A Perfect Day

Today I had a great day. Indian Summer is here, the temperature was 24°C, the sun was shining. I decided to go for a ride, back up to Algonquin Park. Well, almost to the park — my destination was Ragged Falls just west of the Park on Highway 60. It's 68km from my door on one of the nicest riding roads in Ontario.

My motorcycle friends would understand that I was throttle steering all the way through the sweeping turns, really into the ride. I wish I had a helmet cam so I could share the great colours and wonderful weather. Next year, it's on the list. Around every corner, over every hill was another vista... I must have asked myself if I should stop for pictures over 100 times. I hung in there and waited until I was on the way home. Here's a shot from Dorset:

Ragged falls was interesting. I worked my way up a trail that took me below the main part of the falls. It was quite a challenging hike, mostly because of my knees. I was very careful climbing down a rock face. I took a number of pictures then looked up and saw this up near the top of the falls:

Waterfalls are interesting, cute girls taking their clothes off are more interesting. She didn't, though. Just waded out near the top of the falls. She had a couple of little dogs with her that she took out as well.

Here's another shot from the same spot. I did a long exposure with the ND filter but didn't like it. I have a whole bunch more to process, you'll find them on my Smugmug site eventually...

On the way home, I stopped several times for pictures. It's more difficult on the bike because you have to untie the camera bag, not just pick up a camera off the seat. Here's one from Highway 35:

Again I have lots more images to process! These were my favourites.

Yesterday was interesting too: I stopped in Norland on the way home from Toronto and caught this Pileated Woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus) doing her thing on top of a hydro pole:

I wasn't sure if it was a male or female, so I looked it up on the National Geographic website: my picture is better than theirs! Theirs is on a tree, though. This is a pretty tight crop — I couldn't get closer — and a testament to the sharpness of the Nikkor 70-200 VR lens.

As long as we're going backwards in time, these are from a few days ago.

The first shot is just off Highway 35, the second one is on Buckslide Road. I'm planning to go back there tomorrow: just around the bend from this shot is another great scene.

So I wasn't going to shoot colours this fall. But how can you help it? These vistas are all around! Stay tuned...

By the way, it's been an interesting week: there's a bunch of new equipment here which needs review, and a saga about Bell Canada you'll enjoy. You have to be patient — I'm too tired to write about it now!

Algonquin Park Excursion

I joined about 30 photographers in a Richmond Hill Camera Club excursion to Algonquin Park. First of all, thanks to Larry Rezka and B.Dass for putting it together — these things are a lot of work and it often goes unappreciated. I enjoyed everyone's company, especially  Liz (who stayed at my place and is an awesome cook!) and Ron, whose insights and humour are infectious.

The excursion itself was marred only by Mother Nature's lack of cooperation... to a certain extent. Saturday was actually too bright and sunny, and Sunday brought a balanced cloudy/sunny sky, but no really nice dawn (for which I got out of bed at 5:00 am!). The leaf colours were not there yet. There were some, and although it appeared that they hadn't peaked yet, there were some areas where we could see bare trees. Perhaps the lack of bright reds was because all those leaves were already down! Oh well, more to come up here, that's why I live in the Highlands!

I didn't actually shoot any colours. I focused on two things: moving water, using my new Neutral Density filter, and on some texture shots. I was somewhat disappointed in my efforts, but it was a good practice run for the Gales of November excursion coming up in a month. More to say about the ND filter on my Technical Blog. It really doesn't fix sunny/shade scenes... and I learned more about composition this weekend.

Here are a couple of ND shots:

This is the top of Ragged Falls which is technically not in Algonquin Park, but just outside it. It's a 30 second exposure taken with the ND filter, but I had to enhance it with Topaz to make it look half decent.

The main portion of the falls. It's hard to get this perspective: you have to get over the fence and near to the edge to shoot it. FWIW, my tripod feet are just outside the bottom edge of the picture, just a couple of inches from the edge. Processed almost the same way as the previous image. It was hard to think of different ways to shoot these falls. Perhaps on another day.

 I did what I call "Texture Shots" at the old Logging Museum. Here are a few:

Logs hand split and hewn for making a log house. These are done the old way, as it was 100 years ago. A typical structure is in the background.

This was the door handle on a log cabin purportedly from the turn of the last century. You can see the hand work on the lower wood block and tool marks on the door planks. I find it amazing that smooth planks can be turned out using primitive tools. There's a hand built house in the Bancroft area that I'm hoping to get permission to shoot, much more awesome than this.

The handle, however, is screwed onto the door with a Phillips head screw which wasn't invented until the late 1930's...

Ship's wheel. This was in the wheelhouse of a boat used for logging 100 years ago. I loved the textures, and the patina on the wood. This is cropped out of a shot of the whole wheel which I like too, but I wanted to zoom in and show just this portion.

We stopped twice at the same spot. A small turnout on Smoke Lake, just off Highway 60. I was taken with the textures of the trees and roots and rocks. The second time we were there was at Dawn on Sunday (we couldn't find the rest of the group). Here are two similar dawn photos (I couldn't decide which one I liked better!).

5-shot HDR's processed using Photomatix Pro and tweaked with various other pieces of software and plug-ins in Photoshop.

One annoyance that I will share here, in the hope that you do not see yourself here and if you do, you'll take steps to correct it. I was setting up to take these shots, or similar ones a few minutes later and a van pulled up in the little turnout. About 5 people piled out of the van, cameras in hand, to take pictures here. I will NOT share their ethnicity, I'll leave it up to your imagination. The spit of land I was photographing was probably 10 or 12 feet wide, there's nothing but water off to the right in the above picture. They jostled past me, I had to protect my tripod to prevent it from getting knocked over, and proceeded to walk out on the rocks beyond the trees, sit down and take pictures, without a single word of excuse or apology, or any thought of asking me if I was done and if they would be interfering with my shot. By the way, the exact same thing happened the first time we stopped there, and I had to yell at the guy to stay out of my shot when he blithely walked in front of my camera. I found these people to be extraordinarily rude and self-centred. I packed up my camera and we left. Think about it next time you shoot where there are a bunch of other photographers.

The best spot on the excursion, in my opinion, was Ragged Falls. I'll be visiting back there again more than once, possibly in winter too: I'd like to see what it looks like with snow all around. It will be a challenge getting to the same vantage point, though.

Back soon!

— 30 —

Fall Colours and other exciting stuff

I've lived up here in the Haliburton Highlands for 4 years now. You would think I'd be getting bored with and tired of the scenery up here. Think again. Every year there are new and exciting things to capture. This year in particular, now that my eyes are open in a different way, there are some awesome images out there.
First of all, the colours this year are outstanding. I don't think I've ever seen reds as rich and vibrant. And it's early! Still another week to go before the colour peaks. I feel sorry for those who live in places with less variable seasons, they don't get to see this:

This was at Wren Lake just south of Dorset on Highway 35. This is an HDR, but only to enhance the sky! This is how it really looked.

I did use HDR for this shot (same place) but believe it or not, to TONE DOWN the bright colours. They make your eyes hurt!

Janie's dock up on Kushog Lake. at sunset.

At the Minden Wildwater Preserve. I will admit to manipulating this one, I applied the "Indian Summer" filter in Nik Color Efex Pro to enhance the golden glow

This is an extra special photo. It was magic. This is NOT MANIPULATED, it was the way we saw it. Driving by on 35 enroute to Toronto around 9am, I looked left and there it was. As the car rolled 30 feet more, it was gone. You had to be looking directly up-sun to see the rimlighting on the trees.

If you're a photographer and you want to know how to do this kind of pictures in the middle of a sunny day, click here to go to my technical blog and learn how. If you're NOT a photographer, click there anyway: there are some more interesting images for you to see!

This weekend, we're going to Algonquin Park. Look for more georgeous fall photos next week!

— 30 —

I've never been skunked...

Ha! Well I got your attention, didn't I? But it's true! You just have to let me finish my sentence! I'll do that in a couple of minutes, a bit further down.

New Stuff
I'm getting a couple of new goodies! Well it was my birthday, and I decided to buy myself a few things. One of them is the Wacom Intuos4 Digitizer tablet. I've been using a tablet for a couple of years and can never go back. But the one I have is the little "Bamboo" and while it's excellent, it doesn't live up to the professional standard that the Intuos does. The second thing is a fixed 10-stop Neutral Density filter which will allow me to do waterfalls and other moving water long time exposures. If you've followed my blog, you might remember that I bought a variable, adjustable ND filter and I was being a cheapskate and bought a lousy one. This time I didn't compromise, and I got the German-made B&W filter brought to you by the wonderful folks who make glass for Leica (I think...). I also ordered a proper sensor cleaning kit — I've been rather negligent in that area up to now. And finally, I'm going to buy a new TV. I don't need a big fancy one, just a regular $400 flatscreen. I thought my eyes were going on me: but Rosa was watching TV with me a couple of days ago and asked if I realized that my TV was all fuzzy! It's that time — I've had this Sony Trinitron for probably close to 20 years!

I do need a new laptop computer, but I decided that would have to wait a bit. Ditto those lenses I've been looking for. I've squirrelled away some money for the lenses, but not enough. I'd still like to sell my studio strobe lights, that would help! Anyone interested? Send me an email.

What else is new?
Not that much. As I said a couple of posts ago, I've been trying to participate in life instead of just observing it, if that makes any sense. I'm trying to do some meaningful things with my photography. Rosa (she's the artist friend I mentioned a while ago) bought me a couple of wonderful art books and I'm diligently but slowly working my way through them. That said, my images aren't art yet... by my definition. I'll get there. I'm still stuck in HDR mode but there's the occasional flash of other stuff seeping through. I am working on a couple of new Blurb books, hopefully I'll be able to get something printed before Christmas. I'll tell you more in a little while.

So here are a couple of images from the past couple of weeks (still waiting for the 'skunked' thing? Be patient!)

This is a really old image. It dates back to 2007 but I reworked it a few days ago, after looking at that F800 rider's Montana picture (I still haven't been able to get in touch with him). I used the "cutout" filter in Photoshop CS5 to simplify it.

This is a digital painting from an image shot a couple of weeks ago on the Lake. The sky was plain white, so I added the textures (and the matching reflection in the water) and then did the whole thing as a watercolor in Photoshop. Technically it was an HDR at one point...

Last weekend I participated in the NAPP September Rally competition. Two of the categories were "Low Key" (underexposed) and "High key" (overexposed) and my submissions are above. I actually like the second one a lot and you'll see it in my book on the Haliburton Highlands!

All right, all right. The "skunked" thing. No, I didn't get sprayed, it's an expression that comes from Cribbage and Backgammon. It means to lose, big time!

Whenever I drag myself out of bed and go out to shoot at dawn, I ALWAYS come back with at least one image that I like. I've never been skunked. It's an effort to get out there but it's worth it every time. Last night I heard that there were supposed to be 'fog patches'. So even though I didn't go to bed until after 2am, I happened to wake up momentarily at a little before 6:30 and I said, "what the Hell" and got up.

I drove over to Janie's house on Kushog Lake. She said I could shoot there when I wanted to (thanks, Janie!). And here are a few images from this morning, hot off the presses!

"Red Canoe on Dock". Kind of an overused cliché, but it works! HDR done with Nik HDR Efex Pro.

A few minutes later, the sky coloured up. Not as intense as this, but hey, that's what Topaz and Nik Color Efex Pro are for!

This little island was quite far away, so it's a bit of a crop. By painting it, I minimized any unsharp effect due to the finished size.

And finally, down on Janie's beach, I wanted to capture the mist in the distance, the dock and boat, and the detail of the sand and rocks on the beach. The wide angle lens is ideal for this. I used Photomatix Pro to render the HDR toning, then Nik Color Efex Pro and a bunch of control points to achieve the effect I was looking for.

So that's it. I'm going to bed early tonight! Only 4 hours of sleep last night. The fall colours are starting up here (we're at around 20%) and next week is our trip to Algonquin Park! Watch for some cool seasonal shots.

— 30 —

Milestones passed

I'm officially a senior citizen. Yes, folks, I am now in my 66th year on the planet and while trips around the sun should not be of any significance, I do feel different after this one. Imagine! The Canadian Government is going to pay me every month, as long as I keep breathing!

Other People's Stuff.
In a bit of a departure for me, I'm going to show you some other people's stuff. Now I won't post anyone else's pictures, especially without permission, but I am going to point you at a couple of websites that I know you'll enjoy.

The first one is a website gallery called "1X.com". Go there. Look at the photos.  There are literally THOUSANDS of outstanding images. When I first looked through it, my immediate reaction was to sell my camera, because I'll never be that good. Any category, I dare you (BTW there is a "fine arts nudes" category which requires you to read a disclaimer to see the images. You can turn that off in 'settings' after you join).

You don't have to join 1X to see the images. But you have to if you want to submit images for their consideration. They specifically say that 95% of submitted images are rejected. A free membership entitles you to upload one image/week for consideration: I sent them my wasp picture last week and haven't heard back.

There's a bit of a story behind the second site. I was surfing around in anticipation of the Gales of November workshop in a couple of months, and I went to Google Images and searched for "Michipicoten River Light". We were staying at the Rock Island Lodge which is located at the mouth of the Michipicoten where it empties into Lake Superior at Wawa. Anyway, my image came up first but as I looked further, the 14th image looked familiar: it was a shot of the boathouse at the lodge, so i clicked on it. It took me to a web forum called f800riders.org, which is for BMW F800GS motorcyclists. Coincidence! I almost bought one of those but ended up with a Kawasaki KLR650 (much less expensive!).

Anyway, that picture is part of a Twitter trip journal from 2009 by a motorcyclist/photographer whose nickname is f800gecko. I've tried to contact him, without success so far. I invite you to read his journal by clicking this link. "Why?", you may ask. Not only are his photographs outstanding, but the man is a talented writer. Each post is one or two sentences long — necessitated by the Twitter format — and each one is poignant and well phrased.

Scroll down to a little below the halfway point. You'll find a post, "Once I crested a rise and felt my mouth fall open at the scene before me. It is a place that draws an ancient human feeling from within one's depths and puts the taste of it on your tongue..."
and below it a picture taken in Montana that I find incredible. One day, when I grow up, I want to be able to take pictures like that. If anyone knows who this person is, please send me his email address.

Anyway, here's a mixed bag of some images I took last week and weekend. Enjoy!

15-shot panoramic at Grass Lake, Highway 118 on the way to Haliburton. The sky really did look like that so I stopped for some pictures. I took 5 bracketed photos, then moved the camera to the next position and did it again. And again. Then I created 3 overlapping HDR images and merged them in Photoshop. They didn't want to merge correctly, so that portion took some effort!

While I was there, I took this single burst of 5 images and merged them in Nik HDR Efex. After importing into Photoshop, I opened Nik Color Efex Pro and looked through the presets. This one is called "Indian Summer" and it did an amazing job of converting green vegetation to fall colours. This is what it's going to look like in a few weeks!

Last weekend was the "Open Canoe" whitewater race at the Minden Wildwater Preserve, one of my favourite venues. I used my 12mm super wide angle lens and got up close and personal with the competitors. I was about 4 feet away when I shot this image. I used Topaz Adjust to bring out the details.

This was taken standing on the rock to the left of the previous image, looking down on the canoe. Same lens. However I told Lightroom that i had a Sigma 8mm fisheye lens on the camera so I added some distortion to give the shot an interesting perspective.

My real estate agent emailed me about a house that had come up for sale. It sounded interesting, so I wandered by after leaving the whitewater on Sunday. The bank is about to foreclose on this one, so it's likely going to go for a deal! It's a custom built log house, 2 stories, 3BR/2B with a full basement, covered deck in front, fireplace on 3 acres of nicely wooded land. Outbuildings include a storage shed, a gazebo and a sauna. There's a pond and a stream... water is very low right now so the pond is a bit stagnant and the stream is barely a trickle. If this house were on a lakefront or a riverfront, I'd be making an offer. Beautiful property, well-maintained. This is an HDR processed in Photomatix Pro.

Here's the sauna, about 50' from the house and right on the pond (to the right). Very, very nice. Again I ran the HDR image in Photomatix Pro, then took it into Photoshop and used Nik Silver Efex Pro to do the black-and-white conversion. Then I painted the colour back in on a layer mask.

Anyway, that was my week in pictures. Catch you soon!

— 30 —

Don't Leave Home without It!

What's "IT"? Your camera, of course.

I'll talk about that in a few minutes. But first, here's what I did on Sunday...

I took my grandson Ryan (and son-in-law Richard) up to my friend Clinton's "Canadian Motorcycle Training School" in Horseshoe Valley near Barrie. He's 12 years old as I write this (it's Wednesday Morning, 3AM. A song title!) and it's his second visit here. If you're at all interested, this is one of the most fun and challenging things you can do. AND, Clinton teaches kids as young as 6 years old! As a motorcycle instructor, I'm awed by the fact that he gets people riding within a few moments! CMTS supplies EVERYTHING — not only the bike but they outfit you from head to toe. Check them out here: www.cmts.org

Ryan, the "Power Ranger"! Outfitted from head to toe in proper safety gear (without the helmet for the picture, of course). This is a heavily processed HDR which gives the impression he should be riding a futuristic vehicle from Star Wars!

Here's a shot of Clinton teaching a couple of really small kids to ride ATV's. Their siblings — not much bigger — were on motorcycles!

Ryan was riding a Yamaha TTR-125L — one of the bikes we used to use to teach adults to ride on the street at Humber College. The challenge: this bike has a clutch and manual transmission. It didn't take Ryan long to learn how to use it and to shift gears. They put him in the same class as Richard, and treated him like an adult.

Instructor Dave Barr coaching Ryan on how to use the clutch and shift gears. Dave used to work with me at Humber College but now teaches closer to home at CMTS.

Richard had a shorter learning curve. Being a pilot, snowmobiler and all-around power sports enthusiast, he took to the dirt bike very naturally. He demonstrated a pretty high skill level for someone who had never been on a bike before.

Again a pretty heavy level of HDR toning. One image, processed with Topaz Adjust. I also used Nik Viveza 2 to tone down the green background. I never tried it before — it's a pretty impressive program.

Here's Ryan bombing around the track at CMTS. I swear the guy he's chasing is a Star Wars Storm Trooper! Richard managed to get 'air' off that bump Ryan's just past. I got a few pictures, but you'll have to go to my gallery to see them. Special border effects done with Nik Color Efex Pro, emulating an old Polaroid picture (looks better on a white background).

In order to get these pictures, I had to ride my KLR 650 out to the track, down a few hundred meters of dirt path. I was a little nervous with my camera pack on my back, I really didn't want to fall. I almost lost it once or twice when my front wheel dug into some soft sand... the KLR's a heavy bike. I'm really a useless offroad rider and I'm afraid to take the training with my knee and leg problems. I rode about 90 minutes each way from my house to CMTS and my legs are still sore 2 days later.

Now: don't leave home without your camera!

Today I went for an afternoon walk and took my camera with me as usual. I left the pack at home and just took the camera, with the 70-200 lens mounted. I spent a few minutes on my dock, lamenting the fact that the water levels in the lake have been lowered to the point where the dock is entirely out of the water. Then I walked further along the road. About 75m further, I happened to glance in a tree and there was a humungous wasp nest. Not a lot of activity, so I ventured closer for a better look.

The blended colours and textures of the nest are exactly what I've been studying as I head towards picking up a paintbrush for the first time. It looks like something a master artist would create. I got as close as I dared with the 70-200 lens — probably 8-10 feet away. Bracing it on a tree so that I could stop down a little bit, I captured this shot. I love it!

Apparently, these are "Baldfaced Hornets" (Dolichovespula maculata — Google is your friend!). 200mm, ISO=640, 1/100 second, f/8. I used every trick I know to carefully sharpen the insect, but i used Topaz Adjust 'simplify' on the nest to blend the colours

So when I say, "don't leave home without a camera", now you know what I mean!

— 30 —

I'm Baaaaack!

Another 3 week absence. My email is clogged with "where are you?" and "why haven't you written anything?" and "Are you OK? Did you fall off the Earth?" type messages. I guess I needed some down time to reflect on where I am and where I'm going.

I actually spent some time with real human beings. Not cybernerds, not pixelheads. Well sort of — in between 3 motorcycle courses, swimming and biking and other stuff, I sat on a dock, watched the sunset and talked about non-photographic stuff. I enjoyed a whole new level of interaction that didn't involve a camera and with minimal computer time. I also met a new person who is influencing my life to a degree. Some stuff I won't share on a blog, but there is an interesting dimension. She's an artist. I'm about that far from picking up a paintbrush. Yes, a real one, not wired through my Wacom tablet.

For the past two weeks, I didn't pick up a single photo book or magazine (well that all stopped last weekend, but...). Instead, I looked through a thick tome of Group of Seven paintings, a book of Picasso's work... and just viewed the world differently. My perspective is changing. I don't know if I'm ready to put it into effect, but I'm slowly trying.

My artist friend told me, "stop thinking about composition. About f/stops and shutter speeds. In fact, stop thinking. Just do what comes naturally". In my defense, that's what I've been trying to do! Her point is, "stop trying, do it!" It's hard to put in words what she's taught me. Once, we pulled over to the side of the road for a long discussion about colour blends and complements, and she showed me a patch of sand and some grass and how the light blended them... hope I can get it.

You tell me whether you see a change in my work. Not today or tomorrow, over time. I'm heading in a new direction.

Back to reality. We visited the Minden Cultural Centre one afternoon. There's an art gallery (yeah, well — a daily drawing of a teapot doesn't turn me on), and some 19th century buildings. HDR material: here are a couple of shots.

The focal point is the bright orange cupola on the schoolhouse. I tried to lead your eye there with the sidewalk. Great dramatic sky
don't you think?

Inside the schoolhouse. I think the desks are on skids so the curator can move them around more easily. There was a similar picture chosen as "Editor's Choice" on the NAPP portfolio site this week
I like mine better!

Last weekend, I spent a few days with some really good photographers and friends. Whenever I do that, I somehow end up with some interesting images. Here are a few of them, starting with the mundane and progressing to the 'cool' side.

We spent several hours photographing the "Thunder on the Grand" boat races in Dunnville. Here are two of my favourites:

I shot almost everything at a slow shutter speed. This one was extreme: 1/15 second. I wanted to achieve an abstract motion blur.

This was also at a slow shutter speed – 1/125 second. My friends were shooting at 1/1000 second to freeze the action. By panning, I captured a sharp image of the boat and the motion blur of the background. He was travelling at almost 100 mph.

Kids in a Candy Store. I couldn't resist. Imagine their expressions, and what was going through their minds.

Lake Erie on a moody day. Although Photomatix HDR and Topaz Adjust toning added texture and sharpness (well softness in the sky), this is much more effective in black-and-white than in colour.

The final image for today is another HDR, but the lightning has been artificially added. I read a tutorial on how to create it on the NAPP site and this is my first attempt. I'll write it up on my technical blog in a bit, but if you're a NAPP member, you can watch Corey's video yourself.

These last two images are works in progress. The lightning shot especially: it doesn't look real yet. The concept is there, but execution is not. Still, it's interesting and a way to spice up a sky. I plan to do some more work on them so stay tuned!

— 30 —

I can't believe it's been almost a month

Where has time gone? I've been enjoying myself this July, visiting with friends, spending time with special projects and working my buns off teaching in the 50 degree heat. So not a lot of images to share, but I do have a few.

This is my cousin's band, FOG (Four Old Guys). Their first CD is entitled "Eye of the Storm" and I thought this would make a nice cover photo.

Janie's nieces Melanie and Taylor. A little cosmetics in Photoshop (not needed, these are very beautiful girls) and a vignette blur in Nik Color Efex pro. You can't take a bad picture with the 70-200 f/2.8

Janie's son David waterskiing on Lake Kushog

At Furnace Falls near Kinmount. There's something about this picture I like (other than the svelte young female in the black bikini). I tried cropping the photo, but the pail and stick in the foreground really help the image.

HDR image taken at Furnace Falls. Three shots, with the
variable ND filter on the wide angle lens.

Notice all of my pictures have people in them? A departure for me! Anyway, here's one without.

Also at Furnace Falls. BW conversion by Nik Silver Efex pro.