The images below were created in the thick of winter and then again this spring. The challenge in diptychs such as this is to create identical perspectives from one image to the next- in this case: close, but not perfect.
Enjoy – David
Dow's Lake Diptych
I have a “thing” about reflections, whether they be in glass, water, or any other smooth surface. These latest images were taken at the family cottage in Northern Ontario.
Enjoy…
David
Long Lake Reflections 1
Long Lake Reflections 2
Long Lake Reflections 3
It has been a long winter in Ottawa and as is often the fashion in such conditions, Spring has been racing to its finish line – within the last few days I have witnessed the trees move from their winter dormancy to the lime green brilliance that accompanies new buds.
I like to watch the shift of seasons from the same vantage point; there is a steadfastness within a single landscape that defies the passage of time chronicling our four seasons. (FYI: in Canada there actually tend only to be two seasons: Winter and Road Construction.) So I like to photograph the same scene at different times in the year. I am particularly pleased with the image below, which is found along the Rideau Canal in Ottawa, Canada, near the Hartwell Locks.
Enjoy -
David
The Hartwell Locks: Winter and early Spring...
This has to be the best of both worlds: to be paid as an artist to help raise volunteers for a wide range of not-for-profit organizations. Well, all of that is thanks to Timeraiser, a group dedicated to “bringing people to causes and causes to people”. Each year Timeraiser puts out a call to artists and, following a juried selection process, purchases a number of the submissions which it later auctions off at a evening gala. But here’s the really creative side to it all: the bidding is not in dollars; instead, the auction’s currency is volunteer hours with one or more of the registered nonprofit organizations. How cool is that?
Timeraiser is represented in various major centers across Canada. The Ottawa fête was held last evening at the National Gallery of Canada – fabulous venue for art, to say the least. These guys put on a great party, with music videos and munchies to start the evening, followed by a live performance by the band Franklin’s Fault.
Franklin's Fault performing in the name of art and civic engagement at the National Gallery of Canada...
This was my first year applying to Timeraiser and I was fortunate enough to have my image, “Tree Line”, accepted for auction. I was even more thrilled to see it achieve the maximum (i.e. 125) biddable hours during the silent bidding.
Tree Line raising time...
So my thanks to Theresa Wetzel and all of the other people at Timeraiser for including me in its wonderful mission. And a word to anyone looking for future opportunities to get involved: watch for these guys next year – I personally can’t think of a more pleasant way to look for a cause with which to connect…
September 7th marked the start of a pair of photographic exhibits at Carleton University Gallery featuring the artists Justin Wonnacott and Jocelyne Alloucherie. An intriguing combination, these two collections of work curated by Sandra Dyck and Diana Nemiroff respectively.
Wonnacott’s show consists of a set of intimate images of marine animals that have formed part of his daily diet – fish, mollusks and crustaceans alike. Drawn by their vibrant beauty, Wonnacott began photographing them, starting with a moon fish that provided the exhibit’s title image: “I remember + I forget“. But his initial perceptions were to later give way to the underlying reality that the seas, and hence these creatures, were endangered. As Wonnacott so aptly puts it: “the fish are beautiful, they are in trouble and they are food.”
Wonnacott at Carleton University Gallery...
Intimate with fish: food for thought...
Jocelyne Alloucherie‘s exhibit in many respects provides a juxtaposition to that of Wonnacott. Her massive, neutral-toned images carry the viewer across vast scenes of cloud, sand, ice and air which the artist describes as “a space between the immediacy of physical experience and the memory of one or many elsewheres.” But, like Wonnacott’s own work they remind the viewer of our earth’s precarious state of affairs as greenhouse gases threaten the age-old balance between cloud and sand, ice and air.
Alloucherie at Carleton University Gallery...
Viewing vistas: Alloucherie's eye for stark majesty
Wonnacott’s exhibit run until November 7th, while Alloucherie’s work will be displayed until October 24th; two wonderful collections in one spot – what more could one ask for?
Enjoy.
David
My wife Sherry and I were cycling along the Ottawa River Parkway on the weekend and stopped to enjoy the art of John-Félice Ceprano, an artist whose rock sculptures can be found at the Remic Rapids along the Ottawa River. The work is, to my mind, mesmerizing: his stone structures precariously suspended on granite shelves appear to float over the water’s surface. The relative quiet of the the shelves provided good opportunity for photographing the sculptures’ reflections – an obsession of mine, reflections are…
The sculptures...
Eying the eyer...
Collective...
Enjoy.
David
I captured this image of foam on the water’s surface at Hog’s Back Rapids in Ottawa. My eldest sister, the epidemiologist, commented that it looked a little “disease-like”: a less-than-healthy thin-section, perhaps? Yes, perhaps, but I found it beautiful all the same.
Hog's Back flotsam and jetsam...
More of the series, “Today’s view…”, can be seen at my flickr site…
Enjoy.
David
One evening at the lake we witnessed a stunning light display from a distant electrical storm. The actual event was silent (i.e. no thunder), which added an eerie quality to it. I shot a series of stills during the storm, some of which I combined to form the stop motion video short below. I added sounds from another storm and a loon call, all recorded at a later date at the lake.
Enjoy.
David
The lounge chair...
This was my father’s favourite lounge chair and, on the rare moments that he wasn’t moving, one might find him relaxing upon it at the water’s shore. It seemed a fitting prop for a series of family portraits during our most recent time at Long Lake.
It was a blazing early afternoon when we decided to do the shoot – a time that any photographer in their right mind would avoid, particularly given that I planned to photograph the gang hovering over the lake’s surface. And with the sunny conditions, I needed some flash to keep my subjects lit without losing background detail.
Me, up to my knees...
No worries – I had my trusty SB900 and my daughter’s Nikon D80 with it’s built-in infrared trigger: what more could one ask for at high noon sitting upon a giant reflective mirror of water?
Well, I thought a diffusion panel might be nice, so I jerry-rigged one from a step ladder and an old sheet with some clothespins, together with a voice-activated light stand (a.k.a. my brother-in-law). Consistent lighting proved difficult under this scenario, but I took what I could get and ran with it…
Below are selections from the photo series – variable lighting, to be sure, but I was happy enough with the final results.
My wife, Sherry:
Sherry at lounge...
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My sister, Valerie:
Valerie - lounging...
Valerie and high heels...
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Valerie and her husband, Daniel:
Sister and hubbie...
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Enjoy,
David
Cool morning air collides with the surface of the lake, still warm from the previous day’s heat, to leave a blanket of mist hovering over-top.
This past week was spent at the family cottage in Northern Ontario. The lakeside property has been in the family for as long as I have seen days – that would be fifty-one years’ worth – and every year from then till now I have spent at least a portion of the summer there. We call the cottage “camp”, as do all who hail from that part of cottage country, and the Taylor camp has afforded the family immeasurable pleasure over the last half-century. But there are two pleasures that are particularly dear to me: the sound of the loons and early morning mists on glassy water surfaces, the latter being the subject of today’s post.
This first image was taken handheld from our canoe with the early morning sun behind me.
Early morning mist against the peninsula...
The second photograph shown below was also taken from the water and was also handheld. But in this case I was facing into the sun and opted for a high dynamic range version of the scene, which required that I bracket it over several stops. (In fact, this final image is an example of HDR combined with panoramic stitching.) I also found the final version most pleasing in black and white. (A somewhat larger rendering can be viewed from my flickr site, which better reveals the detail of the raft in the lower left portion of the photograph.)
More of the mist - this being a high dynamic range image...
Enjoy.
David
