Day 151 - A glowing piece of abstract art

Sunshine makes outdoor photography so much easier, doesn't it? While out for another stroll on a beautiful, sunny lunch hour I saw this really neat banner hanging from a pole, wonderfully backlit by the beaming sun.

The combination of the light and the bunching of the banner at the bottom changed it from a simple advertisement for Fredericton's Garrison District into a glowing piece of abstract art.

I wish I could say I did something snazzy with the Olympus to get this photograph but this is as basic a point-and-shoot photo as you can get. The camera was on automatic, the autofocus was in play and I simply stood, pointed and clicked.

As I said at the beginning, sunshine makes photography so much simpler. And this lovely image is ample proof of that.

Day 150 - Fish tales (or is that a serpent?)

I love this photo. There's so much going on, so much colour, and the little guy in the middle of the fountain seems to be battling his brains out to subdue the spitting beast.

The first truly brilliant, warm spring day here in Fredericton brought bright sunlight, dozens of noon-hour walkers and the return of the City Hall's weird and wonderful fountain. My goal in this case was to push the Olympus as far as I could to get a freeze-frame shot of the water drops. For a moment, the camera allowed me a shutter speed of 1/2000th of a second (at least I think that's what I saw on the little screen) and the photos at that speed are pretty amazing.

But this one, taken at 1/1000th, was by far the most interesting. I love the spout of water from the lower fountain on the left, the deep hues of the green bowl, the golden dude and the red brick in the background, and the thin jets of drops coming from the... is that a fish? or a serpent?

Day 149 - Sitting on the fence

I'm trying to train myself to look for interesting photographs in places and situations that just don't seem to promise much. To find beauty in squalor, so to speak.

Okay, maybe not quite squalor, but you catch my drift.

When I saw this battered old fence, losing the battle against the bushes behind it, I thought I'd found exactly what I've been looking for.

Then it became a question of how to photograph it: go in close or pull way back; include just the fence and the fern or put it into a context; focus on the first couple of slats or try to ensure the entire line of pickets is crisp and clear.

I'm not sure if I should have included the baby-blue wall in the left-hand side of the frame. I like it, to be sure, but I wonder if the photo would be more effective with just the fence and the bush. The focus question introduces, once again, the limitations of my Olympus, since I just can't make the aperture so wide and the shutter speed so fast to create the kind of shortened depth of focus that I would want to get. Still, I'm quite happy with the photograph. It makes me feel quite serene, for some reason.

Day 148 - The bell tower and the Chapel of Ease

More details, more churches. As I mentioned a couple of days ago, Christ Church (Parish) Church, St. Anne's Chapel of Ease, is a lovely, though strangely named, building located west of the downtown core of Fredericton. I think of it as a kind of hidden gem since it's bell tower is not so tall as some of the other steeples in Fredericton and it's not in a high-profile location.

I took a number of pictures of the bell tower on its own and I think it's quite lovely (see the small photograph below) but I ended up liking this close-up shot, of the stone cross above one entrance with the bell tower in the background, the best.

I was lucky with the day, one of the few sunny days we've had of late, because the direct sunlight brings out the details in both structures and the beautiful blue sky provides a wonderful background for the image.

I was careful in arranging the composition to include both the cross and the tower (which resulted, of course, in the need to stop the Olympus down to f8 to increase the depth of focus) but, when I was taking the photo, I didn't realise just how much the tile pattern of the roof itself would add to the picture.

I'm not much of a church person normally but it is clear after almost five months of this blog that I find them quite photogenic. I guess that should be no surprise, since societies have often invested a great deal in their places of worship.

I'm going to try to move away from them for a while, however. With summer here, bringing more opportunity and inclination to get out of the house in the evening and on weekends, I should be able to feature more of the sights of Fredericton and its environs.

Day 147 - Yes, another musty church

Sorry, sis, another musty church. Fredericton is known for its many places of worship and the downtown core, in particular, is dotted with them.

I forgot to get the name of the edifice that provided me with this interesting photo opportunity but it's on York Street, I believe, just south of King.

This is the kind of detail shot that Michael Freeman mentions in his book and that Fredericton, because of its often ill-placed wires, poles and other interfering structures, often forces a photographer to settle for, rather than the wider angle, postcard shots we all love.

The trick is to make the detail shot work with, as in this case, interesting patterns, attractive textures and pretty mixes of colour. I saw this set of windows, with their neat stone frames, set against the geometric patterns on the greater wall and I though it would work out well. And I think it does.

Day 146 - And now for something completely...

A nice lunch-hour walk around the neighbourhood to the west of downtown Fredericton brought ample photographic opportunities. I took a number of shots of the beautiful but strangely named "Christ Church (Parish) Church, St. Anne's Chapel of Ease", any of which would do well here.

But the photo that stood out when I loaded them all onto the iMac was this one: a snapshot, really, of a discarded shoe and belt, nestled in the gorgeous greens of young grass. To be honest, I saw them there in the lawn and said, "Ah, my sister will like this shot." So here it is.

Day 145 - Adieu, Quebec City

Of all the almost 500 photographs I took in and around Quebec City this weekend, I think this is my favourite. It just has so much going for it: the range of colours, the perspective of the street in the lower half of the frame, the stacking of elements from bottom to top, the beauty of the 17th-century buildings in the foreground and the 19th-century hotel in the background. I could go on.

This picture jumped out at both Patti and me when we were looking at the photographs on the camera, again when we reviewed them on the small screen of my netbook and finally when we loaded them onto our iMac, with its massive screen. So I've decided to use it for my last Quebec City entry before getting back to featuring pictures of Fredericton.

It looks like a simple photo but it took some planning: I had to make sure the Olympus was set at its smallest aperture (f8) to create the greatest depth of focus; I had to work carefully with the shutter speed to let in the perfect amount of light to balance the sunlight and shadows in the frame; and then I had to wait for the crowds of people to thin enough to capture the beautiful buildings along the street. I am very pleased with the result.

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, however, it's practically impossible to take a thoroughly original photograph of this beautiful city. So it didn't surprise me that, when I did a Google images search of historic Quebec City, the very first photo it found was almost an exact match to this one. Oh well. The fact that it's so popular at least confirms that it's a great shot.

Day 144 - The Jaunty Pose

The older parts of Quebec City offer a wonderful collection of narrow streets and interesting alleyways that wind their way in and among the fabulous heritage buildings.

I took dozens of photographs of these kinds of streetscenes and was impressed with the variety these pictures produced. Here, Patti poses at the end of a passageway built into the wall of one of the buildings, a narrow walkway from the street to the courtyard of the building. As someone who loves balance and perspective in a photo, this was too good a shot to pass up. Of course, Patti's jaunty pose also contributes to the effectiveness of the image.

The photographer's challenge in shots like this is to ensure you get your light reading from the person rather than the darker alleyway and that you get as deep a focus as possible, so that both the face in the distance and the stone in the foreground are sharp.

Day 143 - The Purls of St. Roch Des Aulnaies

An old mill, a lovely restaurant and a tumbling stream offer endless opportunities for photographs. We found them all in a small town along the St. Lawrence, which I believe is called St. Roch Des Aulnaies. We visited so many small French towns on our trip (all of them beautiful, all of them offering wonderful scenes and fabulous baked goods) that I lose track of the names.

At the old mill in St. Roch Des Aulnaies, the tumbling water offered something special: a wonderful green colour and the most delicate designs in the water itself. I played with the Olympus' settings until I got it right and I'm so glad I did. This photograph, taken with as fast a shutter speed as the available light would allow (I think it was about 1/640th of a second) and the aperture as wide as it would go (around f3.4), captures the purls and sparkles of the water as well as the deep colour of the stream.

I think this photograph is probably as artistic as I've gotten on this blog and I'm very proud of it. I love its texture and its composition and I'm particularly pleased with the way the photograph captures wonderful designs in the falling water and the delicate green leaves on the branch at the very top. I have included the smaller shot, which is itself quite pretty, to show you the stream from a greater distance, so that you can place the first photograph in its context.

Day 142 - Higher than Niagara and just as dramatic

La Chute Montmorency, located just east of Quebec City along the north shore of the St. Lawrence River, is a water fall that dwarfs Niagara Falls in height and challenges it in splendour.

We visited the beautifully designed park that contains this natural wonder this morning and found the falls thundering at their mightiest, thanks to the high water levels this spring. The park allows you to get close to the falls at both the top and bottom of the cliff, meaning you can get soaked if you want while enjoying plenty of great views. I got a lot of great shots, including this one from a lookout at the top.

The challenge for me as a photographer, of course, involved not just getting the silly autofocus mechanism to find the rushing water but also to get the proper amount of light in the shot, since the light meter under-reads the light reflected by the water. If you go by the meter, the crashing water will be overexposed, without detail. I find you have to deliberately set the camera to allow in less light so that you see the individual ripples and water drops.

It's not so hard to do, however, since you want to push your shutter speed as high as possible (in this case, 1/1000th of a second) to freeze the action. The higher the shutter speed, the less light gets in. Problem solved and photograph improved.

Day 141 - In the shadow of the Chateau

It's hard to take a bad picture in Quebec City. What's even harder, however, is to take a photograph that no one else has ever taken before. I don't think it's possible, quite frankly, since more than three million tourists come through this beautiful city each year and every one of them seems to have a camera in hand.

We spent the day wandering around old Quebec, seeing the sites and taking photographs. 250 photographs, in fact. A very strong wind made it difficult at times, both to walk and to hold the camera steady, but I think more than 200 of the shots are really good.

Original? Maybe not. But good, yes. Quebec is simply a stunning place to be. Everywhere you turn, there's something beautiful and extremely photogenic.

I chose this picture because I thought it might be as close as I came today to an attractive photograph with perhaps a hint of originality. I decided to shoot one of the cannons that protected the oldest part of the French settlement (dating back to the 17th century) from a seated position on the ground, trying to capture both the cannon itself and the magical Chateau Frotenac in the background.

It's not easy, since the Chateau stands on the cliff, high above the original town and its cannons and lovely buildings. I thought I'd let the focus go on the cannon a tiny bit and make sure the hotel is in crisp focus. It looks pretty good, I think. You'll see more photos from this tour over the coming weeks. There are just too many great ones to waste.

Day 140 - Along the St. Lawrence River

I wish I could tell you where precisely we found this scene. I know it's along the St. Lawrence River somewhere, just west of Kamouraska, on your way to Quebec City. I took more than a hundred photos as we made our way peacefully down to Quebec, visiting small town after small town, including a wonderful stop in Kamouraska for baked treats.

This photo was taken on the grounds of one of the many gorgeous Catholic churches that dot the landscape, one church per town, and combines a number of very beautiful elements, including the statue, the tree and the lovely building next door.

This shot is all about the composition, getting the balance right and making sure we've got all of the elements properly placed. I kept the aperture as small as possible to give me the depth of focus required to capture the elements.

I include the second shot because I felt I have to include at least one picture of the river itself. It's an awesome presence and, on this day, was remarkably calm, its surface like glass.

The problem I faced was that, no matter how you look at it, no matter how you attempt to photograph it, the St. Lawrence River presents an extremely horizontal image. I know that sounds ridiculous (of course a river is horizontal) but it was difficult to find a way to photograph the mountains in the distance and the river in the foreground in an interesting way without losing something. Either you're too close and you lose the majesty of the river or you're too far away and you lose any sense of verticality. I did my best, however, and it's not a bad result.

Day 139 - Here's lookin' at you

This photograph makes me laugh. First of all, I like the look of it. The low light conditions in the room, the composition, the content itself. It's just a fun photo.

Patti and I were on Skype with my sister, Lynn, and her partner, Gavin, talking photography and cameras. It just so happens that both couples currently own the same Olympus digital camera and both Gavin and I have started to post our pictures on blogs.

So that, of course, led to Gavin taking a picture of us on his computer and me taking a picture of them (and us) on our computer. The result is a multilayered image with a lot going on. And the glow from the computer screen produces enough light to keep the shutter speed reasonably high while providing some pretty cool colours.

Day 138 - Would you buy a used car from...

As a change change of pace, I bring you this snapshot of my friend Pat, proudly showing off her new car, a 2001(?) silver Mazda Miata convertible.

Miatas seem to be ubiquitous in New Brunswick and Pat's thrilled to be joining the crowd. It's quite a photogenic car and I took some really nice photographs of the car by itself but I think Pat's proud grin makes this picture worth looking at. She's feeling good about living out a long-time dream and I think I've managed to capture that, even if the pose is a little too much "used-car saleswoman".

Day 137 - Ought to Focus

I have mentioned before that I am often frustrated by the Olympus' auto-focus function. It is the nature of auto-focus, I guess, to identify the object closest to the camera that falls within a certain area at the centre of the lens and then focus on it.

This can be very frustrating when you are attempting to take a photograph of anything in the distance when there is "interference" in the foreground (like branches, curtains or even rain drops on a window).

As frustrating as it can be, however, it can also sometimes give you very interesting results. In this shot, I was aiming for a picture of the buildings on the campus of St. Thomas University, situated below the window through which I was taking the photo. The camera, however, found the rain drops on the window itself and that's what I got: a series of little watery magnifying glasses that invert the scene beyond them but bring it into sharp focus.

If you could enlarge this photo sufficiently, you'd see the buildings magnified in each individual drop but upside down. It's really kind of neat.

Day 136 - The Hour

These two photographs, taken less than an hour apart, show how different the colours of a landscape look as night falls. In this case, we visited a friend who currently lives on the top floor of McLeod House Residence at UNB for the evening and he was kind enough to allow me to bring the Olympus and my tripod to try a few shots.

On yet another rainy night, I had to battle the tendency of the camera's autofocus to read the raindrops on the window rather than the scene beyond.

It was frustrating at first but, when I looked at the photos later on the computer, I was pleasantly surprised by how the rain-drop shots turned out. More on that tomorrow.

Even with the rain and the cloudy skies, I was pleased with the results of my landscape experiment. Both of these shots show similar views, with the buildings in front and the St. John River and its walking bridge further off in the distance.

I was interested to see how very different the colours of these two shots were. The first was taken at about 8:15 p.m. and shows the tower (belonging to a building at St. Thomas University) in the blue light of late afternoon. The second, taken about 45 minutes later, shows the fall of night, with the lights of the tower and the city beyond showing through. Both were taken with long exposures and as narrow an aperture as possible under the circumstances. And both bear a neat mottled texture created by the rain-drops on the window just in front of the camera's lens.

Day 135 - Variation on a Theme

I had a hard time choosing a photograph yesterday from the twenty or so I took from the top floor of the UNB Student Union Building.

So I decided to use a second one today, sort of a variation on a theme. The subject matter is similar but I like the balance in this shot, a balance that the designers of the University obviously designed intentionally when they chose a location for and then built the residence buildings around the central green space below the SUB.

At some point, I will go there when I can get out on to the balcony (and, if possible, when the sun is shining) to take these shots again, just to see how different they would be.

Day 134 - View from Above

The University of New Brunswick offers some of the nicest views of Fredericton. This photograph, taken from the third floor of the UNB Student Centre on a soggy, cloudy Saturday, features some of the red-brick of the University, the walking bridge over the river and then the north side of the city in the distance.

I'm pleased with this picture because I was able to frame it in such a way as to capture so much of what makes Fredericton such a lovely place: the university and its distinctive buildings, the multitude of trees that populate the area, the mighty St. John River and the walking bridge itself, converted from an old train bridge. The north side of the city offers a picturesque background to the image.

Day 133 - Benched

These benches are supposed to allow people out enjoying the riverfront trail to sit and watch the water flow gently by.

I think things have gotten a little too interactive, however, for most people. With the St. John River at flood levels, I wanted to find a way to capture the impact of the rising water on the city. We haven't had too much flood damage but it certainly makes for some interesting sights.

I played with aperture and depth of focus on my bench pictures and spent some time trying to figure out what the most effective composition for the shot would be. I quite like this one, perhaps because it's quiet but effective. The benches are just there in the water.

Day 131 - Droplets

The combination of light and water makes for interesting photographs. In this case, it's the sunlight shining through the droplets of water as they crash on the rocks that makes this picture interesting.

All it takes is a fast shutter speed (1/1000th of a second) and a lot of patience and you're bound to get an interesting shot when light and water are working together.

I considered cropping some of the rock out of the shot but decided not to because I like the balanced composition from top to bottom.

Day 132 - Muskrat Love

I went for a walk along the St. John River yesterday, behind the Beaverbrook Gallery, to check out the flood waters. The river level peaked on Sunday, meaning that Fredericton's riverbank should be slowly reasserting itself.

It was but, as you'll see in tomorrow's picture, the water is still fairly high. My photographic exploits were interrupted, however, when a woman who was walking her dog along the path behind me pointed out a "beaver" playing in the water nearby. Turned out to be this muskrat who was patient enough to let me get quite close. I just wish I could tell if he's in focus!

Day 130 - Beach Perspective

A long, barren log on the beach.

The Olympus placed on the end of the log, it's aperture narrow, shutter speed low. No zoom.

An interesting perspective on the beach, water and sky.

The sunlight just strong enough to bleach out the top left part of the image, adding even more variety to the scene.

I like the composition, shapes and texture. The point of view too. I am a log.

Day 129 - Driftwood Art

Sometimes, great photos just present themselves to you. On my recent visit to Mactaquac to check out the flood waters, I spent some time on the shore of the basin below the dam. It's packed with stones and drift wood, making for all kinds of interesting shots.

In this one, the gnarled roots and branches of a long-fallen tree create the image of some kind of petrified monster, long dead, its body hurled up on shore. I tried all kinds of different framing effects for the shot and played with the depth of focus but I ended up choosing this one: a fairly traditional frame (with the trunk dead centre) and a medium-range depth of field so that the background is not completely blurred but not sharp either.

I love the dramatic light caused by the still rising sun coming in from the right of the frame and I think the driftwood has a character all of its own.

Day 128 - Spring Buds

Spring is finally here in New Brunswick. The sun has been out for the past two days, the air feels warm and the rain seems to be tapering off, both in frequency and intensity. One of the recurring glories of spring time is the appearance of fresh buds on our trees and bushes. Add a splash of sun, backlighting the soft green leaves as they emerge into the world, as well as a short depth of focus so that the yard in the background takes on an appealing blur, and you've got a really lovely photograph.

Day 127 - Flood Waters

My trip today to the Mactaquac Dam to photograph the flood waters of the St. John River pouring through the dam's chutes proved to be a real test of the Olympus' capabilities.

Too bad it failed miserably.

I took exactly 300 pictures on my trip to the Mactaquac Dam with a hope of capturing the tumult of the crashing water as it navigated the chutes and found the lower half of the river. I brought the tripod, I gave myself plenty of time and I ventured as close to the Niagara-like falls as I could (I got about five feet away, to be honest) so you would think just about every shot would turn out.

I had to delete almost 100 of them for focus issues. Another 40 or so were boring because the delay between my depressing the shutter release and the shutter actually releasing meant I missed the big sprays of water.

Don't get me wrong: I got some really great shots. Like this one, taken from very close, with the shutter speed as fast as it could go and a strong sun behind the spray. I think it looks great.

But I am very frustrated by the clear limitations of the camera. The shutter delay means I miss too many shots and have to anticipate when something interesting is going to happen in order to press the release well in advance of the action. The focus issues are worse. The autofocus simply cannot adjust to moving subjects, like rushing water. I got this shot by placing the solid wall of the chute in the frame. This allowed the autofocus to find it and, with luck, get the spraying water in focus as well. I took numerous shots of the roiling water from much closer in but not one of them came out with sharp focus.

Patti says there must be a way to focus the Olympus manually but, if there is one, I can't find it. Arggghhhh!

Day 126 - Early Morning Scene

The St. John River is at flood levels and, despite the misery it may cause for many people, it's the perfect time for some dramatic photographs.

I woke up early this morning and went for a drive along the river toward Mactaquac and its dam. This shot, taken at about 7 a.m. from the jogging path along the St. John (looking east), captures the sun on the rise, its reflection in the still waters of the swollen river and the dark silhouettes of the swamped trees that used to dot the shoreline.

This was a planned excursion, so I brought my tripod and the Olympus, allowing me to make careful use of the manual settings on the camera. Here, I went for depth of focus rather than a faster shutter speed and stayed pretty faithful to the light meter's reading. That last step made sure the sunlight didn't bleed the picture out too badly and the trees remained dark and solemn.

Day 125 - Puddle Pic

If there's anything I've learned from Michael Freeman's book on photography, it's that you've got to take what the world gives you. So on a cool, rainy day, try to find some way to make the rain a part of your shot.

When I saw the massive puddles that had formed on King Street in downtown Fredericton in front of the mall, I thought to myself: "Hey, here's a new way to photograph my favourite church: Wilmot United." It's a layered image, with the church captured on the surface of a rippling puddle while the concrete and brick not only surround the reflection but actually show through it.

Okay, the colours aren't spectacular but I think it's an interesting shot.

Day 124 - Blue Sky and Copper

This copper dome is one of the signatures of the Fredericton downtown scenes. I really wish I could tell you what the building itself is but I can't. I'll try to find out and list it in a later entry.

This shot was a bit of a challenge. The copper roof of the building with the dome is currently being refurbished. It is almost entirely surrounded by scaffolding as crews work to polish the metal and make it shine. In fact, I took a series of photos of the roof and the framing that surrounds it, hoping to find an interesting view, but nothing really turned out.

So I decided to cheat a bit by taking a photo of the dome from one building away. The building with the stone and windows at the bottom of the frame is not the same building as the one with the dome. By stepping back, however, I was able to get interesting aspects of both of these lovely edifices into the same shot.

Day 123 - Chandelier Dreams

Perfection in imperfection. I love this chandelier in our dining room, with its many colours and shapes. I especially like the fact that it's pieces aren't absolutely even and symmetrical. It's just off enough to be perfect.

The chandelier makes the light from the bulb inside it a little more yellow and a little more mellow, making photography a little more difficult. You can try to fight its impact or you can just go with the flow, as I have in this shot.

I used a tripod and a slightly slower-than-normal shutter to try to get enough light into the camera without adding shake to the image. Even then, I think it might be just slightly out of focus, a problem with the autofocus on the Olympus, perhaps.

Even still, I think the shapes work, with the ceiling fixture and chains complementing the roundness of the shade itself. I also like the flow from the light yellow ceiling, through the darker colours of the shade, to the darkness of the bottom of the frame.

Day 122 - Weathered Symbol

I had never noticed this decoration on one of the buildings at UNB until I walked through campus recently, Olympus in hand, looking for interesting subjects.

I believe that this wood carving at the top of one facade of the building was once a coat of arms of some kind but the peeling paint and weathered wood make it hard to see precisely what it was. It's an interesting challenge to find ways to photograph decay and make it interesting and not unappealing. I'm not sure I accomplished that task here (the lighting isn't great and the shot needs better centring) but I'm not unhappy with the result.

Day 121 - Spelling Error

The University of New Brunswick is justifiably proud of its new athletics edifice, made possible by the generosity of the Currie family. Located at the north east corner of the Fredericton campus, this new centre for kinesiology, recreation and related research is a beautifully designed building and an architectural showpiece.

It's too bad that an institution of higher education like the University doesn't take as much pride in its own ability to spell. As you can see from this photograph, the building bears a large-lettered sign on its west wall proclaiming to the world that it is the "Richard J. Currie Center". Unfortunately, in Canada, the final word in that name is properly spelt "Centre".

You can make all the arguments you want, the fact of the matter is that this is an error. Maybe even a typo. It's a bit embarrassing, don't you think, for a University to have a massive typo on its wall?

The photograph itself is quite nice, with the trees in the foreground framing the distant building. It's just a snapshot, really, but when you have lovely subjects to photograph you don't need to do much to make them look good.