A Splash of Fall Colour

As we approach the 'official' end of summer, it's easy to get depressed knowing that the fall season is about to usher in months of stuff to complain about: colder weather, annoying teenagers listening to their iPods way too loud on the bus, daylight savings time, CBC running daily NHL lockout updates when there's actually nothing to update ("Gary Bettman seen at JC Penny", or "Donald Fehr takes a shit in KFC"), etc. Ugggh...

However, I do also find the next couple weeks of the year to be the most interesting, colour wise, in Calgary. The neighbourhoods are awash in a splendour of golds, ambers, reds, and even a bit of orange foliage. Coupled with the bright blue skies and beautiful late afternoon sunlight, it's hard not to be impressed by the beauty of nature soaking in the last rays before the snows come. If you're one of my little students in my DSLR class, Professor Mach commands you to go out and shoot some of these late summer/early fall scenes.

Shortest workout ever...

So I was working out tonight… ba dum tish… no for reals, no joke. I've been having nightmares lately in which I'm like Jabba the Hutt at age 40... Anyways, I was doing some pull-ups, and suddenly something went really horribly wrong and my back is now spasming and angry painful. WTF?! When did I get to be so old and fragile? I feel about as frail as the dandelion blooms below… see that? Natural segway!

Shot last week with the Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 lens, outside the school where Anita had her 'graduation' ceremony for Japanese class. Finally, our Friday nights are free again.

I don't do landscapes - Alishan, Taiwan

An oldie from the tail end of our trip to Taiwan back in January. This was shot in the lush mountain village known as Alishan, where people go to watch the sunrise over a sea of clouds, before embarking on a hike through the old forest. Unfortunately for us, it was drizzling rain and the sun stayed hidden that morning... however, the drizzle and humidity in the air did make for some beautiful misted views within the forest.

Public Service Armageddon

Tomorrow is budget day, but many in the Canadian Public Service (Anita and myself included) are preparing for it to be more like judgement day. Here's hoping that the budget cuts, while expected to be deep, will be more like this unexpected sunrise... beautiful despite being viewed through a horribly dirty window.



Photo taken with an iPhone 4S. Click the photo to view it large on black (worth it!).

Weather bitching

I've spent a whole month complaining about how shitty the weather's been with the non-stop rain and cold. Then the barometer hits the high twenties for the last couple days, and wouldn't you know it, I start bitching about how fricking hot it is. There's just no happy medium. On the bright side, I'm looking forward to the heat continuing to scorch the local foliage, so that I can roam around the neighbourhood and capture more shots like this:


Taken sometime last year while we were walking the pathways around our house, with the Kiev88 CM and Arsat 80mm lens combo, on Kodak Ektar 100. Shot wide open of course, hence the shallow depth of field.

Plitvice National Park

These were taken at Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia, not far from Zagreb. Taken around noon, so even in the shade, I had to slap on a polarizer, crank down the ISO to the lowest setting, and still set an aperture of f/13 before I could get a decently long shutter speed for the top three (handheld at 1/6 sec or so as I didn't have a tripod).

My fat fingers

While we were in Vegas, I bought a Superheadz Ultra Wide and Slim camera from Urban Outfitters for 10 bucks (STEAL OF A DEAL - they go for 30 - 40 normally). The only trade off was that it was bright banana yellow coloured. Whatever. Anyways, it took me forever to finish off a roll of 36 exposures with it - the lens is a fixed 22mm, and it has a fixed aperture and shutter speed combo that is ONLY good for bright sunny conditions.

So I finally get the roll developed, and the photos are totally rad (massive naturally occurring vignetting, vivid saturated colours). And for the first time in my life, I had managed to take a half decent landdscape photo. Except for the fact that I ruined almost EVERY FACCCKKKING SHOT with my fat fingers in them. Apparently, 22mm is SUPER WIDE. Like, so wide, that you can't even grip the little bastard camera without getting your digits in the shot!!! This is unfortunate, because the photos I took in Vegas were seriously awesome if my ham hands weren't EFFING in the corners of every shot. Seriously, FACCCCKKKK!! On the plus side, I did manage to squeeze 39 exposures out of a 36 exp. roll.