Victory

I took this photo today as I was walking around the quay. This was around 4:30, so people on the streets were going absolutely nuts from the gold medal in mens hockey. It was just incredible. With all the honking from roudy fans in their automobiles, it sounded like a stereotypical New York traffic jam. I was considering going to downtown to join in on the festivities, but I wanted to enjoy watching the closing ceremonies, so I went home instead. All in all, this was probably one of the greatest days in Canadian history

Going out for a date

And there I go again with my terrbile puns. I was quite surprised when I saw an actual date today, like, raw. I have no idea how you're supposed to eat it, but it looks damn cool. I put it next to an ordinary apple for comparrison. But yeah, after these past few blog posts about trying new things, this seems quite appropriate.

More tea?

So I had some friends over tonight, and of course we had some tea. It's this Irish Breakfast Tea and it's really good. For that matter, I tried adding milk to it for the first time, and it turned out great. I guess I just need to try out new things more often, and just go beyond the things I know I love.

Head on

One of the things I love about doing this daily photo thing is the new perepective I have of the world. I'm finding myself looking for new ways to look at things, like this doorknob for example. It's such a common item, used frequently each and every day, yet I never noticed it until today. The thing is, this kind of thing has been happening more and more in my everyday life, which is just awesome.

I'm not one enjoys living in regret, but to have had this kind of sight in my younger days would've changed many things. Not just like, taking pictures, but just seeing things in a different light. There seems to be beauty and complexity in everything in life. But hey, it's good now, and there's no reason it should change in the future

Pie Chart

Remember that post I wrote about pumpkin pie on saturday? Well I finished that pie and bought another one last night lol. I thought I might try a little play on words. Get it, it's a PIE chart...ha..hehe...he......no?

K I'm sorry, I just love really bad jokes. Anyways, for anyone who has tried using my camera, you've probably noticed that the lens seems like it's "zoomed in." I'm not going to go into detail about my lenses, but I'll just say that that lens has a minimum focusing distance of 45cm, meaning that I had to get my camera half a metre above my dining table. I'm quite thankful that I didn't break anything whilst balancing a tripod on the table

Go Canada Go!

I'm still working my way through the photos I've taken recently, so I haven't been able to put up the facebook album yet. In the meantime, I thought I'd share these shades that I purchased downtown yesterday. They look and feel great (and they were only 15 bucks). As I was walking around downtown yesterday, I noticed a lot, if not most people dressed up with crazy amounts of Olympic gear. I thought that those people were a little...off. But today I went out and bought an Olympic sweater and everything changed. I felt like suddenly I needed more. Much more. I didn't even need to think about it, I just saw myself in the mirror, and my first thought was that I needed more red on me. It's a strange sensation, kinda like patriotism, but not really. It's quite difficult to describe until you've experienced it for yourself :P

My own Olympic Torch

For the first time since the olympics started, I went to Vancouver today. It was an absolutly amazing experience, an I encourge anyone who has not gone to get going asap! The photo here is just a little fun we had when viewing the cauldron. We had considered doing the zipline, until we found out that there was to be a 9 hour wait from 9am. So that obviously didn't happen. We did, however, have a very productive day. I will post the link to the photos I took when I get them posted to facebook.

Ghost Ship

Don't you just hate it when you're out minding your own business, when all of a sudden, a ghost ship appears out of nowhere? Yeah, totally happened to me today.

I kid, of course. To those unfamiliar with this kind of photography, click the link here. Anyways, I thought I might experiment with HDR photos. I've hear mixed things about them. Some photographers say they love them, others say that they're way too overdone and borderline cliche. This is only my first attempt, so I still don't really know what I think about them. I might have to try more to get a better feel for the process.

Piece of heaven

I'm gunna be honest, I'm a man who loves his pumpkin pie. It really doesn't matter what time of year it is, anytime is good for pumpkin pie. In fact, I've gone as far as to make a limerick about my love for pumpkin pie

There once was a piece of pie

And not a single day would go by

that it wouldn't get eaten

or at least go meetin'

it's end of existence, goodbye!

Must've been moonglow

The moon's been absolutely beautiful these past fews days, so I just had to get a photo. I had to get out one of my older lenses just because it had that extra 100mm to it. But yeah, I then had to crop the photo quite a bit to get it to this point. Anyways, after that apple photo a few days ago, I thought I might go for the real deal.

Constants

So today I went out for lunch on Lonsdale Ave. with some friends, it was a lot of fun. By the end of it all, we were in a McDonalds and I ordered a happy meal. I honestly cannot remember the last time I ordered a happy meal. I'm talking like serveral years. And yet, in the midst of this ever-changing world, the happy meal had not been changed (very much).

Sure, there were new options to choose from, but the stuff I ordered as a kid are still there. Heck, even the dip for the chicken mcnuggets was the same, down to the packaging. I felt a surge of nostalgia at that moment, just from a happy meal. But I guess the best part is always getting that little toy. It just makes it all worthwhile :D

Nap time

Alrighty, so I decided to take my buddy out for some light painting tonight, and we managed to get a few epic shots (I'll post a link at the end) Anyways, it was his first time, as would be the case for most people. I must say, it feels a lot less freaky when there's somebody there with you out in the middle of nowhere. Although we met a few people on the way there, we were uninterrupted during the shooting, which worked out for the best.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=150690&id=516531871&l=9c11ff6fc4

That's no moon...

I decided that I might try some more different lighting techniques today. For this shot, I used a tiny flashlight to light the apple for a few seconds. I was experimenting with other methods, but I liked this one the best. After looking back at it, I realized that this apple reminded me of our beloved moon. The way we can tell that it's supposed to be a round object, and yet only a fraction is visible. It's funny to see patterns repeat on different scales like this.

Escape

Ugh, I'm sitting here trying to study for this test, and it's just not going well at all. I try this and that, and yet I still fail. I know grade 12 isn't supposed to be easy, but seriously, this is just ridiculous. I then started to think about a quote I heard a while back, "Death would be [the] escape from maddness." For anyone who knows where that quote came from, you get 10 points.

But yeah, I wouldn't really say that I agree with it. It just caught my attention and has given me something to think about for the past little while. It's not that I'm condiering suicde, cause that's just stupid. It's more a matter of why people might consider it. Math is hard, but it's nothing worth dying over.

Simplicity

Today is Feb 14th, commonly known as Valentine's Day. At first I had considered doing a picture with vibrant red hearts and such, but I decided against it. I chose to go against the status quo. As with most holidays in this day and age, Valentine's Day has become too commercial to mean anything real. It's just like, "I'm going to show you how much I love you because that's what I'm supposed to do today." And many, if not most poeple are fine with that. I just have a problem with that. No offence to all those in love today, good on you. I'm just wondering why one day of the year should be so special. One day is only 0.274% of the whole year.

Now people may argue, they act this way because it only happens once a year. In that case, it's only right to make it extra special, right? I guess so, except for the fact that the orgins make no sense. Personally, it bugs me when something this big doesn't have a concrete origin, like say.....the whole Terminator franchise. I could do an entire rant about the movies, but I'll save that for another time. What I'm trying to say here is that Valentine's Day doesn't make much sense to me.

I'm not trying to put down Valentine's Day or anything like that, and I'm certainly not trying to stop it from happening. I'd be a hypocrite if I argued against making the best of each day. I'd just like poeple to appreciate the love they have, not the love that they're supposed to have. Just remember, there's nothing sexier than authenticity.

Repeat

Alrighty, I was cleaning out my room today and found one of the first CDs I ever bought: Boston. I absolutely love that album, and when I found it on vinyl a few days ago, I was unbelievably happy. I must say, it sounds so much more....authentic. I guess the best way to describe it would be to say that it sounds less perfect. And when it comes to this genre of music, it really sounds amazing

Return of the Trippy Turtle

Although today did mark the opening of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, I think I've posted enough about the Olympics lately, so I thought I'd go back to an older post. It just stopped raining, and thought I might take advantage of the wet concrete outside of my house. Anyways, I really think it's interesting to note that it's been over a month since I posted that picture. For that matter, it's been well over a month now. Before you know it, the year will be gone. Might as well make the most of it then :P

Meet the gang

So I came home today to find out that my older brother had acquired some little Olympic mascots, and of course my first thought was how I would go about photographing them. Mind you, this basket was in a dark corner of the living room, so I had to get creative. I ended up using a giant lamp, diffused through an umbrella, all balanced on a chair. Recently I'm really pushing myself to get better results with less professional equipment, cause let's face it, I'm no professional. But overall, I'm quite pleased with the results

Torch

Today the people of North Vancouver were able to witness the olympic torch come through the city. It was quite an exciting event, with massive crowds of energetic people. Personally I'm quite excited for the olympics to start. Sure, there will be those inconveniences here and there, but come on, this is a once in a lifetime experience. Why not just make the most out of it? Live a little :D

Stars

For the first time in a long time, the stars were out. I decided that I might try another technique I read about, astrophotography. Now I don't have any fancy telescopes to take pictures of stars light years away, so i decided to bring back my kit lens. I usually don't use the kit lens because my other lenses have much better image quality. However, the kit happens to have a wider focal length, so it's good for this kind of scenario. Now I won't go into all the technical details about the picture, but I will just say that those streaks across the sky are all stars moving over the course of 32 minutes. The last thing I also wish to mention is that the sky was not blue, it just looks that way because of light pollution in this city. I gotta go camping sometime...

Forward reaction

To all my brethren in chemestry, I bet you're all laughing right now, both from the scientific incorrectness of the picture, and from the insanity than ensues from trying to comprend equilibrium. For everyone else, potatoes make potatoe salad.

Change is inevitable, but sometimes change has no effects. People often talk about how life would be perfect in equilibrium, with perfect balance. But from what I learned in chemestry class, reactions still occur on both sides of the equation in equilibrium, they just don't change anything. In that case, what's so great about change without change?

Still life

Now first off, I know that I didn't technically take this photo today, but I had not seen it until today because it was buried in with the other basketball photos. The whole process of shooting a basketball game takes quite a while as i learned this year. It starts with analyzing the gymnasium for locations and lighting, then trying to figure out which settings to use, and of course shooting the game. The hard part comes in at home when I sort through the hundreds of photos, and then editing the "good" photos to make them look nice. But I must say, it was interesting to see this photo mixed in with all these other action shots, especially since I had never tried a long exposure in a gym before.

I get by with a little help

Alrighty, so I did mention yesterday that something epic was coming, but this actually isn't what I had I mind. My original plan was to get yestersday's post up, then go outside for some wiked astrophotography, but when I got outside, the clouds were rolling in so I had to give up.

Anyways, I just think it would be interesting to see what would happen if I could have multiple copies of myself. In my younger days, I would have just told my copies to go and do all my homework and choores. But realistically, which copy is real? Do any of them have the right to have dominance over another? As I believe I may have mentioned in a previous post, "I think, therefore I am." If each copy can think for itself, it's as real as anything else in the world

Rush

Not going to lie, I got home today at 11:44pm for the first time. I literally had to run to my room to get my camera, and then think of, set up, take, download to computer, edit, export, and upload this photo. But I'm glad it turned out well. I'm actually going to be going out in a few minutes to try for tomorrow's photo, since it will be Feb. 6th in a few minutes. It's going to be EPIC

Awwwww

I got home about an hour ago after a 13.5 hour school day. Yeah, I left my house at 0800, and came home at 2130. But I had a fun day, what with dissecting a bovine heart, going to the French carnival, and finally the basketball game. The picture here just shows the free spirt I only wish I could have. I was lucky enough to be able to volunteer today at the carnival by supervising the digital media equipment. During my free time, I went around with my camera, and this is just a (excellent) sample of the things I managed to photograph

Growing up

I'm 17 years old. In about a month I will be 18. I'm still finding it difficult to believe that I'm not just a little kid anymore. Sure, there are always going to be adults telling me that I'm still just a child comparred to them. But comparred to elementary school kids, I'm pretty damn old. Everything in life tends to be arguably relative, and that just makes everything very inconvenient. By my age, I'm finding it more and more necessay to be able to define myself. Now the definition of define is: state or describe exactly the nature, scope, or meaning of.

That said, I'm sure if I can say that I know myself. I often find myself reflecting on everything in life except for myself. The times I do look into myself, I usually come out asking more questions than I did going in. Now some might say that this is a good thing, but the world generally doesn't care about who you are on the inside. As much as that sounded very pessimistic, hear me out. In the big picture, people are defined by their actions. And what do you know, we're back to define! On the other hand, actions are mostly influenced by who we are on the inside. So indirectly, the world cares about who you are on the inside, the world just doesn't want you to know.

^See, this is what happens when I start asking questions, I end up confusing myself quite a bit. Anyways, sorry for the long post, I just started writing and this thing came about

Fly away

It's no longer January, so each day feels closer to spring. I really think that spring is my favourite month of the year for several reasons. It's like it represents the continuation of the circle of life. You walk through a little path, and you just see all these little sprouts sticking out of the ground. Even the air feels really fresh, especially after the rain. It's just fantastic...unless you have allergies lol

Dad's collection

Alrighty, since I hadn't been able to update the blog properly, I thought I might try something new and special. I really have no experience with panoramas, but they have always intrigued me. I'm still trying to find the best stiching software, so if I can make a better version, I will update this post. But as for now, I'd just like to say how happy I am to be back at home with my camera and computer. It's not so much that I had this craving for technology while I was at Big White, but I did spend a fair amount of time checking out what I had missed while I was gone. I guess it's good that I don't surf the internet on my cell phone, or else my bills might be ridiculous :P