Monthly Archives: May 2015
Co-posting: an experiment in styles
This is the first in a series of joint posts with Ehpem that are the result of a visit that I made to Victoria in April. The idea is to show things that we both photographed in our own ways, and we will each show the other’s photograph along with our own in our blogs at the same time. We intend to take turns writing the posts; Ehpem took the first turn:
We have become friends through blogging; internet friends are not something I could comprehend until it started happening to me through this blog. Fortunately for me Melinda has, twice now, had work to do in Seattle and made the trip over water to Victoria for a visit. This collaboration arises from a visit she made in April when we spent a few days touring around the south end of Vancouver Island looking for things to photograph, and just looking.
Our first co-post is a garbage can at the Point No Point Resort where we stayed one night. It serves as a warning to, or at least as a convenience for, our co-viewers. Some of you might want to scuttle off-stage right now and stay there for a week or two. The more tolerant might be relieved to know there is a bin handy for those of our posts worthy only of the trash.
It is a lot of fun, and very interesting to take pictures with another photographer – to start to feel how they see. One or the other of us might exclaim about something the other had not yet seen, or sometimes go all quiet with concentration. Either usually drew the other of us to have a look and perhaps take a shot too.
This is not the first time we have done this since Melinda visited last year as well. We did not get a collaboration off the ground last year though we did do one co-post – for all of our collaborations click on this link. The idea is to present each other’s photos of the same place taken together, but with our different ways of seeing, and making the most of camera equipment to hand.
On the equipment front I had the advantage of variety, being at home. I shot mostly digital using the Canon 5Dii and assorted lenses. I shot film on a Canon Elan 7N with the same set of lenses, a Olympus mjuII point and shoot that was always in my pocket, and finished a roll of film in a Mamiya M645 Super medium format camera. Melinda used a Nikon D7000 and a single wide-angle prime lens she was trying out.
(You can see Ehpem’s post here.)
Ehpem’s photo:
My photo:
Point No Point Resort
photographed 4.22.2015
Caught between
When I was in Victoria last month, on a photo-shooting frenzy with my friend Ehpem, we made many stops at the storm drain. It’s one of his favorite subjects, and has become one of mine too, when I’m in town. The constant changes in the water and sky, and the relatively unchanging drain make for some interesting opportunities to make photos.
Like this day, when the cloud and drain seemed to mirror each other, leaving photographers caught between the two.
Victoria, BC
photographed 4.21.2015
A five-member herd
I drive this highway every day on my way to work. It’s not a very exciting trip, most of the time – just 30 miles or so of mostly straight 4-lane highway. Sure, it curves a couple of times, and the speed limit drops through the little town of Smyer.
A few months ago I started to notice the chairs outside the fence of a junkyard that’s along the way. Sometimes there are two or three, other times there are as many as five. Sometimes they face each other, sometimes the highway, and sometimes one or two of them are on their side. I always look when I go by; it gives me something to do.
Toward the end of last week, I noticed the chair census had grown from two all the way to five. So on Saturday morning, I took a drive out that way to make a portrait of the herd of chairs.
Highway 114
Hockley County, Texas
photographed 5.9.2015
Water color
Usually, the Victoria Clipper goes on a relatively straight line from Seattle to Victoria. On the day of my trip, a storm in the Strait of Juan de Fuca would have made for a rough trip*, so we took an alternate – and much longer – route north through the San Juan Islands. It was less open water, and more to look at. Like water on the windows…
on board the Victoria Clipper
San Juan Islands, Washington
photographed 4.21.2015
*Prior to departure an announcement was made regarding the availability of motion-sick medicine onboard. It was, “If you know you are prone to motion sickness, if you think you are prone to motion sickness, or you don’t want to find out if you are prone to motion sickness, you can purchase tablets at the concession stand.” It was the best twenty five cents I’ve ever spent.
The shape of every day
This was the scene on the porch of a little food market in Port Renfrew. While we were there, a man and a dog arrived. The man was driving a three-wheeled motorized scooter, which traveled so slowly that the dog could easily trot alongside. The dog had a tennis ball in its mouth. The man got off the scooter, filled a plastic jug from the water spigot between the chairs. Then he and the dog continued along their day’s journey.
It was very ordinary, and I was glad to have seen it.
Port Renfrew, BC
photographed 4.22.2015
One Day | One Image 