park, didn't see any moose and only one bear (no photo). But I did take the macro lens out, and I discovered that I could mount it on my teleconverter for a net 210mm. Less bending down!

Dewdrops on a spider web, Mew Lake Airfield, Algonquin Park

Hoverfly on a wildflower 

Wild blueberries at the Airfield 

I went back up to the Park a few nights later because I was hoping for Aurora. Nope, but I did take these...

At the Lake of Two Rivers beach. A little light painting with a flashlight, a little Topaz Simplify... 

...and this is at Opeongo. There's a hint of Northern Lights on the horizon, but nothing to speak of. This is a 162-image StarStax composite. 

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As I mentioned at the top of the blog, I did a DSLR course last week and I invited a Great Blue Heron to join us at the white water. I'll close with a few more shots from the workshop.

Illustrating lighting, focusing, point-of-view and composition (centre is OK when you've got symmetry).  

North-facing window lighting, focus, spot metering 

And this is our group, at the white water, with our invited guest! The lighting was challenging, Lightroom to the rescue! 

Parting Shot:

Topaz Clarity, called under Topaz Studio. Minor crop in Lightroom. 

OK. I'm caught up. Back soon!

PS: Gales of November is full! Yahoo!

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Algonquin Park and Aurora. You choose.

Algonquin Park
a conversation with the staff

Some discussions have occurred regarding some apparent changes in AP policies and I decided to find out directly from the Park. At the same time I wanted to ask about an issue that's been bugging me. They were kind enough to give me clear and very reasonable answers and gave me permission to reproduce the correspondence here.

The two main questions were:

1. How to shoot nighttimes (stars, aurora, etc) when the day pass clearly expires at 10 pm, and
2. Access to the campgrounds with a day pass.

Here's the email correspondence in full, except that I had to retype the 'questions' because they got mixed up in the back-and-forth.

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We corresponded last year on the subject of coming into the park to shoot star trails or milky way or aurora pictures. The issue was that the day pass expires at 10pm and the solution we came up with at the time was to buy two day passes (for the next day as well). I would have bought a camping permit except all the campgrounds were full and they wouldn’t sell me one. Anyway, that worked after the guy at the West gate figured out how to do it! By the way, a better solution might be to get an annual pass… but that carries the same 10pm limitation, I think.

Answer:

The correct process for anyone wishing to be in an Ontario Provincial Park with a day use permit after 10 pm is to request permission from the Park Superintendent.  The easiest way to make application for this is by having you email directly to David Coulas (david.coulas@ontario.ca) explaining your request and  reason.  He will then be able to reply directly to you.  DVP’s and Annual DVP’s do all carry the same 10pm limitation.

Question # 2:

Sounds like there's been a policy change at AP. One of our members was denied access to Mew Lake because she only had a day pass. All she wanted to do was to photograph some birds at the Airfield, not to camp. In the past we've told them at the campground entrance that's all we were there for. In the paper I picked up at the gate the other day it says "a day permit does not allow access to campgrounds (unless specified otherwise; check at the park office at the point of entry)".

Answer:

 With regards to day use visitors being denied access into campgrounds for day use areas ie, beaches, airfield, trails, etc., Mr. Nichols, who is the Zone Manager has sought clarification with Head Office and has confirmed that we cannot restrict people from coming in to the park or campgrounds if they have a valid day use permit in any Ontario Provincial Park.

The front page of our tabloid where it indicates that a day permit” does not allow access to campgrounds”, however it also states “unless specified otherwise, check at the Park Office at point of entry”.  This allows us to clarify to our park visitors.  You would continue to stop at the office and advise them of your intent and if you are unaware of parking space please ask at the office entrance.

If at any time, access to a campground with a day use permit becomes a safety issue, ie, campground is over maximum capacity during an extremely busy time and therefore becomes a safety hazard within the campground, then and only then may the Park Superintendent make a decision to restrict access to day use.  The park office will not be making that decision without the approval of Park Superintendent.

Glenn I hope this will clarify your questions for you and your group at this time.  

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Topaz Studio
Different Strokes for Different Folks!

Topaz Labs has hit another home run. They have developed a new program which means different things for different people, depending where you are in your post-processing life. As far as I can tell, it will be valuable for three different groups:

• You DO NOT have Lightroom or Photoshop or Elements. Studio is a post-processing workbench for you and it's FREE! (well the 'base' version is... see below). You're one of those who doesn't want to "rent" the Adobe CC suite: YOU DON'T HAVE TO ANYMORE.
• You DO have one or more of the Adobe products. TS gives you a whole new set of adjustment tools that are effective, easy to use and quick.  You may decide to use them instead of ACR or in addition to it.
• You have other Topaz products, perhaps the whole suite, and you want a way to use them in combinations, whether from within an Adobe product or standalone. This functionality is FREE.

Too many words. It's all explained much better on the Topaz site. But before I send you there, I have to tell you a couple more things.

You can download and use it for FREE. Forever. 

Or you can buy some enhancements if you want.

The FREE TS shell comes with 10 fully functional adjustments like "Basic Adjustments", "Tone Curves", "Blurs", and others; plus a whole whack of tools like support for RAW files, cropping, masking, lens effects, etc. There are also 14 other adjustments which have limited functionality (they work, you just can't control them much) such as dehaze, noise reduction, sharpening, texture, abstraction, etc. If you want full control of one of these you can buy it or you can get the whole pack of 14 for $99. 

Enough! Get thee over there and read about it. Download the free app. Try it. Here's the link to get you there. And if you decide to buy anything before the end of June, use the coupon code "STUDIO" to get up to $270 worth of adjustments for just $99.

PS: They produced a great introduction video which explains clearly what Studio is and how it works. Here's the video link. But use the other link in the paragraph above this one to log in and download in order to take advantage of the discounts (and, fair disclosure, give me my "brownie points"!).

I processed this image in Studio. The original was a soft HDR (testing the bracketing function on the new D5500) created in Lightroom. In Studio I used the built-in HDR preset which really just increases Clarity, but then I masked it back. I added a Gaussian Blur layer and painted a quasi-precise mask over the boat (not fine enough over the ski frame, I should go back over it) and a vignette and painted in some sky colour. I didn't use any Topaz plugins although in hindsight I should have tried Clarity. The masking brush is brilliant. And the fact that you can copy and paste the mask onto different "layers".

By the way this is NOT my boat. I wish. It's at the same marina and I'd be embarrassed to have mine in the same picture.

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Gales of November
an update

If you're a new reader and you haven't heard about 'Gales' yet, here's a quick summary:

A 360° pano taken at the Rock Island Lodge 

On the weekend of October 26-29 (It's really called "The Gales of November come early"), we will be holding a four day low cost workshop in Wawa, Ontario on the shores of Lake Superior, for 12 lucky participants. The event is hosted by the Rock Island Lodge/Naturally Superior Adventures and the price includes all accommodations and food. The lodge rooms are first class (when they fill up, you'll stay at a nearby motel/cabin facility, maybe even better!) and the food is fresh, family-style and organic where possible. How much would you spend for food and accommodations in a first class facility? Think about that then check out the cost of our workshop!

This year, Ben Eby will be joining me in leading the workshop. Ben is more of a photo-realist than I am (I lean more towards impressionism and do a lot more post-processing). I'm still working on a "Ben-Bio" on the site but for now check out his website here.

The word "workshop" is a bit of a misnomer. Yes, we'll be challenging you with some themes and educational content, but if you just want to do your thing, you're welcome to do so, and enjoy one of the most picturesque nature venues in all of Canada in the company of a bunch of great photographers. You can even bring your dog and your spouse, as long as they're friendly! Check with us.

This scene was two minutes from the lodge, first thing in the morning one day last year. 

There's still some space available. But this is going to fill up and you need to stop procrastinating! Here's the link to the website and signup page (still a work in progress!): www.photography.to/gales. I dare you to check it out.

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Newfoundland Trip

It's creeping up on me!

Less than 3 weeks from now, I'll be on my way to Newfoundland. My plan is to drive to North Sydney, Nova Scotia, then board the ferry to Port aux Basques, and spend a month in Newfoundland, primarily in three locations, where I've booked cabin/efficiency accommodations. I've left the last week open but I intend to spend a couple of days in the Cape St. Mary area, then board the ferry home from Argentia. Here's a map:

Obviously a month isn't long enough to explore the whole province and I'll be skipping some interesting spots: primarily the West coast including Gros Morne National Park and the northern peninsula. My goal is to shoot picturesque seascapes and outports, waterfalls, stars (aurora!), birds and other wildlife (including whales if possible). Icebergs are a bonus although I have to admit that I sort of have a "seen one, seen them all" kind of attitude. I'm following and have been in touch with some outstanding local photographers and hope to hook up with one or more on my trip. I have some friends there right now: in my opinion, they went too early. There's massive sea ice and even snow on land. It's been hugely foggy the past few days.

I'm hoping to "storyboard" each of the locations. I'm probably using the word wrong, but I want to present a picture of each spot in an attempt to capture its flavour. So while my focus is on the landscapes, I want to force myself to include other aspects of life there. "Work the scene" will be my operative phrase. My plan is to shoot during the golden and blue hours, so get up at ungodly hours, shoot, then relax and maybe nap during the day and go back out in the evenings. We'll see how that works out. I plan to bring my sketching and oil painting kits with me and force myself to draw and paint as well.

Aside from camera gear and my computer, I'm bringing too much stuff. It's not just a week-long vacation, I need kitchen stuff, bathroom stuff, clothes, even food. I can't imagine flying there with one checked bag and my camera stuff. I'll be in touch over wifi but I'm going to try to wean myself off of social media. I have a big note in front of me to make a list of all the stuff I need and organize it.

Speaking of cameras, I  acquired a Nikon D5500 as a backup to my D800. It's got a crop sensor so technically I'll be able to reach out further with my long telephoto (not sure how much more than cropping on the D800 but we'll see). It seems to do a creditable job.

Here's an image from the landfill when I was there practicing on the birds. With the Tamron zoom on the D5500, this is like a 900mm lens on a full-frame.  This isn't cropped and it was handheld. I'm going to have to be really careful to keep the shutter speed up at these values. 

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What's your favourite lens?

The obvious answer to that question is, "well, it depends on what I'm trying to shoot". I have 4 lenses that I use regularly and a couple of others... and if I were told "You can only have one lens. Choose." I would have to say, my Nikkor 70-200 f/2.8 VR. It's not even the new model. It's just so good, I can't imagine a better one. If I need to reach out further, I couple it with my TC-17e III teleconverter for a net 340mm at f/4.8, no discernable loss of sharpness. That's not enough for birds, though, so I find myself using the Tamron 150-600 a lot. It's "OK" but it could be sharper. I can't afford the Nikon big guns, so it'll have to do.

My Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 wideangle is very good. Landscapes and astrophotography. But the "favourite" label is a tossup between the 70-200 and the Nikkor 105mm f/2.8 macro.

Here are a few shots with the macro when I loaded it on the D5500 for testing purposes.

Dandelion head. 

Don't ask me to name this flower and I won't have to lie to you. It's a wildflower growing behind my house. 

Dragonfly sitting on my car. 

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Last weekend, my sister and brother-in-law came to visit for a couple of days. We had a great visit, I took them out in the boat, gave them the nickel tour of the Highlands, and then I said to my sister, go park my ATV in the garage. She said, "really"? Why not.

She's never driven one, or any bike for that matter. She started laughing hysterically to the point where she was wiping tears from her eyes. By the way, I think she was going 2 mph! Of course as a good brother, I had to capture it on camera and post it for everyone to see... 

While they were here, I was a good host. Until I got an alert on the computer. KP of 7.3! Do you know what that means? The aurora borealis are visible here with a KP of 4 or so. 7.3? I ran out with the camera and took a quick test shot but I didn't need to: it was obviously visible to the naked eye. I told my sister I was going to be a terrible host, I turned on the TV, showed them how my remote control works and said, "Bye. See you in the morning!"

I've seen Aurora before. But the last time I saw a display like this was probably 30 years ago, on a moose hunting trip south of Timmins (still reading my blog, Pete? Remember?).

The Northern Lights

No words. Here's a link to a short timelapse I shot. And here's another one, something I called "Pastel". A little different. Enjoy.

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It was a rainy day...

It was a rainy day... well it is April!

The power of advertising. Who among you doesn't finish the title of this blog entry with... "in Pizzaville..." What do you think of when I write, "two all-beef patties..." or "It's the real thing" or "Gales of November"? Repetition is the key! Just sayin'...

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Sometimes a new piece of software adds a new dimension to one's images.

It was a rainy day... 

This is the case with Seven Styles Watercolor actions for Photoshop. I saw someone else using it, got interested and purchased the action for the princely sum of $6.

Here's the thing. You can get carried away and use it endlessly, in appropriate and not so appropriate cases. The effect is intriguing but like HDR, not all the time! I'm looking forward to using it on some of those pretty outports in Newfoundland and maybe the odd landscape.

In this case it worked well: the original photo was ugly, all the powerlines, garbage cans and complicated foreground details. The building in the background jumps out at you in the finished image, and although I've lived here for 10 years, I never noticed it before!

The original image. 

Here's another image I processed with this interesting software:

While we're on the subject of software, if you're really quick (the sale ends tonight at midnight), Topaz Labs has everything in their program on sale for 40% off. Here's the link, and enter "SPRING40" in the discount field on checkout.

They have a new product in the works: called Topaz Studio. It's designed to let you access all their plugins and more, much more, with ease. It's in Beta-testing right now, a bit buggy, but they'll work it out soon! Stay tuned.

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...musings

There was another thread in the Algonquin Park group on Facebook deploring the behaviour of many of the selfish and thoughtless tourists who stop dangerously on Highway 60 and who pester and annoy us, and feed the wildlife, and get in our shots and who are not there for the quiet enjoyment we are. I responded to that thread as follows and would like you, my readers, to think about what I meant. 

" ...stopping is NOT prohibited. In fact I often stop (safely) along 60 for photographs. Like you, I deplore people who do so unsafely or do not get right off the travelled lanes when they stop.

I too avoid the Park on a holiday weekend (or any weekend in the Fall) because of the hordes of busses and tourists, many of whom come from a culture where the concept of personal space and courtesy is different from mine (and presumably yours). But this IS a Provincial Park and it is intended, among other things, to be enjoyed by the public.

It's been discovered by many more people now, some of whom have never seen wildlife or even fall colours and as much as they sometimes inconvenience and annoy me, I'm not about to deny them their enjoyment of this fine example of Canada's natural splendor.  

Sure, I'm in favour of increasing education and enforcement of the laws and regulations, but let's have some tolerance for people who are not as privileged as we, who want a chance to enjoy this beautiful park."

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Newfoundland Update:

I'm working on my agenda as we speak. It's back to a solo trip, and I'm still looking at late June/early July, for 3-4 weeks by car.  East coast, primarily: the drive up the Western peninsula, as attractive as it looks, is a LOT of extra miles. That could possibly change...

I'm going back to my painting classes this week. I really want to bring my oil paint stuff and sketch pad with me. I'm very frustrated by my inability to paint what my mind sees, but I'm determined not to give up just yet. 

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Gales of November update:

It's filling up, only a few spaces remaining. For those who are procrastinating, it's that time. And yes, it's a long day drive up to the Soo from Toronto but really worth it! Last time I drove up, I decided NOT to turn on the radio or listen to music the entire trip: instead I focused on what was going on around me, and I turned it into a Zen experience.  Try it, you'll be pleasantly surprised. I drove all the way to the Soo in one day last time, but if you want a shorter day, stop for the night along the North Channel, in Thessalon or Iron Bridge... the drive from the Soo to Wawa is only 200 km.

Here's the link, if you forgot! www.photography.to/gales

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Parting shots

I took two trips out to shoot pictures this week. One was to the White Water, where we met the fisherman above and where I took this image of rushing water and rocks:

If you're a member of the Haliburton Highlands Camera Club, we (the exec) are undertaking to have multiple outings for our members. Informal ones, like the visit to the whitewater last weekend, as well as more formal trips. Watch the Facebook group for meetup information. 

You don't need to be an HHCC member to access the group, you just have to be a legitimate person interested in photography, not someone trying to sell Sensy products or sunglasses, or give away some of the money being held for me by someone who knows a Nigerian prince. Visit  https://www.facebook.com/groups/165270077016715/ and ask to join, it's an interesting group.

The other visit was to the rookery in Georgina where I got some pictures of Herons nesting last year. I chatted with the landowner and learned that most of the land around there is below the level of Lake Simcoe and it would be flooded if it weren't for the berms and the roadway. Most of the landowners rent out their land to companies growing 'asian vegetables' which he couldn't name. They use the same water for irrigation in the summer. He was there maintaining the berm and bringing in pipe for irrigation. I also learned from another source (the "other" Glenn S, I think) that the land on which the rookery sits has been donated to the township as a conservation area. 

This was cropped somewhat tightly from a shot with the 600mm lens. He was somewhat far away – not all the nests were occupied yet, including the closer ones. 

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