Tag: The Michael Lam Collection

2015 Deck – Week 02

On By themichaellamcollectionIn 2015 Deck, Photography2 Comments

Although I am keeping an eye out for “square(s)” upon which to base my compositions this month, I didn’t intend to include one in each photo I choose for the Deck Project, but, coincidentally, this one met both criteria (so to speak)

I noticed the square shape of the front of the food cart (or juice cart), and the square doors, I ran upstairs to grab the camera (light conditions not ideal for the phone), when I came down the vendor himself had moved away from the cart (still to be seen wearing a beanie cap or tam and glasses at the back of the group of people), I was lucky enough to catch this “active” scene.

Everyone was trying to stay dry, from the cart-man to the pedestrians to patrons of the fast-food restaurant on the corner.

Staying Dry |  Canon EOS6D, Canon 24-105L  |  1/200s, f/5.0, ISO 200 (cropped)

I cropped the image for the final composition, because, frankly speaking, I was trying to stay dry too 🙂

Click on the image to see it in the gallery.

Men and Boys

On By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography, thoughts2 Comments

I was originally just going to upload the photo and post a link to Facebook, but then I decided I actually had something to say…

Across the globe things are changing, rapidly in some places, slowly in others.  While everyone is striving for an education and a job that earns a high salary, I think we too easily forget the way of life that actually matters; satisfaction at the end of the day’s work, a ready smile for friends and strangers alike, playtime as well as work-time, and actually caring about another human being.

This photo reminded me that we should pass onto other generations the joy of life, of actually living, and not just the drudgery of daily toil that has no reward but a monetary one.

Work hard, but enjoy the benefits of your labour, be able to say “I did that” with pride and with satisfaction; play easily without the need for satisfaction, but able to enjoy it for what it is, human interaction and the joy of Life; cry for joy and for sadness, because sadness means you were once joyful.

Look towards the horizon, curiosity is a good thing, but remember your roots, remember Home.

Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 18-270mm  |  1/125s, f/8.0, ISO 200 (46mm)

Click on the image to see it in the “Up East” Gallery (it only has 14 pieces so far) 🙂

Fishermen

On By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography2 Comments

Third time.

I have no idea why I keep going back to this particular set of images, I’d shot a few frames of these fishermen on a photowalk in 2013, and I realized yesterday I’d now processed three of them…

one was a cover image for my Facebook page, a second one I had processed as a vignetted sepia image (two years ago):

And yesterday, I clicked on one and felt the need to process it in black and white…

Different but similar images, treated differently, tell different stories.

Click on the images to see them in their respective Galleries.

Smoke Signals

On By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography, Seascape3 Comments

There was this “plume” of clouds in the sky that reminded me of the smoke signals I remember seeing in old Western movies, except that it was more contiguous than the separate puffs that I remember from the movies.

I was trying to get an average exposure, but no matter what I did that day the birds in the boat just “glowed”, the intensity of the afternoon sun I guess was just too much for my camera lens/sensor.

I only looked back at this image today and decided to process it through anyway 🙂

Canon EOS 60D  |  Sigma 10-20mm EX Lens (@20mm, 1/125s, ISO100)

Click on the image to see it in the Black and White Gallery, along with many other of my Black and White images.

Glee and Garbage

On By themichaellamcollectionIn Commentary, Photography, thoughts5 Comments

It is usually a breath of fresh air to read in the newspapers that some small group of people have embarked upon a “clean-up campaign” along our seawalls; one of the more recent ones would have been the one involving the Ministry of Natural Resources, the EPA (Guyana) along with the Pick It Up Guyana campaign, in the past the Guyana Shines group did a stint, on International Coastal Clean-up Day various NGOs came out in numbers, even the national Football (real football, not that American thing) Team even joined Youths For Guyana on a round of cleaning.

I prefer to re-iterate that cleaning up is an after-the-fact solution, our primary goal should be NOT to litter in the first place, we should be encouraging our peers, and children on a daily basis to do the right thing and put it in the trash!

How hard is it to keep your trash with you until you reach a suitable receptacle (the garbage bin in your yard works marvellously for this) to dispose of it in the right way?

When I take photos along our coast, invariably there is trash within spitting distance, much less within the scope of my camera lens, some of us include it deliberately to make a point, many of us (myself inclusive) try to compose to minimise the presence of the debris and detritus.

When I took this photo two years ago, I dismissed it out of hand as not appropriate for what I was doing at the time, but now, I think it makes a statement.  Why should our children, who look forward gleefully to playing on the seawalls and seashore, be subject to the dangers, physical and health-wise,  of the abundant and widespread disposal and accumulation of garbage on the seawalls?

We shouldn’t have to “Pick It Up” because we shouldn’t have thrown it down in the first place, let us live not for now, but for the future, our children’s future.

Click on the image to see it in the “Streets” gallery

2015 Deck – Week 01

On By themichaellamcollectionIn 2015 Deck, Photography2 Comments

Every year I have a photography project that I call The Deck, it’s basically what other photogs refer to as a Project 52, one photo for every week of the year.  The main reason I do it is to keep me shooting, with work and family life it is easy to sometimes put the camera down and not shoot anything, and I prefer not to have that happen, some weeks I get good stuff, other weeks I get a load of crap, even in those weeks the “crap” has to have something salvageable, and I find that in those instances I find myself seeking out the basics of the composition and putting the little artistic portion of my mind to work for the best processing possible to make it worthy of the project, failing which that would be the end of the Project, and I don’t really want that.

In shooting images all year round, I get more than I need for The Deck, and out of these I’ve been able to narrow down some to my Oniabo collection, I intend to keep the Deck Project going, and hopefully get more smaller collections developing.

I decided that for January 2015 I want to also try and photograph (not exclusively) around a sub-theme: Square.  I started using Instagram (see my last post) and the square composition, while at first very ill-fitting for me, has become a bit more appealing, so my first week’s image will be an Instagram photo, and I hope to include “square” into other images for the month, not necessarily as the crop ratio, but maybe as elements in the composition.

Since you’ve probably already seen the last post I did, and in there is the image I chose for this week’s Deck photo.

Respect – Samsung S5 Mini Duos  | Instagram

In Guyana, we have many cultures that have merged into this cook-up that we call our “One People”, and many are from the east, as in Asia, most eastern culture have in their traditions or as part of their religious beliefs the habit of removing one’s footwear when entering a home.

I’ve always seen this as a sign of respect, but I also know that in some religions it is mandatory, and in some cultures such as in Japan it was originally a hygiene/health habit (not tracking dirt and germs into the space that you eat and sleep).

In many parts of Guyana, this is how we’ve been taught, but the western culture has slowly crept in over the years and the respect we the dwellers show the visitors to our homes is one of acceptance, in that we may ask them to take off their shoes, and they may refuse, often we let our own judgement dictate who to ask and who not to.

In this photo, I also show respect for the change in photography as it widens its doors to an acceptance of non-traditional devices, processing and distribution methods, my older phones would produce some real crap, but with my current phone, I think I can produce acceptable images.

Click on the image to see it in the Gallery.

2015

On By themichaellamcollectionIn Photography2 Comments

I began using Instagram when I got my hands on a phone using the Android OS, and I like how it challenges the way I look at a scene; after composing images in wider (or taller) formats thinking “square” had it’s challenges, but it’s fun.

And it is almost too easy to use… makes you want to put down your larger cameras and just use the phone… which is exactly what I did on New Year’s Day.

Many of you may not use Instagram, so I’m posting images and the Instagram links here for these select images.

There is a thread running through these images, but I don’t expect anyone to get it, and that’s fine, they are simply photos that I wanted to share.

Chef Vishal

Bush Construction

Welcome

Respect

Here’s wishing you a Happy 2015, one filled with surprises, great expectations, few regrets, fewer disappointments and lots of Love!!

2014 Deck – Week 52

On By themichaellamcollectionIn 2014 Deck, Photography1 Comment

Another year, another 52 images for the project.  Almost thought I wouldn’t make it this year…  My fascination with Jhandi flags on the shore as well as my focus on seascapes has spurred some thoughts to the cohesion of images into proper collections…  My Oniabo collection is still taking shape and I hope that the new year will bear fruit in similar manner.

The last photo of the year exhibits the theme nicely, in colour, so it would not be a part of my Oniabo Collection, but it is a seascape with Jhandi flags at Lusignan.

After taking a series of images here, with both the Canon 60D and the Canon 6D, I then used my phone to snap one for Instagram, and I rather like that one!

Canon 60D, Sigma 10-20mm  |  1/250s, f/11, ISO 100  |  Lusignan ECD.

Click on the image to see it in the Gallery along with all the images from this year’s Deck Project.

2014 Deck – Week 50

On By themichaellamcollectionIn 2014 Deck, Photography1 Comment

In week 50 of 2014 I took a lot of photos, however most of them were on a photo shoot for a family, who specifically asked that we (Fidal and I) don’t share publicly, I don’t do those types of shoots normally so I was looking forward to it, and I think I got a few nice ones 🙂

So since practically all my photos for that week were scratched I fell back on one I took that was during the shoot but not of the family 🙂

If it messes with your eyes, it’s doing the same thing to mine… cool!!

47mm, f/4.0, ISO 800

Click on the image to see it in the Gallery