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.
Wednesday gone was our Republic Day in Guyana, and the big event was the Mashramani Parade, so I had already decided that I was going to pick one of those photos for this week’s Deck image.
After several days of torrential and continuous rain (that flooded my house) the day was Sunny, very sunny, still clouds on the horizon, and every once in a while, above us, but primarily sunny. My head now looks like a large cherry on top my shoulders, I am sunburnt. But hopefully after I upload all the selected images from the day, I’ll think it was worth it 🙂
I chose one that I think represented the exuberance and gaiety, the sheer joy of tramping and mashing down the road that the revellers seem to possess (on and off) through their parade.
In Guyana, one of the festivities marking the occasion of Republic Day is Mashramani, the word being derived from one of the many native Amerindian languages, meaning roughly “celebration after a job well done”, the actual celebrations are more African in origin celebrating the end of the harvest time. As part of the Mashramani Celebrations the various schools have entries into the Children’s Float and Costume Competition, the parade is usually held the Saturday before the main National festivities.
I took some photos that day and have uploaded them to the site, below is a checkerboard of photos from that collection, please click on it to go to the collection for the full set.
With any luck today will be sunny and I will be ably to get a nice set of photos from today’s National Mashramani Float Parade.
Happy Mashramani to all Guyanese, a Happy Republic Day, and to the rest of the world, Happy Wednesday 🙂
I’m a bit under the weather, so just a quick one to tide me over.
In almost every village area in Guyana, you either have walking, riding or driving vendors crying out their “wares”, I think some of the famous ones are “Broom Here!!!”, “Papers! Papers!, Kaieteur, Chronicle, Stabroek, Times! Papers!” and of course “Chips! Chips! Chips!, fresh chips!”
Maybe I’ll get the others another time, but for now here’s one of the Chips salesmen 🙂
Chips!
Click on the image to see it larger on the site, and of course, browse the sight at will 🙂
Strange enough I had a totally different image in mind for this week’s Deck Photo, I hadn’t processed the images as yet, but I had sorted out in my mind the images I had taken and had somewhat settled on a particular image. On importing the photos into Lightroom, I saw one that I had dismissed mentally, it was taken hastily and I did not think that I had captured what I wanted. As I looked at it I realised that it had some merit, and as I processed the image it grew on me to the point that I haven’t bothered to process the rest until I finish this blog post 🙂
It was a nice lazy afternoon at Good Hope on the East Coast of Demerara, and I was probably on my fourth Cuba Libre, and I saw them coming down the street, barely time to put down my glass (carefully), go for my camera bag, take out the camera, frame up and shoot. There was no second take, just the one shot.
Having a photo buddy is good, being in the company of other photographers is even better, you pick up things, learn a few tricks and see things from different points of view. Often enough, whenever Nikhil and I are out on a photo-walk, I will see him suddenly divert and take aim at something, and out of my mouth would pop a phrase like “the bike and the tree, eh?” or “the pattern of leaves”, or “the red block and the white blocks caught your eye”.
I am usually right, and I admit that I saw what caught his eye (either before or at the time), I see what it is, I see that there’s a photographic opportunity, but most times, I don’t see the composition that he sees. I’ve come to the conclusion that , at least for now, it’s just not really my thing. He does a marvelous job on those patterns and juxtapositions, on odd combinations of subjects, I don’t “see it” as he does, and that’s fine, if we all saw things the same way, there’s be nothing special in any of our photographs. I think that photographers understand to a good extent what I mean, but the regular Joe, or photo-tekker-outer, or snapshot artist, may not. It’s like Street Photography, there’s an art to it that not everybody gets, certainly not me, and I’ve tried some before and may try more in the future. A good photograph can tell a story in just one scene, the problem I see these days is that not everyone can read 🙂 and even less of us are good story-tellers.
This one is a good example, I saw it, I noticed things like the contrast in colours, the symmetry/non-symmetry, the textures, the geometry, but I wasn’t inspired to take it, I just wanted to do it to see what I could come up with if I pushed myself. I know that in some circle it has merit, but I just can’t bring myself to say it’s a good shot. 🙂
Although Nikhil is no longer pressured on a daily basis for a photograph since he completed his first 365 project, we still manage to go for a photo-walk every now and again. One of those walks took us into Campbelville, and although it was mostly for him to get some Nas-inspried photographs, I came away with a few goodies 🙂
One was also somewhat inspired by an image I once saw from a controversial photographer called Ken, although my photographs may never become as “professional” as Ken’s I learnt a lot from reading his blogs and rants 🙂 So, I titled this one “Ken”, it was taken at the corner of DeAbrue and Duncan Streets (north-west corner)
Ken
The second one, I wish I had spent more time on, the scene reminded me of a photograph I once saw from Errol Ross Brewster, and I am ashamed I let the rain chase me away from this spot without getting more out of it, but there you go, the Canon T1i isn’t weather-sealed. This is at the corner of William and Middleton Streets (north-east corner), it is a single image, but I used HDR Efex Pro to recover some detail in the clouds, in the shot it was totally blown out.
Although the “Deck week” ends on Friday, I usually try to post by the Friday, but this week I held off, hoping to get some more photographs, but that didn’t work out 🙂 The main activity this week was the Festive Lantern Display that I blogged about for the eve of Chinese New Year.
I actually have another photograph from that evening that I favour, so that’s going to be the photo for the Deck this week. The Khom Fei is like other chinese (oriental) lanterns in that they are made of paper, it is lightweight, stretched on a frame and carries a cross-piece at the base for the heat source.
In this photo, a few people help to hold the Lantern while the lantern fills with the hot air, eventually it will get hot enough to rise on its own, much like a hot-air balloon.
Happy New Year! Today is Chinese New Year, the year of the Rabbit! To anyone of the Elmer Fudd persuasion, leave the Wabbits alone, go Duck hunting 🙂
Last night there was a display of Festive Lanterns, or Khom Fai, to mark the occasion in Guyana, and it was a very nice display, if you got there in time. And when I say in time I mean before the time that was originally advertised. Originally billed for a 7pm start (even one of the organisers Facebook page has it that way still) there was apparently a change during the day and it was moved up, anyone reaching for 7pm would have missed it (almost entirely), I arrived 15 minutes before seven and almost missed it 🙂 Maybe next year I’ll camp out an hour before hand. It was held at the Parade Ground, Georgetown.
It’s not a great photo, but it gives you the idea of what went on!
I went out on at least two occasions this week with the sole intention of using the Sigma 10-20 Ultra-wide angle lens. Just so that I didn’t disappoint myself I made sure I chose one of those for this week’s Deck photo 🙂
This is what remains of the building that housed Frandec Travel Service and Frandec Health Insurance, it was one of Georgetown’s old wooden structures, nothing as fancy as a Victorian Styled Mansion but nevertheless, it gave the area some of it’s character.
I almost thought that I’d have to re-post Compton as my Deck Photo this week, I didn’t do much photography until the end of the week 🙂
I had the chance to re-visit a scene I had done a few year’s ago, back when I was shooting the Canon PowerShot S5 IS, which I still miss. The scene was on Sheriff Street, and it was a photo that was “borrowed” from my Flickr photostream to be used on a Facebook page about Guyana.
Once again, it’s Twilight time and the sky is touched by the wings of the angels, the wands of the fairies, or just one of those physical phenomenons of light on particles in the air 🙂
I hope you like it.
The Street that never Sleeps. Handheld, 1/13s, f/3.5, ISO400, 18mm
Buddy’s Pool Hall give s a nice addition of lights to the street, and it is Sheriff Street, the street that never sleeps!
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