Space For God - Photo Blog

Photo a Day: Jan 3

2012-01-03T23:59:00.000-08:00

The day almost got away from me before I remembered I hadn't taken my photo, so the subject matter is kind of boring. Taken right next to my computer desk. I'll try to venture farther away tomorrow.

Photo a Day: Jan 2

2012-01-02T23:00:00.000-08:00

I was going to go out for a walk today to take my picture of the day, but it was dark before I knew it. Fortunately the days are getting longer, so this issue will recede. This was shot through my upstairs window, of the Christmas lights wound around my balcony railing.

Photo a Day: Jan 1

2012-01-01T23:54:00.000-08:00

I decided to do one of those photo-a-day projects that I've seen others doing. I think it will help me refocus on seeing the world that is out there, one of the main reasons for this blog after all. I'm going for spontaneity here, and the art of seeing, so no Photoshopping.

Today felt uncommonly warm for a New Year's Day. I went outside to check if the neighbor's snowdrops were poking up out of the ground already, and they were. No buds yet, but still, a nice early harbinger of spring. So much for our coldest winter on record that was predicted. I suppose it could still happen, but I'm not holding my breath, and I'm sure hoping the weather prophets were wrong.

A walk in the neighborhood

2011-12-11T17:02:00.001-08:00

It's been a long time since I've walked to church and had the luxury of time to be attentive to what I was seeing along my path. I had my camera with me too, and was inspired to pull it out and take some photos. It felt good. It's been way too long.

This neighbor's front yard always draws my attention. But this time I saw that the owner, an avid gardener named Jim, had added another whimsical element to it: this structure which seems to be part fish, part bird. You must click and zoom in to see it more clearly! I later found out that my housemate Jo had helped him place it in its location. He wanted it oriented in the best possible way to catch the eye of passers-by. It worked. As I was admiring it, Jim came out to chat with me. He proudly told me he had just celebrated his 90th birthday yesterday. He is one of the bright sparks in the neighborhood. His garden brings joy. I'm glad to see he's going strong at 90!

Wildlife Photographer of the Year Winners

2011-10-22T01:25:00.000-07:00

The winners of Wildlife Photographer of the Year have just been announced. This is my favorite photo competition in the world. The photos are stunning. I got to see the 2004 winners in person in the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow. Wow! Here's this year's Wildlife Photojournalist of the Year Award Winner: Still Life in Oil by Daniel Beltrá, Spain:

Contemplative photography

2011-10-20T09:54:00.000-07:00

Sorry this blog has been dormant for so long. I've been posting lots over at Faith and Technology.

I've come into contact with Alex Soojung-Kim Pang who is working on a book called Contemplative Computing, which is also the name of his blog. He's got quite an interesting post on photography as a technology that invites skill, essentially a contemplative practice. Made me realize I've let that practice lapse in my life, and I want to get back to it.

Edge Effects

2011-04-05T21:47:00.000-07:00

I recently discovered a cool cache of useful Photoshop actions (free to download; donation requested; do give; I did) at The Light's Right Studio. I’ve been playing around with the TLR Edge Effects set and liking them.

You have to run one of the Create Unframed Edge actions first before you can run one of the edge effect actions, with the exception of Gaussian Blur Frame which requires one of the Create Framed Edge actions to be run first. Took me a while to figure that out, but now it’s awesome. My favorites are Gaussian Blur Edge, Frosted Glass Edge, Spatter Edge, and Sprayed Strokes Edge.

Here's what the image looked like:

And here's what it looked like after applying Create Unframed Edge and Gaussian Blur Edge actions (4 clicks):

You'll have to try it out yourself to see some of the others. There are a couple dozen different sets of actions, and I've only had time to play with one of them so far. Go to http://www.thelightsrightstudio.com/photoshop-tools.htm. And if you like them, do give a donation to support Glenn Mitchell's creative work.

Catching up

2011-02-14T10:26:00.001-08:00

Finally got my new PC after more than six months limping along on my old slow laptop which kept me from getting much photography work done. So I'm back!

Just a pretty sunset image from a recent trip to Galiano Island for now.

I recently finished reading Enter Mourning: A Memoir on Death, Dementia & Coming Home, by Heather Menzies. Very profound and well written. She's a photographer, so she used her camera as a way of processing the whole experience of gradually losing her mother to Alzheimer's Disease and finding healing from old wounds that it was too late to work out with her mother verbally. She intersperses her reflective memoir with some shots she took while on a visit to her mother's old cottage after moving her into an assisted living facility. Here's a beautiful excerpt that grabbed me:

"I reached for my manual Minolta slung over my shoulder, and took off the lens cap The camera and all the actions involved in taking photos bought me some time, helped prop open the door to what I was doing. As an old friend Moira once observed, we ritualize the unknown as a way to face up to it, to wrestle it into revelation; my camera became my medium for doing this. Repeating the ritual motions--adjusting the shutter speed and focal length—-slowed me down and allowed me to dwell in my hands and eyes, opening my senses to the body of this remembered space. It brought me closer, helped me to be present to what I'd spent so much time absenting myself from over the years. I also used the camera to hone in, to find and focus in on what I had particularly avoided. I'd learned to divine for water when I was a kid at the farm, using a forked apple branch, and I felt I was doing something similar here in this quest. The camera was the stick while Mum's place and the tangle of the time we'd spent here together was the ground, the currents of water were my feelings running hidden beneath its surface."

I've done a bit of using my camera to understand my mother's journey into the ravages of the disease, and to study the bits of herself that she's left behind all over the house. It's too personal to share any images here, but I definitely find it a method that helps me process stuff.

Interview with the photographer

2010-07-19T22:30:00.000-07:00

I was interviewed by Iambic Admonit (Sorina Higgins) in a blog series on "Where are we now?" (the state of the arts in North America). Here's the interview.

News

2010-06-05T03:39:00.001-07:00

My photo "New Beginnings" has been published in Comment Magazine in their online edition.

Focal lengths

2010-02-16T04:35:00.000-08:00

Someone over on a Flickr group I'm part of was asking us to post some wide angle portraits and pet shots. I didn't have any to share, but I did post this:

The widest angle I've got is 28mm. It was interesting that you asked this question, because that led me to discover a feature in ACDSee, the photo organizing software I use, that lets me search for photos by focal length. I was surprised to find out how seldom I used the 28mm focal length. (I have 28-70mm and 70-200mm zoom lenses.) I tend to do portraits and pet photos somewhere between 60-100mm.

I did a breakdown of what focal length I've used on all my photos since I switched to digital:
28mm - 491 shots
29-39mm - 3382
40-49mm - 4239
50-59mm - 3898
60-69mm - 2508
--> 70mm - 7288 *
71-100mm - 697
101-130mm - 564
131-160mm - 377
161-199mm - 347
200mm - 1879

By far my favorite focal length is 70. Not surprising, since that's the highest I can go on my short lens and the lowest I can go on my long lens, so when I'm stretching the limits and wish I had the other lens with me, that's where I'll gravitate.

It's also interesting that I prefer the 200mm extreme to the 28mm extreme, but the larger majority of my non extreme (including 70mm as an "extreme" because it's the end of the range on both lenses) shooting is done on the shorter lens. That's probably mostly a matter of practicality. It's lighter and smaller, and it lives on the camera (it's the only one that it fits in the case with on it), so if I'm going out and only want to bring one lens, that's usually the one that comes with me.

Wide angles lenses (smaller focal lengths; 35 and below) are best when you want to fit a lot into your photo, either a wide landscape scene, or an entire subject from close up (this was shot at 28mm):

Medium length lenses (about 60-90mm) are good for portraits (this was done at 70mm, from fairly close to the subject):

Long lenses (aka telephoto; about 135 and up) are good for close-ups from a bit of a distance (this was done at 200mm):

Cool things you can do with color

2009-11-19T05:13:00.001-08:00

Palette
Originally uploaded by jakerome

I came across this palette on Flickr done by jakerome. It is made up of a 16x16 gride of square photographs each emphasizing a single color. Put together, they produce a quilt effect. Very cool!

Long time no post

2009-10-31T21:23:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy summer and early fall, and I haven't had time to post anything in a while. So here are a few of my best shots to catch you up with what I've been doing photographically (and otherwise) for the past three months. I'm now storing photos on Flickr, so clicking on these images will take you there and you can browse at some of my other work.

After being inspired by some of the reading I was doing for the Food Course, I bought a share in a CSA farm called Urban Grains, which grows organic wheat; well, UG partners with Cedar Isle Farm which actually grows the wheat. The shareholders took a field trip in July out to the farm in Agassiz, BC, to see the wheat fields and meet the farmer. The setting was stunningly beautiful, in the Fraser Valley with the Cheam Range of the Canadian Cascades off in the distance.

In late July and early August I went to Santa Fe for the Glen Workshop, put on by Image and CIVA. I also did some touring around that part of New Mexico, visited several cousins, and saw a lot of great Spanish Colonial art and stunning landscapes. No wonder Georgia O'Keeffe and others have been so inspired there.

In August I went back East for my family's annual vacation at our summer cottage in Vermont. The highlight of the week was of course getting to see my nephew Isaac again. He seems to get cuter every day, if there were any possibility of ever being more cute than he already is. Sorry no public photos of him. Friends can see them on my Facebook page.

In August, and late September to early October, I had visits from two dear old friends, spent time with them at Galiano Island, and did some fun things in Vancouver. Here's a B.C. Ferry, all repainted in preparation for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, going through Active Pass as seen from Sturdies Bay on Galiano Island. Man, if only I had the new "content-aware fill" feature that Adobe Labs has been working on for some future version of Photoshop! I'd get rid of that light post in front of the ferry. Too time-consuming otherwise. But take a look at a cool demo here.

I'm taking a portraiture photography class at Focal Point, the photography school which is a block from my house. (I'm so lucky!) Our teacher is Alex Waterhouse-Hayward, a well-known Vancouver-based commercial and fine art photographer who has photographed famous people including Bob Hope, Douglas Coupland, and Annie Liebovitz. He's also an avid gardener, so he likes to have us use plants as props in some of our photos, and he is teaching us to recreate certain historical styles in portraiture. He also sometimes is wacky and suggests amusing poses with props. Here are a couple of my best shots from a studio session.

This first one is heavily color adjusted in Photoshop.

We've had the most glorious October for fall colors this year. I went out shooting some of the leaves in my neighborhood a couple of weeks ago, and this is my favorite one. It looks like they're floating on water, but they are on the hood of my neighbor's car, with reflections of the trees overhead.

Finally, I got to attend the U2 360 Tour concert in Vancouver the other night. It was a great experience. Took my trusty G9 along with me and didn't see any signs or hear any announcements about no photography allowed, so I went for it. The stage was set with this giant space ship on it. Apparently it takes so long to set up (8 days) that they had three identical sets so they could be working ahead setting up the stages for the next two concerts while performing one. This tour cost them about $750K per day! Hmmm, you wonder how many poor children in Africa Bono could have fed or given AIDS medications to if they'd kept the budget to...oh, maybe $300K per day? Still, I know he inspires many and is very generous, so I don't complain too much. It certainly was quite a spectacle.

SoFoBoMo Book

2009-07-05T13:23:00.000-07:00

OK, I’ve decided on a solution so that I can post my book. I added a page of text explaining the situation and posted the PDF as is. Hopefully I won’t get sued (apparently it’s not very likely: see “Can a Recipe Be Stolen?”), and maybe I’ll even inspire some purchases of the cookbooks that some of the recipes are drawn from.

Here is the link to the completed book on the SoFoBoMo page:

SoFoBoMo - Finished!

2009-06-26T08:46:00.000-07:00

I finished in perfect time! I started shooting on May 24, finished the PDF on June 23 and had 22 copies of it printed and spiral bound to give to the people involved, and got most of them distributed that same day. I had participated in a two week course on the theology of food, titled "Food: Creation, Community, and Communion." That was going to be the title of my SoFoBoMo book. I took photos throughout the entire course, of us working in the garden, cooking, and of course the food itself. I've put a selection of the best of those in my Food Course Flickr group.

But I shifted my project goal as the course progressed: I decided to create a cookbook with all the recipes of the dishes we ate -- the food was amazing! I began collecting the recipes (sometimes by photographing the page in the cookbook they came from, other times typing them in directly from a friend's description, or copying from emaikl). Fortunately, I had taken enough photos of food to illustrate the cookbook with a photo for nearly every dish (ended up using a total of 42 of them -- not always my very best shots overall, but the best of the food ones I did).

Unfortunately, I can't post it on the web, because it ended up being a cookbook (with photographs of nearly all the dishes), and some of the recipes came from copyrighted sources, and I didn't track down sources in all cases. Even when I did, I'm not sure what the legality is of republishing a recipe from a published cookbook without permission. So, while I have the personal satisfaction of having finished, I don't get credit on the SoFoBoMo website for being among those who did. Oh well, at least I learned I can finish such a project, and will be better equipped to do it next year.

Here's the front cover, at least;

Food: Creation, Community, and Communion

2009-06-07T22:33:00.000-07:00

I'm back from Galiano Island now and am still not quite sure what hit me. It was an amazing experience, hard to put in words. It was pretty exhausting -- hardly a moment to sit and think. Our routine (weekdays) was usually: breakfast at 8, morning prayers around 8:45, class from 9-12, lunch around 12:30 or so, about an hour of free time (which was all the free time we had and we had to use it to do our daily assignments), a couple of hours of work projects (either work in the garden, kitchen cleanup and meal prep, or working with our teams to research and plan the meal we were going to present), dinner, evening prayers, and occasionally a class-related movie in the evening (e.g., "The Future of Food"). Any gaps between those items were filled with walking back and forth between the Wilkinsons' house, where classes and meals were held, and the cottages most of us were staying in; showers after working in the garden and getting all sweaty; and quick checks of email.

I took 2074 photos in all over the two weeks. I'm now into Phase Two of SoFoBoMo, which is selecting which ones to keep for the book. I also want to share a larger subset of them with all the people I took the course with, so I've begun a first pass, which I'm about halfway through. The ones that haven't been weeded out so far are up on my Flickr page. A very interesting phenomenon, by the way: I was somewhat apologetic about posting a couple of potentially disturbing photos showing blood and guts from slaughtering a lamb, but those have been the most popular ones for people to go and visit -- three times as many visits on those as the average for all the other photos in the set. Go figure. I guess people are into blood and gore.

I haven't done much editing yet, other than fixing the exposure and shadows/highlights on a few of them. I'm finding I like the exposure editing features of ACDSee Pro quite well and am so far doing all the work in that, rather than Photoshop. However I know I do prefer Photoshop for detail touch-up work. It seems to preserve the pixel resolution in the vicinity of the editing better than ACDSee does. Before I went out to the island, I did a very thorough clean of my camera, including cleaning the sensor, but I still wasn't able to get rid of a few visible dust specks. So I'm anticipating I'll have to do some spot removal. I guess I will have to have my camera professionally cleaned.

Eating Mercifully

2009-05-11T23:23:00.000-07:00

The Humane Society of the US has created this short film (26 minutes) about the importance of stewardship of animals as part of God's creation. Apparently they are realizing the value of enlisting the help of people of faith in this important work, and people of faith are waking up to their responsibility to care for their fellow creatures. This is good news!

Thanks to Matt Humphrey, one of the TAs for the Food Course I'll be taking later this month, for the pointer to this video. I'll repeat his caution:

WARNING: There are some disturbing images here of the treatment of animals. I think it is essential that we become people of truth-telling, which means to face the facts rather than hide behind slogans like "that can't be true - farmers wouldn't do that." This is a call to action and faithfulness which demands thoughtful reflection and creative action.

Watch and pray.

I should point out that at about 13:49 in the video, Rev. Dr. Laura Hobgood-Oster relates a story about Jesus stopping a man from beating his mule. This is extra-biblical (it's from the Coptic Gospel found in the Nag Hammadi library). It's a nice story and quite in keeping with what Jesus might well have done, and surely many of the stories written down about him by others besides the Gospel writers really did happen. But it's non-canonical. However there are in the Bible passages that clearly talk about taking good care of animals, e.g. Proverbs 12:10 ("The righteous care for the needs of their animals, but the kindest acts of the wicked are cruel."), Deuteronomy 22:4 ("If you see someone’s donkey or ox fallen on the road, do not ignore it. Help the owner get it to its feet."), Deuteronomy 25:4 ("Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain."), and of course the extending of the Sabbath command to animals in Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15.

The Oblation of Onions

2009-05-05T19:02:00.000-07:00

I've got my computer back up and running for the most part. Still some software yet to reinstall and some settings that aren't quite the way I had them before the crash. But at least it looks like I'll be able to go ahead with SoFoBoMo. I've been getting warmed up with some more food photos lately.

Onions are pretty amazing, you know. I've recently finished reading Robert Farrar Capon's The Supper of the Lamb: A Culinary Reflection, which is a wonderful combination of cookbook and theological essay. In Chapter 2, "The First Session," he guides the reader through a truly spiritual encounter with an onion. This chapter alone is worth the price of the book. I'd been exposed to the onion exercise in a class at Regent once before (The Christian Imagination, taught by -- surprise, surprise -- Loren Wilkinsons). But it was fun to savor the chapter from which the onion experience came.

Some choice excerpts: "Once you are seated, the first order of business is to address yourself to the onion at hand....You will note, to begin with, that the onion is a thing, a being, just as you are. Savor that for a moment." Later: "But look what your onion has done for you: It has given you back the possibility of heaven as a place without encumbering you with the irrelevancy of location."

Still farther on, one of the best sections, worth quoting at length:

"Note once again what you have discovered: an onion is not a sphere in repose. It is a linear thing, a bloom of vectors thrusting upward from base to tip. Stand your onion, therefore, root end down upon the board and see it as the paradigm of life that it is--as one member of the vast living, gravity-defying troop that, across the face of the earth, moves light- and airward as long as the world lasts.

"Only now have you the perspective needed to enter the onion itself. Begin with the outermost layer of paper, or onion-skin. Be careful. In the ordinary processes of cooking, the outer skin of a sound onion is removed by peeling away the immediately underlying layers of flesh with it. It is a legitimate short cut; the working cook cannot afford the time it takes to loosen only the paper. Here, however, it is not time that matters, but the onion. Work gently then, lifting the skin with the point of your knife so as not to cut or puncture the flesh beneath."

Later on: "Perhaps now you have seen at least dimly that the uniquenesses of creation are the result of continuous creative support, of effective regard by no mean lover. He likes onions, therefore they are. The fit, the colors, the smell, the tensions, the tastes, the textures, the lines, the shapes are a response, not to some forgotten decree that there may as well be onions as turnips, but to His present delight--His intimate and immediate joy in all you have seen....With Peter, the onion says, Lord, it is good for us to be here. Yes, says God. Tov. Very good."

Later he touches on his idea which he elsewhere calls oblation: "Man's real work is to look at the things of the world and to love them for what they are. That is, after all, what God does, and man was not made in God's image for nothing. The fruits of his attention can be seen in all the arts, crafts, and sciences....But if man's attention is repaid so handsomely, his inattention costs him dearly. Every time he diagrams something instead of looking at it, every time he regards not what a thing is but what it can be made to mean to him...[r]eality slips away from him; and he is left with nothing but the oldest monstrosity in the world: an idol. Things must be met for themselves. To take them only for their meaning is to convert them into gods--to make them too important, and therefore to make them unimportant altogether. Idolatry has two faults. It is not only a slur on the true God; it is also an insult to true things."

I think a photographer's calling is very connected with this idea of attentiveness to things, of oblation (offering them up to God and to others by really seeing them and loving them).

Ron Reed, in his blog Oblations, quotes the core exposition of this idea of oblation from Capon's chapter "The Oblation of Things" in his book An Offering of Uncles. My church, Point Grey Inter-Mennonite Fellowship, is going to have Ron as a guest speaker on Sunday, Sept 6, to give a version of his talk "Oblation: The Artist's Holy Calling." Lucky us!

SoFoBoMo at risk

2009-04-11T12:20:00.000-07:00

Woe is me. My computer crashed and the hard disk is toast. I stupidly had it configured as RAID 0, not RAID 1 (I hadn't really understood all that stuff) so I don't have a duplicate drive to jump back in and keep going as if nothing had happened, as I thought I would. My latest full external backup of the drive was over four months ago (again, stupid; I should be doing them nightly). I've got the disk down at a data recovery specialist place and they will be able to retrieve it all, but it doesn't sound like they will return me a bootable drive exactly identical to the one that died. I think they're just going to get my files back for me and put them on an external drive. I will have to start fresh with a new install of the OS and reinstall all my software, etc. Very time consuming. Bleeacchh! This is a major setback and might put my entry into SoFoBoMo at risk.

No photos to share today, as I haven't been taking any, since I don't have anywhere to put them to process them and don't want to get too far ahead of myself until the computer is back up and running.

More SoFoBoMo Thoughts

2009-03-29T17:20:00.001-07:00

I did some thinking about PDF file creation and hosting, as I was coming up with an answer to Billie Mercer's question on the SoFoBoMo Flickr forum.

Here's what I wrote:

If you have CS3, perhaps you have Adobe Acrobat (the full version, not just Acrobat Reader). It comes with Creative Suite. Anyway, if you've got Acrobat, you can combine the separate PDF pages generated by Photoshop CS3 into one multi-page PDF file by starting Acrobat, clicking on "Create PDF" and selecting "From Multiple Files..." then browse to the folder where your files are located.

If you don't have (and don't feel like buying) Acrobat, another easy way to make a PDF file is to create the book in Word first. You can lay out pictures and text there however you like. Then using any of several "print-to-PDF" utilities (such as the free PDFCreator) which you would have installed first, just print from Word as if you're printing to a printer, but select the PDF output instead of your printer.

Now about hosting: Anita has her own website and she has uploaded the PDF file directly to the root folder on her website. That costs money and is non-trivial. However, there are other options that are nearly as good.

1) Try http://freepdfhosting.com (it's free, but you have to register, and you have to make a donation in order to store a PDF file larger than 2 MB which a book of high quality photos probably will be). Pretty straightforward to create an account and upload files. I haven't tried it myself, but I've Googled to find other books hosted on it. The URL will look something like this http://freepdfhosting.com/uploads/413a3e072b.pdf (you can check out that book to see an example of how your book will look).

2) Try the free webspace available through SkyDrive on Microsoft Live Spaces (http://spaces.live.com). Uploading files is pretty straightforward (once you've created your account, navigate in the browser to your public folder and click "Upload Files" then Browse on your hard disk for them), but viewing them isn't quite as smooth as if you had your own webspace. It doesn't show up embedded in the same browser window, but asks whether you want to download the file. And the URLs aren't very nice. But you can store up to 25 GB for free.

3) Try creating a free website on Google Sites (http://sites.google.com). Pretty straightforward to sign up for an account and create a new site. You need to upload your PDF file as an "attachment" to some page in your site (e.g., your home page), but then you can point people to the URL of the file directly. File size limit: 10 MB per attachment.

4) Try uploading the PDF file directly to Google Docs (http://docs.google.com). Like Google Sites, you have to have (or create) a Google account to do this. But once you've got one and are logged in, just click Upload, Browse your computer to find the file, and click "Upload File." Again, the URLs aren't very nice, and there's a bunch of Google Docs framework stuff at the top and right of the window. File size limit: 10 MB per PDF.

None of those solutions is IDEAL, but they're all pretty simple and have varying advantages/disadvantages.

I have realized that I can't just do a Blurb book, because I do want to have a PDF result to post online, and Blurb doesn't give you one. So I'm back to the drawing board planning to either use InDesign (which I'd need to spend some more time learning) or Word. I don't want to have to do the layout twice (both for PDF and for the printed Blurb book), so I'm going to try to do what someone else suggested and just export the individual PDF pages (complete with text and photos) as JPGs and plop them in to Blurb pages one at a time with full bleed. I'd like to try that once before the real thing comes along. I still think I'm going to go with Issuu for the hosting, as I really like its polished looke and page-turning interface.

Another thing I've decided to do, at the recommendation of an artist friend, is to prepare for the actual shooting I'm planning to do over the two weeks of the Food Course by photographing my meals from now until then. I think that not only will that discipline prepare me for the SoFoBoMo task, but it will also prepare me for the contemplative aspects of the Food Course. It will make me more mindful of what and how I'm eating, and it will help me to slow down as I approach my meals. Perhaps I'll be more grateful for them, too.

OK, here goes the first meal. Took 23 shots and kept 6 of them, to tell the story of my dinner.

Hmmm, a full fridge, but nothing interesting to eat...

Besides, I haven't done dishes in weeks and there's gross stuff growing in my big cooking pot...

I guess it's one of those frozen dinner days...

Zap it...

Nice and hot...

Yum!!

Back from Boston

2009-03-29T17:09:00.000-07:00

I had a wonderful visit with my nephew Isaac over the past week. There's nothing like spending time with a baby to bring you back in touch with what is fundamental about being human. All other things fade in importance when you're looking into his eyes and babbling back and forth with him. I could sit with him on my lap for hours mesmerized by his little movements, his attentive looks, and his adorable smiles and coos. It was very hard to tear myself away to go to the airport. Here are a few choice photos.

SoFoBoMo 2009

2009-03-15T21:56:00.000-07:00

The challenge is on again this year, to complete a photography book, from start to finish, in one month. It's called SoFoBoMo (for Solo Photography Book Month) because it's loosely modeled after NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and NaSoAlMo (National Solo Album Month). Last year 170 photographers signed up, and 60 of them completed their books. That shows it is challenging, but not impossible.

This year I will be taking part in a two-week intensive course on the theology of food, called "Food: Creation, Community, and Communion," on Galiano Island, from May 25 to June 5. My intention is to photograph every aspect of this course, the participants, learning, gardening, slaughtering a lamb, cooking, partaking in meals, celebrating communion, etc. This book will be a documentation of the course. I plan to complete it by June 25, 2009. I am even hoping to get credit for doing this as my optional extra project.

Today's photo is of one of the sheep from Hunterston Farm on Galiano Island, with her triplet lambs. Who knows? Maybe one of these lambs will be the one we slaughter for the Food Course. I shudder to think of it. Reminds of me of the time when my mother went to visit her cousins as a kid and she naively asked "where's Blackie?" (their pet lamb). Her cousin blithely replied, "Oh, he's in the freezer." I guess, though, when you live on a farm, that's part of life. I don't know how they choose one to slaughter for this course. It seems such an ominous thing to do, but of course humanely slaughtering an animal on one's own farm for the purpose of food is far better than what they do in commercial slaughterhouses. I'm sure I will be learning more about all of this in this course.

Getting feedback

2009-02-16T11:37:00.000-08:00

I'm thrilled to report that my bleeding heart photo (see Feb 13 post) was selected by one of the admins of the "A" Class group on Flickr, and I was invited to post it on their best Valentine's Day photos thread. What a way to get more traffic and comments! Much as I like to think I do my photography just for the joy of it and to be a blessing to others, I have to admit to some baser motives: the kudos I get are part of what keeps me going.

It's been a while since I've done a mystery photo, so here's one.

Happy Valentine's Day

2009-02-13T23:41:00.000-08:00

This is a repost, but it's seasonally appropriate, and I don't have anything new right now. As you can probably tell, my project of taking 100 photos a day got derailed. I'll try to get back to taking some new photos for the blog soon, but I had a few deadlines to meet on other stuff.

One Hundred Photos a Day

2009-01-14T01:16:00.001-08:00

I'm starting a new challenge that an artist friend/mentor has given me to get in practice for SoFoBoMo 2009 (Solo Photography Book Month) in May/June: take 100 photos a day for 30 days, cull them down to the best three each day, and then pick the 35 best ones of the 90 I end up with at the end of the month. I'm to attempt to shoot photos in a theme, and look for ways to connect the best photos of each day using that theme; a new theme might emerge as I look over my photos for the first few days, which is OK; but then I should direct my shooting for the subsequent days to fill out that theme.

This is a good challenge for me, as I never shoot this way. I'm finding it really hard to even shoot 100 photos a day. I can do that with no problem when I'm travelling somewhere outside my home turf, but it's harder with the familiar. The first day I took 20. The second day I did better and took 73. The third day I did none. And today (well...it's yesterday by now, it's nearly 2:30am), I have taken only 60 and am about ready to call it a night and go to bed.

Here are a few of the photos from the past three sessions:

This one I took when I thought I was working on a theme called "thresholds":

I was thinking this next one could be part of a series called Departure.

This one doesn't fit into any particular theme, but I like how it came out. It took the most set-up and post-processing of all the photos so far.

This one I've titled "Constellations" -- see the constellation reflected in the Christmas ball, as well as the constellation of lights on the tree? Kind of a Little Dipper / Big Dipper pairing. Not set up. It just turned out that way (after some cropping), and I didn't even notice the resemblance to the dippers until now.

So, you see, I'm not very good at finding a theme to tie all my photos together, or sticking to a theme I've pre-selected. This project is going to be very hard!

From the archives

2009-01-04T18:35:00.000-08:00

I haven't gotten out to do much shooting in the snow apart from that one day. I've actually not even gotten outside much. I still haven't dug my car out in two weeks. Church was cancelled a second week in a row this morning, due to the snow and ice on the roads. So I've been spending lots of time inside, and one of my projects has been scanning old photos and slides.

Here's one from my archives. Taken in 2004, it's of the piano at Regent College. Taken on my old Yashica 230-AF, on Fujichrome Sensia slide film.

Let it snow, redux

2008-12-26T23:56:00.000-08:00

Well, the snow did eventually come, and come, and come. Buckets of it! It just won't stop. As of Wednesday morning, we'd had 62 centimeters (about 2 feet) of accumulated snow since all of this began. And probably about 10-15 cm more has fallen since. Closing in on an all-time record snow fall for Vancouver for the month of December. We did have the record accumulated snow on the ground by Dec 25, so it was the whitest Christmas ever for our fair city. Here are some photos:

A tree in my yard.

Icicles on my house.

The view out my front door.

After I shoveled my walk.

Someone's car. Yes, I think that's a car!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

2008-12-13T04:48:00.000-08:00

We were supposed to get a snow storm tonight, but we didn't. So I've put some digital snow in my blog instead. Enjoy!

(Note: You can't see it from a feed reader, you've got to actually go to my blog site. And for the technically inclined, here's where I got the code.)

The First Noël without Cricket

2008-12-11T00:30:00.000-08:00

I'm tired of having a dark and gloomy house for Christmas when all my neighbors have lights up and/or trees showing through the window. I want to be part of the Christmas cheer. So I caved in this year and bought an artificial Christmas tree. I like real trees better. They smell nice, they are more environmentally friendly, and they were part of all my Christmases growing up, so they bring back fond memories. But they are such a hassle (they're hard to get home, they drop needles all over the place, and then you've got to find a way to recycle them afterwards), that I rarely get one. I've actually only had a real tree once, when I had a housemate with a truck who helped me pick it up. (The year that I used the trimming off the top of a friend's tall hedge as a "tree" doesn't count.) So I figured if I'm not even going to enjoy a real tree, why keep hanging onto the somewhat irrelevant sentimental notion that they are nicer? So I finally took the plunge. I went out and bought myself a Noma 6-1/2' Pre-Lit Self-Shaping Pine Tree, with little white lights. Here it is, pre-ornaments. As my Dad used to say every Christmas, I think it's the nicest tree I've ever had! I've already had one compliment from a neighbor about it. It has already enhanced my Christmas mood, and I got out my trumpet and have been playing Advent hymns and Christmas carols every day since. Yay! I love this season of the year.

But someone is missing from it all. Here's a photo from Christmas 2005 with Cricket. This is my first Christmas without her, and I still miss her a lot. I doubt she ever knew that there was anything special about the Christmas seaon. She actually looks kind of bewildered about the Christmas tree in this photo; it's the only time she ever saw one. But she loyally kept me company no matter what incomprehensible things I did. She just wanted to be wherever I was in the house, and she got used to being posed for photographs. She was usually pretty good at it, though in this one she does have that look of, "Come on, Rosie, haven't you got a good shot yet?" (I took six.)

Thanksgiving

2008-12-05T11:18:00.000-08:00

I have much to be thankful for this season. I'm still in the Thanksgiving mood, even more than a week later. I continue to be impressed with the way President-elect Obama is thoughtfully putting together his team, fostering transparency in government, and soliciting input from the people. I love the way he's using a YouTube channel to keep people informed, and we can "join the discussion" and give our suggestions (which they take seriously) at Change.gov. Very interesting "Inside the Transition: Health Care" video, for example.

Well, enough politics. I'm also very thankful for the great time I had with my cousins over an extended Thanksgiving weekend. We had our turkey meal at Point Roberts and went for a hike down to the beach. There we saw these interesting rock formations.

Here we are playing a game of "Bananagrams" (aka Speed Scrabble) at Arbutus Cottage on Galiano Island.

An arbutus tree.

There's an awesome view behind the fog on the hike up to Bodega Ridge, honest.

Tunnel View, Yosemite, Election Day 2008

2008-11-26T21:56:00.001-08:00

This is one of the most spectacular views in the entire world. Made famous by many photographers, including Ansel Adams. El Capitan on the left. Half Dome off in the distance. Bridal Veil Falls on the right. I stopped to see it on my way back out of Yosemite Valley earlier this month. I was awestruck. No other words are needed. Since I saw it on Election Day, perhaps it was a portent of clear skies ahead. I hope and pray so. You must click on it to see it full size (or at least as full a size as I was willing to post here).

Segue to a Segway & Touring San Francisco's Architecture

2008-11-11T02:30:00.001-08:00

I had a great time in San Francisco last week. One of the highlights of my trip was getting to ride a Segway for the first time. I've been wanting to try one ever since I first heard about Dean Kamen's invention back in 2001. So when I heard about the tours San Francisco run by the Electric Tour Company, I signed up right away! They give you a half hour lesson on riding the Segway safely and then take you gliding around in groups of six or so, following in single file behind the tour guide who tells you (over a walkie-talkie system) all about what you're seeing. The tour I went on was around Fishermen's Wharf and the North Beach neighborhood. You get to stop and take photos and just buzz around on your own at a few places. It was way cool!

Here's a video of me riding it (click on the image first to activate the control, then click the start button at the bottom left):

Another highlight was the Architectural Walking Tour of San Francisco, led by historian Rick Evans. It was outstanding! He gave all kinds of fascinating information about the quirky history of buildings, the privately-owned public open spaces (POPOS) which hardly anyone in San Francisco even knows exist, and future urban planning for the city which is already underway. Rick is very knowledgeable and a great communicator. He's been researching all of this for years out of personal interest and for a book he's writing, but has only been leading the tours for the past year. You'd think he'd been doing it for over a decade based on how good it is. I highly recommend this tour.

Rick Evans, tour guide extraordinare, showing us the POPOS atop the Galleria Park Hotel, 191 Sutter Street, where our tour began:

The Hallidie Building (1917) at 130 Sutter Street, designed by Willis Polk, is remarkable for containing the world's first glass curtain wall, even predating the Bauhaus movement. Rick says that in spite of how ugly it is, this is the most architecturally interesting building in San Francisco. The American Institute of Architects (AIA) have their offices here, so they must agree.

The Crocker Galleria (1983), a spiffy shopping center with virtually unmarked access to two of San Francisco's underutilized POPOS. If you go there, take the escalator to the top floor and look for nondescript doors hiding staircases up to roof gardens adorning the two adjacent buildings. You can't see these garden courtyards from anywhere below, and you'd miss them if you didn't know they were there. See COMMONSpace for more info on San Francisco's privately-owned public open spaces.

The Hobart Building (1914), 582 Market Street, designed by Willis Polk (same architect who did the Hallidie Building). Because the building next door was torn down for the construction of a BART station, and its "air rights" sold to another developer so the latter could build a higher skyscraper, that odd exposed wall will remain there forever. Rick hopes it is used someday for a mural, to prevent advertisers from taking it over and ruining the view. The tall building behind it in the first of these photos is the 44 Montgomery office tower.

111 Sutter Street (1926), the Hunter-Dulin Building, aka The "Sam Spade" Building (on left) next to 44 Montgomery (office tower). The former has an interesting mix of French Chateau and Romanesque ornamentation. The building was the site of Sam Spade's office in The Maltese Falcon. The author, Dashiell Hammett, lived in San Francisco while writing the novel, and the building appears in the movie.

In the elevator lobby is an amazing hand-painted ceiling with an eclectic mix of imagery (birds, Stars of David, heraldic shields, lions rampant, fleurs-de-lis). The ceiling had been hidden for years under a layer of cigarette smoke until restorations completed in 2001 revealed it and it was repainted to its former brilliance. (Rick told us that buildings never get face-lifts by their original owners; only when a new buyer takes over, as in this case, is anyone willing to spend the money to restore great architectural history.) The lobby also features Italian marble columns and floor. A neat tidbit: you can see a foot-sized impression in the floor that was made by elevator attendants pivoting from the same spot for 50 years to direct people to one of the six elevators. (Unfortunately I neglected to photograph it, but you can see it here.)

The Shell Building (1929), at 100 Bush Street, the last great Art Deco building built in San Francisco, reflected in the glass of the Crown Zellerbach Building (1959) across the street at 1 Bush Street. The latter, designed by George Kelham, is the first glass building built after WWII. This photo shows the irony of their juxtaposition. Because it took San Francisco a long time to recover from the Great Depression and WWII, there was nothing much built between 1929 and 1959. Incidentally, I learned an interesting fact about why most tall office buildings are built with glass walls nowadays. That way they can rent out all the square footage all the way up to the edge, whereas otherwise you lose some space due to the thicker walls.

Here is the lower portion of the Shell Building:

130 Bush Street (1910), one of the narrowest buildings, if not the narrowest, in San Francisco. Sandwiched between two taller skyscrapers, this Gothic Revival structure is 10 stories high and 80 feet deep, but only 20 feet wide. (It doesn't quite make the cut for narrowest commercial building in the world -- that's the Sam Kee Building in Vancouver, at 6 feet wide). The building was originally occupied by a garment manufacturing company that specialized in thin accessories: neckties, belts, and suspenders. (Hee hee!) Notice how the Shell Building to the right has matched the height of 130 Bush with its lower floors. Contrary to what you might think, the narrow building wasn't squeezed in to a narrow spot. It was built that way when nothing was to the right of it. The Shell Building came later.

Former Standard Oil Building (1922), 225 Bush Street. This was not a stop on our tour, but Rick did point it out from a distance as we walked by, and I've learned some more about it from the Web. It was the tallest building in San Francisco when it was built. Built in the Beaux Arts style, it was modeled after the old Federal Reserve Building in New York. It "has a Mediterranean crown--a loggia capped with a red tile roof supported by a heavy, corbeled cornice." The Renaissance ornamentation was derived from a Florentine palace. (Sources: Wikipedia, SkyScraperPage, Emporis, and Vernacular Language North)

All of this has gotten me excited about architecture, which I'd never really been that keen on before.

Election time

2008-11-01T01:07:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been obsessed with the U.S. election and haven't been paying attention to much else online for the past few weeks. In honor of this election which is sure to go down in the history books no matter who wins, here's a photo I took of the Oval Office. (Actually, it's a replica from the Jimmy Carter Library & Museum in Atlanta, which I visited in 2006.)

After the rain

2008-10-07T13:53:00.000-07:00

Nitobe Memorial Garden - honoring a Japanese Christian

2008-10-06T11:57:00.000-07:00

This is the classic view of the Nitobe Memorial Garden on the UBC campus. It's a quiet place of reflection amidst the busyness of a major university. It was built to honor Inazo Nitobe (1862-1933), a Japanese Quaker, philosopher and statesman, scholar and agriculturalist, who early in his life had expressed the desire to be a "bridge over the Pacific." "He devoted much of his life to promoting trust and understanding between the United States and Japan," and served for a time as Under-Secretary General of the League of Nations.

Most people who visit the garden don't realize Nitobe was a Christian. According to Wikipedia, "he was converted to Christianity under the strong legacy left by Dr. William S. Clark," the first Vice-Principal of Sapporo Agricultural College (now, Hokkaido University), where Nitobe was educated, though he and Clark never actually crossed paths. Nitobe and some friends of his who became converts to Christianity at the same time were baptized by an American Methodist Episcopal missionary, Bishop M.C. Harris. Nitobe helped found and was the first president of Tokyo Woman's Christian University.

Nitobe is perhaps most famous for his work Bushido: The Soul of Japan. He called for Christianity to be "grafted onto the trunk of Bushido." ("Bushido, meaning 'Way of the Warrior,' is a Japanese code of conduct and a way of the samurai life, loosely analogous to the concept of chivalry.") Nitobe believed that the Japanese concept of giri (duty) is "infinitely inferior to the Christian doctrine of love." He says that giri (literally "Right Reason") "should be the 'categorical imperative' for moral behavior" but that it had "degenerated into a vague sense of propriety" in an "artificial society." He draws parallels between the bushido ethic and the Christian West's "presumption against force, limiting the conditions when force can be applied, and conduct in war." That is the essence of just war theory, though he didn't use that term. As a Quaker, he leaned towards the avoidance of force altogether: "fighting in itself, be it offensive or defensive, is, as Quakers rightly testify, brutal and wrong."

In 1884 Nitobe traveled to the USA to study. There he met a young Quaker woman, Mary Patterson Elkington, and they were married (against the wishes of both their families) at the famed Arch Street Friends Meeting House, in Philadelphia.

As for his Quaker sentiments, Nitobe writes, "The starting point of Quaker teaching is the belief in the existence of the Inner Light...the presence of a Power not our own, the indwelling of a Personality, other than human, in each one of us." He points out that such an idea goes back to the most ancient forms of mysticism. The Buddhist mystics make reference to it, but "Quakerism stays within the family of Christianity....Unlike Orientals, George Fox and his followers conceived...of light as a person." Nitobe recognizes a superiority in "the revelation of Godhead in the person and life of Jesus Christ.... We read Lao-tze; we read Buddhist saints; I've stud[ied] Oriental mystics... [By them] we are brought very near to the idea of redemption, atonement, salvation...but we feel that we have not reached our finality....Yes, we see light, but not the one thing essential-perfect, living Personality."

Nitobe died in Victoria, B.C. while visiting Canada in 1933. The Nitobe Memorial Garden, which opened in 1960, was designed by Professor Kannosuke Mori of Chiba University, a distinguished Japanese Landscape Architect, at the recommendation of the government of Japan. He conceived it primarily in the Shinto tradition, but he gives reference to Nitobe's Christianity in the "remembering lantern" near the waiting pavilion. "This is a so-called Oribe lantern, first designed by the notable tea-master, warrior and designer Oribe Furuta (1544-1615). At the base of this lantern, partly covered by earth, the figure of a Madonna is visible. Christian icons hidden at the base of Oribe lanterns enabled Japanese Christians to worship covertly. The history of Christianity in Japan goes back to 1549 when the Jesuit priest Francis Xavier landed at Kageshima. At first, driven by a desire for Western firearms, numerous warlords converted. Subsequently however, the new religion was suppressed, at times brutally, hence the covert worship with Oribe lanterns."

Nitobe was honored in 1984 with a new Japanese 5,000 yen note bearing his image (superseded in 2004).

Sources: Wikipedia and NationMaster encyclopedias, Nitobe Garden's bio of Nitobe and other pages on their site; "A Japanese View of Quakers" by Inazo Nitobe; Prophets of Peace by Robert Kisala; A Portrait of Two Founders by Steven Elkinton (Friends Journal, October 2007); Nitobe Memorial Garden page on British Columbia Garden Tour site; and any other links above not repeated here.

A view of Vancouver you don't often see

2008-10-04T01:53:00.001-07:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while again. This shot looking east over the Port of Vancouver, along the Burrard Inlet, was taken from the observation deck at the top of Harbour Centre. It isn't what you usually think of when you think of scenes of Vancouver. But even Vancouver's "ugly" bits (the commercial port area) are beautiful. There's an enormous bright yellow pile of something-or-other (sulfur, I suppose) across the inlet from downtown, which is quite cheery. In this photo, I like the colorful rows of containers and cranes, and how they form a pair of converging lines that draw your eye towards Burnaby Mountain off in the distance.

Bodega Ridge

2008-09-24T04:12:00.000-07:00

Here's another panorama, since people liked the last one so much. This is the view from Bodega Ridge, the second highest point on Galiano Island, looking southwest out over Trincomali Channel. The closest island you can see is Wallace Island. Beyond that is Salt Spring Island, and beyond that Vancouver Island.

I posted a Bodega Ridge panorama a while back, too, but this one is at sunset and you can see it all at once without scrolling.

Remembering the dead

2008-09-19T20:18:00.000-07:00

I still think of Cricket a lot and miss her and cry every now and then. But life has returned to normal for the most part, except I have more time now, and fewer expenses and worries. I still haven't gotten around to giving away or otherwise disposing of all the leftover dog food, medications, toys, bedding, etc. Some few special things I'm going to keep to remind me of her. But I don't need the stuff that takes up lots of room. That stroller only got two days of use, and I'm sure somebody would enjoy having it.

I am writing a book now, on anticipating and going through (growing through) the loss of a pet. These blog entries will form the core of it, but there's lots more to say. I am enjoying getting into the routine of writing a bit every day, but that means I've been neglecting the blog. However writing here is still a good way to try a few new ideas out. I don't want to give away the whole content of the book here, though. But expect a few snippets from time to time. And of course, life goes on, and there will be other things to photograph (or bring up from my archives) and blog about.

On Wednesday I picked up the art glass that was made by Memoria Vitria, encorporating some of Cricket's ashes. The colors I chose were cobalt (blue) and apple (green), the former because Cricket always wore a blue collar, and the latter because she loved apples -- she'd always ask for the core whenever I'd finished eating an apple. This will be a permanent memorial of her that I can take with me if I ever move away from Vancouver. It is beautiful in its own right, so it doesn't shout "urn!" I have friends who have kept the ashes of their loved ones for years and not known quite what to do with them once the desire to have them out on the mantelpiece has passed. At that point it's sort of anticlimactic to go scatter them somewhere, and yet it's disrespectful to put them in storage in the garage. I plan to sprinkle the remainder of Cricket's ashes to mark the one-year anniversary of her death. I also got a ceramic pawprint made before she was cremated. And I took a clipping of some of her fur before she died and saved it in a plastic bag for I don't know what yet (perhaps to be made into a necklace or something). And there are all the hundreds of photos and video footage. So many ways to remember Cricket!

I'm feeling less and less of a need for the physical reminders as time goes on. But weird as this might sound, I do like summoning the tears once in a while. Staring at Cricket's art glass and seeing the sparkles from her ashes brought the tears to my eyes again this evening. I don't think it's a sign that I'm not moving on well with my life. After all, actors, whenever they need to play a role in which they are crying, call to mind something real in their life that they were sad about. So I can choose to go there whenever I want, or not. I think there is something healing in tears. If I'm ever troubled about something completely unrelated (but not particularly sad), going back to remember Cricket and cry about missing her takes away the knot in my stomach. Never a need to go to a counsellor again. I have built-in therapy now!

Enjoy the music

2008-08-27T19:24:00.000-07:00

As part of my continued healing from the loss of Cricket, I am bringing music back into my home. It's not that I'd banned it (I listen in the car often), but I had not listened to it at home much in the years since I moved to Canada. (My good stereo is still down in Seattle.) The time has come to move forward into a new era.

As a symbol of this decision, I've added music to my blog. Scroll to the bottom to see what's currently playing on the playlist. If you don't like classical music, you can mute the player by clicking all the way to the left on the volume control.

I'm feeling a bit wistful about the fact that CBC is in its last week of the old format of mostly classical music (with some jazz). They are totally revamping their programming to reach a broader audience (i.e., younger listeners). Hmmmph! Who listens to a radio station that plays a whole smattering of lots of different styles? You end up going back to the stations that play your favorite kind of music.

I've been part of a grassroots effort to get them to change their mind, but I doubt it will make any difference. The new leadership doesn't understand the importance of classical music to a culture; doesn't realize that younger generations do listen to it. "Classical" is actually a very broad category that includes many different styles, including new music by contemporary Canadian composers, etc. They could meet their mandate to be Canada's national broadcasting station and still please the million or so long-time listeners who are going to abandon them and go elsewhere come September.

Some of us are starting to look into XM satellite radio, others are making do with iPods. Me? I'm exploring new online options like Playlist.com. But I'll miss discovering new music if I just listen to my existing collection of favorite works. There's always streaming audio from KING-FM in Seattle and other classical stations, or Shoutcast (free Internet radio from do-it-yourself DJs and broadcasters all over the world). But I can't pick up the Internet in my car. Not yet, anyway. (I'm sure it's coming...) And the quality of DIY broadcasters or the free tracks available through Playlist.com will never rival CBC's non-commercial classical programming (I'll miss Jurgen Gothe, Eric Friesen and the lot). So more classical music at home is the only solution to my need for it.

Lake Dunmore panorama

2008-08-26T18:29:00.000-07:00

Anonymous wants to be able to see the panorama shot all at once. You asked for it, you got it! Click on it to see a larger version.

0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_S9qff53nGNE/SLSuU9fNquI/AAAAAAAABaY/hLufOPdXWSw/s400/dunmore.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5239003941664828130" />

Photo Software

2008-08-26T02:13:00.000-07:00

I've been playing around with photo software again lately. I am very impressed by ACDSee Pro, and am using that now almost exclusively, instead of a combination of Windows Explorer, Picasa, and Adobe Bridge, for all my photo organizing tasks. The only thing I still need some other software for is occasionally being able to edit EXIF fields that are not editable in ACDSee Pro. For that, I use Opanda PowerExif.

I've also discovered the Panorado java applet that makes embedding interactive panoramas in a web page a cinch (for someone with HTML skills). It's a freebie giveaway to entice you to buy Panorado's stand-alone panorama viewer/browser.

Here's a panorama I stitched together using Serif Panorama Plus (which I've written about elsewhere in this blog), of photos taken from our dock at Lake Dunmore, after the floodwaters receded.

You can click on this image and drag the mouse around to explore up/down and left/right in the image. Or just watch it scroll itself like a movie, which it has probably finished doing by the time you read this far.

width="600px" height="400px">

Courtesy of:

Confidential to frequent blog visitor from Connecticut

2008-08-19T21:38:00.000-07:00

You are someone who probably knows me, as you visit my blog regularly (more than once a day) by Google searching my name. I'm curious to know who is out there that is so interested in my blog. I'm not aware of any friends in Stratford, Connecticut (which is where my stat counter says you're from, but that might just be your ISP's location; your ISP appears to be Optimum Online). Please identify yourself either by leaving a comment on this post (anonymous is OK as long as you give me enough info to figure out who you are if you're someone I know) or email me. You can find my contact info at my website.

New bird species: olive-backed forest robin

2008-08-19T16:18:00.000-07:00

Meet the olive-backed forest robin, a new bird species recently discovered in Gabon, Africa. How wonderful to know that new species are still being discovered even as others are becoming extinct. This little creature is so beautiful! Isn't God's world just amazing? The variety and colorfulness never cease to delight me. [Note: though I do love photographing birds, this is not my photo. Source: Science Daily; photo by Brian Schmidt]

Heron on the dock!

2008-08-19T03:39:00.001-07:00

A bit of a break from blogging about Cricket. (For those who are wondering how the grieving process is going, I'm doing well, and will write more later.)

I just got back from a week's vacation in Vermont at the family summer cottage. One morning I was awoken by my sister knocking quietly at my door to tell me there was a heron on our dock. I managed to snap a couple of photos of it (alas, through a screen window) before a motor boat went by and scared it away.

That bird was huge! As you can see, it's taller than the adirondack chair.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust

2008-08-11T19:17:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was one of the hardest days of my life. I had to say a final farewell to Cricket. I know she was gone already, and only her lifeless body remained. But that was still a tangible connection to her. She was still beautiful even in death, and her fur was still soft and precious to touch. I'm glad I had those three extra days to ease into the absence of her physical presence. Even so, the waves of grief over letting go were intense. But I know I've given her back to God, and that helps soften the grief.

After much deliberating over the past few months, I had chosen to have her cremated. That will allow me to spread some of her ashes in a few special places that have been meaningful to us. I found out about a wonderful pet cremation service in North Vancouver called Until We Meet Again, run by Kevin Woronchak and his wife. They do a professional job of the cremation business, but their mission is primarily to care for the people who are going through loss of a pet, and they treat the animals with dignity. They have a beautiful meditation room for pet owners to sit in while the cremation is taking place. Kevin was so gentle and tender with Cricket, and made me feel really cared for. He allowed me to participate as much as I was comfortable in the cremation process. I ended up being brave and wanting to see what her bones looked like when the oven was opened, before they were ground down to ashes (see photo above left). It was a shock looking in and seeing how little of her remained. One amusing bit: I had chosen to have two of Cricket's favorite toys cremated with her (her whale and her elephant), because they were "dead" too: they no longer made their noises if you squeezed them, as their unchangeable batteries were dead. We found little bits of exploded battery and melted down circuit board in the cremains. Kevin removed them with a magnet, so that what's in Cricket's urn is pure Cricket. I chose to have him reserve some of the ashes to be made into a piece of memorial art glass, with swirls of color in it. The colors I chose were cobalt blue (because Cricket always wore a blue collar) and apple green (because apples were one of Cricket's favorite treats).

For now I have the urn set up on my hearth, with candles and flowers next to it. I could have straightened out the skewed photo, but I realized it is better that way, as it represents how my life is now out of kilter without Cricket in it. It will take me some time to find equilibrium again. When I'm ready, I plan to sprinkle all the ashes. Again, it will be hard to let go, but I know that Cricket is not really there in the urn. She's in my heart and will be forever. People I know who have hung onto the ashes of a pet or loved one until they figure out what they're going to do with them have ended up hanging onto them indefinitely and then feeling awkward about it. Do you keep them out visible forever, or put them in storage? Neither of those seems like a good alternative. I want to find freedom through releasing them all back into God's creation.

God has been really good in showing me his presence throughout these sad days, and sending friends to help me bear the grief. Never has Isaiah 53:4 ("Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.") meant more to me than now. Last night I went with a friend to hear the Vancouver Cantata Singers perform Brahms' Requiem - perfect timing! It was a very fitting closure to such a day. A requiem mass is the traditional mass sung for departed souls, only Brahms' Requiem is a bit unorthodox, as it is meant to comfort the living, not petition for the souls of the dead. The text was beautiful (as was the singing), in German with English translation in the program: "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted." "Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" (all from Scripture). This last photo of me was taken a couple of years ago by the young daughter of some friends of mine when we were playing around with guessing emotions from someone's facial expressions. I was putting on a sad face on purpose.

Ritual is very helpful in handling passages in life such as the death of a loved one. I have done several things intuitively which have turned out to be comforting. Lighting a candle each night of the "wake" when I kept her body in my house, and again the first night with the urn on my hearth. Crossing myself (even though I'm not Catholic, it seemed the right thing to do) as my friend and I prepared to lift her body into the car to take her to be cremated, and again when I said farewell to her body before the oven was closed.

I slept well last night.

Rehearsals for death

2008-08-08T23:09:00.000-07:00

This photo was taken by my photographer friend Chris Berrio in 2003. I was already by that time anticipating losing Cricket in the near future, as she'd been diagnosed with cancer. I invited Chris over to do a photo shoot so I'd have some good ones to keep her alive in my memory. I picked out this photo as my favorite -- the one I would use to send around a death notice card (another friend of mine had sent out death notice cards to family and friends when their dog died, and I liked the idea). Turns out it was a false diagnosis, and Cricket lived another five great years. She did get cancer in the end, and that is what ultimately took her away from me, but that wasn't what she had back then.

Anyway, that was the first of several "rehearsals" Cricket gave me for losing her. Each time, I was strengthened for the future work I'd have of caring for her and grieving for her. It's not that it was easy, by any means, when the time came, but I was as prepared as I could ever have been. I knew by the time we had the diagnosis of her terminal illness that I wanted to do hospice care for her at home until she died naturally. It was those false alarms that got me thinking about preparing myself for her death, whereas before, I was blithely going along in denial, pretending she would never die.

It is finished

2008-08-07T16:07:00.000-07:00

Cricket died early this afternoon. I was not present when she breathed her last. I'd gone out from 12:30 - 3:30, and she was dead when I returned. Though I wish I could have been with her (for my own curiosity as well as to comfort her), I'd already made peace with the possibility of missing her final moments. I know she was resting comfortably, and I'd given her a dose of her pain medication before I left, so she wasn't suffering. Her lights just went out.

Now comes the first task of the next few days: putting her body on ice to keep it here for the next day or so, kind of like a traditional wake for humans, so that I can come to grips with her death and begin the next phase of my grieving process.

Emails welcome at this time, but please don't call in the next 24 hours. I need the space to just be with her, deal with practicalities, and sleep. This has all been very exhausting. Thanks for all your understanding and prayers. I'll be writing more over the coming days.

Rainbow Bridge

2008-08-07T02:30:00.000-07:00

No changes in Cricket. This post follows immediately after the previous one.

The following poem has been posted on many sites helping people deal with the loss of a pet. It made me cry, as it hits pretty close to what I believe about our animals and eternity. We will meet again. The thought comforts me as I say goodbye to Cricket (for now) ...

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.

When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.

They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.

You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together....

Author Unknown

[The photo was taken in Scotland in 2004. That's my uncle photographing the rainbow. Note the raindrops on the back of his coat. You might need to click to zoom in to see them.]

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me."

2008-08-07T01:03:00.001-07:00

Cricket is still here, but just barely. She has stopped drinking and is just lying in bed now. Other bodily processes are shutting down. No more intake, so no more output. Her breathing is more rapid and shallow now. I debated whether to put this photo, taken last night, on the blog, thinking thoughts of respect for the dying, etc. But I want to share with people what the journey has been like, even up to the part where she doesn't look cute anymore. I did at least tidy up the towel (dirty from icky drool) in Photoshop. I felt kind of like a mortician beautifying a body. But I didn't touch up her body at all. She looks peaceful and dignified to me, if not altogether beautiful, in spite of how close she is to death.

I've spent most of the day, on and off, by her side, on a mat on the floor, reading, stroking her, dozing. I've taken breaks to sleep in my own bed, eat, do stuff on the computer. But I made sure to be with her for the transition past midnight. A silly little thing, but even if I miss her last breath while I'm asleep, I want to at least know what day she died. I'm learning through all of this, though, to give up trying to control anything. I cannot predict or control God's schedule.

As those who are dying prefer darkness, I've kept the lights off, using just a small clip-on reading light (aimed away from Cricket) after the sun went down. By its illumination, I'm continuing to read Johann Christoph Arnold's Be Not Afraid: Overcoming the Fear of Death. (Just to myself now. Cricket is sleeping or zoned out most of the time. The pain meds are keeping her comfortable.) I'm finding it very illuminating. Here are some good quotes from it:

"I have met people who say they'd rather die a quick death than undergo the drawn-out suffering of a slow one. Still, in three decades of counseling I've never met a dying person who wasn't grateful for the chance to prepare for death."

"There is something deadening about going through life cautiously -- testing the water, toeing the line. But there is nothing as exhilarating as living it to the ful. It requires rising to challenges that come your way, rather than evading them; sticking out your neck, instead of hiding in the crowd. It means daring to take false steps -- and leaps of faith. And the reward...is calmness in the face of death."

"Elisabeth Elliott points out that...there is a price to be paid 'every time we satisfy our need to rationalize such things as suffering. Once we think we have unlocked a mystery, we tend to close the books to further study. Unsolved, the problem captivated us with the challenge of discovery; shelved, it loses relevance and meaning.'"

Arnold quotes Solzhenitsyn (who, incidentally, just died a couple of days ago) as saying "the solution to suffering is this: that the meaning of earthly existence lies not, as we have grown used to thinking, in prospering, but in the development of the soul."

"[G]iven the number of people I know who have not only coped with enormous suffering in their lives, but come through it stronger than before, I have come to feel that maybe we ought to stop approaching pain as something purely negative. If we allow it, pain can be an occasion for redemption -- a crucible of sorts that may refine and renew us."

Some recommended reading on dying

2008-08-04T11:28:00.000-07:00

I'm continuing to hang in there with Cricket -- I clean her, change her bedding, carry her outside and back in when she needs to pee, feed her by hand when she feels like eating (which is not very often anymore), etc. She has alternating good days and bad days. She can sometimes still stand and walk (or crawl) on her own. I've found her at various places out of her bed when I didn't carry her there.

She hasn't yet communicated to me that she's fed up with living. Dogs seem to have a different view of suffering than we humans do. It's something to endure, unpleasant as it is. It's not excruciating for her. She's at peace actually, most of the time. She is alert, looks endearingly into my eyes and still wags on occasion. She still lies out on the lawn and enjoys the simple pleasures of breathing in the fresh air and watching people go by. She is teaching me the inestimable value of life in itself, just for the sake of being alive. I will cherish these days for as long as I live, no matter what happens at this point.

Although anticipation of death is crummy, the extended period of time of waiting has given me the opportunity to slow down, get all my ducks in a row as far as practical preparations, and also to do some profound reading which I might not have found time for at other stages in my life, for example Marva Dawn's Being Well When We're Ill: Wholeness and Hope in Spite of Infirmity, Henri Nouwen's Our Greatest Gift: A Meditation on Dying and Caring, Richard John Neuhaus's As I Lay Dying, and Ray Simpson's Before We Say Goodbye: Preparing for a Good Death. All excellent books. Still on the "to read" shelf: Gerald Sittser's A Grace Disguised: How the Soul Grows through Loss, and a reread of both C.S. Lewis's A Grief Observed and Walter Wangerin's Mourning into Dancing.

Tonight I started reading Johann Christoph Arnold's Be Not Afraid: Overcoming the Fear of Death aloud to Cricket, in the hopes that maybe it'll help her figure out that it's OK to let go. Not sure she gets it, but it can't hurt. She likes having me beside her anyway, and it's a way for us to spend some time together (I snuggle up close to her so I can hear and feel her breathing and heartbeat, and she mine). I've heard of children reading to dogs, and apparently they like it. So why not?

Last bloom?

2008-08-02T23:55:00.001-07:00

I keep thinking Cricket is finally at the end, but then she rallies again and shows a strong spirit and will to live. So there's been one "last bloom" after another. This morning I woke to find she wasn't in her bed. She had managed to get up and carry herself over to a chair which she was sleeping under. They say sometimes dogs, when they are getting close to death, will try to hide away. But today, she seemed more alive than she had for several days. She ate a bunch, she wagged at me for the first time in several days, and she was able to stand up on her own again (after yesterday being too weak). So we continue waiting, not knowing what each day will bring.

I took this photo of a sunflower today in Van Dusen Botanical Garden. I enhanced the contrast slightly in Photoshop, but the colors really were that brilliant.

Kaleidoscope

2008-07-31T23:08:00.001-07:00

It's been altogether too serious around here lately. So now for something completely different. If you've got a webcam, you can take pictures of yourself, with all kinds of fun special effects, at Cameroid. Here's a silly one of me:

The birdies and the bees

2008-07-29T16:57:00.000-07:00

Bee on a blossom that looks like a badminton birdie. It's a Purple Coneflower, near the rose garden at Stanley Park.

The early bird gets the worm

2008-07-28T01:48:00.001-07:00

A friend is visiting from Paris, and today we went to see the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden. We saw this robin bringing food back to her babies in the nest.

(Cricket is still hanging in there, but getting more and more droopy, for those who have been following her story.)

New set of wheels!

2008-07-24T22:42:00.001-07:00

Cricket is now traveling in style. We've retired the leash (she wouldn't be able to run away anyway) and joined the baby jogger crowd. I bought this stroller today at Toys 'R' Us. I lined it with a foam pad and put one of Cricket's beds in it, covered with an underpad in case of any leaks. And off we went to Pacific Spirit Park for a stroll. It's the first time we've been there in months, if not over a year. She hasn't been able to walk very far and I haven't had the desire to go for walks by myself there. But I need the exercise, and she is getting bored being cooped up inside all day. The front lawn is a lovely place to hang out and watch people go by, but I thought it would be nice, for whatever days she has left, to let her see a bit of the wider world once again. Even if this is her last day in this life, I feel we've already gotten our money's worth on the stroller. What a joy it was! We got all kinds of interesting looks and a few comments from people we passed. And Cricket LOVED it! She perked right up and was so engaged with everything she saw.

Not dead yet

2008-07-21T01:16:00.000-07:00

Cricket is still with me. She seems to be in some sort of remission. This photo of us was taken by my friend John when we went to visit on Thursday (three days ago). She doesn't look like a dog with one foot in the grave, does she? Compare that to how she looked in her "hospice" bed (in my living room) on July 1, the day she stopped eating and went four days without food. After telling all my friends that my dog was in the process of dying, now I'm wondering whether they'll believe me next time when it's really happening.

I came across a quote in Richard John Neuhaus's As I Lay Dying of a poem called "Adjusting to the Light" in which Miller Williams "reflect[s] on the embarrassment of friends and neighbors when Lazarus returns from the dead. He was gone only four days, but already it is not easy to fit him back into things."

Lazarus, listen, we have things to tell you.
We killed the sheep you meant to take to market.
We couldn't keep the old dog, either.
He minded you. The rest of us he barked at.
Rebecca, who cried two days, has given her hand
to the sandalmaker's son. Please understnad
we didn't know that Jesus could do this.

We're glad you're back. But give us time to think.
Imagine our surprise... We want to say
we're sorry for all that. And one thing more.
We threw away the lyre. But listen, we'll pay
whatever the sheep was worth. The dog, too.
And put your room the way it was before.

Chicken Hearts

2008-07-18T11:38:00.000-07:00

Cricket and I had the most divine time on Wednesday at Heavenly Spa, with Cindy Horsfall, our canine water therapist. We spent time in the water just holding her, crying together, talking about this special time. Cricket was very relaxed and enjoyed the warm water and the loving attention. Afterwards we took her outside to lie on the grass and dry in the sun. It was a gorgeous day, the birds were chirping, and Cricket was in bliss. I told Teri, who runs the spa, my story about Cricket and the organic chicken heart. She replied that she always feeds chicken hearts to her older dogs, and in fact had a couple of tubs of them in her kitchen right then, which she brought out and gave to me. And you'll never believe the brand name -- Rosie Chicken Hearts! Cricket loves them and is eating well for the first time in weeks, putting weight back on. I'm also feeding her sardines which Teri recommended. Ah, poor Cricket, that she had to wait until this late in her life to eat like the amazing being she is. But she's enjoying it now!

Waiter, what's this fly doing in my soup?

2008-07-16T00:01:00.000-07:00

A fly died on my windowsill a few days ago and was perfectly preserved. I thought it would make a great prop for a photo. (For the past two weekends, I've been hanging around guys who spend enormous amounts of time setting up perfect lighting for a shot for a film, so the idea of doing studio set-up didn't seem as odious to me as it once did.)

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you know by now that I enjoy humorous juxtapositions in my photos. So I thought of the classic joke: "Waiter, what's this fly doing in my soup?" "I think he's doing the breast stroke." I made some homemade cream of chicken soup out of the bones from that Hunterston Farm chicken. My intent was to eat it myself, but I decided I could "waste" one bowl for this staged shot and give it to Cricket (minus the fly) afterwards.

I carefully picked up the fly on a piece of paper so as not to damage its pristine wings and brittle rigor mortis legs. I set up the camera on a tripod with the right lighting for the soup bowl, and then slid the fly into place. Didn't want to put him there too soon, or he might have gotten a bit soggy. As it was, he flipped over on his back when I first dropped him in the soup, but I was able to right him without getting any goop on his wings. Then I shot away, messing around with framing and depth of field until I got it just the way I wanted it. Be sure to click on the photo to zoom in so you can see the fly in all its beautiful green glory.

Cricket liked the soup, by the way. She seems to be having a bit of an Indian summer of her life now. Ever since that chicken heart (and the phosphoric acid that the homeopathic vet had me start her on a couple of days ago), she's really been perking up. She took herself for a little walk down the sidewalk today and I had to go follow her to keep her from going in the street. That's the most spunk she's had in quite a while. I think she's up for her canine water therapy session tomorrow, so we're going to go for it. Here's my favorite picture of her and me in the dog pool where we're meeting Cindy tomorrow.

Life mimics art

2008-07-14T12:46:00.000-07:00

I was working on a film shoot for the past couple of weekends, doing the production stills photography. At one point, someone noticed the resemblance between one of the lighting guys and a painting on the wall in the home where we were shooting, so I shot this photo of him posing beside it. Jean-Sebastien wanted the make-up artist to do him up in green and blue like the painting, but she never got around to it (or was joking when she promised to do it for him). So I took care of it in Photoshop.

Something to drool over

2008-07-14T02:33:00.000-07:00

Cricket is still around. Not much has changed in the last couple of days except that she had quite a treat on Friday - a fresh raw chicken heart, from a chicken raised on Hunterston Farm. And since then she's been eating a bit of that chicken every day. There must have been some elixir of life in the chicken heart, as she has decided that this chicken is too good to pass up and she's sticking around for a few more days. She has always been a big drooler whenever she drinks water, as this photo (taken a couple of weeks ago) illustrates. (Just realized you have to click to enlarge it to see it.)

Raindrops that fall on my nose and eyelashes...

2008-07-11T23:20:00.001-07:00

Cricket has always had the most beautiful eyelashes, and still does. This photo was taken just a few days ago.

These days I've been doing a lot of crying, and sometimes when I cry, when I'm close to Cricket, my tears fall on her nose and eyelashes.

Another day

2008-07-10T12:55:00.000-07:00

Cricket is still here. I am so grateful for this run of beautiful days we've had the past couple of weeks. We've been able to sit outside every day for long stretches of time. There's no rain in sight for the forseeable future.

This poem has been on my mind:

Death - by Emily Dickinson

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

Or rather, be passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.

We paused before house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.

Death by inches

2008-07-09T19:28:00.000-07:00

My beloved dog Cricket is slowly slipping away. I keep thinking each day might be her last, and yet she keeps on surprising me, as she has all along with her longevity (she's 17).

Waiting for death to come is a profound and holy experience. It has its moments of extreme sadness, but it is also a unique opportunity to observe up close what the approach of death looks like, something which I will one day have to go through myself. There is also a peacefulness about it. She is not in pain, just losing her appetite, slowly losing weight, and spending most of her time asleep. When she needs to pee, she is still walking out the door on her own. She still likes to spend time lying out on the front lawn enjoying the summer breeze, taking in the scents, watching people walk by, barking at the occasional dog.

A friend of mine who is a composer likened this phase, the winding down of Cricket's life, to the coda at the end of a piece of music, which often builds up anticipation for the end so that when it comes there is a sense of resolution. My friend understood why I'd decided against euthanasia. As she put it, "Euthanasia takes away the coda, and jumps you straight to the end without preparing you for it."

I've been reading Henri Nouwen's Our Greatest Gift: A Meditation on Dying and Caring. He writes of how being in solidarity with those who are dying can heal us of our fear of death. "Only when we are willing to let their dying help us to die well will we be able to help them to live well. When we can face death with hope, we can live life with generosity."

As humans approach death, we become more and more dependent on others and have to let go of our own abilities and receive the gift of others' caring. (I'm guessing it's somewhat the same with dogs.) Nouwen writes, "Through our caring presence, we keep announcing that sacred truth: dying is not a sweet, sentimental event; it is a great struggle to surrender our lives completely. This surrender is not an obvious human response. To the contrary: we want to cling to whatever is left." But when we surrender to this most common human experience, instead of fighting against it, we can have a good death. "If we grow in awareness that our mortality, more than anything else, will lead us into solidarity with others, then death can become a celebration of our unity with the human race."

Cricket seems not to be quite ready to let go. She has been trying valiantly to rally, perhaps because she doesn't want to leave me and knows I'll miss her terribly. But as her body gradually shuts down, she seems to be becoming more resigned to the fact that she won't be living forever, at least not in this body. I don't know if she knows what she'll be transitioning to, but I believe our canine friends will be with us in eternity. I can't imagine the God of love not letting that be so for these blessed creatures who give us such unconditional love.

Production stills

2008-07-08T22:03:00.001-07:00

Well, life has been a roller coaster for the past month or so. I was away for a couple of weeks in mid-June (family reunion in New York, etc.), and two days before I left, my dog was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. So I've had my hands full taking care of her and preparing myself to say goodbye. It's been a very precious time. Nothing slows life down like waiting for death. We are taking things one day at a time, as each day could be her last. It's amazing how much more I notice when I'm slowing down like this.

In the midst of it all, I've still had time for a fun new endeavor. I have the privilege of being the stills photographer for a film called "Pop Switch" that a friend of mine is directing, starring Lucia Frangione and Michael Kopsa. Here's an interesting video on what a stills photographer does. Here's a still from the film and some shots I took of the filmmakers at work.

Precious moment

2008-06-03T23:39:00.000-07:00

This is Gibbie, the resident border collie at Hunterston Farm, nosing up to Precious, an orphan lamb that was hand-raised. Gibbie also likes to sit near the chicken coop and watch and protect the five chicks, as if he were their father. They run about all over the place, right in front of his nose, and he never harms them. The hen doesn't mind him being near by, but she squawks if humans come too close. Gibbie stays out there all day until the chicks are all safely nestled under their mother for the night, and then he goes home to his house. Gibbie is named after Sir Gibbie in George MacDonald's novel of that name.

Sunset over the Arno

2008-05-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

I finally got around to processing all the rest of my Florence photographs from September 2007. Here's one of sunset over the Arno River. You can view the whole album here. I always like to put a sunset shot last in my slide shows, if I've got a good one.

That's what computers are good for

2008-05-06T01:53:00.000-07:00

Sign seen near the home of some friends of mine. Now why on earth would you need to repeat the name of the street so many times? Another friend who was with me as we were walking by this sign said, "That's what computers are good for." Looks like somebody went crazy with copy & paste.

Meeting my hero

2008-05-01T10:06:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately this can't be included in my SoFoBoMo book, because I didn't take the picture. But it does go down as one of my favorite photos taken on my camera.

I was visiting my brother in Atlanta for a few days last weekend. I drove three hours to Plains to attend Jimmy Carter's Sunday School class at Maranatha Baptist Church. I've been wanting to do that for years, since I found out his classes are open to the public, but this was the first time he was on the schedule to teach when I was in the area.

Carter is one of the people I admire most in the world. Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002, he continues to be involved in peacemaking and humanitarian work even into his 80s. He recently returned from a trip to the Middle East, where he met with Hamas leadership in the hopes of moving things further along towards a peace agreement with Israel. He faced criticism from Washington for his overtures, but I believe his approach is more likely to win lasting peace than what we've been doing for the past few decades.

The Carter Center which he founded is involved in peace negotiations, human rights, and global health (they have almost achieved their goal of the complete elimination of the horrible guinea worm disase, which would only be the second ever disease eliminated from the face of the earth). Jimmy and his wife Rosalynn (which he pronounces with a long o: ROSE-a-lynn) have also worked with Habitat for Humanity, actually on the ground building houses with them.

In spite of his world fame, Carter is a remarkably down-to-earth and humble man. He would not allow any applause for him in the church. He would not sign autographs there. He wanted us to remember we were there first of all to worship. (All of this was announced to us ahead of time by a member of the church, so that he could just come out and be himself.) Yes, there were secret service guys protecting him, as well there should be (we had to get wanded down and have our bags searched at the entry). But he came across as just a normal person teaching in his home church. Which of course he was.

He taught a real Bible lesson, on the book of Daniel. His message was about sticking up for what you believe in, even in the face of opposition (which is what he does all the time with his peacemaking work). He walked us all the way through the major parts of Daniel's story, which was the text du jour in the teaching materials he was using (Adult Uniform Series from Smyth & Helwys). He spoke from his heart, with hardly a need to refer to the notes on his podium. Jimmy Carter is the only president to have ever taught Sunday School while in office (he taught some classes in Washington and back in Plains on visits), and to the best of anyone's knowledge, the only one to ever teach it after leaving office.

President Carter has been a hero of mine for years. His election was my political awakening. I would have voted for him if I'd been old enough (I was 13). I remember getting permission from my parents to stay up late and listen to the election returns on the radio in my bunk bed, and it was very exciting that he won. To have met the man in person is one of my greatest joys.

SoFoBoMo: Editing phase

2008-04-30T03:59:00.000-07:00

I'm back from a few days in Atlanta, where I took the last of my photos for my SoFoBoMo book. Still need to go through and select out the 35+ best ones for the book, but once I've weeded out the bad ones, I have decided on my further selection criteria: No theme whatsoever, simply a look at the breadth of (sometimes extraordinary) experiences I have in an ordinary month. I'm going to go for variety as much as possible.

I shot all the photos over a period of 30 calendar days, though I actually only shot on 14 of those days (March 29-30, April 1-3, 5, 6, 13, 20, 21, 24-27). So I am allowing my “fuzzy month” to spill over into the first couple of weeks of May for the editing and layout work. I decided to do the layout in Microsoft Word, since I know it intimately, and it was taking too long to get proficient in InDesign. I will do the front and back covers in InDesign. I've already done a layout for that. All I need to do is plug in the photo I choose for my front cover.

I've also picked a title for the book, written all the introductory material, and thrown together a first crack at the book with one page of text and one photo, just to give myself some momentum. I converted the cover from InDesign to PDF and the content from Word to PDF and combined the two PDF documents into one. All this in about 5 hours this evening. It looks pretty good, if I do say so myself. I've signed up for an Issuu account so I can publish it there once I'm done. Yippee! This is getting exciting.

SoFoBoMo: Day 23

2008-04-22T12:08:00.000-07:00

I started a couple of days early, so I've only got a week left of my "fuzzy month." But I am going to be away in Atlanta for most of that time, taking more pictures no doubt. So I'm going to have to make my fuzzy month longer than 31 calendar days. I claim the right to do that because I have had big chunks of time in the middle of this month when I've been busy with other things and have had to put the SoFoBoMo project on hold. I plan to enter full time into editing and compilation mode immediately upon return. I've already been doing some selecting and editing as I go.

Yesterday I went shooting at the A Rocha field study centre and got some nice shots. A Rocha is a worldwide organization of Christians doing environmental conservation work. I'm friends with the couple who head up the Canadian arm of it. They've invited me to do some photography for them, for their website and newsletters. This one shows the farm side of their property. I tend to prefer close-up work, but I think I've been looking at Paul Butzi's photos long enough that the beauty of a wide shot of a rural setting is starting to rub off on me. The small size of this blog format doesn't do it justice, so you need to click on it to see it enlarged.

Weird weather! Snow in April in Vancouver!!!

2008-04-19T01:03:00.000-07:00

Usually we don't get snow beyond January. This is a very strange winter indeed. We're expected to get an accumulation of up to 5cm. Lows around freezing through Tuesday. I took this photo earlier tonight:

Meanwhile the cherry blossoms are out and looking spectacular. I took this one five days ago:

Saint Francis of Assisi

2008-04-14T04:44:00.000-07:00

Small statue in the garden of the Mission Concepción in San Antonio. I took this from close range with a low camera angle, to make him look a lot bigger. But he was really only about 3 or 4 feet tall. He seems to have lost a hand.

SoFoBoMo: A splash of color

2008-04-13T21:56:00.000-07:00

This was a fountain I saw in San Antonio, near the River Walk. The "splash of color" looks like an Andy Goldsworthy creation, but it's got random twigs and dead petals in it, which he'd never do. His works are so perfect. So evidently the petals were formed into that shapely splotch by the flow of water from the fountain.

I'm still not seeing a theme emerge for my SoFoBoMo book, so it might end up being random photos. Today I went out walking with my dog and my camera, like what Paul Butzi has been doing for his SoFoBoMo project. Nothing great came of that. It's hard to take good dog pictures when you've got to keep your dog on a leash, which I do in my neighborhood, since she's going deaf, and there are cars, and she's prone to wandering off and getting into people's trash.

SoFoBoMo: The halfway point approaches

2008-04-12T01:14:00.000-07:00

Well, I haven't taken any more photos since the Texas trip. Perhaps I should have arranged a hiatus from all my other responsibilities for the month. (Yeah, right. Tell that to the IRS!)

Here's a photo of my friends' sons (ages 7 and 5) sitting outside the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, looking at a fountain. Smart, thoughtful kids. I have never seen kids behave so well in an art museum. They were actually interested in stuff! I remember back at that age, and even older, my siblings and I were bored silly in them. The only fun times were when my brother set off the alarm once by touching a painting, and when he and I rearranged the letters on a sign to spell naughty words.

Transforming Culture Symposium

2008-04-10T17:14:00.000-07:00

As promised, here's my initial summary of the conference I attended last week, along with another photo from it (which might make it into my SoFoBoMo book). I sent this out to a bunch of Regent College friends, hence all the Regent references.

Regent Alumni Enjoy a Great Banquet at the Transforming Culture Symposium in Austin

Perhaps it was the lure of seeing and hearing Eugene Peterson and Jeremy Begbie again, or the desire to support our fellow alum David Taylor (ThM '00) whose brainchild this conference was, or simply the need to get away from the unusually long winter of 2008 in Vancouver. Whatever the reason, 25 Regent alumni and current faculty/staff/students congregated in Austin, Texas, making up about 4% of the 600+ attending the Transforming Culture Symposium from April 1-3, 2008.

The conference -- aimed at pastors, church leaders, and artists, and led by David and his collaborator Larry Linenschmidt -- put forth a "vision of a relationship between the church and the arts that is theologically informed, biblically grounded, liturgically sensitive, artistically alive, and missionally shrewd."

It sought to address six key themes and questions: 1. THE GOSPEL: In what way is art a gift, a calling, and an obedience? 2. THE PASTOR: How is the pastor an artist and the artist, a pastor? 3. THE WORSHIP: How can our actions and spaces be artfully shaped? 4. THE ARTIST: What is an artist and how do we shepherd these strange creatures? 5. THE DANGERS: What are the dangers of artistic activity? 6. THE FUTURE: What is a vision of the evangelical Church in the year 2058?

Food metaphors were in plentiful supply.

We were treated to a tasty smorgasbord of talks on these questions by the six plenary speakers: Andy Crouch (author, editorial director for The Christian Vision Project at Christianity Today), Eugene Peterson (author, pastor, Regent professor emeritus), John Witvliet (director of the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, former Regent Summer School professor), Barbara Nicolosi (screen-writer, consultant, film critic), David Taylor (writer, arts pastor extraordinaire), and Jeremy Begbie (musician-theologian, founder of Theology Through the Arts, former Regent Summer School professor).

THE GOSPEL
Andy talked about art as those aspects of culture that cannot be reduced to utility. Art is a free response to grace; it is play. Like play, pain is also useless. They both must come together in art. Play that doesn't acknowledge pain can become escapism. Pain without play and grace can lead to sadism. Only in Christ can we make art with full awareness of the pain that exists. Andy also pointed out that art cannot be done alone; it requires community.

THE PASTOR
Eugene was quintessentially Eugene. He told us stories. Stories of three artists who had shaped his pastoral identity by teaching him the difference between a vocation and a job description. There was Willy, the painter, who made a prophetic portrait of Eugene looking gaunt and grim, as he might look in 20 years if he insisted on being a pastor; Willy said "the church will suck the soul out of you" (Eugene didn't take his advice, but kept the portrait as a cautious reminder).

There was Gerard, the architect who came and worshiped for a year with the newly forming church community in Eugene's basement, so that he could listen to who they were and what they needed in a new church building (simple, honest, beautiful).

There was Judith, the weaver, who felt "lucky" to hear the story of David preached for the first time in her life (she had a "beginner's mind, a child mind" as the Buddhists say). She would weave Eugene tapestries of things she'd heard him say. She eventually became a Christian, but none of her artist friends could understand what she saw in it.

THE WORSHIP
With many beautiful projected images, John introduced us to three spiritually nourishing and culturally crucial constraints on art for use in public worship assemblies. 1. It must be corporate, resisting isolation and elitism. 2. It must help people pray, resisting both sentimentality and the temptation to make the art an end in itself. 3. It must aid in perceiving the glory and beauty of the triune God, resisting idolatry.

THE ARTIST
Barbara, the only Catholic on the panel, and by all accounts the "spiciest" (she had us in stitches with her hilarious and sometimes irreverent quips), spoke first of some of the functions of beauty: its wholeness brings rest, its harmony brings joy, and its radiance brings fulfillment. The beautiful makes us feel small and humble. We have a responsibility as the church to provide art so that people can get in touch with their creatureliness and be okay with it.

Barbara told us how to recognize real artists: their artistic talent shows up early; their work has emotional power; they connect personally to the audience/viewers; their work has a freshness, a prophetic voice; and they are obsessed with details of form. She countered the common misperceptions that artists are crazy or lazy.

Finally, she outlined the "crosses" artists have to bear: loneliness, rejection, instability, entrepreneurism, having to collaborate with people, and the burden of success.

THE DANGERS
David talked about his passion to see artists as fully integrated persons, mature, and alive to God. To that end, he discussed six dangers of artistic activity in the church: bad art (e.g., cliché, melodrama, impersonal), super-saturation (too much of a good thing), the stubborn ossification of tradition (which he called "estancandose tercamente" -- Spanish for "getting stuck stubbornly"; also known as "the dead faith of the living"), the utilitarian subjugation of art (to worship or evangelism), art as a form of distraction (escape into feeling, entertainment), and immaturity (lack of self-control, manipulation, being ruled by fear).

David gave us three qualities of healthy artistic growth: it is relationally ordered (pastors relating to artists, older to newer generations, home culture to distant cultures), contextually relative (artistic excellence is when a work accomplishes the purpose for which it was created, as Nicholas Wolterstorff said), and organically rhythmed (seasonal, balancing "festal muchness" with "cleansing simplicity").

THE FUTURE
Finally, Jeremy was charged with predicting what the next 50 years of art in the church would look like. He treated us to an amazing tour-de-force in his typical style, a combination of lecture and performance (he's a fine concert pianist, in addition to sharing initials with J.S. Bach). Using the final movement from Prokofiev's 7th Piano Sonata, and bits of other works, Jeremy demonstrated "hopeful subversion," starting not with where we are now, but rather with a vision of God's future and working backward from there.

His main points were: 1. The Spirit unites the unlike (e.g., people hearing one another in their own tongues at Pentecost). 2. The Spirit generates excess (the same "festal muchness" David talked about; the New Creation is not merely a restoration of balance to the world but vastly exceeds the Garden of Eden). 3. The Spirit inverts (the rich become poor, and the poor rich). 4. The Spirit exposes the depths to which Christ has gone and the depths of who we are (as opposed to sentimental solipsism which avoids darkness). 5. The Spirit recreates (the Resurrection was the first day of the New Creation) 6. The Spirit improvises (the new heaven & new earth is surprisingly, endlessly new). For many, God is dull because he seems so "ordered" -- all word/logos and no spirit. Jeremy invited us to embrace "non-order" (as distinct from disorder), which is the realm of laughter and the Spirit.

Bryan Brown and his team led us in worship that reinforced the principles being espoused in the conference. There was beauty, simplicity, and honest grappling with darkness. The unifying theme was the colors of the rainbow (a work of art by the triune Creator). Each day of the symposium, the lighting was changed to highlight two different colors from the spectrum. We sang some very Regent-ish songs, including Eugene's favorite "St. Patrick's Breastplate" (complete with all the weird rhythms and versification). Visual art, music, dance, and drama were all interwoven with excellence.

In between the keynote lectures and worship times, there were testimonies by practicing artists. There was also a cornucopia of breakout sessions covering everything from The Care of Artists, to Drama, Architecture, Cross-Cultural Mission, Forming an Arts Ministry in the Church, etc. (Recordings of all the plenary lectures and many of the breakout sessions will be available on the conference website at some point in the future.)

In addition to the four plenary speakers with Regent ties, there were also Regent connections with several of the breakout session leaders: Dal Schindell participated in the session on "Seminaries & the Aesthetic Formation of Pastors." Luci Shaw (writer-in-residence and alum) presented "Called & Completed: A Vision for the Vocation and Maturing of the Artist of Faith." Sandra Bowden (whose work has been exhibited in the Lookout Gallery) spoke on "Visual Homiletics: How Can We Preach to the Eye as well as to the Ear?"

As David clarified during one of the Q&A sessions, the title of the symposium meant not that we aim to transform the culture by our art, but that God is in the business of transforming culture, and we are blessed and called to participate in that. What an awesome privilege it was to participate in what I truly believe will be looked back on in generations to come as a key moment in the growing renewal of the arts in the evangelical church that God is in the midst of accomplishing. A tasty morsel indeed!

SoFoBoMo good for blog stats!

2008-04-09T17:34:00.000-07:00

Cool! I just noticed that the number of visitors to my blog has shot up since I started my SoFoBoMo posts. That's a mixed blessing. It's always fun to get more traffic, but it puts the pressure on to keep posting good stuff. I have literally no time to be doing this right now, but I can't keep from looking at the photos I took in Texas. I've selected one that can stand with no post-processing. Oh, sure, I could do stuff to it, like lighten up the shadows at the bottom (or maybe not -- I've just come from the TCS where we heard about the importance of grappling with darkness in art, to avoid glib sentimentality -- not that this photo would be in danger of that without the blackness). Or maybe I could extend the sky a bit on the top to make up for my having been so fascinated by the patterns in the fence rail that I perhaps framed out a bit too much of the environment. Well, I'd better not write more now, or I might just as well have spent this time tweaking photos.

SoFoBoMo: Out of the gate, limping

2008-04-09T00:30:00.000-07:00

Sorry again for the long hiatus from posting. I've been in Texas attending the Transforming Culture symposium (I'll be posting more about that here and/or at Iambic Admonit when I have some time). My first day of SoFoBo occurred while I was gone. I'm accepting Paul's allowance that we start our fuzzy month a couple of days early if we have good reason to (I arrived in Fort Worth on 3/29), because I can't pass up the opportunity to take photos when I'm on a trip! And I'm really busy this month (as I will be next month, no doubt), so SoFoBoMo is going to have to fit in somehow in the cracks. I have a feeling this 31-day period is going to be more like an intense 9 day period, followed by nothing for a couple of weeks, followed by another intense 4 day period when I go to Atlanta to visit my brother. I can't seem to get out of all the other obligations that pull at me when I'm at home.

Naturally, many of my photos were of friends I was visiting and of the conference itself (such as this one of Jeremy Begbie playing the last movement of Prokofiev's Piano Sonata No. 7). Those are not necessarily going to be excluded from eligibility in my SoFoBoMo book. In fact, I've been thinking of writing up a book-format report on the conference and making that be my submission for SoFoBoMo. It could do double duty that way (I'm all about killing two birds with one stone when my life is overwhelmingly busy).

A bit sheepish about SoFoBoMo

2008-03-12T13:59:00.000-07:00

Got some logs you need the bark stripped from? Nobody's better at it than sheep! These guys were busy at their task at Hunterston Farm the last time I was out there. Even the new lambs were joining in, and climbing the heap of logs was no impediment for one of the older ones.

Others have been commenting on how quickly the start of SoFoBoMo is approaching (I'm starting April 1) and how daunting the task seems for one reason or another. My problem is that I'm scattered all over the map in the themes that I like to photograph. I thrive on variety. I get bored working on one project for any length of time. So I will find it hard to photograph for a straight month on one subject. Maybe I don't have to. But doesn't a book of photographs need to have some sort of unifying concept that ties it together? I was thinking of doing the funky colored houses in Vancouver, but even that could get tiresome after several days of shooting. Basically just driving up and down all the streets where I suspect these cool houses are (though I could do the site scoping ahead of time and write down addresses to save time during SoFoBoMo month).

And then there's the same issue Paul Butzi is worried about -- won't the resulting book be kind of boring? Just pictures of a bunch of houses, funky-colored though they might be.

And do I really have the right to publish photographs of people's private homes without their permission? Probably, because they are all viewable from public streets. But it still would feel kind of voyeurish driving around taking pictures of people's houses. I might be suspected of being a criminal preparing for a break-in or something, especially if I linger around each house long enough to get an interesting composition.

Argggh! I think maybe I need to go back to the drawing board for an idea for a theme.

Piano (four) hands

2008-03-11T17:17:00.000-07:00

This photo, titled "Piano Hands" is currently one of two photos that I have in the (almost) Annual Regent Community Exhibit at the Lookout Gallery at Regent College in Vancouver, BC. When I title a photograph, if I think it's likely to be a one-off, I just give it an obvious title like this. But if I think I'm likely to do others which would naturally have the same title, I will title the first something like "Orchids I" (in anticipation that there will be an "Orchids II" someday).

However, what to do when I've already titled one "Piano Hands" and then along comes another nice photo of someone's hands at the piano? Do I rename the first one "Piano Hands I" and call the new one "Piano Hands II"? Or once I've titled a photo, should the title remain forever? Should I call the second one "Piano Hands II" without having to have a "Piano Hands I" (the "I" is implied)? Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, I know, but it has me wondering.

Actually, fortunately (or not), it's a moot point for now. The resolution of the latest one is so bad that it will only ever see the light of day on this blog (I took it from a distance with my Canon G9, handheld, at 24x zoom (6x optical + 4x digital), at ISO 800. So it had all things going against it. The only way I can get away with it not looking like crap is to show a very tiny version of it here.

Update: It just dawned on me that if this latest photo were exhibit quality, of course I'd title it "Piano Four Hands" (for obvious reasons). In case you're not a music afficionado, "piano four hands" refers to works written for two pianists to play on the same keyboard (as opposed to a piano duet with two players at separate pianos).

Red-breasted sapsucker; SoFoBoMo update

2008-03-10T01:32:00.000-07:00

I saw this red-breasted sapsucker (a kind of woodpecker), doing what its name implies, on Friday on Galiano Island. I hadn't been looking for birds, so I wasn't really prepared. But I did what I always do in such situations: start shooting with the longest lens I have available, no matter how far away I am, and then gradually move closer, continuing to shoot as I go. I figure any photo at all is better than none (if the bird should fly away as soon as I start approaching). But this time I got pretty lucky and was able to pull off some pretty nice shots from about 15-20 feet away, using a 200mm lens. I was delighted to catch him with his beak in the hole.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm teaching myself Adobe InDesign in preparation for Solo Photography Book Month (SoFoBoMo), which for me will run form April 1 to May 1. I've been working through the tutorials on a CD-ROM called Mastering InDesign CS, by BDG Publishing (appears to be available for free + shipping here). It's a bit outdated (I have CS2, so some of the menu commands aren't in the same places) and not as scintillating as the training DVDs from Software Cinema that I've used to learn Photoshop, but at least it's helping me to dive in. I am using a photo directory for my church as my learning project. Another photographer who is participating in SoFoBoMo pointed out that InDesign is pretty daunting, which it is. But I figure it's worth learning, as it will come in handy for other things in the future.

Just to show that I'm multifaceted

2008-03-09T00:07:00.000-08:00

I went to a Barenaked Ladies concert tonight, as the guest of a friend of mine who knows the wife of the owner of the casino-theatre where the concert was held. If that doesn't make you chuckle, I've already chuckled enough for both of us. First, the idea me of going to a concert in a casino is pretty incongruous. And that I'd be listening to a band with a name like that is amusing. But don't worry; the name is just silly. They are all men, in fact, and they wear clothes. It's a popular Canadian alternative rock band. They have a wacky sense of humor and they support the World Wildlife Fund, just to give you a bit of an idea of what they're like. Anyway, I brought my little Canon G9 along, as it goes everywhere with me in my purse. I took pictures throughout the whole concert, and got some pretty nice shots. That made me enjoy the concert even more, though I think I would have liked it even just for the music. The words were funny (when I could make them out). Thankfully, it wasn't ear-splittingly loud, as the two other rock concerts I've been to in my life were. But to be honest, I'm still more of a classical music lover.

The first photo above is of an enormous disco ball that was hanging from the ceiling in the theatre. The photo below is of singer-guitarist Steven Page. Not a bad zoom shot on that G9 (compare with the middle photo which was taken with no zoom). 6x optical zoom compounded with 4x digital gets me up to 24x.

Something lovely this way comes

2008-03-08T13:09:00.000-08:00

Out of the death and decay of last fall springs beauty. A metaphor for the spiritual life perhaps?

SoFoBoMo

2008-02-27T21:31:00.001-08:00

I have signed up to participate in the first annual Solo Photography Book Month (affectionately known as SoFoBoMo). It's being organized by my friend and fellow photo blogger, Paul Butzi. The idea is to produce a solo photo book with at least 35 photos, from start to finish (print ready), within one month. We can start any time between March 1 and April 1, but then we have 31 days to finish. I'm planning to do it from April 1 to May 1. I'm a bit daunted by the task, mostly the part about getting 35 photos that are worth publishing in a book within a month. I could probably find 35 photos from my entire oeuvre over the past few years that I'd be willing to publish, but all in one month? That's more than one great photo a day. But as Paul points out, it's not about getting something that's going to win awards, it's about getting something completed, which is the problem most of us face. So I'm looking at this project as a good impetus to get out there and do some more shooting. In order not to waste time with the nitty gritty during the limited month, I'm spending some time now to learn Adobe InDesign, the software I'll use for the book layout.

I'm not yet sure what theme I'll choose for my book. It'll necessarily need to be stuff I can take locally, unless I manage to complete the 35 photos in one week in Texas, where I'm going for Transforming Culture, a symposium on arts and the church. If it's going to be local photography, I could get back to my series on interesting colored houses in Vancouver which I've been wanting to do. Since there are no silly restrictive codes and covenants limiting what color people can paint their houses (like in the neighborhood where I lived in the Eastside of Seattle), there are all kinds of houses painted fun colors -- shocking purple, green with orange trim, ones with fake thatched roofs, etc.

And speaking of amusing local sights, I often see this bus parked along the side of the road not far from my house. You probably have to click to see the larger version to read the smaller text "Please stop when dogs are barking." Vancouver is a very dog friendly city, which is great for me and Cricket. There are off-leash areas in almost all parks, and dogs are allowed to go in swimming at certain parts of the public beach. A lot of business owners put water bowls for dogs out on the sidewalk in front of their shops, and most stores allow people to bring their dogs inside (unless they sell food).

Save a tree...or...make a tree?

2008-02-18T17:54:00.001-08:00

A group of students at Regent College built this "tree" in the atrium out of paper cups to give us all a visual wake-up call about how many non-recyclable paper cups we throw away in an average week. A sign on the wall nearby encourages better stewardship of God's creation: "Drink responsibly. Bring a travel mug from home or use a ceramic mug here. Every bit helps." Gives new meaning to Regent's occasional slogan "Under the Green Roof."

My little Canon G9 is coming in handy for all sorts of impromptu photos like this. As long as the lighting is good [note the painting in the background which you can just barely make out: "The entrance of thy words giveth light" :-) ], I'm quite pleased with its results.

Spring is sprung...

2008-02-18T01:43:00.001-08:00

Yikes! Has it really been that long since I've posted? I see some of you patient regulars have been checking back nearly daily in hopes that I'll get back to some new material. Well, between scanning old slides, staying inside because of yucky wet snowy weather, and being busy with other non-photography things (yes I have another life -- or several), I haven't had much new to post. But your patience has been rewarded.

Generally spring comes very early in Vancouver. I've seen crocuses pushing their heads up as early as the last day of January, but first week of February is not uncommon. This year it came late, but it is coming. I saw my first snow drops a few days ago. And this weekend the weather has been beautiful.

Color restorations, continued

2008-01-24T23:30:00.000-08:00

A friend suggested that I consider just making these old slides black & white instead of trying to restore the color to an original I can never be sure of. So here's that same photo again, completely desaturated. It should would save time to do it this way, and I like the result. But there is also something to be said for the color restoration (imperfect as it is).

Color restorations

2008-01-18T02:49:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to show you the before and after on the color corrections for one of the slides I've been restoring. Here it is after I've touched up all the dust specks and scratches but before any color corrections:

And here it is after the color restoration:

Amazing what you can do in Photoshop, eh? I did this using Color Balance (sky) and Hue/Saturation (everything else).

Scanning and restoring old slides

2008-01-17T17:05:00.000-08:00

I have a big project I've been working on in dribs and drabs, and that's to scan a whole heap of slides that my grandfather took back in the 1930s and 40s, get rid of scratches and dust specks, and restore them to their intended colors. Most of them were taken on a Kodak Bantam Special on 828 slide film. It's hard to find anyone who will scan that stuff anymore these days, since it is larger than the standard dimensions of 35mm film (28x40mm as opposed to 24x36mm) and doesn't fit slide scanners. I bought the top of the line, a Nikon Super Coolscan 9000, thinking that would allow me to do them at home, but even that doesn't have a large enough opening in its slide holder. So I'll have to try to rig something up with one of its larger transparency holders, or else do them on my Epson 4870 flatbed scanner in transparency mode and manually crop them to the right size and rotate them slightly if I didn't get the orientation lined up just perfectly with no tray to hold them in (and that won't be ideal, because the focal distance of the scanning beam will be slightly off). For now I'm working on the few 33mm slides that are in the collection.

It's a labor of love, I tell you. It takes nearly an hour to do each one if there is a lot of color distortion and hundreds of noticeable specks. Photoshop can do a pretty good job of dust and scratch removal on sky, but on other things it sometimes adds too much blur which I don't like. So I'm going through and doing them all painstakingly with the spot healing brush tool. Even though it is time-consuming, I'm quite pleased with the results. Here are two of the ones I've done so far. One is my grandfather with his uncle and the other is his wife, my grandmother, with her aunt-in-law (the wife of my grandfather's uncle), with my dad as a little boy in the background. I love how vivid the reds still are in the flowers (I really didn't have to restore that at all) against the still somewhat muted rest of the photo of the women. Did their dresses have more blue or green in them? I can't tell. I got the skin and hair and grass colors looking right, and that's about all I can hope for. I have chosen to keep the slide mount backgrounds on, to reveal the origin of these photos.

Candle in the Night

2008-01-16T23:17:00.000-08:00

I'm always mesmerized by candle flames. I shot this with my Canon G9. If you stare at the dark space between the wax and the flame, where the wick is, or just a hair above that, at the bottom fringe of the darkest orange part of the flame, after a while you'll begin to see the flame shrink from the bottom up, as if it's climbing up the wick.

OK, I've been at the computer too long. I keep forgetting that I've started the kettle boiling for a cup of tea. I'm now heading down to flip the switch for a third time! Maybe I ought to just sit down there and read until it boils this time.

Singing off the same hymn sheet

2008-01-10T16:14:00.001-08:00

That's what they say in the UK when people are what we in North America would call "on the same page" (or "wavelength"). These lovely sisters in my church gave me permission to post the photo I took of them in one of our services. We are one of the few churches around which still sings in four-part harmony. It's wonderful -- like being part of a heavenly choir! Congregational singing has been a big part of my faith over the years, and like a friend of mine once told me, hymns are part of my prayer language. I've been invited to document our church's worship through photography on a couple of occasions. All the photos in the mini slide show that flips by on the home page were done by me. If you're in the Vancouver area and looking for a church that seeks to integrate faith and the arts; peace, justice, and biblical truth; heart and mind; spiritual formation and mission; people of all generations; lay men and women in ministry...come check us out: Point Grey Inter-Mennonite Fellowship.

Merry Christmas

2007-12-17T01:20:00.000-08:00

I took a walk at night with my Canon G9 and got some interesting photos of Christmas lights, etc. I'm not thrilled with the image quality of the G9 as compared to my 5D, but it's not bad for something I can just toss in my purse and take with me anywhere I go. And this photo was shot after dark (the sky looks way more blue in the photo than it did in real life; the camera figured out it needed a long exposure). It's pretty grainy and blurry (handheld, of course) but I kind of like the effect. No Photoshop sharpening at all.

I'll be taking a hiatus for the next couple of weeks, through the New Year. See you when I get back.

Narrative Photography

2007-12-07T02:28:00.000-08:00

Update: fixed the link for Jeff Wall's Mimic, so if you read this already but couldn't see the photo, try now.

I've just signed up for a course on Narrative Photography at Focal Point, the photography school a block away from where I live (one of the reasons I moved to this house). Narrative Photography includes photojournalism, documentary photography, some kinds of travel photography. It's photography that tells a story, whether in a single photograph or a photo essay.

I was in Future Shop yesterday buying a small portable camera to keep with me in my purse all the time. I ended up buying a Canon PowerShot G9, after reading Paul Butzi's glowing recommendation. I had a pleasant experience with the salesman, Rick, who helped me. He is an avid photographer himself and was very knowledgeable and engaging (rare for Future Shop employees). We had a great conversation, exchanged recommendations for good photography websites, etc. He asked me who my favorite photographer is. I said Art Wolfe, a Seattleite who does beautiful nature and wildlife photos, particularly of the Pacific Northwest. Rick called that kind of work "eye candy" and introduced me to narrative photographer Jeff Wall, a Vancouver native who does "cinematic photography." He develops a concept, hires actors, sets up a scene, and takes thousands of shots of it until he gets it just right. Rick showed me some of Wall's work on the web at the store's computer. Wow! Check out this amazing photograph of his: Mimic. Look closely at the gesture the guy in the middle is making (view it in detail by clicking on the detail sqaure to the right). And the facial expressions on the other two. Now that is photography that tells a story!

I realize that most of my photos do not really tell stories, beyond just "this looks cool!" I hope the class on narrative photography will help me advance to a whole new level in my art. Today's photo is an attempt at narrative. The photo tells it all, but if you want the details behind it: It was taken on the property of my cousin in Hood River, Oregon, where I spent Thanksgiving this year. There had been a big wildfire Hood River in August and it came to within about 60 feet of my cousin's house!

Speaking of narrative photography, one of the more lengthy and interesting threads on photo.net's Forums is "Should a Picture tell a story?" Not all are in agreement about that.

Rusty spokes

2007-12-03T20:16:00.000-08:00

Rusty old car wheels in front of the Western Antique Aeroplane & Automobile Museum in Hood River, Oregon. I did some burning in Photoshop to darken the topmost element wherever spokes and wheel parts intersected, to make them look more three-dimensional.

New Toy: Epson P-5000 Multimedia Storage Viewer

2007-11-29T14:15:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the sparsity of posts lately. I've been trying to get an article finished which is overdue.

I didn't think I'd ever use this blog to do product reviews, but I like this one so much I can't help it. I recently purchased a new solution to the problem of not being able to take my laptop along with me in addition to my camera on long trips anymore. (I was forced to check my camera bag on a flight from London to Milan because of Heathrow's extremely narrow interpretation of the "one carry-on bag" rule; even a woman's small purse counts as a carry-on bag in their eyes; it was either check my camera or check my laptop; some choice!) Anyway, now I have this cool Epson P-5000 Multimedia Storage Viewer. The image quality is great, the 4-inch display is large enough to really see the photos, and the user interface is intuitive and easily accessible. It accepts CF or SD cards, copies the contents onto its internal hard disk (which stores 80 GB), and can connect via USB to a computer (where it will appear as an external hard disk). It also plays back MP3s and video using its little built-in speaker (zoom buttons control volume). A nifty little device. Much better than the SmartDisk FlashTrax XT that I'd been using before. The latter is excruciatingly slow, has a crappy UI, very poor image quality, and intermittently doesn't work at all.

That photo I'm displaying on my Epson P-5000, by the way, is one I took recently out on Galiano Island, the view from Hunterston Farm out over Retreat Cove, with the celtic cross on Loren & Mary Ruth Wilkinson's lawn in the foreground.

[Italy trip] Prayer

2007-11-17T18:44:00.000-08:00

Old monk praying during the Vesper service at San Miniato al Monte, in Florence.

[Italy trip] Rose in the garden of Villa Agape, Florence

2007-11-04T21:42:00.000-08:00

[Italy trip] Conventional conventical technology

2007-10-20T13:38:00.000-07:00

I liked this wooden cart which I saw on the grounds of Villa Agape where we stayed in Florence, which is run by the Sisters of "Stabilite nella Carità" (stability in charity). Simple technology, elegant and rustic at the same time. Interesting shapes and textures. I did quite a bit of Photoshopping on this, as there were some distracting blotches of lighter color on the handle near the rusty metal joint which immediately drew one's focus and ruined the composition (in my opinion). I think I did a pretty good job of cloning the wood grain where those spots had been, in a way that doesn't look faked. This is Photoshop at its best -- used to fix something which was not a photographer's error, yet without violating the true nature of the original subject. (That gives a lot of latitude, by the way, to adjust colors, etc. And there is always validity in creatively changing the subject. So don't quote that line back at me if you see something more wild in my use of Photoshop in the future.)

Destroying restored art vs. restoring destroyed art

2007-10-13T20:09:00.000-07:00

More reflections from my art tour of Florence. This 14th or 15th century fresco in San Miniato al Monte (Florence) looks like it has probably had some restoration work done on it over the years, as its colors are so well preserved (I have not touched them up in Photoshop). But also preserved for all eternity (until someone decides to do another restoration on it) are the graffiti of some 20th century vandals (in the lower right corner, on the red patches; click to zoom in on image). It appals me that anybody could be so philistine as to ruin art in a sacred space like this. Fortunately, at not very great expense (certainly not like what it would cost to repair the actual fresco), I can fix the damage pretty well in Photoshop. This illustrates the non-destructive restoration possible in digital media. I can keep a copy of the original, just in case someone doesn't like the kind of touching up I did.

Not so with non-digital art. Case in point: the famous Crucifix by Cimabue, painted to hang above the altar in Santa Croce in Florence. It had been lingering in storage, leaning up against a wall in the refectory, after renovations had replaced it with some other piece. Then it was almost completely destroyed in the great 1966 flood of the Arno River. The controversial restoration by Umberto Baldini used a new technique in which areas where the paint had been completely washed off are approximated with a pixel pattern that only suggests the color and outline of what was there before, but does not recreate brush strokes. Baldini and his team "felt strongly that it was inappropriate to leave this extremely important work as a mere fragment, and yet they were unwilling to deceive the viewer into thinking that the work was undamaged. Chromatic abstraction was their answer to this dilemma. Chromatic abstraction is formulated on the idea that three dominant tones can be abstracted from any painting. These colors, combined in the losses in small strokes that follow the dynamic flow of the image, and in the correct proportions, create the neutral color that blends most perfectly with the painting, making the losses the least distracting without inpainting them imitatively." (Getty Conservation Institute, Painted Wood: History and Conservation, p. 414.) You can see this clearly in the detail of Christ's feet (below, right; click to zoom in on image). Some people have objected to Baldini's restoration because it is not Cimabue's work at all. They claim that the ravages of time and natural disasters are part of the history of art that should be preserved. I am still undecided on this issue. I can't say I liked the restored Crucifix. But it is intriguing from an art historical point of view. You can read more about the restoration debate in this article, and (if you have JSTOR access) in "Art and Its Preservation" by David Carrier (Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 43:3 (Spring 1985), pp. 291-300).

With digital art (including digital photography), all of this is moot. The original cannot become degraded over time, or destroyed by a flood or fire, nor can it be vandalized, as long as a backup is made. And as long as it is converted to new media as they are invented and the old ones become obsolete! That latter would be a subject for "a whole 'nother" post (my favorite example of tmesis, a figure of speech in which a word or phrase is inserted into another word, often for humorous effect).

The golden lampstand

2007-10-11T16:47:00.000-07:00

[News flash: This photo of mine has been published online in Comment Magazine. Click here.]

"Aaron is responsible for keeping the lamps burning continually on the Lampstand of pure gold before GOD." (Lev 24:4; The Message)

Here is another in my votive candles series (see also this one). It is a portrait of a serious man of God, at work in the house of the Lord. This is one of the monks at San Miniato al Monte in Florence, lighting additional candles before the Vespers service. I was drawn to the glow on his face, and only later noticed the subtle outline highlight on his hair from a bit of sun coming in the window above his head. Without that, his head would have blended into the dark background. I considered whether to crop more of the black space at the bottom, but I decided to keep it, to emphasize the height of his body. You can see his robe disappearing into darkness and can imagine where it extends to.

Another possible composition crops it in way close and reveals the time on his watch (even though I was standing about 30 feet away from him; see, there is a use for 12.8 megapixels!) -- the Vespers service did indeed start at 5:30pm. You'll need to click to view the image at full size to be able to read it. For you techies who are interested, this was shot with a 70mm lens, ISO 1600, f/4 at 1/125. Hand held, no flash. ISO 1600 on my Canon 5D rocks! It was very dark in there. I'm beginning to think I like this second one better. What do you think?

Where is the frame of this picture?

2007-10-05T18:11:00.000-07:00

Frame-within-a-frame is a motif that shows up in all kinds of art, from René Magritte to Norman Rockwell to Alfred Hitchcock's films to the Frame Within a Frame group at Flickr. I visited Siena for a day and took lots of photos of all the beautiful architecture and art, just for my own memory. Boring. Well, you might want to see them and they might cause you extreme envy, but I can't claim they are my own artistic creations. However, when I deviated from the usual touristic camera behavior and started looking for the offbeat and quirky, which I guess is where my forte lies, I found this fun subject walking right across my field of view. I like it because though I've chosen to frame it in a certain way, the frame the man is holding makes its own declaration about what is the subject of the picture -- the man's legs and the bag of the lady behind him. Because he's holding two frames (which, incidentally, make a nice repeated shape), the people on either side of him got that experience (though I with my camera could only see one of those views).