Tag: art

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Advanced Advanced Lessons Art Landscape Photography Photography

Keep It Simple

Sometimes when taking a photo it is tempting to include a lot of “stuff” to give you more to look at. Often it is better to get rid of all the extraneous and simplify the composition.

This photo was inspired by several of the works of Joel Meyerowitz. I remember seeing these back in College and I have always been sucked in by the simplicity. The images are very meditative.

To get this image, I waited until the boat was framed between the two rock islands. I increased the overall saturation and brightness and lightened the boat. I also removed a second boat on the horizon that was distracting. I also did some other local adjustments to the sky and water. This image is not “straight out of camera”, however it is how I saw the scene at the time.

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Art Photography POTM

POTM – July 2018

The month of July has been very hot. In fact many heat records have been broken. This is not news, but I have never been great in the heat. I can easily get heat exhaustion, if not heat stroke. Maybe because of that, I have not taken many photos this month.

I did however capture this cheeky “Pipe Smoker”…

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Photography Portrait Photography POTM Retouching

POTM – June 2018

Here is my Photo Of The Month for June (POTM).

Nevada as Lup

I chose this image for a number of reasons. I did not get out to do much personal work this month (time seems to fly), but this image was part of a shoot with a friend who is into cosplay. The intent of the shoot was to try something completely different. 

The post processing is a bit different than my usual style, going for more of a graphic novel feel. The shoot was fun, we went up to Mount Tolmie at sunset, but the “magic” happened in the post processing. A lot of time went into creating the appropriate “look”, as well as enhancing the image. We did use on-site lighting (two circular softboxes) to separate the subject (Nevada/Lup), a number of layers and masks in photoshop further emphasized the composition. Colours were enhanced, and contrast was changed in various areas as well.

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Art Photography POTM

POTM – May, 2018

I had a tough time choosing my photo of the month this time. I went on a vacation in Tofino and took a lot of photos. This was taken at Bog Trail, and I think represents the trail quite well. It has a bit of a “spooky” feel.

The composition was very straightforward. I pictured the dead tree as a kind of skeletal spine, so it had to be dead centre. I chose my angle of view to minimize background distractions and yet unbalance the bush behind the tree.This gave a bit more tension to the image. I processed the image to a high contrast B&W to further emphasize the starkness of the scene.

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Landscape Photography travel

End of My Week Long Vacation

I have been on vacation from my day job for the last week, but it has been a full week.My parents came over for a few days, so I showed them around the southern island. Once they left, I drove up to Tofino for a couple of days, I came back and sold a couple of prints, shot a family portrait, and hung an Art show. I feel like the guy in the photo below. I had a great time, but I’m tired…

 

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Art Photography

Mrs. ET

Many years ago, while I was in photographic art school, I took a picture I titled “ET” (the movie was still fresh at that time).

This was a traditional{{1}} Black and White print, and I liked it…

Recently I took a trip up to Tofino for a bit of a break. While exploring the town I came across this…

… and thought that must be Mrs ET…

[[1]]Traditional meaning from film with chemicals on silver sensitized paper. at the time, this was the only way to make photographic prints. I took a digital photo of the print to publish it online.[[1]]

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Art Photography Studio

Spring Bouquet

Some people buy flowers to create a centre piece for their table. Photographers buy some flowers to bring into the studio and explore…

Continue reading “Spring Bouquet”

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Art Photography

Not a “pretty” picture

Took this image on a photo outing with friends today. I am not sure why, but I find it a bit fascinating.

Definitely not a pretty subject matter. Maybe that is why I find it interesting….

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Photography

Happy Easter

What do you do on an Easter weekend? visit friends of course, and then you spend a few hours exploring a bouquet of flowers…

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Art Photography POTM Printing

Photo of the Month

I have been trying to figure out a way to cull my photographs. Even (especially?) in the film days, it was easy to accumulate a lot of images. Most of them OK, The trouble is that, after each shoot, I fall in love with an image or two, but do not know what to do with that image.

To that end, I am going to try an experiment. At the end of each month I will review the photos I have taken and pick one as the photo of the month (POTM). That image will be available as a limited edition print{{1}}. 

For February, 2018, the following image was taken at Whiterock, BC. The image is one of the first images taken with my replacement camera after a nasty fall broke my previous camera. The log and grass are on a hill beside the railway tracks. I like the pattern of the grass and flowers that is broken by a log, and more subtly by several branches echoing the angle of said log. The print available is on 13″x19″ matte paper, hand signed by me.

grass and log

for more information, please contact me

[[1]]The printed image will not have the watermark (gold signature). The watermark is to prove ownership and to provide a link back to this website if the image is shared.[[1]]