Unbalanced

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It’s been a while since I posted an image that a) was in colour and b) covered a subject other than the British Virgin Islands, so time for some variety.

I was photographing a concert last weekend (a very successful fundraiser for earthquake victims in New Zealand, held at a church in central Toronto). A concert in this setting can’t help but have a sense of formalism; the audience is expected to sit in the pews, and choirs take up defined positions in front of the audience to sing; everything is balanced.

Except for the foot thrust into the picture 🙂

 

Wrong Foot

Getting to What I Saw

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I was struck by the way this boat jutted out, like it had been thrust onto shore. Originally shot in colour with my D90, I used Silver Efex Pro 2 with a heavy red filter setting to darken the sky as much as possible. This plug-in really helped me go from what the camera recorded to what I saw.

Boat On the Beach

Copper Mine Ruins

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Back to digital for this one: one of the more interesting sites on Virgin Gorda is an old copper mine from the 19th century; on the top of a hill by the ocean, there are amazing images in every direction! This image was captured in colour, then converted to black and white with Silver Efex Pro 2.

Copper Mine Ruins 2

The Corridor

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In Virgin Gorda we passed this stand of trees every day, and every day it caught my eye, as it seemed like a corridor in a cathedral. I took many pictures of it, and I think this is the one that best captures the impression it made on me. For this image I used my Mamiya medium format camera, 55 mm wide angle lens, and Ilford Delta 100 film.

Tree Corridor, Analog Edition

In Closer

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There were a lot of fascinating trees in Virgin Gorda, including one that had basically taken root and grown on top of a boulder. I couldn’t get a satisfactory shot of the entire tree that I liked, so I went in closer to focus on the gloriously messy root structure. I used my Mamiya, and a combination of Ilford Delta 100 film and Xtol developer; this could become my goto combination for a lot of photography!

Roots on Rock 2

Young and Old

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Here is the second image I am posting that I created using my 4×5 Cambo SC view camera; it is a portrait of my older daughter Julia. What I enjoyed about creating this portrait was the low tech approach I used. The lens used was an old brass lens, a Busch “Rapid Symmetrical” that is at least a hundred years old. The lens board (used to attach the lens to the camera), was homemade, using two pieces of mat board, glued together. As for the exposure, since the lens has no shutter, I made the exposure (about 1.5 seconds, using a paper negative) by simply covering/uncovering the front of the lens with my hand. About as far from modern technology as one can get!

Daughter Julia

Cloud and Texture

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This image was created on the only cloudy day we experienced on VIrgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands. On a island known for sandy beaches and sun, I found this rocky beach fascinating. Much of the smaller rocks are actually old weathered pieces of coral that have washed onshore, along with small shells or broken bits of larger shells. Amazing textures, that demanded to be captured in black and white, so out came the medium format Mamiya, loaded with Tri-X.

A Rocky Beach On Virgin Gorda

From a Distance

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This image was made with my Nikon D90, and processed using the just released Nik Software Silver Efex Pro 2. We were all on the ferry boat from St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands to Virgin Gorda in the British Islands when I noticed this building on an island, quite some distance away. Luckily, as we left port we got close enough for me to take some images. Even though the original capture was a colour digital image, from the beginning I knew I needed a vintage black and white treatment, so Silver Efex to the rescue:

Entropy

Travel Textures

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I am continuing to work through the images I took in the British Virgin Islands, and while many of the photos are colour-centric (to be expected in a place where the ocean is a melange of breathtaking shades of blue), I do like the black and whites images I took. I’ve only had time to develop one roll so far, which contains images taken at “The Baths”, a famous beach on Virgin Gorda.

The Baths, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands

Virgin Gorda is not only a place of amazing colours, it is also a place of  amazing textures and shapes, and I am looking forward to developing the other black and white rolls I shot during my week in paradise.

Bottling Joy

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Last night I got back from a week in the British Virgin Islands. A business meeting, but no shortage of fun, and time for photography! (Both film and digital). The image below is one of my favourites from the trip: a couple living and loving the moment. Just for a moment, I felt like I had bottled joy.

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