London Convention Centre, Urban Photography
Inspired by Jane Heller’s Montreal Landmarks photography series I started thinking about how to make it my own. Minimalist. Black and white. Clean. Crisp. Focusing on details. Suggestions of London.
I’d love to hear what you think. Do you like the black and white or would you prefer colour? Too minimalist or not enough? Is there a location you think I should definitely consider adding to the collection?
When I was out indulging in the beauty of spring flower photography I waited until the sun rose up beyond the horizon to get some warm sunshiny, sun flare-y images. These are my new favourite thing.
Do you like photographs with sun spots? Or do you prefer a nice clean landscape with soothing soft light?
Got plans Thursday evening? Then why not pop by The Arts Project for the official opening night for this year’s Visual Fringe Festival. We’ve been busy over here framing up three landscape photographs to hang in this year’s show. For your peaceful viewing pleasure we’ll be featuring Secret Song, Exhale, and Summer’s Serenity, all are signed 11×14 photographs, professionally framed and ready for your wall. Darren and I will both be there along with many of the 26 other artists, so stop by, say hi, have a snack, check out some fantastically diverse art, and get inspired.
Visual Fringe
June 5-16, 2012
Opening Night: Thursday June 6th, 2012, 7-9pm
The Arts Project
203 Dundas Street, just west of Clarence
London, Ontario, Canada
Free Admission
A group show and sale
You can join our Facebook event here - https://www.facebook.com/events/659096060784021/
In addition to opening night I’m also slated to be in the gallery on Friday, June 14th, 3:30-6:30pm, so if you have questions about my work, about photography in general, or if you’re looking for a bit of guidance with your camera, then come on down and we’ll talk. Hope to see you there.
Have a beautiful Monday!
Golden Beach, Lake Erie Landscape Photography
I have a love hate relationship with 4am wake up calls. It means going to bed at 9pm if I can and I still need to drag myself out into the darkness in the morning. But when the sun comes up on the beach it makes it all worth while. It was beautiful and quiet in Port Stanley, summer is definitely in the air. Surprisingly lots of people out getting the town ready for summer.
Here’s how my day looked:
4:00 am – wake up call
4:40 am – load car and leave for Port Stanley, gear was packed the night before
5:30 am – arrive at the beach in Port Stanley, set up and begin photographing in pre-sunrise light
6:00 am – sunrise, keep shooting
6:30 am – wrap shoot and head back to the studio
7:20 am – arrive back at the studio and unpack the car
7:30 am – begin downloading and backing up files
8:45 am – breakfast
8:00 am – choose selects, tweak images for colour, contrast, lightness, and darkness, process raw files
10:30 am – caught up on client orders and emails
1:00 pm – retouch
1:30 pm - send test prints to the lab and archive final image
Oh and I just about forgot! A little video from my morning on the beach {if you’re reading via email or RSS you’ll likely need to click through to our blog to see it}:
Where do you dream about spending your spring mornings?
Summer’s Serenity, Seascape Photography
Eeeek! I can’t believe I haven’t officially shared this photograph with you yet! It’s one I made last summer, I guess things got a little crazy with my artist in residency at Beausoleil Island that it slipped through the blogging cracks. You probably recognize it from our May desktop calendar plus it was the cover image for both our 2013 wall calendar and 5×7 calendar.
I just wanted to share with you a few details from this early morning session in Bayfield. I’d seen these rocks during my location scout, and as you can see, they’re in the water. I remember the water level was up and down that week with rain and hot dry spells so I had no idea what I’d be in for when I showed up at the beach. Luckily the rock in the foreground was just at the water’s edge so I was still able to get some of the coarse beach sand in the bottom left, then a band of foggy water fading out into the smoothness of the lake. For those of you just tuning in you can click through to read all about how I create the look of calm water in my seascape photographs, hint – it’s done entirely in camera.
Here’s how my schedule looked that day:
2:50 am – wake up call
3:20 am – load car and leave for Bayfield, gear was packed the night before
4:45 am – arrive at the beach in Bayfield, set up and begin photographing in pre-sunrise light
5:48 am – sunrise, keep shooting
6:00 am – wrap shoot and head back to the studio
7:30 am – arrive back at the studio and unpack the car
7:45 am – begin downloading and backing up files
8:00 am – breakfast
~ Spent the morning tending to client orders ~
1:45 pm - choose selects, tweak images for colour, contrast, lightness, and darkness, process raw files
2:15 pm – retouch
3:00 pm – send test prints to the lab and archive final image
And here’s a little video so you can get a sense of how beautiful it was out on the beach {if you’re reading via email or RSS you’ll likely need to click through to our blog to see it}:
Days like these can be busy and long but they’re oh so rewarding I’d never trade them in. Plus, it’s awesome to start my day on the beach!
Blushing Bog, Landscape Photography
I woke up to another beautifully foggy morning this past fall. It hung heavy over the city creating a cozy blanket of wonderfully soft light. My early dawn walk through the Sifton Bog was filled with woodland magic, deer and all. One of the nice things about fall frosts is that it casts a thin layer of white on all the brown leaves turning them a soft pink, making a chilly day less bleak.
Where are your favourite places to go in the fog?
Morning Delight, Landscape Photography
This winter has certainly been a rough go for minimalist tree photographs, we’ll get a dumping of snow then it warms up the next day and the bulk of it disappears. So my choices are no visibility and poor road conditions or patchy snow that doesn’t do much to hide the grass or the background.
Unbridled Wonder, Landscape Photography
{You may recognize Unbridled Wonder from our March 2013 Desktop Calendar, if you haven’t downloaded yours yet you can do so here.}
Orchard Fog, Landscape Photography
Fledgling, Landscape Photography
Vanilla Dream, Autumn Fog, , Landscape Photography
So I’m left to play in the fog, which we’ve had quite a bit of. It makes driving visibility terrible for getting to locations but at least the roads tend to be dry. I click to the Weather Network each morning to see the prospects for the coming days and snow still seems like a distant dream.
What do you think? Do you still prefer my Winter Tree Photographs? Or is the style too distinctly different that they can’t even be compared? And how do you like the black and white? Too eerie?
A Place to Dream, Landscape Photography
Whisper To Me, Landscape Photography
An Unexpected Journey, Landscape Photography
Morning Run, Landscape Photography
Fog, oh beautiful, elusive fog. You always take me by surprise. How I love playing in your wake. You make the light soft and beautiful, put smiles on people’s faces, and fill the morning with magic.
More to come.
Romp, Newfoundland Landscape Photography
Late last summer, just two short weeks after our stint on Beausoleil Island, Darren and I took a last minute trip to Bell Island, Newfoundland to visit my family and walk the land that my Dad grew up on. I hadn’t been there since 2004, the year before he passed away, and I knew it was going to be hard but worth it tenfold. A few of my aunts were going so we tagged along, it was such an amazing way to get to know them better.
Evenings on Bell Island are beautiful! Big family dinner with my aunts and cousins then winding down with Darren on the cliff’s edge for sunset. I remember visiting this spot with my Dad the last time we were there, not the most glamorous walk to get here but the view makes you forget about it completely. Take a deep breath, inhale the fresh air off the sea, and relax, because you’re home.
Generations, Newfoundland Landscape Photography
I come here almost every time I’m in Newfoundland. See that tiny white building on the horizon? It’s Bell Island’s lighthouse. I remember going there with my Dad and hearing about how this is the new lighthouse. The old one was more traditional but it was too close to the cliff’s edge and tests showed the ground there was slowly becoming unstable.
My Dad loved looking out over the cliff’s edge, I mean, how could you not. Check out those stripes in the rock, there’s so much to look at, so much natural history. And the colour that evening was amazing. Photographing the lighthouse was high on my list of image priorities, but it was more of a souvenir for myself and the details weren’t important, so I chose to step way back and get it all – the vastness of the landscape, the strange rocky pillars that surround the island, the cliffs, the layers of earth, the sea, and a nod to my Dad and his stories of the lighthouse.
Bell Island Beach, Newfoundland Landscape Photography
Darren and I always make a point of spending some time on the beach, skipping stones, daring each other into the ice cold water, and watching the ferries go back and forth. Aren’t you just dying to know what’s in that opening in the rock? Me too.
The Watch, Cape Spear, Newfoundland Landscape Photography
On this trip we ventured off Bell Island a few times, something we never did when we went with my Dad. He just wanted to spend time at the house he grew up in. My cousin drove us out to Cape Spear, the most easterly point in North America, where we got to check out the oldest surviving lighthouse in Newfoundland and Labrador, built way back in 1839. It’s no longer in operation and just sits on the cliff’s edge for us to bask in it’s charm.
Cape Spear Lighthouse in Fog, Newfoundland Landscape Photography
Other World, Newfoundland Fog Photography
The old lighthouse was taken out of service in 1955 when a new concrete one was built in a more modern iconic lighthouse style. As soon as we arrived the fog rolled in like a house on fire, blanketing the cliff like a cloud on a mountain top. So we didn’t get to revel in the view from up there but it definitely gave me a chance to play with my camera in the fog Newfoundland is known for.
What comes to your mind when you think of Newfoundland? The cliffs, the sea, the rock? Or jellybean row and lighthouses?
We did it! We’ve tested a TON of calendar printing houses and we’ve finally found one that prints gorgeous quality photographs in traditional wall calendar form. Hooray! Our final calendar test arrived in the mail last week and I’m excited to share it with you.
Fill your year with large, peaceful photographs! Our 2013 wall calendar is filled with the same photographs as our 5×7 2013 Calendar and our 2013 Jewel Case Calendar but in a much larger, more traditional format. It’s professionally printed on thick cardstock with a wire-o binding so it hangs nice and flat on your wall. Each month features a large 12×12 inch photograph at the top and a calendar grid below with lots of room to fill in all your appointments.
We’ve only got two of each of our other calendars left, so get yours while you still can. You can see our full collection of 2013 calendars in our shop.
Have you gotten your 2013 calendar yet? What style did you choose? Do you prefer a traditional wall calendar or a smaller desk calendar? Or do you use iCal or some other digital planner?
