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.
I took very few photographs this week, I am not sure why that is, I just took very few. So out of twenty-five photographs total over seven days, I had to choose one for The 2010 Deck. As it turned out, I found some I really liked, and the choice would have been hard had it not been for this particular image in the set.
All the elements just fell into place for this one, and I was very happy with the final shot.
In observance of the holy month of Ramadan I give you this week’s Deck photograph:
I had a few images that I rendered in monochrome this month, these were the results of three walks I did with Nikhil, I got a few nice coloured images, but more that I processed in monochrome, which is unusual for me. I have a few friends who always love my monochromatic work, so I think that they will like these images 🙂
I know that the title “monochromes” cover more than just black & white and sepia images, but I have not quite gotten around to expressing myself in the other formats as yet, although some of my black & white images are actually more of a selenium tone rather than pure black & white. I tend to lean towards the idea that if it is close to black & white, then that’s where I will categorize it, even if it does have a slight tinge of another colour. If the effect is more obvious, then I will rethink its category.
To start it off I have two Sepia images, one from the shore at the Kingston Promenade seawall and the second from the Manatee Pond at the Botanical Gardens, Georgetown.
And now for the Black and Whites, I have four new added to the album; and they go like this:
I have found a fondness for monochromatic images, now all I have to do is learn how to represent them better and better, each time I try one I find something new, sometimes I want lots of detail and other times I want high contrast with starkness, sometime I want a bit of both. Hopefully I am learning all the time 🙂
I was going to title this post “Two from the Seawall” but since the seawall itself does not feature prominently in either of the photos, I changed my mind.
I had taken these since the 20th of this month, but never moved them to the Seawall album, nor blogged it until now, my Deck photo that week took precedence and these fell by the wayside (so to speak).
Of course, I prefer one over the other, and I suppose everyone will have a preference, but I have found that when it comes to photography, there is never a time when everyone can agree on which photograph is the “better” one. When I first started taking photographs, I had often tried to upload photographs that I thought others would like, then quickly realized that this didn’t work for me. Now, I upload what I think are good photos, even if there are two or three that look similar, if I like them enough, up they will go. By doing this, I have found that there is a great diversity in the “likes” and “dislikes” of those viewing my images, some that one group will like another will dislike and so forth.
I wanted to try out a poll on my blog and this seemed as good a time to try it as any, so take a second and just let me know, which do you prefer?
I have always been fascinated by the “Kissing Bridges” in the Botanical Gardens, ever since I was a child and saw paintings of it on someone’s wall or prints in the old GTC telephone directories. These bridges have been photographed and painted for decades and I find it hard to do a current photograph of it, I have tried a few times and never been satisfied with what I came away with.
It may also have to do with the time of day that I’ve tried 🙂 recently it has always been midday, I really should try an early morning or afternoon and see what comes of it.
I was back in there again this week with Nikhil, trying to get his photo for his 365 Project, and there I was faced with the bridge again. This time, I came away with something that I was happy with, it may not be the iconic images that live on in my memory and on canvas, but I think it speaks for itself.
My photo for the 2010 Deck for the thirty-fourth week of the year: The Kissing Bridge
In my younger days, I spent some of my days in my father’s house in Kingston, Georgetown, and this hotel has always been known to me as The Pegasus. The name of the hotel has changed a few times over the years, but regardless of who has owned it or what name they gave it, it has always been known to locals as The Pegasus. Under the new owners, it is once again The Pegasus (officially Pegasus Hotel, Guyana), a name that stirs up images of the mythological flying horse. Of course, my images of Pegasus are of the winged white horse of the books and older movies that I recall, not the black beast of the recent movie, but times change and perceptions change.
I was walking on the Kingston Promenade with Nikhil, when I saw the clouds to the south-west, and although it is not usually a picturesque scene I thought that maybe it would make a nice Black and White HDR (High Dynamic Range) image, so I took my three exposures and moved on to other things. The only thing of interest in that direction, other than the clouds, was the Pegasus Hotel, so the resulting photograph was of Pegasus and the Clouds.
The resulting image come out a bit grainier than I had hoped, but I think that the overall image made a nice Black and White.
At the risk of looking like a total idiot, I went onto the road at midday yesterday for this week’s Deck photograph, walked under a few of the trees lining Avenue of the Republic, stood as close to centre under each as I could get and pointed the camera upwards. Needless to say, I drew a few stares, lots of people wondering if the chinaman had finally lost all his marbles, or if there was a cat up the tree (we don’t see many cats up trees in Guyana, must be a northern thing)
This was one of the few “planned” shots, I usually wing it, go out and see what there is to see, but this was something I genuinely wanted to try out, so I took several photographs under the trees, trying to get the composition that was in my mind’s eye. This is why I do not plan these things, you never get what the mind’s eye conjures up. After several tries I got what I thought was the one I was looking for. I still went out later with Nikhil, to take a walk and see what else I might get for the day, unfortunately the light was not co-operating with us at all yesterday, if you are one of those people unfortunate enough to get my personal email updates you’ll see some of the other image I retrieved from the day 🙂
Now, without boring you with too much chatter about the other images I took, here’s this week’s photo for the 2010 Deck:
As I mentioned in previous posts, the island is divided into two portions, I would love to say halves, but I am not one hundred percent sure that the square mileage would be equal. Anyway, as I was saying, it is divided into two portions, one under Dutch rule and the other under French rule, and in my photo jaunts across the island I actually managed to take photographs for two Panoramas, one in Sint Maarten and one in Saint Martin, so neither side can claim I didn’t do one, right? Right.
That being said, I am no expert on photography, much less Panoramas, but I liked both that I took, they have their appeal and, of course, their faults, but I give them both over for your viewing pleasure (or disgust, whichever label suits you).
In Sint Maarten, the Great Bay is where the Cruise ships filled to overflowing with tourist anchor and dock, there is a roadway that winds its way up the hillside on the opposite side to the area where the ships moor, and there is even a lookout point on that road set aside for viewing the scene. Because of its vantage point high up in the hills, I needed only take three overlapping photographs to produce a simple panorama of this scene. Fortunately, there were two cruise ships in the bay that day, so the image has that little extra caveat.
I was taken to a spot on the French side that is not frequented by people, my memory fails me a bit here, I think it is somewhere near Baie Rouge (I welcome any clarification). It was a little late in the afternoon and the sun was setting to my left, so I got a little colour change in the sky, I find that my best Panoramas (that include skies) usually are done nearer to the midday hour. For this Panorama I wanted to include the shallow waters near the shore as well as the skies, so I took the photographs in portrait orientation mode, this meant more photographs to encompass the view than if I had used a landscape orientation for the camera. In total I used thirteen (13) photographs for the panorama, and only cropped out a portion to the left that was too much into the afternoon sun.
Sometimes one photograph of a scene is not enough to express the feeling that envelopes a person, that’s when you either take a veritable cornucopia of photographs of the large and small items of interest in the scene or you do a Panorama 🙂
I hope you enjoy the images I have shared, please click on them to see them larger (hopefully) at my site.
Whilst in Sint Maarten, I went to church at a small Catholic church not too far from where we were staying, and when I say “not too far” I mean a couple of minutes walk. The church was called the Mary, Star of the Sea, Catholic Church. On a separate occasion, I walked over to photograph it from the roadside, and although I have already posted and uploaded to my site, at least one photograph of it, I had reserved one for later processing.
The name of the church had captivated me, I assumed that its location was partially responsible. I couldn’t remember seeing a particular effigy bearing the name during my growing years, but I do remember the phrase “Mary, Star of the Sea” being part of hymns and litanies, and probably a prayer. I was surprised to learn that the Latin was Stella Maris, which happened to be the name of the Primary School I went to as a child. It is strange that many of us go to schools and seldom, if ever, question the origins of the name of the school.
Like this church, the school I attended was located on a coastal area, Mary, Star of the Sea, is the patroness of seafarers. Under this title she was believed to intercede as a guide and protector of those on the seas either as travelers or workers.
On this photo I did something unusual (for me) I used an orange filter for a special effect and did a high structure monochrome, the original was nice enough in colour, but I thought it warranted a bit more “umph” for impact. I hope you like it.
I had just finished processing two photographs from my recent trip to Sint Maarten, and as I processed them I knew that I would be including both in one blog-post, then as soon as I put the title into the post I was reminded of a bible quote:
And I say to you: That you are Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. (From the Gospel according to Matthew, 16:18)
Now the post, nor this blog-post has nothing to do with that quotation, it merely sprang to mind as I gave the post it’s title. Some portions of Back Street (and Front Street), Philipsburg have nicely rendered cast-iron stump columns that mark the end of the pedestrian pavement and the beginning of the vehicular roadway, but there are a few spots along the street where these do not exist, at some of these spots, they have put large (maybe medium is a better description) rocks to keep the vehicles off the pedestrian walkway. One of these intrigued me and that’s the photograph that I want to share first:
As a pedestrian on these streets, I was very hopeful that this rock, like Peter, would prevail against an errant vehicle if not the Gates of Hell.
Farther down Front Street, Philipsburg, past the Jewelery Shops and Casinos, there lies the Roman Catholic church of Saint Martin of Tours, it extends from Front Street onto the Boardwalk facing the Great Bay. I have to assume that either the hurricanes don’t hit too hard here or this church was built to prevail. I took the opportunity to take some multiple exposures with the intent to try an HDR image. The pews are stained a deep reddish wood colour and this is very evident in the photograph. The few people who go to pray during the day must be accustomed to crazy tourists snapping photographs since it didn’t seem to bother them as I took my time getting this shot, of course, I tried to be as unobtrusive as possible, but that quite hard for a man of Chinese descent with a rather large camera in hand.
This HDR is a composite of three exposures, 0ev, +2ev and -2ev, I still have some issues with alignment, but I think I am getting the hang of it.
This week, I’m off in Sint Maarten on holiday, so I have quite a selection of photographs to choose from for this week’s addition to the Deck. It was a hard choice, but I selected one that epitomizes the week I’ve had so far.
It has been a week of goodbyes and departures, of hello’s and discovery, of family and of friends, I have shed tears of sadness and tears of joy; in life there is light and darkness, the sun and shadow, deep blue heavens and golden sunsets. Life is about change, and as day changes to night, there is beauty to be found, beauty in the day that is ending, in the time of change itself and in the night to come.
So I give you this week’s Photo for the deck of the week.
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