Odds & Ends

...just rambling...

I'm sitting here today just catching up and organizing things. I'm going to be out of circulation for a few weeks for a medical procedure so there's a lot of small stuff to take care of.

I'm a cancer survivor. I had a couple of previous surgeries to remove my thyroid and many affected lymph nodes to which it had spread. I'm having some more surgery next week to remove some malignant nodes in my neck that have returned. They can't get it all but I've lived with it for 12 years, so no reason to think I can't continue to do so. According to the docs, although it's not a minor procedure, I'll be out of hospital in a couple of days and should recuperate quite quickly. 

Yesterday I had the pre-admission appointments at Toronto General prior to the surgery. I wanted to share what an interesting experience it was. For those who have gone through this, usually you go 'here' for paperwork, then 'there' for bloodwork, then 'there' for an EKG, then to the anaesthesiologist's office for a consult, etc. This time they put me in a little exam room and all of the necessary people came to see me instead, one after another! It certainly was much more user-friendly and they had their act together: I didn't have to wait more than a couple of minutes between appointments!

And of course this digital world we live in is conducive to virtually instantaneous sharing of information, so everyone had access to all of my history (what year did you say you had that gall bladder surgery? Our records show it was in 1973...) This could be a good or bad thing, depending how you look at it. Now Princess Margaret Hospital has given me direct online access to both my upcoming schedule of appointments and also to test results. So instead of having to wait two weeks, then trek all the way downtown to sit with the oncologist to find out the results of a CT scan or MRI, I was able to see the actual radiologist's report online about two days after the test. That waiting was always the worst part (of course if they found something bad, I would imagine they would phone me).

So last night, I got email notification that there were new results available and I was actually able to see the results of my CBC blood tests, just like the doctors do:

A screen grab of just a small portion of the test results. FWIW, everything they checked was in the Normal range.  Well, except for one thing, but they didn't give me a hard time about it. I'm just a wee bit short for my weight. In fact, my BMI is off the end of their chart. Have to do something about that when this is over.

By the way, I had the test just before 2 pm. When I got home just before 8, the results were already there.

So I should be back blogging in a week or two, but I won't have taken too many new pictures. In fact, I've decided to send my camera and some selected lenses in for inspection, cleaning and service while I'm in. I'll let you know how that turns out when I get back!

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SPEAKING OF CANCER

On April 16th, I'm participating in the Cops for Cancer event at the Yorkdale Shopping Centre. I've teamed up with my friend Sean Shapiro and will be having my copious curly locks shorn publicly to express my support for cancer research. Not only my support, but YOURS! The whole idea is to raise donations for the Canadian Cancer Society. 

I didn't know what to put down for a goal so I think I set it too low. Don't let that daunt you: please take the opportunity to donate to this critical cause. Here's a link to my personal page on the Cops for Cancer site. Please visit it and make a donation, every dollar counts.

And yes, I'll post bald pictures after the fact!

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It's  been an easy winter and although we shouldn't count our chickens (you KNOW there's going to be more of it before real spring sets in), it's +11°C out there today and although there's still snow on the ground and ice on the lake, it'll be gone soon. I'm not taking the chains and plow off the ATV yet, though!

I only had one day of dripping water in my entry (did the roof last year. Can't figure out where it's still coming from!) and although the sump pump line froze up again I have it under control (Note to self: you really have to address that this summer!). Everywhere you walk is muddy right now, it's not my favourite time of year.

I'm stepping down as president of the Haliburton Highlands Camera Club next week, just because I think that other people should guide it now. When the club was founded two years ago, we assembled a talented and selfless team of people to run the operations and judging by the enthusiasm and activity of the membership, they've done a great job. Some of us are stepping back and some new people are coming in. It's good to see. I'm sure that the goals of the club – a friendly learning and sharing environment – will be well catered to.

The growing skill and artistic vision of the club members is portrayed in a rotating slide show on the website greeting page: (link) take a minute to view it, you'll enjoy it. It's gratifying, when I wear my teaching hat!

By the way, watch this space for an announcement of what we're planning as a show and sale of some fine images from the club members, as well as a lecture by a renowned wildlife photographer. Tentatively scheduled for May 2016

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Speaking of artistic endeavours, I'm gaining a little more confidence in my painting. For the first time, I tried painting something other than rocks and trees, and it didn't come out too bad!

This is a portrait of a Pine Marten based on a photo taken in Algonquin Park a few months ago. It needs a bit more work and more back story but it tells me that maybe I can draw, just a little bit, so I'm looking forward to trying more things. Right now it's about learning techniques that I can call upon when I need them. 

And yes, that's what a Pine Marten actually looks like! Someone on the Algonquin group in Facebook gave me a compliment: "hey, I know that animal! He's the one at Mew Lake"! Think I should try people now?

I wish I had started painting 20 years ago. It's a bit of a late start at my age.

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Gales of November

Lots of chatter, lots of interest, still waiting for people to book the second weekend! It's possible the October 27-31 weekend will be geared more to intermediate shooters... but that depends on who books.

The booking page was down for a while but it's back up. For more information on this awesome workshop opportunity, go to www.photography.to/gales.

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OOh, a secret!

I'm not allowed to say who, yet. One of my pictures has been selected for a very prestigious organization's promotional brochure. Although I won't get paid for it (yeah, what else is new? LOL), I will get VIP access to one or more of their events. I can't say more until they give me the go-ahead, so watch this space!

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Dog Sled Derby

The Haliburton dog sled derby was last weekend. I was out both days and, as a camera club colleague said, "I near to wore out my delete button" when editing my pictures! I shot about 500... and while there were a large number of technically acceptable images, they all tended to look alike and were consistently boring! More and more, I feel the need to tell a story in my pictures.

I think this shot does that. If you want a picture of dog sledding to put in the dictionary, this would do it! I spent some time working on the background to make sure the trail was there to show where they came from and I softened some of the detail to give it a more painterly look. I'm being critical, I know. Now I'm wondering if I would have the skill to paint this! 

However of all the pictures I took that weekend, here's my favourite:

A variety of 'cute' captions come to mind: "Let Me Out!", or "The Evil Eye" but none of them tell the truth.

I did three versions of this shot. The most dramatic was this one:

...which I like but it's only about the 'evil eye'. The wider picture above tell the story better. By the way, if you're feeling bad for the dog, don't. First of all, dogs love their 'crates', it's where they want to be to feel safe and secure. And people who feel concern for sled dogs don't understand: do you think an Olympic marathon runner needs your pity when s/he is exhausted nearing the end of a race? Same thing.

I said three versions. The third one, a crop between these two, was preferred by the majority of my Facebook readers and I get why. I prefer the story of the top one. But here's the third one, with a 'story' added:

Be afraid. 

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Some wildlife pictures to close out the blog this week.

I've seen, and even taken, better bald eagle pictures. Especially at the Canadian Raptor Centre. But this is in the wild (well, sort of: it's overlooking the Scotch Line Landfill, just north of Minden). Again, it's that story telling side of me that makes me like this one better. The bird is dead centre, I know. He's small in the picture. The lines are static and horizontal. But this says to me that an eagle stands proudly alone and is the monarch of everything s/he can see. 

About a minute later. Going out for lunch! 

Ruffed Grouse. On the way home from the dogsled races. The lesson is, always have a camera ready, because I only got a few seconds to shoot this guy, from the car window! A few minutes later I came across a wild turkey and a couple of deer, both of which I got shots of but this one is my favourite of the three. 

OK, see you on the flip side, folks!

— 30 —

One Swell Foop (Not)

Sometimes I like writing this blog all in one swell foop. But occasionally I'll start writing an article, then revisit it a few days later when something interesting happens that I can add in. Doing it this way (a bit at a time) makes it more topical for me and hopefully for you. But it does make it somewhat disjointed, with a bunch of non-related topics! Sort of a stream-of-consciousness kind of thing. Hope that floats your boat!

Last week, I showed you a picture of a bunch of ice huts teetering on the edge of falling through the ice on Mountain Lake, because we had several days of unseasonably warm temperatures and two days of rain. Not to worry, they didn't fall through. Today is a whole other thing.

Country Living Challenges (part 2)

Last night, we reached -33°C with a wind chill of 44 below. My sump pump line froze up (it does every year) so I had to run a temporary line (I have two of them; when one freezes, I bring it in to defrost in the bathtub!). I'm hoping I got it right this time: if it has a continuous downhill slope, the water should just flush out of the hose and not stay in there to freeze.

This is the setup. I think I solved it: I was just out there (next day) and it isn't frozen up. By the way, this is a pano created using Lightroom CC 2015.4 in about 5 seconds! Four shots, and the new boundary warp feature is awesome!

if anyone is interested, here are the details.  The pipe at left is the problem: it runs underground across my driveway and even though there's a heatline connection (not sure it works) it freezes every year. I think it's because it comes up at the other end and water sitting in the pipe freezes. The connection in the house goes to the sump pump in the crawlspace. I attached the flexible hose and ran it up further to the hook you see (the check valve will let water drain back down into the sump).

Then I used this old metal frame to stretch the hose downhill. The logs are there to help support it when the water is running, and there's a bungee cord holding it in position where it drops on the right. 

Then I used an old piece of eavestroughing to keep it straight and a couple of logs to keep the end of the hose out of the frozen water on the ground. 

Pretty ugly, but it works (I hope!). I'm going to have a skating rink behind my house but I just use that area to turn the car around so I can back it into the garage.

PS: It's two days later and yesterday's temperatures were well above freezing. Water everywhere and the lake ice is dangerous. Such a weird winter!

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FWIW, this is how I transport my firewood into the house. Beats carrying armloads! I generally split the wood this small, I find it burns more easily. 

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When I woke up this morning, it was still 27 below. I had posted that I was planning to stay inside today but I had to go out to fix the sump pump line, so I bundled up and went out. Wool longjohns, snow pants, thinsulate jacket liner, down jacket, sheepskin hat, insulated mittens, the whole works. You know what? It was a beautiful day! So I hopped on the 4-wheeler and took a run out on the ice. No spectacular pictures (I had to take my glove off to shoot. THAT was cold). Then my face got cold. I headed back in. But just to prove I was there:

It doesn't really look that cold. Trust me. It was. 

There are people whom I know TENT-CAMPING in Algonquin Park this weekend. I submit that they must be of a different species. Even when I was young I wasn't that foolish! 

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That was yesterday. Today is crispy cold beautiful again.

A chickadee trying to keep warm at -25°C. This was shot with my 70-200 f/2.8 shooting at f/8, 1/320 sec, ISO 640 and cropped. I was right to send back that cheap 500mm mirror lens. Have to find a way to get a Nikon 400mm lens. A lot of people are telling me that using black-and-white for nature shots isn't really appropriate: but I thought in this case, the detail comes out better. 

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OK, I did buy a new lens

Well, mint condition used. I bought a Tamron SP 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD lens because I can't afford the one I really want, the Nikon 200-400 f/4 which is only $7000 at B&H (but it's backordered, so I guess I have to pass on it!).

I took a couple of test shots with it. I was hoping to see a pine marten attacking a rabbit on the side of Hwy 118 on the way home, but no such luck! Maybe tomorrow, when we're going looking for bald eagles. In the meantime...

I shot this at 1/1000 second, f/8, ISO 1100, 600mm handheld. After seeing this picture on my camera LCD, I agreed to buy the lens.The blowup isn't quite 100% but you get the picture. Stay tuned...

I think notwithstanding the shake reduction (Tamron calls it "Vibration Compensation") I'm going to try to stick to  the 1/focal length rule until I can test how effective it is. That means, 1/1000 at f/8 is going to be my go-to setting when shooting handheld at 600mm.

I did go out in search of telephoto subjects on Friday. Larry and I went to the Scotch Line landfill (euphemism for "garbage dump"!) because there be bald eagles there. So here's the 600mm doing its thing:

This was cropped a bit, it's about half-a-frame. However it took a fair bit of post-processing to get it looking this sharp. Shutter speed was a bit low – 1/400 sec – but I was on a tripod. The lens does autofocus pretty quickly.

"Mom and Dad and little Eddie" (you know — 'Eddie the Eagle'...). Rico suggested another name for this image: "Family Tree". Again it took a lot of work to get it this sharp. I've had a lot of good comments on it in Facebook. Same shutter speed, shooting at f/8, ISO 2000. Technically, not the greatest image: it's quite noisy if you blow it up.

So how do I feel about this lens? It's not a $10,000 piece of Nikon glass. But I think with some practice and work, it will do a good job for me, especially at places like Carden Plain in the Spring.

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From the sporadic musings department...

 1. Do as I say, not as I do

I'm typing on a new keyboard and have a new mouse too. Both wireless, both from Logitech. My old one more-or-less died last week, they've been working sporadically so I dug out an old wired set for the time being.

I should learn not to eat at the keyboard. You would not believe all the crumbs that came out of both of the older keyboards when I turned them upside down and shook them. Unbelievable. 

Oh, by the way, I'm sitting here enjoying some cranberry-almond thins, they're like tasty crunchy baguettes. There are already a couple of crumbs on the new keyboard! {sigh}

2. Like a kid in a candy store

On my way home yesterday, via the 400/11/118 (I went that way to meet Mike with the Tamron lens) I stopped at Cabela's in Barrie, at Missy Mandel's suggestion. I had told her I was planning to go to Bass Pro to buy some camo's for bird shooting and she suggested I try Cabela's instead. Good call, Missy.

They're both about the same size – huge – with similar products and selection, but I think Cabela's might be a bit higher end. I've dealt with Cabela's before, by mail order from Nebraska. I still have a Goretex duck hunting shell from 25 years ago; the Goretex isn't completely waterproof any more, it was time to replace it, but the quality is great and it lasted forever.

Anyway, put me in a store like that and I'm a kid in a candy store. It's like going to Costco, you know, "just to pick up one item"... so I now have a set of waterproof camo pants and parka, both on sale, plus some other stuff. Don't ask.

They also carry camo ground blinds that would be great for bird shooting. They weren't on sale so no hurry, but I'm tempted.

This one's a folding chair surrounded by a camo shell, which you can easily carry, then pop it open and sit down. The sales guy told me he also uses it for ice fishing (don't look at me. I'm not sitting out there in the cold!) Only about $100. There's another one that's tall, designed for archery shooters, but I could easily stand up in it. And bigger ones for more than one person. Hmmm.  By the way, doesn't that look like a Pine Marten crawling into the blind? It's not, but it sure looks like it in this picture!

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PS: re Gales of November

I have expressions of interest from enough people to fill up the second session. But they're sitting back, not committing yet. Folks, if you want to attend this, you need to get booked or you might be disappointed. There is still space available October 27-30.  October 20-23 is technically full, but a couple of people have said they could do either weekend, so we might be able to shuffle.

www.photography.to/gales in case you lost the address.

Several people have said they'd like to find someone to (a) car pool with and/or (b) share a room with. If that's you, contact me. I can probably help.

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The day before (nobody said this had to be in chronological order!), the weather was also exciting. We had huge snow squalls, to the point where visibility was down to zero on the highway. In-between, there were some great photo ops.

I want to preface this by adding that I've been re-reading Freeman Patterson's "Photography and the Art of Seeing", and improving my visual thinking was in my mind as I was driving home. I stopped by the roadside because the patterns of the trees and the dead hanging leaves caught my eye. Here's one result:

This is what I saw. Not only the red leaves, but also the pastel, charcoal-like trees half-hidden in the blowing snow. That's what I wanted to capture. 

Instead of driving straight home, I headed down Pleasant Point Road. I had something in mind:

I viewed this scene through a painter's eye. I plan to put oil paint on canvas, using this image as a source. Stay tuned. 

There was also this scene:

No doubt you've seen images like this one: the technique is not new, it involves moving the camera while the shutter is open. I've done many of these over time but this one seems to capture the depth and the textures the way I saw them. By the way, the magic of this image is that it is 100% "Straight out of Camera". Nothing was done to it, not even a crop or exposure adjustment. A departure for me.

— 30 —

Spring Fever

Spring has sprung, but I'm feeling a bit uninspired these days. Does it show? I'm a little distracted. One of the reasons is that I'm investing a lot of creative energy in other media: painting, and re-learning to play guitar. When I pick up the camera, I feel like I'm 'phoning it in'. Time to get motivated again!

NEWSFLASH:
Topaz Labs just announced that TOPAZ SIMPLIFY is on sale for 30% off, reducing the price to $27.99 for the month of May. Use this link and enter the code "MAYSIMP" at checkout.

Turtle Power

As I hinted last week, I finally managed to get some turtle shots! For some background, there are eight species of turtles in Ontario and all but one of them are on the endangered list. The one that isn't is the Painted Turtle:

Every spring, the turtles venture out of their marsh homes in search of food, nesting spots and mates and often cross roads to find them, where they often meet with untimely ends at the "hands" of car and truck tires. In Haliburton County, organizations are in place to monitor the populations. Other people see turtles all the time, but I never actually have... despite driving around on appropriate roads in search of them. Until last week, when I came across this hefty Snapping Turtle specimen:

I should have added something for a sense of scale, but this guy's shell is probably half a meter long. I was tempted to remove the piece of grass on his head. Only for a second, though: it would be a good way to lose a hand! 

Birds of Prey

I also mentioned last week that I had visited the Canadian Raptor Conservancy with a group of 10 friends from here and from Richmond Hill Camera Club. We had a great time, weather was good, the birds were cooperative! And impressive as usual.

Others got better shots than I. Sometimes you're not in the 'groove' and that was me that day. I succeeded in getting many in-focus, well-exposed images but my timing was off, especially when they flew a bald eagle over the pond, and several of my colleagues got great shots where the bird's wingtips brushed the water. Mine weren't so exciting.

So I don't bore you, here are a couple more and that's it.

Baby Great Horned Owl 

Aplomado Falcon showing off 

We went into Port Dover for lunch (worth it! The pickerel and perch at the Erie Beach Hotel is worth the trip) then headed home. Along the way there was an apple orchard that had caught many of our eyes, so we stopped. Again, I was a bit disappointed. I think I was more concerned with the long drive ahead of me and didn't give it the time I needed. However I did get a few 'keepers'.

This is what caught our eyes. You'd think there's be some killer shots here! 

A bit of a painterly treatment from Topaz Impression helped this one 

This was what I had in mind when I stopped 

And here's a shot of John Kot doing his thing, with a little help from Impression/Monet. 

I also stopped at a wind farm, with the intent of doing a slow shutter exposure. That didn't work out, but here's a composite shot that didn't look too bad:

Half a dozen exposures blended in Photoshop

More Birds

To close for today, here are two more bird shots from Carden Plain (I was back there on Saturday) that I liked. I was wearing my springtime fragrance, "eau de Deep-Woods-Off". Yep, the black flies were out!

Eastern Phoebe 

Barn Swallow 

— 30 —

It must be Spring...

...somewhere!

No surprise, or it shouldn't be. I've seen snow coming down as late as early May!  Last night there were flakes of the fluffy white stuff that accumulated a few inches but the temperature is hovering around the freezing mark and it's melting. The maple syrup people aren't happy, nights are still getting down to the -10°C area and the sap isn't running, but it will get there.

Today I saw the first American Goldfinch pair at my bird feeder. Robins shouldn't be far behind. And a Cackle of Grackles is out there making a ruckus and scaring off all the other birds. The chipmunks haven't come out yet but the gulls are back at the landfill, competing with the crows for the delectable morsels of disgusting garbage... we've had bald eagles there all winter but I haven't seen them in a few days.

There was a red-winged blackbird at the feeder this morning (April 3) but he was too shy to let me take a picture. Remarkable because (a) it's the first one this year and (b)the red patch was outstandingly brilliant – almost fluorescent,

The ice fishing huts are off the lakes. Well, off our lake anyway... law says today is the deadline for removing them. My neighbour Jim Walker stopped by to chat, he says there's 30" of hard water in spots! That's a LOT. It's been a rough winter, very little snow but very cold.

It's the "Ugly" season for us landscape photographers. If you don't like muddy brown vistas, naked trees and wearing rubber boots that keep you dry when you step into deep gooey mud puddles, you'd best be patient. It'll get green again soon! And the flowers and buds will be out, bringing with them that sneezy drippy season if you have allergies and those itchy lumps cheerfully provided by our national birds, the blackfly and the mosquito!

T.G.I.S. !!

Painting is HARD!

Some people make it look so easy, but it's not! My regular readers will know that I've finally, after all these years, picked up a paint brush and started putting pigment on canvas. But it's really not easy.

I have a decided advantage over some of my other painting newbies: I get composition. I have a feel for light and how it affects the subject. But what I'm struggling with is putting lines and shapes where I want them, in the way I want, and mixing colours.

I've learned that you can make any colour out of Red, Blue and Yellow paint. You can tint it with white or shade it with black (frowned upon: you want black, you "make" it!), but I haven't been able to make the same colour twice! You mix up some, then run out and want to make more... good luck matching it!

So far. Not finished yet... I need to add some more bright colour and texture. And fix the edges of the leaves. I took some artistic license with the colours and with the composition (the leaves are supposed to be sitting on a log...)

Here's the original photo 

and here's sort of what I had in mind. This is courtesy of Topaz Impression and I haven't figured out how to emulate those brush strokes. Or colours! 

Thing is, I ruined this painting. I'm trying to fix it but it's not like rolling back the develop instructions in Lightroom or removing offending layers in Photoshop. Either I have to paint over what I've done (after it dries) or add to it, or just throw it away and start over.

I paint (and photograph) in an impressionistic mode. Two reasons: I haven't figured out how to paint fine lines yet, and I'm lazy and just want to stand back and throw paint at the canvas. I haven't got the nerve up yet to try a complex subject like a tree, but that's my next step.

It's fun, but it's hard. My goal is to be able to go out and paint "plein aire" some time this spring. Stay tuned...

Birds of Prey field trip

Shot in 2013 

These pictures were taken at my last visit to the Canadian Raptor Conservancy on Lake Erie just West of Port Dover. I've booked a return engagement for Sunday, May 10th for a group of 10 photographers. Cost is just $50 each plus tax (Right now I have about 7 people confirmed and a bunch of "maybe" folks. If you want to go, you need to send me an email RIGHT NOW.

Understand that this is NOT a teaching workshop: I'm not making anything, just facilitating the field trip. Priority goes to Haliburton Highlands Camera Club members.

Here's one I haven't previously published from that visit a couple of years ago. Great Horned Owl coming in for a landing. 

One final bird picture for today. I know, just an ordinary black capped chickadee staging on a twig near my feeder but I really like the sharpness and the "velcro" as Dan Busby calls it. And the diagonal lines, the lighting... I used Topaz Impression and started with the "Palette knife and Oil" preset for the painted texture.

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Sometimes you're in a different place

Life's all about change, right? Some things have changed for me, in my approach to my photography. Maybe it's just temporary, but when I pick up my camera, I have something different in mind. Let's see if I can explain what and why.

I'm planning to take a booth at the Haliburton Home and Cottage Show, to sell pictures. The show is at the end of May, I'll send my commitment in this week. A lot of planning goes into this effort, from the design and construction of the booth, to the choice of images for sale, framing, how to display non-framed pieces, what sizes and media, what price points, finding a device to accept credit and debit cards, lights, and so on. I'm working on all of those things.

The choice of pictures to sell is a major component, also size and quality. I've pretty well decided that most of them will be in the 12x18 size range, and most of those will be printed on lustre paper and priced quite reasonably under 50¢/square inch (so a 12x18 would be nominally $100, unframed). This is, after all, a cottage show. However I plan to have a couple of more expensive pieces there, such as this one:

This is a triptych which I plan to print on canvas and do gallery wraps. The vertical size will be around 18" and the price will be set around $450. The image, by the way, was shot in the fall of 2008 with the D300. It's an HDR and I used the oil paint filter in CS6 to complete it.  

Another image that I plan to display for sale is this one:

I want to print this one on watercolour paper, mat and frame it normally. $350 framed, $250 unframed, 12"x18". I shot this image yesterday (Sunday) with the D600, it's also an HDR. It's the Trent-Severn waterway, with Balsam Lake in the background. 

So here's my dilemma. I'm searching for images in my archives that are suitable for printing. I've come up with about 100 candidates, but some of them don't make it for various reasons: usually because I've cropped them too tightly and there aren't enough pixels left to do a large scale print. Here's an example of that:

I love the oil paint filter in CS6. Some people don't: what do they know?? LOL. It's only about 1600 px wide, so I MIGHT be able to get an 18" print out of it, but only because it's painted and small detail is irrelevant. 

I really like this image. I can picture it as a large scale print, say 24" x 36" flush mounted, or at the very least 18x24 in a mat. But it's never going to happen, unless there's some magic way to go from 1600 pixels to at least 5400 pixels without losing essential detail or introducing artifacts. So as I said, perhaps I can get it to a 12x18 but even then I wonder.

I haven't thought about printing before, really. Among other things I did in the past couple of weeks was to visit a professional print shop, where they specialize in archival and exhibition quality prints. I spent an hour picking the production manager's brain and sitting with some of my own images on their large screen. The conclusion was, if an image isn't originally 4000 pixels on the long side, don't bother. Yes, there are exceptions: the filtered oil painted image above might work because all the detail has been smeared out (his words) but certainly not as a large scale picture.

Incidentally, there's a fantastic print mounting method out there called "acrylic face mount". It's by far the best presentation I've ever seen for saturated, detailed images, they literally "glow". It ain't cheap: I was quoted almost $1 per square inch, just for printing and mounting. But it's beautiful. Google it...

So I've started thinking about composing my image in the camera so I don't need to crop. I'm paying much more attention to detail, to lighting, to textures and nuances of shading (love the snow in the above image, by the way). I've started making images with printing in mind. And that's a whole other mindset. This is stuff that other people have been saying to me for years, but I just haven't listened.

The good news is, I now have a 24 megapixel full sized sensored camera. I can still crop, but only "some". If I want images to look at onscreen, it's still OK to crop up to 100% size: but don't be tempted to print them.

I was out pretty well the whole day on Sunday and while I clicked the shutter about 150 times, many of them were 3-shot bracketed bursts, some were variations of the same image, trying to get it right (about 50 exposures of the Trent-Severn, above for example). And I was in 4 different venues.

By the way, if you want to buy prints, drop me a note and let's talk! If there's a picture you've seen here on the blog that you'd like to see hanging in your house, let me know and I'll figure out if it's do-able, size wise, then let you know how much it will cost. For now, until the business is established, prices will be not much more than the cost of printing and shipping. So a 12 x 18 could end up in your hands for under $40, for example.Send me an email

That said...

I haven't taken a lot of images in the last month, and certainly not snapshots. Well there are some exceptions, after all that's what a point-and-shoot camera is for! Here's one:

Four generations of women, and my brother-in-law. My mother, my sister, my daughter and my granddaughter. North-facing window light.  What's technically wrong with this shot? Well to start with, my daughter is in my sister's shadow. I should have had everyone swing around a bit to their left so the light would be more even. There are lots of other things that make this a less-than-professional portrait but (1) it's a snapshot! and (2) as I've said often in my workshops, "you can't take a bad picture of your family". Because there are memories, not just pixels, embedded in the image.

So what else is going on?

2013 Workshop Schedule

The Spring 2013 workshop schedule is up at www.photography.to. Check it out. I reworked the landing page to clean it up as well. The workshops are designed for beginner and intermediate DSLR users, they're 2 days long and run up here in the Highlands, although I'll come to Toronto to run sessions on demand.

If you're an advanced photographer, I have two things to offer you: one would be to give someone you know (perhaps your SO or child) a step up, when they're ready to inherit that DSLR of yours (an excuse to get that new Nikon or Canon body you've been wanting?)  The other would be an opportunity to get out of the city and spend some time shooting up here in the Highlands. Talk to me.

Some new and exciting news!

But I can't tell you about it yet. Watch this space...

There be eagles there...

A couple of weeks ago, someone told me there were bald eagles on Horseshoe Lake Road, coincidentally, right at one of my very favourite dawn shooting spots. So I wandered over there one afternoon and got lucky:

These were shot with the 400mm lens on the D600, then cropped drastically because they're about 400m away! I spent 2 hours there on Sunday, didn't see hide nor hair of them. I'll be baaaack... 

Lastly, I was testing the light pucks I told you about a while ago, in the light tent. Not a wonderful solution but it works. Here's a test shot of a wedge of Mandarin Orange on my frosted background.

I got all extreme on this shot, playing in the NIK plugin set. Just for fun! 

See? Not everything is print- and exhibition-ready.

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