Early Riser

It's been a few weeks before I've headed out for a sunrise.  Though the 'Day Job' comes with an early alarm, I am far from what you would call an early riser.  As the days get closer to Summer, the sun rises a little bit earlier every day, which means that with each day that passes, my desire to see the sun rise in the sky gets a little bit weaker compared to my desire to sleep a little bit more.  However, as I'm sure many people with young-lings at the house are aware, The Heir Apparent works on her own alarm and when she wants to wake up, she wakes up.  So, that's how I found myself awake a few minutes before the sun was due to rise this week.  After shaking loose the cobwebs, I noticed there was some cloud cover, but that it should have still led to a nice sunrise.  I packed up my gear and headed to a train station located close to me where I was hoping to grab a shot of the sun next to the tracks.  Sadly, my timing was a little bit off as I arrived with the sun a little higher in the sky than I had hoped.  I also had some cloud issues as there ended up being a huge shelf of clouds that swallowed the sun moments after it came out.  However, I was already there and the cloud cover was kind patchy after the shelf so I decided to stick around.  I think it made for two cool photographs.  The first one, taken at f/16, 1/50sec, ISO 100 at 70mm had the warmth of the rising sun and with the second, taken at f/16, 1/250sec, ISO 100 at 63mm, I tried to show the power of the sun as it broke through the thick clouds.  I've always been drawn to train tracks, I feel like they are the perfect photographic accessory.  However, they're also a dangerous place and I always make sure that there are no trains anywhere within my sight when I take photographs, often with someone watching out for me as well.  Safety first my friends, safety first.

Favourite Winter Moment

We've arrived near the end of the month of March.  A month that is loved by many because it means that Winter is almost over.  Infact, the first day of Spring has just passed.  Winter is almost over and the misery of the heat and humidy of summer is but a few weeks away.  So, in honour of my favourite frigid moments, here is a photograph that I took on the coldest day of the year.  It was -26C with the windchill that morning so of course I thought it would be a bright idea to head down to the river.  I was there originally to take a photograph of the moon over Montreal, but quickly realized that the rising sun over the foggy water with the iconic Victoria Bridge in the background would be a far more interesting shot.  I quickly marched over to the river, made my way gently down to the shoreline and snapped away.  I chose this particular shot, taken at f/16, 1/400sec, ISO 100 at 70mm, because it looked like the fog was parting for the sun.  I then did a second version of the photo cropped to a more wide-angle shot because while I feel the regular sized version does a good job of showing how cold it was with the water, the wider version just seems a little more dramatic.  I love these kinds of morning, where the air is crisp, clear and cold.  You don't get them in July.

A Duck For Dad

Today was my Dad's birthday and due to 'The Plague', it's the second year that I don't get to celebrate it with him.  Missing these events was hard enough the first time around, but now that we're beginning to double up on some of those events, it's making thing even harder.  Since I couldn't be there in person, I thought I'd put up a photograph of one of his favourite things.  A little duck that I spotted while visiting the family of My Lovely Assistant a few years back.  This lovely lady was walking around the property and swimming in the lake with her little ducklings.  I have a nice shot of that as well, but it will wait for another time.  The photograph was taken at f/16, 1/500sec, ISO 400 at 200mm.  Sorry again about missing your birthday Dad, I hope to be able to make up for it in the near future.

I Spy With My Little Eye

Though I often get accused of being old when I mention this, I enjoy watching birds.  I think that they are colorful and very photogenic.  For me, the King of Birds has always been the cardinal.  There are some that often hang around my parents home, but I was only able to visit them twice last year and they never came out to play.  One day, my brother introduced me to this little trick of playing a YouTube video of bird calls on a phone to attract the fine feathered friend of my choice.  We put the phone on the roof of my car one day while I was visiting and sure enough, within minutes a cardinal was flying by us, landing here and there.  At one point it landed in a budding tree and seemed to be looking us over with his eye.  Wondering if there was another bird out there somewhere, or if he should grab my brothers phone and fly off with it for us having bothered him.  Thankfully, the phone survived.  The photograph was taken at f/8, 1/200sec, ISO 100 at 200mm.  Never one to give up, I'll be out on the porch again this year.  Maybe the birds will be more used to me after a year.

An Unforgotten Friend

Long time visitors to the old blog will remember that I sometimes have little strange or unique stories to go along with my photographs.  This would, I guess fall under that category.  Back before moving, I had saved a grasshopper from a spider web on our balcony.  The little guy had stuck around long enough to pose for a few pictures before taking off.  Every year afterwards, I would get visited by a grasshopper at the exact same spot.  I would jokingly say that it was the return of my friend Hoppy, back to once again thank me for saving him that day.  Yeah, it is kind of an impossible theory, but what can I say, I'm a sucker for some happy fiction.  This photograph would have been the final one that I took of my hopping friend.  The photograph was taken at f/5.6, 1/125sec, ISO 400 at 60mm while using a Macro lens.  So far, there have not been any fun little insect stories at the new Head Office, but hopefully the critters will be comfortable in front of my camera one day.  I also hope that the people who are currently in our old place enjoy their annual visit from Hoppy.

Spring Is In The Air

I know it was only a few short days ago that I was telling you not to put away the shovel just yet, but today I kind of fell into the False Spring Trap.  Upon arriving at home from a little evening walk with My Lovely Assistant and The Heir Apparent, I couldn't help but notice that Mother Nature had been busy at work.  The snow on the front lawn is slowly receding and the front flower bed can now be seen.  We're still quite a bit away but that little sight of wet soil seems to have stirred something in me. I'm never going to be a fan of warm weather, but I do like flowers.  So, I dug into the archives and pulled out a shot of our flowers from last year.  This was a little bunch of pansies was from the front of the head office and have always been among my favourite flowers.  On a sunny day last summer, I spent a little time under the sun snapping away some of the flowers around the house.  These were taken at f/4, 1/2500sec ISO 100 at 70mm.  There will be a multitude of fresh flowers to be seen everywhere in a short little while, but just to be on the safe side, keep those shovels close by for at least a few more weeks.

 

 

Supporting Actor

Over the years here on the old blog, you've seen a wide variety of photographs of the bridges that lead to Montreal.  There is just something about these structures that draws me to them.  I heard their call again this past weekend as I headed down to the Jacques Cartier Bridge to catch the sunset.  I didn't quite find the view that I was looking for, but on my way back to the car I continued to keep my eyes open as I hate to go home empty handed.  I was watching the bridge through the trees when I came upon a little clearing.  The setting sun gave the bridge a nice glow that you can notice peeking through the branches.  The photograph was taken at f/16, 1/800sec, ISO 1600 at 41mm.  Maybe the bridge doesn't always need to be the star of the shot.  Here, it acts as a background piece next to the large tree and the nice blue sky.  It also serves as a little reminder to always keep your eyes open.  You may not find what you were looking for, but there's often something else out there.

Musical Memories

We're rapidly reaching the point where I am running out of musical memories.  At this point last year the concept of 'Musical Memories' wasn't really planned.  Rather than thinking of musical memories, I was excitedly thumbing through the concert listings, trying to line up shows.  It wasn't meant to be though, so it's back to the past we go.  This time we're returning to the Théâtre Corona in Montreal where The Picturebooks were opening for Canadian rockers, Monster Truck.  As usual, I showed up nice and early to get a spot at the front of the stage and began clicking away.  It was the first time I had heard of The Picturebooks, a hard rocking duo from Germany.  I don't know how many others in the crowd were seeing them for the first time, but they had made a room full of fans by the end of their set.  Up next was Monster Truck and they proceeded to tear the venue down with their full throttle, high energy rockers.  The first photograph was taken at f/2.8, 1/160sec, ISO 3200 at 48mm.  Here are a couple more shots from the evening.

f/2.8, 1/320sec, ISO 3200 at 24mm

f/2.8, 1/100sec, ISO 3200 at 160mm

f/2.8, 1/125sec, ISO 3200 at 24mm

While it doesn't look like shows are coming back in the near future, I continue to hold out hope that I'll be back at a venue before this year comes to an end.  I hope.  If you'd like to see the other photographs that I took that night, you can find my photographs of The Picturebooks at this link and my photographs of Monster Truck at this link.  While you're surfing around, don't forget to visit the websites of The Picturebooks and Monster Truck to find out more about them and their music.

Don't Put Away The Shovel

As we enter March many people suddenly get the impression that Winter is over.  We get a couple of days of warm weather, the snow and ice begin to melt away and people get to go out a few days without needing a scarf or toque.  Then, just when that false sense of security begins to settle in...WAM!  A big snow storm hits, catching everyone by surprise.  It seems to happen every year, and if I'm lucky, it happens on a day off so that I can go out and take some photographs.  Such was the case a few years ago when we got hit with a huge storm near the end of the month.  I lived near Seaway Park at the time and I went out for a nice little walk in knee deep March snow.  I loved it, though the general population wasn't all that pleased at the time.  The photograph was taken at f/9, 1/125sec, ISO 100 at 24mm.  So a little word of warning.  It's true that Winter is on its last legs, but there is always one more big one out there just waiting.