I'm number 1 !

Just tooting my own horn - this month my images were chosen for first place in our photo club's web and projected competitions. Here they are:

Projected Competition




Web Competition



YAY!!

New Camera Story

Recently I did a photo shoot where I was using both of my digital cameras...the Canon Digital Rebel XT and the Canon 20D. A couple of times I fumbled with the settings on the XT as it is more finicky when handling exposure compensation and exposure lock (and different to the 20D).

I decided that it was smarter to have another body that was the same. My options were anything in the 20D-50D line. I scratched out the 20D/30D as I was not comfortable buying something used that was that old (although mine works fine). That left the 40D and 50D. The 50D was a little more $ than I wanted to spend, and after some research I felt that the additional benefits that the 50D offered over the 40D was not work the price, especially when comparing the price of a new 50D to a used 40D.

To my delight I found a Factory refurbished 40D - I thought great! Some peace of mind as it is factory refurbished, and a good price! After receiving it in the mail, a quick test showed it was defective...

I called the store and they had no other that I could exchange it with. I returned it.

After some searching, the only other 40Ds that I found were $100+ more than the first one, and at that price, I started looking at the 50D again.

In the end I got a 50D, and I am happy as I have the latest technology, a NEW camera, with warranty, and it matches my 20D perfectly. There are still debates on the quality of the high ISO performance, but I am satisfied with what I have seen so far.

The XT is already sold - with the money going to fund the 50D purchase - now I just have to sell a few more things....

Photo Fredericton Field Trip to the Moncton Zoo

Our Photography Club went to the zoo in Moncton yesterday - it was better than I expected! They had Halloween happenings for the kids, and the weather cooperated for the most part.
I just got my new (refurb.) Canon 40D the day before, and brought it along to try it out. Too bad it had issues out of the box, so I switch to my trusty 20D, and shot all my photos with my Canon EF 70-210mm f3.5-4.5 USM lens.
In record time, I have selected and edited a number of my fav photos from the trip.



-André

Photo Club Summer Experience Show

Our first club meeting will be showing members photos on the theme 'What I experienced this summer...'

Here are my entries...
(a few are repeats from earlier posts)

Bouctouche!

At the end of June, Photo Fredericton went on a weekend trip to Bouctouche, which is about 30 min. north of Moncton.

We went to a variety of locations to take photos, and while I thought the area was better suited to a week long family camping trip than to an abundance of photographic opportunities, I enjoyed the time out of the city to talk photography and focus on picture taking.

We went to a variety of location and I will share some photos from each. I usually used my Digital Camera - the Canon 20D, but also shot a roll of medium format film on my Zeiss Ikon folding camera, using Ilford FP4+ developed and scanned at home. These were taken at the Irving Park - The Dunes.



We stayed in a wonderful place called Auberge Le Vieux Presbytère de Bouctouche. It was located across from an old Convent, now museum, and next to a cemetery. I guess it was the Priest's residence originally, but the church had burned down some time ago. Here are a couple of photos from the environs...





Our first sight was the lighthouse at Cap Lumiere, while not a real light house, it did offer a number of photographic opportunities.




More to come....


-André

Spring in New Brunswick means Lupines!

There are tons and tons of lupines here in New Brunswick, and while they are common, they are varied in their colour and size. They provide many opportunities for exploration in composition and experimentation.

Click here for Wikipedia info on Lupine.

They are only out in their prime for a few weeks, so you need to act if you want to photograph them.




I am a little behind in my editing and blogging, but these were taken June 14, 2009 at midday in a buggy farmer's field about 15 min from my home. I love the one with the bumble bee - it was a huge bee and its legs were covered in pollen as you can see in the photo. I was practicing the technique of having blurry foreground elements present to help place and frame the subject.

There were a few daisys out as well...




Most of these photos were taken on a Canon 20D, with Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens set on aperture priority at f/2.8 and zoomed to 50mm, and using a polarizing filter.

All RAW files were tweaked in post production, but mainly just a slight colour balance, and exposure correction. The first daisy photo was a horizontal crop from a vertical photo, and vignetting was added.

-André

Photo Collage Workshop

Originally, the idea of a photo collage did not really appeal to me. I think it was partly because I did not know how to do it effectively, and partly because I thought they were a little cheesy.

Our photoclub had a workshop on the weekend, and I had a great time learning and building photo collages!

Here are the collages I created during the session:







The trick is making an effective border so the images pop off the background. These were done using a large paintbrush tool, and then going around each photo so only the edge of the brush affected the photo. Also the background is usually made from a photo in the theme you have selected - do the colours are similar - and then the photo is blurred to create a background. I dound it was also effective to choose the photo, and invert it. This way you get colours which are literally complementary to the colours in the photos you have selected (like in the haircut photo collage).

I will be building more, I am sure!