Long Life

On December 29, 2010December 31, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography12 Comments

My Last blog post of the year! So I take it to do a small “family letter”, or as close as I’ll get to that in a while 🙂

As two of my brothers have already written or expressed through video, this has been an “eventful” year.

Maureen and I, as well as Andre and Areza, celebrated a decade of marriage, Miriam did well in school, although she says she did not do so well, her overall percentage fell, but she did her best and we are proud of her. Joan Ann got married to Jerry and has migrated to Barbados, God called into his arms two of our loved ones, Granny Correia and Uncle John (Moll), they are both missed and we pray for their souls and the strength to carry on without them. Aunt Kumarie (Maureen’s mom) was diagnosed with Gastric Cancer, the surgery was successful and her chemotherapy begins soon, we hope we have the strength to support her, but she is a strong person and may be our support even through her own trials. I started my own blog and am enjoying my photography even more through it. Nikhil and I were robbed whilst in pursuit of our photography endeavours, quite an experience. This year I also went with my family to Sint Maarten, where I got some amazing photographs and was called Blog-o-matic for the frequent blogging I did from there, and we had a thoroughly enjoyable time.

Areza and Ariel migrated in time to begin Ariel’s new school, and she is doing wonderfully, a real champ, my niece. Andre followed them shortly and their family is now re-united and moving forward.

Of all these events Andre’s parting has affected me the most, I couldn’t even take a focused photograph at the airport as he was leaving. Don’t get me wrong, I miss my grandmother dearly, and I do miss Joan a lot, but there is something about the three eldest brothers that was just different. Together we were MAN (Michael, Andre and Nicholas), we complimented each other, as different as brothers usually are, but we grew to be not just brothers, but friends. That friendship with my other siblings is still developing, but with the three of us it was forged in growing, in fights, in scheming together, in church and in the schools we attended together, in Karate classes, in playgrounds, and even in our varying tastes in music, and with Andre, we were in the choir together (shhhh!), both of us later found mutual friends at University, and a common interest in photography.

This photograph is not the one I wanted, I really wanted a good one of him boarding the aircraft, but my eyes and hands betrayed my at that time. But this one is typical of the males of the Lam family, we hug very seldom, we shake hands more than not, and even more often we just smile and acknowledge each other. We seldom say “I Love you” or “I am proud of you” or say in words how much we care, it is mostly a nod and a smile and that is enough for us, we KNOW!

This photograph gives thanks! Thanks for the many years God has given us with our Dad, his wisdom, his sense of right and wrong and his commitment to the family! On the wall in the background is the transplanted family photograph or Andre, Areza and Ariel. Thanks for all that they have been, for what they mean to al of us, and always will. And the brass Chinese character hanging on the wall, a reminder of our ancestry, where we have come from, the generations of Lams who have been born on Guyana’s soil, and those from mother China whom we never knew but owe our genes to 🙂 That chinese character is the symbol for Longevity or Long Life, symbolic and serendipitous.

To all our friends, our family, and anyone reading this, we wish you a happy and prosperous 2011, and Longevity.

The Deck – Week 52

On December 29, 2010December 30, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2010 Deck, Photography7 Comments

This week, I complete my Project for the year, the 2010 Deck, 52 Photographs, one for each week of the year. There were times when I thought I would have to upload a photograph of my shoes, that was when a week was tough, and other times I had difficulty choosing from the ones I had taken, so taking too many is just as bad as taking too few photographs.

I am not sure that I have grown as a photographer over this year, but I do have a better appreciation of the photography of others as my blogging has introduced me to many other wonderful photographers, many of them with superior talents and images, and others learning as I am, as we take our photographs whether daily or weekly.

Although the sun sets on this year’s project, I look forward to renewing the project next year and hopefully finding a new perspective on photography through the inspiration I gain from the works of others and the encouragement of my family and friends, online photographers being a new and integral part of my new friends.

I hope 2010 was filled with as many learning experiences as you could handle, and I wish that for 2011, you see the world with fresh eyes (or lenses) and appreciate each passing moment for what it is, whether it can be captured digitally, on film, or just in your heart.

The Deck – Week 51

On December 24, 2010December 24, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2010 Deck, Photography6 Comments

This week’s photograph is not the best I’ve taken for the week, it is, however, somewhat representative of Christmas in Guyana. The Masquerade bands come out during the Christmas Season and then at Mashramani, although I didn’t see the “Mother Sally” and the “Bull” at this gathering, these gentlemen were out in the hot midday sun, entertaining the public and raising some funds for their future endeavours.

Merry Christmas to all who stop by to read this, busy though most of us are 🙂

Scotiabank Guyana 2011 Calendar

On December 21, 2010December 22, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography22 Comments

Well, it’s not the first time I’ve had a photo used in a project, but this is the first time since I started a blog 🙂 I had two photographs printed in the 2010 Calendar for the Guyana National Trust.

Scotiabank (Guyana) did their 2011 Calendars through a firm called KRITI, who approached a number of photographers who had some local scenes with a slight emphasis on the skies above, be it dramatic skies, overcast skies or just beautifully clouded skies. Of the six photographs featured, there were five “local” photographers and one foreign photographer (who lived here for two years, so he’s as local as foreigners get).

Below are some snapshots of the calendar with links to the photographer’s pages that I could get. (Click on the photos to go to the photographer’s pages)

Starting of was Nikhil’s image along the LBI (La Bonne Intention) shore,

Then Dwayne Hackette’s Sunset along the Berbice River,

Phillip William’s Earth Station photograph,

Philip Williams: Earth Station, Carifesta Avenue, Georgetown, Guyana

Rustom Seegopaul’s Georgetown from the Harbour Bridge crossing the Demerara River

My Lonesome Tree photograph from the Hamburg (Tiger Island) in the Essequibo River (taken when I shot with a Canon S5 Bridge Camera

Lonesome Tree on the Hamburg — Michael Lam: Lonesome Tree, Tiger Island, Essequibo River

and to top it all off with James Broscombe’s Great Balls of Fire, from the Rupununi

To be absolutely frank, the image of James’ Great Balls of Fire in the calendar does not do the original photo Justice, definitely click on the image above for a good look at the photo on his blog.

It should be noted that these cover all three major rivers of Guyana, the Georgetown Coastline and the Interior. If you are a Scotiabank Guyana customer, make sure to collect your copy 🙂

Thanks to Scotiabank and a special thanks to Sita at KRITI.

The Deck – Week 50

On December 17, 2010December 17, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2010 Deck, Photography13 Comments

After three successive monochrome postings for the Deck project, I decided this week, that regardless of what the weather was like I wanted a coloured image,and I finally got something in keeping with the season, Demerara Mutual Insurance company lit up their building very nicely, and I took a few images at night to try and capture the spirit 🙂

Here’s the resulting image. Demerara Mutual has it’s main office on Avenue of the Republic in Central Georgetown, to the right of the photo, you can even see a portion of City Hall.

The Deck – Week 49

On December 10, 2010December 10, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2010 Deck, Photography15 Comments

This week sees a continuation of the monochromatic trend of late, but instead of just a straight BW, I went for a sepia with a vignette. It was on one of those walks with Nikhil, while looking for his Photo for his 365, and even though these waterways have been done, and over-done, I thought I’d give it a try, with the over-cast sky and perpetuating gloom of the afternoon this was pre-destined to be a monochromatic photograph.

After minimal processing in Lightroom, I did the monochromatic rendition in Nik Silver Efex, it came out rather nicely.

The Deck – Week 48

On December 4, 2010December 4, 2010 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2010 Deck, Photography14 Comments

I am pretty much disappointed with this week’s photographs, I have one of my wife that I thought was a great shot and was very tempted to put as the photo for this week’s Deck entry, but she would never forgive me if I did, so I had to settle for this one.

I intentionally took multiple exposures most of this week because I intended to do some more HDR attempts, but this one didn’t come out as expected. For some reason my alignment was all wrong and there’s quite a bit of haloing as a result. I did intend a BW HDR, so this I used as much to my advantage as possible.

I did the HDR merging in Nik HDR Efex Pro, and also added a vignette to it there. The final touches were added in Lightroom using a BW POP preset I got from Eric Kim, who does really great Street Photography, I hope he doesn’t mind that I used it for something other that Street Photography 🙂

I rather liked the lone tree and it’s reflection, so that’s why this was my choice this week.