Fountain Pens!

It's time to expand this blog from just photography.  So let's start that by talking fountain pens and what better time to start talking about fountain pens than when you can get free shipping from a  new company in Canada.  I'm talking about Alexander Pen Company and if you use the code HSSF2012 this Monday December 10th you can get free shipping.  It's a great way to give (or even better get) something nice for Christmas and support a small business trying to make a go of it in Canada.  I took advantage of the last time this store had free shipping and picked up some ink and paper, it arrived quickly and packed very well.  Selection might not be that extensive but the products that are offered are great and priced competitively with any other on-line retailers I have dealt with.  I am currently saving up to buy one of those Edison Pens (probably that Hudson Ruby) and more ink and paper of course.  You can never have too much!

So if you are looking for a great gift for yourself or someone else that appreciates fine writing instruments and you would like to support one of the little guys starting a brand new business Monday would be a great day to go shopping.

I love my fountain pens.  I can write for hours without my hand getting tired or cramped like used to happen all the time with ball-point pens and I get to use all kinds of crazy colours.  That's one of the great things about bottled inks, you are no longer limited to blue, black, red and green, you can have any colour you can imagine.  Noodlers or Diamine or Private reserve or someone has that colour, whatever it is.

After Christmas, when I've played with my presents, I'll gush about how I have given up my electric razor and now shave with a safety razor.  And no shaver cream, it's soap and a badger brush!

Best of Project 365 - October 2011

Another month has gone by and

 

Oops... another almost year has gone by and this is still sitting in my drafts.  The picture I liked best from my October Project 365 pictures taken last year.  Well, it is finally up.  Maybe I'll dredge out November and December too!

 

I have gone through a lot in the last year or so including but certainly not limited to my boss retiring leaving me in charge but short staffed and unable to hire a replacement.  Well, that is finally coming to an end, a new manager has been brought in and I get to go back to my old desk.  The good news is that will free up more of my time and energy to focus on my photography. 

 

With that in mind my first step was to set up a studio in my house.  Well that's mostly done and I moved my computer in today and decided to update my blog. 

 

I haven't been completely artistically idle in the last year, I have taken some pictures, although not nearly as many as last year, and I completed the "Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron a twelve week journey which I found very enlightening, and now, in her words, I am taking the next right step.  More will follow.

Best of Project 365 - September 2011

Another month has gone by and there are 30 more pictures for me to pick a favourite from.  It was very tempting to pick one the very cure pictures of Eli but I tried to look more at the quality of the picture rather than the cuteness of the subject.  This is the lake at the top of the road when you drive up to Kokanee Glacier.  I really need to get up there more often...

Changing the Format

I've come to the conclusion that forcing myself to update this blog weekly isn't making for a very interesting read so as of now, no more week numbers and no more schedule.  Instead I will blog when I feel like it and when I have something I feel is worth saying.

So what's worth saying this time?  Well, I turned 41 and, as I tend to do around this time of year, I spent some time reassessing things in my life which included my photography and what I'm doing to improve it. Weekly blog is out, Project 365 stays, adding in self-assignments, photo excursions and creating a proper portfolio.

So, my first photo excursion was to Kokanee Glacier park.  I only went to the parking lot and I made no attempt at all to get there when the light was good but I did end up with some photos that I quite like and a plan to try again a whole lot earlier in the day when the light is better.

Week 45 - Semi-Semi-Professional?

I hereby declare myself a semi-semi-professional photographer.  I figure, a professional photographer makes a living as a photographer, a semi-professional makes some money but not enough to give up the day job and a semi-semi-professional saves money by not paying a professional or semi-professional.  Therefore, I am a semi-semi-professional photographer since I just didn't spend a small fortune to decorate our bedroom.  Are you following my logic?  I could have gone to the store and purchased some art to fill this wall but instead I bought empty frames and put my pictures in them thereby saving, well, depending on the value of the photographs in question, hundreds of dollars.  Well, dozens of dollars anyway...

Week 44 - Seminar in a Book - Chapter 3

Chapter 3 is about working with natural light, an obvious choice for nature photography.

The assignment involved taking a series of pictures over the course of a day on a single subject but in the variety of light from dawn to dusk.  It took me a couple of days but thankfully the weather was sunny the whole time so the series of photographs still demonstrates the lesson nicely.

Sadly, I picked a view that doesn't look great in any light and only after taking the last picture did I look to my right and see something worth photographing.  That picture is posted to my Project 365 and is the picture from September 5th.

Week 43 - Best of Project 365 - August

As usual, I had a tough time picking a favourite from August Project 365.  In the end, I went for the simple geomtry of the brickwork of the PEP building in Nelson, BC.  In post-processing, I took out most of the colour and increased the contrast giving it an antiqued look.