The past is a new project

Somewhere in your house I'll bet there is a box of photos, maybe several boxes. Not you, mom, I know you've cleaned out all but a few favourites during your last move. But the rest of you, yeah. Maybe there's a photo album or two, but unless you're really organized, that's it.

It worked like this for us. We had an inexpensive point and shoot, and usually forgot to take it places. When we remembered, I took most of the photos, on the theory that if I was holding the camera it couldn't be used to take photos of me. Eventually we'd reach the end of the roll, and typically we took it to Black's because they had a store in a mall near us, and near our local library. It was common to pick up or drop off books and photos on the same trip.

Do you remember what that was like? We'd get the envelop of photos and sit on a bench nearby to leaf through them. Usually there'd be at least some we had totally forgotten about because they had been taken months ago, maybe several months ago. Some wouldn't turn out at all, some would be blurry or really badly exposed, and some would be amazing.

They'd go back in the envelop and might come out again to show a friend or family member, or to be put into that mythical photo album. But most likely they would go in a box and never be looked at again. The box would gradually fill up. We have several dozen envelops and the box is pretty full. 

If you've been following along on this, and my photoblog, you'll know I've been putting film through some old cameras, and putting some of the results in my blogs. Just yesterday I posted some Christmas lights on my photoblog using Cinestill film. The intent with these is to have fun, learn a bit more about photography, and in an ideal world produce some interesting photos.

The same time I handed in those to be developed, I finished a roll of black and white film in the small camera. I digitized those yesterday, using a technique involving two panes of special glass to hold the negatives flat. That went very well.

A couple things related to that came to fruition yesterday. One, a while ago was a buddy who had inherited stuff from his recently deceased parents which included negatives from before WWII. I showed him the process, but the carrier made it a bit difficult. I've mentioned the glass to him, but he's deeply involved in some projects of his own just now. I'm also unearthing an old Mac computer, and trying to find all the related parts. I'm still looking for the original keyboard and mouse. In the process of this I unearthed the box of photos, and enjoyed opening a few at random.

This is one of the reasons why looking for things takes so long. One is there are lots of places to look. The other is discovering other things that might have been the object of a search at another time, or that lead you down memory lane. The older I get, the more attractive memory lane seems to be, in some ways.

Many of the photo envelops include negatives, and some of the photos are pretty good. Some are from early in our marriage and include our cats of that time, Sebastian and Nefertitti, so they are of historical interest to us, at least. I was amused to see photos from our first back yard reno process, which included building a stone retaining wall and steps to the back door. The really amusing part is that I still not only had hair, but had a beard as well. This dates it to the very late 80's or early 90's. There may be earlier yet photos. 

I'm going to gradually work my way through the photos and digitize those that seem to be worth doing. Some may make it here, with suitable commentary. As a side note I'm not going to go to extraordinary lengths to make these photos perfect. I'll try to minimize dust spots and hair as I put the negatives on the glass, but I'm not going to obsess about it. I'll colour balance the photos, but I'm not going to clean them up. After all, these were taken by people who were not photographers, using a point and shoot camera with a plastic lens, on unknown film stock, with unknown settings, and developed by a lab that was processing and printing some large number of rolls of film per day. This is decidedly not an artesinal process.

Here's a few from the recent roll of black and white.

1. South Glenmore Park.

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6. Big Hill Springs park, film from a walk with Sean a couple weeks ago.

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8. Me. Almost none of my readers have seen me with this much hair. And Sebastian, the terror of the local cat neighbourhood.

9. The first back yard construction project in progress.

Serendipity from 2017.

Of the Day

Driftwood

Peony

Tombstone

River Reflections

Film

Two weeks in

Believe it or not, I'm almost having trouble keeping up. We're already 2 weeks into the year, and it seems like the NYE party was just the other day.

I get up, get coffee going, browse the regular internet stuff, play a hard sudoku if it's there. I'm a big fan of the XV variation. Do the Vox crossword. Maybe The Atlantic. Do the Wordle. Linda and I keep track, and anybody walking near the house might hear her triumphant cry of "TWO!!!". Or whatever the number might be. You can see my stats here.

After the regular morning stuff, 3 days a week I'm into the pool, their schedule permitting. Last year was swimming for distance, and rather than set a higher goal, I've set a goal to swim faster. Typically that means swimming intervals, going faster, but with a rest. So as an example, I might swim 100 m in 1:45 or faster, and then start again on the 2 minute mark, so getting 15 seconds rest. Last week I did that 10 times before not making the interval.

The problem is when you're sharing the lane, which often happens. Unless they're doing the same thing, and they swim the same speed, there's going to be a conflict sooner or later. Then you get a longer rest than you might like, which sort of makes it hard to keep track of improvement. It's frustrating when you come up on them near the end and have to slow down, missing your interval, then they keep going and you catch up even sooner.

Generally I like to look over the people in my lane, as I think of it, and then decide what I'll do. I'm not one of those swimmers that can bring in a card marked up with complicated sets. I can't keep track. If I'm counting anything I'll use my flip flops like the hands of a clock to keep track. Even then I goof sometimes. There's a few people that swim faster than I do, and it's fun to try to stay ahead, or coast in their draft, if they know in advance that's going to happen.

I've got a swim goal in mind. The first one is to swim faster, without giving myself a heart attack. I know about what my max heart rate is, and I've been counting it at the end of some of the swim sets. Best I've done so far is above 80% of my max, which puts me into zone 4. Most of my swims last year were comfortably aerobic. When I was doing bike intervals one of the things to measure was how long it took to recover back to a a low aerobic heart rate, and I haven't been able to measure that yet in the pool. 

At some point this year I'd like to be about 30 seconds faster than my current aerobic pace for a Km, and have that be my new aerobic pace. There's 40 lengths in 1 Km, so all I need to do is swim each length about 3/4 of a second faster. When you say it that way, it sounds easy, doesn't it? Just keep in mind that water is 800 times denser than air, and as you try to swim faster the drag and the cardio and strength requirements go up, and it's not linear. Try to double your speed, and those requirements are much more than doubled.

After the swim it's lunch. Then onto whatever else is happening for the day, That might be taking one of the cameras for a walk. Or puttering around the house. The latest project was to try and find parts for the old Mac Cube computer. I've got the cube itself, big flat screen display, power supply, and speakers. I even have the original manual. I'm missing the original keyboard and mouse. I suspect they're in a box somewhere downstairs. I've already thrown out an entire blue cart of packaging for things we no longer own. Eventually I'd like to get all the parts, get a photo of the About This Mac screen, and put it on Kijiji. My readers get first crack at it, of course. If you're interested in the coolest computer that Apple ever made, just let me know and we'll work something out. 

Sometimes I'll be up early for a photo date with buddies, but usually I sleep till I wake up. This is an amazing thing!

In evenings, when we don't have something else, like community association stuff, or Master Gardener stuff, or a good book to read, we'll settle in and watch a DVD. Just now we're in the middle of season 2 of Medium. It's relaxing fun. It's nice to see a family living a normal life. By that, I mean that they live in a normal suburban house, and with 2 working parents and 3 kids, the house is barely contained mess and chaos. Unlike so many shows where the protagonists don't have real jobs and afford a swanky place, and apparently, a maid service to keep it that way.

And zoom, another day is over. Retirement is fun!

Part of why the days go so fast is that we're enjoying what we're doing. I'm trying to pay attention and be mindful of what I'm involved in. Then I get involved, and next thing I know it's hours later.

Of the Day

Driftwood

Flower

Peony

Tombstone

Normally, I'm all about the colour in Tombstone. But sometimes b&w can be compelling. Or there's a bunch of haze in the valley, and converting to b&w cuts through that. There's 3 at different focal lengths. Stay tuned.

River reflections

Film

You never know what you'll find along the river bank till you go and look.

Was film, turned into long exposure

The story grew in the telling. I'll try not to get too long winded here, but you know how I get sometimes. Maybe best to go get a beverage.

You knew I hadn't been out much with any of the cameras during the last part of the year. Part of it was a bit of a photo overdose with the trip to Yukon and the followup editing. Part of it was the minus WTF cold spell that went on forever. Some of it was not wanting to face the crazy pre-Christmas traffic any more than necessary.

I touched base with Sean to find out what his schedule was like, now that he's done preparing for his exhibition at the Exposure Photography Festival in February. We noodled various ramble possibilities and settled on Big Hill Springs Provincial Park.

My initial thinking was to expose a bunch of the black and white film in the Canon 7. And since I was thinking film I brought the GW690 with a roll each colour and B&W in case I saw something compelling. The digital camera was almost an afterthought, but I thought I might want it as a sophisticated light meter because the waterfalls are in shade, and the light might be tricky.

I didn't quite swoon as I saw the first set of water falls, but almost. There were several bits of arched ice with water under them that were quite attractive. The digital camera came out to see if it agreed with my light meter.

There were a few digital photos, and then some film ones, and I moved up the stairs to be surprised by the waterfall under the log. I loved it! The words ND filter leaped into my mind, since I happened to have it, and the tripod. I had a happy time finding different compositions with the digital camera, and ended up taking a few more film photos while the digital was doing its thing. However, the none of the scenes were so compelling that I felt the desire to break out the big film camera and try some long exposure photos. Of course, I won't know what the film looks like for a while. I have the rest of the roll to expose, and then get it developed.

Photographing moving water is difficult because our eyes see it quite differently than the camera does. The camera can freeze the water with a fast shutter speed so you see motionless individual drops, or it can capture long trails with a really slow shutter speed. Our eyes and brains see something in between. We can see the individual drops and follow them in the arc as they fall down. Getting a photo that matches your artistic vision of how it should look can be tricky.

The technique for making the water look like milk is easy, but I don't like the look. After the first few photos getting dialed in, I realized I could make the water look like a thick mist flowing over the rocks. That's mostly what I aimed for. 

One of the digital photos was worth the trip for me. It's image of the month so far, not that there is a lot of competition. Can you pick out which it is?

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13

Of the Day

Driftwood

Flower

Just before it snowed. The blooms are still there, crumpled and faded. I just took a couple photos, and we'll see if they should go here, but this is just about it for the flower feature.

Peony

There are still at least 2 dozen more peony photos from last year, so that should get you through the worst of the winter.

Tombstone

River reflections

Lynx

Film

From a walk along the Bow with Sean.

Image of 2022

The dithering started just after Christmas this year, starting with a review of the several thousand 3 star photos. What complicated life is that I'd classed a bunch this way for complicated reasons involving the community association photos, which are not eligible. Still, I can cope. A few got moved to 4 stars, and that's the group under consideration. I also specifically consider each Image of the Month, regardless of how many stars.

I like to see if my thoughts on any had changed, and a few got bumped back to 3 stars. Out of 28,781 photos last year, 101 ended up with 4 stars (0.35%, and 16 with 5 stars (0.055%). This is where things get complicated. Taken as individuals several photos might be given 4 or 5 stars, but when I look at the group I start to think about which is the best in comparison to the others. So out of 5 great photos of a wet peony, I'll probably pick just one for serious consideration. In this selection, I dropped one really similar to number 8. Dealing with the many similar Tombstone Park photos was tough. After a bit of dithering to get to 15 photos, mainly because that fits a preview screen shot really well, here's the selections I'm working with. 

But to get new readers caught up, I like to periodically look over my images and think about which are good, and more importantly, why they are good. Yearly seems like a good time frame. I started doing this when I started to get serious about photography, and you can, if you wish, read over the Image of the Year blogs for 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021. I've just gone back to read them over so I don't repeat myself too much. 

The actual writing for the post started on Jan 1, though there has already been much image dithering. The big change this year has been film. Regular readers will recall I bought 2 film cameras during 2022, and exposed about 40 rolls of film. For the purposes of image review, I don't distinguish between film and digital, though I have to admit, many of the film photos have been better than the digital ones because the process is a bit slower, and I tend to think about it a bit more. And before you say it, some are much worse. Of the 15 photos above, 7 are film (6 are 120, and 1 is 35mm).

By Jan 3 I think I've got 2 of the finalists picked, but don't ask about order. I'm trying to think of 'better' in terms that Sean has used, photos with heart or that are about something not just of something. Something I read somewhere along the way is that the best photos are of an idea, not just a thing. Photos that make you feel something.

Which, as I look over those 15 images, puts me in a tough spot. Most of them are are 'there I was and this is what I saw'. Some are good examples of that, crisp and clear, with some nice reflections to add interest. One of the flower images offers an idea of life, going from a blossom in waiting to a beautifully expanded bloom, with water drops adding interest. One was technically tricky, merging two film images into a digital one. One of them has something very different happening than what I perceived when I captured and edited the image. One of them is all about the potential. Any of the Tombstone photos takes me back there, revelling in the wild open spaces, feeling the trepidation of working with film, hoping they would turn out.

So here I am, drinking coffee on Jan 4. Struggling. Dithering.

Jan 5, down to 5. Stuck. Down to 3, after much pondering and wincing. Now for the order.  

This selection was a real struggle this year. I'd have been pleased with any of the 15 I think, starting right from the stairwell black and white in May. As soon as I saw it I was happy I had a contender for image of the year. 

I cannot understate how pleased I am with the photos from Tombstone, especially the film ones! 

Second Runner up.

This was the runner up for September. I still love the painterly quality of the image

First runner up.

Those reflections! The clarity of the image! Finding and composing to capture the letter K. Nailing the exposure so as to need almost no editing.

Image of the Year

This was actually taken during a walk in early October, but not developed till late December due to complications in film processing. It is ever so slightly different than what I posted as December image of the month. 

We didn't spend a lot of time on the photo. I asked MC to stand in that patch of light and contemplate life for a moment. She is so good at projecting a mood, even if it wasn't what she was actually feeling. This is as far from 'there I was and this is what I saw' as I've got this year. What do you feel when you look at this image?

Still dithering, so, books

Yes, I'm still dithering about image of the year. I'm looking at 15 images, over and over again. For a while I thought I was down to three, then I wrote more about criteria, and that changed the three. So to keep you from getting bored while I dither, here's the latest reading.

Rarely Seen is a gift from Linda. It's full of wonderful photos. The title is appropriate. 

The Midnight Library was a fast easy read. Woman takes her life, ends up in an infinite library of the infinite lives she could have lead. She explores some of them. 

It sort of reminded me of a story where everybody comes to a tree and hangs their troubles on it. They can walk around and look at the other bags of troubles, but to walk away from the tree they have to take a bag of troubles with them. In the end they select the bag they brought.

Thief of Time is one of the many disc world novels. I'm not sure where it fits with the others. It's a fast breezy read, and if you like other Pratchett work you've probably already read this one. If you do, and you haven't for whatever reason, you'll probably enjoy this one. My favourite character is Death.

Maybe this is heresy, but I've never been a huge fan of his work. I tried reading some back in the day, and it didn't take. But then I saw Going Postal because there were some actors in it that I really like (Richard Coyle from Coupling, Claire Foy from anything she's been in, David Suchet from Hercule Poirot, Tamsin Greig that we saw in one episode of Elementary and in Neverwhere, Charles Dance from a ton of stuff. And the trailer hooked me right from the start. Reading the book after watching the show was fun.

Then I was browsing in the library and saw this. It doesn't cost anything to take it off the shelf, so I did, and enjoyed it.

The reason I was browsing the shelf in the first place was to look for a book I'd read recently, or fairly recently. Two of them, actually, and I think there's more in the series, and that's what I wanted. There's a library of secret books and other secrets, and librarians with a guardian tattoo, families of dragons that run parts of the world, and portals that lead to different times, allowing various characters to show up. It's not The Library, or The Librarians. Damned if I can find it. Various searches have lead to similar things, and there's enough of them to thoroughly confuse things.

And yes, it will be no surprise to my readers that I'm nearly peeing myself laughing at the Republican failure to elect a speaker. They're nearly done the 6th round of voting as I write this, and it looks like essentially the same result as the last 5 times. Tell me again the definition of crazy?

If they can't elect the leader of their little clubhouse gang because the can't spell compromise let alone do it, how on earth do they expect to actually govern? They can't count. The children voting for their own version of life, which involves breathing different air than the rest of us, are getting 10% of the vote. Sure, do a few like this to make your point. But it's ludicrous to think the guy getting 10 times as many votes should step down. That's the tip of the tail wagging the whole dog. 

What frightens me is that we have people that think like this as politicians in Canada. The USA is an object lesson in Conservative idiocy just now. 

Of the Day

Driftwood

Flower

Peony

Tombstone

River reflections

Lynx

Film

December Image of the Month

Not so many images exposed in December, and most of them are for the community association. Some are quite nice, but are not eligible for consideration here. The vast majority of the rest are 35 mm film where the exposures started early October. But by the rules I made up, I consider the date they got imported into Lightroom as the day of the photo, which turned out to be Dec 20.

Why that rule? Mainly because it's harder to keep track of the actual photo dates for film. Lots of times photos exposed in one month don't show up till the next month, and I'm not going to go back and reconsider. Which, I admit, has complications of it's own. For a while I considered having two separate Lightroom databases, one for digital, and one for film, but didn't. Maybe I should have.

Both of these are a Visions3 film, which needs special processing, but I love how it captures colour and light. If you don't follow my photoblog and want to see more photos with this film, and a bit about the film, go here. 

Runner up

The south side of the Glenmore reservoir has a lovely treed section between the shoreline and the main paved path up at the top of the hill that goes all the way around the reservoir. There's lots of paths, and I don't think I've explored them all yet. I found this stairway in great light and didn't even have to think about it. I might have to bring a model back to pose here.

Image of the month

I was out for a walk with my dear friend (and favourite model and BRBE) and asked her to pose in this patch of nice light. I love how the film and light treats her skin, and the air of serenity from her pose.