2012 Deck – Week 20

On June 16, 2012June 16, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography1 Comment

Aday.org had come up with an idea to present “A day in the world” through photographs, they wanted photographers worldwide, from amateurs to professionals, basically anyone with a camera, to take a few photos on May 15th and upload them to their site. They had so many uploads they quickly got problems handling it and I am still not sure if my photos are there and if they are eligible for the final project, I think a lot of the information went AWOL during the upload. At the time of writing this blog-post, they are still sorting out everything to relaunch the website.

I took a few photos within the city to contribute, and I am choosing one of those to share as my photograph for Week 20 of this year.

Its a very familiar scene in Georgetown, this was “after-work” and these people are most likely workers on their way from their jobs to get transportation home, and I used City Hall as a backdrop for some added familiarity 🙂

Click on the image to see it better in the Gallery.

2012 Deck – Week 19

On June 13, 2012June 13, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography4 Comments

This week almost passed without me having taken any photos. I had some slim pickings, but I think I got a nice one.

Nikhil has often used the word “Grok” especially as relating to “grokking the scene”. It has become more important to grok the scene if you want to capture and express through the photograph what it is the scene says to you.

Even though I thought I had heard the word before, no one lese I know has ever used it as often as he does.

I check it up on Wikipedia and then thought to myself, “that’s where it came from!”, apparently coined by the author Robert Heinlein in his novel “Stranger in a Strange Land”. I love the definition given for it in the novel (keep inmind that it is a Science Fiction novel set on Mars)

Grok means to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the observed—to merge, blend, intermarry, lose identity in group experience. It means almost everything that we mean by religion, philosophy, and science—and it means as little to us (because of our Earthling assumptions) as color means to a blind man.

Can we understand a scene so completely that we become as one with it? That is probably something to aim for, to achieve it would be great,

Here’s a photo of Nikhil, Grokking the scene 🙂

Click on the image for a better view in the Gallery, and if you haven’t seen the other entries for the Deck project they’re all over there in the Gallery.

2012 Deck – Week 18

On June 8, 2012June 8, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography2 Comments

Lunar Perigee and the 2012 Supermoon

In 2011 and 2012 there was much reference to the term Supermoon, which is an astrological term, as opposed to the Astronomical term Perigee. What was so Super about it? Well, I was out there and it looked like a regular full moon, but we’d all love to believe that we could see it larger and brighter than at other times 🙂

Perigee is the time at which the moon is closest in its orbit to the earth (doesn’t matter what phase it’s in), while the Supermoon refers to a New or Full moon that occurs when the moon is within 90% of its closest approach to the earth in its orbit. So I suppose that the perfect Supermoon would be a Full moon at Perigee 🙂 (incidentally, the time when the moon is furthest away from the earth in its orbit is called Apogee)

The Perigee varies from around 357,000km to 369,000km (in roundish figures), and while a difference of 12,000km sounds like a lot, the difference to the naked eye is negligible.

On May 5th, the moon was at its fullest at 1 minute to its perigee, so that’s about as perfect a Supermoon as we can get I suppose.

Anyway… on May 5th this year, I was up the coast near Lusignan when this year’s “Supermoon” was supposed to occur, two things happened (well, more than two, but two that are relevant to this post); I had lent out my telephoto lens, so getting a close-up was out of the question, and the clouds were conspiring against me, So I ended up with a wide shot full of clouds 🙂

After playing hide-and-seek with the moon for several minutes I gave up and headed out, one that I took would work, so this is one that worked 🙂

Click on the image to see it better in the Gallery.

2012 Deck – Week 17

On June 5, 2012June 5, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography8 Comments

Fortunately for me, during the 17th Week of the year (or starting it, more precisely) was a mass celebrating the opening of the 56th Plenary Meeting of the Antilles Episcopal Conference in Guyana. Months prior to it, I was asked to help cover the event photographically, specifically the group photograph of the Bishops attending, while I usually don’t do portrait photos, I finally acquiesced to give it a try, and was permitted to call in some help.

I was fortunate to have helping me, for the mass coverage, four other photographers, who volunteered their time and expertise; Troy Parboo, Fidal Bassier, Derek Rogers and Joseph Lewis. I was truly glad for their assistance as I don’t do “people” and event photography too well, Troy and Fidal have had much experience in these areas and truly came through for me, and Derek Rogers has covered many events for more years than the rest of us combined, he also did my Wedding 🙂 Joseph came with less experience but much eagerness and a good knowledge of the proceedings that was invaluable.

It was agreed upon beforehand that the clergy of the church would prefer to have very few people “gallivanting” around the upper walkways, so I volunteered to be the one doing the running around (okay, I hogged it!)

This week’s deck photo I chose from that set. After taking a group photo of the Bishops, I ran across the road, hurried through the church and scampered all the way up to an overhead walkway that allowed a very high vantage point (Bishop Francis had expressed a desire to have a photo from up there after I had mentioned the view).

Although I have a liking for many of the others that I took, I chose this one for the Deck, it shows the High Altar of the Cathedral from above, with all the Bishops, Monsignor, Priests, Deacon and Altar Servers. It also shows a bit of the “Our Lady” altar behind, the passage (to the left) that I took around the altar and the pipes of the old Pipe Organ on the right.

Click on the photo for a better view in the Gallery, also in the album there are a few others from the event that I chose to share.

2012 Deck – Week 16

On May 31, 2012May 31, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography5 Comments

I’ve been staring at this photo for weeks, and finding the right words to accompany it in the blog seems to be hard…

It’s a great spot, it has the Kissing Bridge, popular with brides and lovers, photographers and kids who like to run over it back and forth. The pond has the manatees, where kids come to feed them on afternoons, there are little spots where families picnic and relax, and it’s where budding artists sit and sketch simply because there is so much of interest around.

Does it have too much? is the photo crowded? Am I just being hard on myself? Who knows…. but this is the photo for Week 16 🙂

Click on the photo for a much better view in the Gallery

2012 Deck – Week 15

On May 18, 2012May 18, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography5 Comments

Easter Week. I suppose that the easiest thing to try to get photographs of for Easter Week is of children flying their kites (at least in Guyana, anyway). On Easter Monday we went to the seashore near Annandale (someone referred to the spot as “Friendship”), on the Easy Coast of Demerara.

I was taking a photo of a spot where an old Koker (sluice) once stood, and my daughter and her cousin came over to play/annoy/get in the way and so I made good use of them as they were already in the scene 🙂

For a better view of the photo, please click on the image above to see it in the Gallery.

2012 Deck – Week 14

On April 30, 2012April 30, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography1 Comment

I am still going through my photos from the 2012 Pakaraima Mountain Safari, there are lots of photos of vehicles and mountains, and I think I’ll save those for my post about the Safari (I really have to get around to that!)

On the way back from Orinduik after a very gruelling drive through “Rock World” we stopped for a breather and for the other vehicles to make it safely through. I think that after making it through Rock World, if you smoke, you need a nice long pull on a cigarette, and if you drink, then you’d probably need a really stiff shot of something or a nice cold beer, and if neither option is available to you, then you need to go find something to just relax your mind and body and say “I’m alive!”

I grabbed my camera after I had gotten my legs to co-operate with general mobility, and went looking for things to shoot 🙂

This image was taken intentionally like this, also in post processing, the contrast slider in Lightroom was used liberally 🙂

As always, click on the image above for a better view in the Gallery 🙂

2012 Deck – Week 13

On April 27, 2012April 27, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography6 Comments

The thirteenth week of this year found me on the road trail, heading into the Pakaraima mountains towards Orinduik Falls on the Ireng River that borders Guyana and Brazil.

Although I took quite a few photographs, I had not been able to fully go through and process them, this week I did manage to do some narrowing down.

I have lots of photos of mountains and vehicles from the trip, not too many people, but I decided to go against the flow and choose one of a person…

When I took this photo I noticed the “look” in the eyes, Naseem had that Clint Eastwood stare, and with the hat and the general scene I was reminded of the spaghetti westerns.

Its not a Spaghetti Western, maybe we can call it a Macaroni Western, starring The Great N, and we’ll title it “A Neckful of Straps” 🙂 And the catchphrase could be “Mister, I’m watching you, one of these straps has your name on it.” 🙂

Although I was tempted to try for a “Technicolor” processing, I went for a copper-tone instead 🙂 As always, please click on the image to get a better view in the Gallery.

2012 Deck – Week 12

On April 13, 2012April 13, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography4 Comments

There was a competition in the Guyana Photographers’ Facebook Group on Colonial Architecture, it was getting very close to the deadline and there were very few entries, I “hurriedly” entered one that I took in passing, not a good shot by any standards, and regretted it immediately after.

Even if I am putting up a photo to “fill up space”, I should pay more attention, I have been less focused recently (no pun intended) , I can’t seem to get myself, the camera and the subjects to comply, to align properly.

I was out with Nikhil on a walk to get a photo for his 365 (366) Project and as we were wrapping up I saw this house and thought I should get a few snaps of it, and I knew right then that I had a better photograph than what I had recently dropped into the competition.

It was heavily overcast, and I deliberately composed it with lots of headroom.

As always, click on the image to see it larger in the Gallery 🙂

2012 Deck – Week 11

On March 29, 2012April 13, 2012 By themichaellamcollectionIn 2012 Deck, Photography4 Comments

I try not to do single image HDRs, that is, using a single exposure and tone-mapping it for greater detail throughout the scene, but sometimes I can never quite seem to get the processing on an image quite right in colour, and sometimes its an image that I would prefer not to use as a monochrome, so then I tone-map it in an HDR software to bring out that detail that I know is there.

This photo is of the Moravian Church in Queenstown, Guyana. It is more than a hundred years old.

It stands at the junction of Anira Street and New Garden Street, and there are utility posts and wires on two sides of it, I composed this to minimise the effect of those wires.