Photography; I shoot what I like, and sometimes people like what I shoot. All photos are copyright to Michael C. Lam unless explicitly stated otherwise.
This year, I think most of my photos come from the Seawall areas along the coast of Demerara, simply because I’ve had little opportunity to go elsewhere… but the amazing thing about the seawalls, is that I think you can take a photo there every week and still come away with something interesting
This one I was tempted to call “Low T”, but knowing the western mind-set it would probably be a bad idea 😀
Took this using a low perspective, with the Sigma Ultra-wide 10-20mm, even at 1/200s the bird in the sky shows motion blur 🙂 (Probably added a bit to that with the wide-angle distortion at the edges of the lens)
The clouds, they roll toward distant shores,
O’er seas and lakes, past engines and oars,
horizons mean nought, but a curve of land
that changes but slight, by nature or man
The sun shines on, through fog or haze,
O’er stormy skies, or clear summer days
It beats upon the land beneath
or upon the clouds, spread like a sheet
The sands, they move with the ocean’s might,
on ebb tide or flood tide, all day and night
valleys are made, with wondrous ease
and disappear as quickly as a deity’s sneeze.
Click on the image to see it in the Gallery along with others in my Black and White album
Photograph and Poem copyright to Michael C. Lam, all rights reserved.
I was processing this image as a part of another long-term project that I’ve been doing; Seascapes, but I decided that I would also include it into the Deck Project as it turned out so nicely 🙂
The water was lapping around the larger rock seen here, the tide was on it’s way out, and the sand/mud could be seen at the rock’s base when the wave had receded. The waves seemed fairly predictable, coming in, swirling past the rock and then receding, so I set my self and waited for it, when it came in, it came a little harder and faster, and I involuntarily jerked backwards a bit and the shot actually came out at a bit of an angle, so I had to crop back to straighten the horizon. I did have others that I could have used, but this one came out nicely, in terms of composition and the way the water was.
The skies were just how I like them recently, fairly dramatic, nice variations and with a fair amount of detail that I knew I could eke out of the RAW file.
Normally I try to process my images just to get them to that stage that I like, my personal preference… so theoretically, not too much processing, just adjusting the sliders a little here and a little there… it works for most images.
This particular image I knew that I would most likely process it in monochrome, but while making my Lightroom adjustments I felt that I wanted a little something extra out of the image…. I processed it with one aim in mind after that… to get as much detail out of that stream of clouds as I could… I even carried it into Nik Silver Efex to give it that extra structure that I was looking for….. It even has a slight selenium tone over it.
Did I overdo it? Some may say so, but it’s what I was looking for 🙂
Canon Rebel T1i | 1/400s 18mm f/13
Click on the image to see it in the Gallery along with other Monochrome images.
Every time I see a skeleton or decomposing body of an animal, I think of Avinash Richard who, although known for his Street Photography locally, was also known for his photos of such things, and how he countenances death not with morbidity, but with fascination; fascination not in the death of the creature but in thoughts of the life it lived and what caused it to knock on Hades’ Gates.
Of course, this is how it comes across to me, he would be better equipped to answer for himself 🙂
As with most photos that I render in monochrome, I knew the instant that I composed and pressed the shutter button that this image would be rendered in BW, but this one made me think a little, I even compared the coloured version and the processed monochrome for a few days before asking Nikhil’s opinion. Thankfully, he reinforced my original thought process.
Most of my new images usually become my current favourite, but I believe that this one is truly one of my favourites of recent images.
I really think it can be seen better on the site, so click on the image above to see it in the Gallery, along with the previous images from this year’s Deck Project.
As we were behind schedule, I thought we would have left Paramakatoi extra early, but we started out close to 8am and headed for Kato.
At Kato we had a brief stop, some vehicles were attended to, and some thirst needs were also attended to 🙂
Our next stop would be at Kurukubaru, although I did not take many photos on the way into the village or even at the village, this one of a family at their home I liked.
From Kurukubaru, our next stop would be the destination of the entire Safari, Orinduik Falls, the route there proved to be unusually treacherous for the vehicles, it was on the way there and back to Kurukubaru that evening that the vehicle suffered the most damage 🙂 Unfortunately, no photos, not a lot of stopping on that leg of the journey 🙂
Just to prove that the Destination was worth it, I’ve selected quite a few photos to show you of Orinduik.
One of my favourites from Orinduik, Jason and Lily take in the grandeur of Orinduik Falls
See the crazy white dude? He just HAD to get a bit of fishing in… no, he didn’t catch anything 🙂
A Panorama of Orinduik Falls to catch the breadth of this stage 🙂
Although we wanted to make it back to Kato that evening, we lost the main convoy in the rains up at Kurukubaru, and were advised by the villagers not to descend the mountain in the rain, so we spent the night at Kurukubaru, the highest village in Guyana.
There may be one more post in this series, but it will be sometime next week, the Easter Weekend is upon us 🙂
Please click on the photos to see them larger in the Gallery.
My priorities in life must most definitely be askew, since I seem to have less time for photography than ever before… But even if I have to take a photo of the same thing every week, I will finish this project 🙂
As I was driving along the seawall, I noticed the white-capped waves as they rushed to shore and thought to just stop and catch a few. It was a bright afternoon, but lacking any fancy filters or gadgetry I thought that I’d just bring out the focus of my intent in post-processing.
I used an orange filter in Post-processing to deepen the hue of the sky and emphasize the white caps of the waves.
I had never been into the Indian Monument Gardens before, and it seems that the one time I did venture in was when they were doing some new construction on a stage to the western end and had not done any recent cleaning near the monument itself, yet I still think I got a few usable photographs (if you ignore the weeds on growing near the monument and the stains on the base itself)
The monument itself commemorates the arrival of the East Indians to Guyana as indentured labourers, the first arrival being on May 5th, 1838, the first ship being the SS Whitby (symbolically represented in the monument). The monument was erected in 1988 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of their arrival, a portion of the Merriman’s Mall was appropriated for the Monument Gardens. (the area bordered by Church Street, Camp Street, North Road and Alexander Street.)
I found very little information in my short research, but it appears that a nationwide competition was held for the design, and after choosing the winning entry the design was made real by an “Builder” from India, the Gardens itself was laid out by two architects, one from India and one from Guyana (Albert Rodrigues).
I chose this angle because it shows some of the supporting structure of the Ship itself.
As always, click on the image to see it in the Gallery.
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