Celebrating the New Year

Take52 Challenge – Week 1

There is always something worth celebrating in life.  It’s important not just to simply the “special” moments when we have planned or scheduled celebrations; but to remember to celebrate the “ordinary” and the everyday occasions as well.

As part of my Take52 Challenge I selected a photograph I took while snowshoeing around Lost Lake in Whistler, BC with my brother and his fiancé Johnny.  This year for Christmas I put only a few items to purchase on my Wishlist, the main component of my wishlist was activities to do with the “giver” to create memories.  Why have someone buy me something I can easily go to the store to get myself.  I’d much rather be able to spend time creating memories with those I love.

One activity I placed on my Wishlist was a day snowshoeing.  My brother, Houston, and Johnny had planned a day for us to drive to Whistler, snowshoe around Lost Lake on some of the most beautiful trails, and warm-up while sitting in the Village sipping on our coffees.  It was a gorgeous, bluebird day; I was almost disappointed I wasn’t boarding instead.  But due to their upcoming yearlong cycling trip throughout Asia, they didn’t want to risk any injuries.  I don’t blame them at all.

I found myself carrying the camera ready to shoot everything I encountered.  The white contrasting with the blue sky and the green of the firs peaking through was stunning.

I’ve whittled the hundreds of photographs I took that day to two. 

The following photography is of an ornament hanging from a Christmas tree along one of the trails.  From this Christmas tree you can look over to the runs on Blackcomb Mountain.  Although I didn’t want to focus on the runs themselves, I wanted all focus to be on the ornament in celebrating the Christmas season.

Aperture Priority; ISO 400; Shutter1/1250; Aperture f22; Focal Length 35mm; ev -4.0; WB Flash*

The second photography is of Houston and Johnny posing along the trail.  I was more interested in telling the story about our day snowshoeing; that’s why I focused on the trail sign instead of the two of them in the background.  However, it was important for me to include them in the photograph, otherwise the whole story wouldn’t have been told.  You may not be able to recognize their features but to me the scream.

Aperture Priority; ISO 400; Shutter 1/400 ; Aperture f5.6; Focal Length 35mm; ev 0; WB Flash*

I love the fact that I’m able to celebrate the beginning of the New Year with Houston and Johnny.  Over the past couple of years I’ve tried more and more to make an effort to spend quality time with my close friends, those that I consider family, and family.  As a bonus was able to start off the New Year in fine form doing something active and outdoors.

This New Year’s Day I was celebrating family, new beginnings, healthy/active lives, and the beauty of nature.

*I must have accidently chosen a White Balance of Flash.  Most of the day I spent with my White Balance in Daylight, Shade, or Cloudy.

Photography – My New Year’s Resolution

Growing up I was enthralled with photography!  It's my New Year's Resolution in 2013 to continue to develop my photography skills and to keep my DLSR with me whenever possible, if not a point-and-shoot, and at the least my iPhone.  I want to develop my artistic eye and to capture the objects, the subjects that tug at me.

My dad, although he had a regular full-time job, was a professional photographer.  On weekends, and weeknights during the long summer days, he’d be off taking family portraits or wedding portraits.  I of course wasn’t allowed to accompany him to the wedding sessions, but would often go as his assistant to shoot family portraits.  I’d be the “sit-in” before the clients arrived.  He was great!  I’d sit there in awe, especially when it came time to developing in the dark-room and retouching by hand. 

For himself personally though, he’d prefer the abstract concepts of photographing everyday items found in unusual places, or landscapes.  I’ll have to dig out a copy of my favorite piece, it’s a close up of a doll he’d found laying on the ground with runny make-up.  He traditionally shot everything in black and white. 

For my 16^th birthday he bought me my first film camera, a Nikon D50.  I was so super excited by it!  I had been taking photography classes at school and was spending all my spare time using one of my mom’s old cameras.  Throughout the next couple of years I’d play with the camera, never spending lots of time to perfect the skill.  You know how busy highschool can get in your senior years (I was taking advanced classes and lots of extra time went into homework, and I began playing more sports).  Photography went by the wayside for a while.  Then something happened, I’d lost my mentor when my dad passed away.  I’d played with the camera and in the darkroom for a while.  Until the chemicals that were on-hand expired.  There was no sense spending the money on the chemicals when I was living 50 minutes from the family home, in which the darkroom was located. 

I continued to take photographs when travelling with my film camera, some photos I loved, some were okay, others (most) I was frustrated with that they were “noisy.”  Getting good film, with decent ISO,  in South East Asia was apparently hard.  So that was it…the D50 was put away and the small digital point-and-shoot was bought.  I’d lived with the point-and-shoot for nearly a decade before I decided it was time to buy a DSLR.  Last spring I began to realize that I was missing something, and now that I had time to spend on my own hobbies I wanted to get back into photography. 

Last spring before heading off on another trip to Europe in the summer, I was adamant that I was going to get a DSLR for a birthday gift to self.  I didn’t get the camera I ultimately wanted, the Nikon D7000.  I just didn’t have the money to buy it nor could I justify spending the money on a camera I knew I wouldn’t need while I was learning to photography all over again.  Instead I bought myself the older version, the Nikon D90.  My choice was between these two cameras so I could continue to use my old lenses, without having to start my collection from scratch again.

Shot of Mont St Michel from the Emerald Coast, France.  ISO 3200; Shutter 1/3200; Aperture f14.0; Focal Length 78mm

This fall I enrolled myself in a ten-week Beginner’s Introduction to Digital SLR course with Vancouver Photo Workshops, a great place to learn.  Throughout those ten weeks I reviewed some concepts I was familiar with, and learned many that I was not familiar with.  I’ll share some of these photographs at a future date.

Shot of Downtown Vancouver from Granville Island.  Aperture Priority; ISO 200; Shutter 1/3; Ap f4.0; Focal Length 35mm; WB Auto

And here we are today, the start of a new year.  I was going to continue taking photography classes, although I realized that this term was going to be a busy term with my teaching.  So I decided that I would need something to entice me to keep my camera in hand and out of the closet gathering dust.  I am going to challenge myself to take the CameraShyTake52Challenge.  My goal will be to complete the weekly challenges and post the photographs here on my blog.  (Please note that the photographs posted will have little to no editing done, since my computer lacks any memory space to actually work on the photographs and install any editing software).

Wish me luck!  And good luck to those of you participating in the challenge.

Why Blog?

 

Why not blog?  It seems that everyone else out there has a blog of their own, so why not me too?  Maybe I was feeling left out of from a piece of technology, a little left behind by the cool kids.  I mean I embrace technology in all other mediums; I was just missing a personal blog.  Well, actually, I have abandoned some forms or social media and technological mediums as they become out of date.  Really, who uses msn anymore?

Now the questions is what kind of blog should I keep?  Formal or informal?  Focused or broad?  I suppose only time will tell.

Truthfully the main reason I thought I’d start my own blog, is because I believe that in doing so, I will be motivated to write on a regular basis.  As a teacher, more specifically an English teacher, it’s important to ‘practice what you preach.’  Often times students have difficult times expressing themselves and their ideas a loud.  And experience shows that when the words are stuck on the tip of your tongue, out of fear of judgment by others, it’s easier to let the words flow through your fingers. 

Wow…just now I’ve realized that the way this blog is going to work is simply to allow the letters to form words, the words to form sentences, the sentences to form paragraphs, and all of this to represent my thoughts as they come.  No rhyme or reason.  Hopefully the combined thoughts within each post will not wonder or lose focus too much.

So…at the end of this first post, I want to thank your for stopping by, and hopefully for coming back.  I will do my best to share some cohesive ideas about My Life, My Thoughts, and in My Words.