Deadly Waters

A volunteer searcher scans the shoreline for the remains of a drowning victim.
  

When I started this little blog I never thought I would use this media as a forum for a public service announcement. However it dawned on me that the primary reason folks visit Peggy’s Cove, Nova Scotia, is to marvel at its rugged beauty and take photographs – millions upon millions of photographs. I too have taken my fair share of images of this tourist icon.

I am also a search and rescue volunteer who has been called to this same location in that capacity, most recently just two days ago. Yes, the beauty of Peggy’s Cove can also bring tragedy. I won’t go into any details, but let’s just say it is not much fun when the outcome is inevitable. The Atlantic Ocean is that unforgiving and does not have a conscience.

Based on my 15 years experience of sailing on King Neptune’s briny ocean from above the Arctic Circle to below the equator in waves as high as 83 feet, I fully understand the power of a single wave. It can break arms, legs, backs, and worse still, claim a life.

If I am sounding as an alarmist – good. I will not apologize.

I am begging any photographer who goes to Peggy’s Cove to use common sense. Please. Heed the signs and if that rock is black or wet, it means a wave has already been there – another is inevitable.




The warning signs are not placed to enhance beauty. Unfortunately they are not heeded.

And yes, that one single wave can sweep you off your feet, and I will receive another phone call in my volunteer capacity. None of us want that, especially your family.

So please, if you happen to be along the shoreline of not just Peggy’s Cove, but the entire Atlantic Canada coastline, please think of your future and not your picture.

ON ASSIGNMENT

This was a dream job. Over the next few posts I will introduce you to some of the locations and perhaps a few of the challenges the crew faced.

I had already been to most of these Cape Breton Island locations previously, and was familiar with many of the folks working at those venues. Golf was a relatively new pursuit for me, and the Parks Canada locations seemed very much like a home coming of sorts. Each was to present a creative challenge: with golf I had to learn the game as I am not a duffer, and with Fortress Louisbourg it was to come up with something new and fresh.

But first we had to get to Cape Breton and the acclaimed Cabot Trail, and more specifically Cape Smokey. Our crew was blessed with a magician as a production manager. I didn’t see her pull any rabbits out of a hat but she had a Mazda Miata drop from the sky, and land right on top of Smokey 15-minutes before the 6:30 call.

I don’t believe the details of how we avoided traffic on a public highway are necessary, but let’s just say there isn’t too much volume early on a Sunday morning. Pre-scouting revealed a location where the sun would be rising perpendicular to the highway at 6:49AM. Consequently, we knew from experience that a polarizing filter would perform at its optimum efficiency and this would be necessary to control the reflections that were certain to bounce off the car. The Singh Ray LB Warming polarizer was the obvious choice to also control the sky-blues that would reflect on the top-surface of the car, and generally warm the overall scene. In fact, I rarely take this filter off my lenses – I see no reason to.

Canon 5D MkII, 24-105 USM lens, Singh Ray LB Warming Polarizing filter

Some post production work remains to meet the clients needs, but generally we were able to capture a useable image from which to work.

Next stop was the Celtic Music Interpretive Centre in Inverness County.

Cape Breton and celtic music fit like a pocket on a shirt – they are a natural. I won’t go into the background of Cape Breton music as it is deserving of a book, but check out the site. Suffice to say I don’t know if it is possible to be around a Cape Breton fiddle and not start tapping your toes; so how is one supposed to do a photo shoot when one of the better players is in the next room playing at the Sunday afternoon ceilidh?

The objective of this stop was to show the interaction of a student and instructor, and we did get that shot for the client. Once we were finished that shot, I wanted to take a few extra minutes and capture a portrait of the student. While it is true the piano most often accompanies the fiddle, this antique pump organ really captured my attention; perhaps because it was like the one in my grandparents house when I was a kid (no that does not make me an antique by default).

Canon 5D MkII, 24-105 USM lens, Singh Ray LB Warming Polarizing filter

One of the downsides of this shot was that we had no time to establish the direction – it was quite literally a gun-and-run. The lighting was very simple: A Canon 580EX in a ¾ back location and a second 580EX above and slightly to the left of the camera as a fill. I rarely use these flashes without the ST-E2 onboard the camera as it makes life so easy. In this case, and I’m guessing, the ratio was established at 4:1, with a shallow focus. Further selective focus was done in post production, but other than that this is pretty much a grab shot that was done in about 5-minutes.

So concluded the first day of this shoot – sailing on the incredible Bras d’Or Lake at sunrise awaits.

Semi-palmated Sandpipers Re-Visited

Semi-palmated Sandpipers feeding on mud shrimp.

Canon 5D MkII, 24-105mm lens, Singh-Ray LB Warming Polarizer

I hadn’t forgotten, but I knew it was getting late. That’s when our 15-year old son asked: “Are we going to Evangeline Beach to see the birds this year?”

The book deadline could wait, the job quote I was working on could wait, the fact that we were going through an oppressive heat wave didn’t matter. When a teenager asks to do something that doesn’t involve body gyrations that seem to be connected to thumb-induced instructions that somehow tie into a television screen, all else can wait.

This year I was going to do something different. I had a pair of pocket wizards that had been laying around for about a year-and-a-half, and as I recall I had difficulty getting them working on command. Experience had shown, however, that the difficulty usually related to the operator and not the equipment. Sounded like a good opportunity to have my son engaged during the one-hour trip to the beach. Much to my chagrin, and not surprisingly, it took him about 5-minutes to have all working well.

Earlier he had this great idea that we should put on a wide angle lens and try to get some intimate, in-your-face, type portraits of the sandpipers by shooting the camera remote. All worked well, except we hadn’t calculated that the birds follow the ebb tide as they feed on mud shrimp, a Bay of Fundy tide that recedes at about 8 miles per hour. In short, we would just get the camera planted and by the time we got back outside the birds comfort zone, the tide would be too far out.

A flock dips-and-dives their way in to a landing right in front of a remote triggered camera. 

Canon 5D MkII, 24-105mm lens, Singh-Ray LB Warming Polarizer

We played “chase the tide” two or three times and decided we were simply stressing the birds too much with all our movement to the shoreline to advance the camera. So we just sat on the beach and silently marvelled at this incredible migration while the sandpipers feasted in peace.

The pictures attached to this post were all made by our son. Sometimes our best moments as photographers are not in the gratification of getting that perfect shot, but in the satisfaction of enjoying quality time with family while enjoying the pure pleasure of each other’s company in a common interest.

On the drive home he looks at me and says: You know, I think if we got a small Remote Controlled pick-up truck and mounted the camera on the back we could then just drive it through the birds without distracting them and get some really good pictures. Mmm, I thought ... “I suppose you should have a couple of boom arms on either side to attach flashes as well?” His response was very succinct and matter of factly: “That would work.”

I have a funny feeling I know what our winter project will be.

A small flock of sandpipers take flight over Fundy waters.

Canon 5D MkII, 100-400mm lens

It's All About The Screen

I have had more than a handful of enquiries over the last several weeks how I created that surreal look on the lichen and rock picture posted on 27 January.

I wish I could take claim to some great creative innovation, but I can’t. The inspiration, as mentioned in that post, belongs to Michael Orton. Whereas the Orton technique was developed on film, I have developed my own recipe in Photoshop to mimic the original ethereal look and feel that it creates.

Please bear in mind that the technique works on some images, and not at all on others. With Photoshop as your kitchen, here is my recipe:

1. Open image in Photoshop
2. Create a duplicate layer of the “Background” and call this new layer “Base Layer”
3. Create a duplicate layer of the Base Layer and call this new layer “Screen Layer”
4. With Screen Layer active, change Blend Mode to Screen
5. With Screen Layer active, select Merge Down
6. Create a duplicate layer of the Base Layer and call this new Layer “Blur Layer”
7. With the Blur Layer active, go to the Filter Menu and Gaussian Blur. Adjust the blur to the point that there is barely any detail visible in the image
8. With the Blur Layer active, change the Blending Mode to Multiply, and adjust the opacity and/or fill to attain the desired look
9. Flatten the Image, and adjust to taste.

This is the exact process I have used in the below image. I will confess this is not the greatest image for this technique, but it does show the effect.

Sugar Maple in Winter, Lynne Mtn., Colchester County, Nova Scotia

By comparison in the image below the multiply mode simply would not provide the desired ethereal look. Consequently, what I have done is used a “Hard Light” blending mode, and this allows the trees to be more, dare I say, avant-garde.

Beaver Dam in Winter, Thomson, Cumberland County, Nova Scotia

I have also found that many photographers today are experimenting with HDR and tonal mapping – whatever that really might be. Should one wish to be experimental with the above recipe, sans the blur layer, this technique will also add a lot of depth and tonal range to an image. Be forewarned, however, some layer masking will more than likely be necessary. With that having been said, you should be provided with a really pleasing histogram and very little opportunity for clipping to sneak in on either end.

Hope you have as much fun as I using this recipe. Now get cooking.

Sticks and Stones

Coastal wind swept birch in winter.

By now you are probably starting to think I might be suffering from bouts of depression. I am – we just can’t seem to get into the throws of winter. It snows one day and rains the next, making it very difficult to get some vibrant clean white snow pictures of the season.

Consequently I admitted defeat and reverted back to something I learned a long time ago: Shoot subject matter that is enhanced by the current conditions and stop feeling sorry for yourself. (The other option is a real 9-5 job! Yikes.)

Unbeknownst to me I had been over the years making photographs of trees that had a unique look or feel for no particular purpose. Similarly I had also been making photographs of rocks with no particular purpose in mind. In retrospect I can look at these images and see that they were mostly taken in what one might consider poor lighting conditions. But poor for what? Flat even light is great for doing portraits; be that portraits of people, trees or rocks. I have since come to the realization that what I have been unknowingly doing all these years was developing a portfolio I have since come to call “Sticks and Stones.”

Lichen on Coastal Upland Rocks

Here is this weeks offering. Both images have been enhanced digitally using a technique that is my own spin on the Orton Effect and layer masking. Giving credit where due, Michael Orton is British Columbia photographer who developed this technique back in the days of film by sandwiching two slides together. My good friend, and Ottawa photographer Garry Black, has a tutorial on the Orton Effect here http://www.garryblack.com/digitalorton.htm . My technique is somewhat different, but the results are very similar. As in any learned skill, embrace something you enjoy and then endeavour to make it your own.

So the moral of this story is ... just get out and shoot. It is necessary to keep one’s sanity.

Finally - Snow

“Winter is nature’s way of saying, “Up Yours.”

- Robert Byrne.

Finally, after two months of living in the doldrums of the dreaded tween’ season, we finally got our first good dump of snow. It really wasn’t that much in the big scheme of things, but it certainly covered those dull browns that seemed to be everywhere. And only after about 30 minutes of sunshine in the morning, and if only to tick me off, the temperature rose and the rain started.

Those 30 minutes were fabulous though. The chickadees and nuthatches were busy at their feeder, while the pair of downy and hairy woodpeckers busied themselves at the suet feeder. Of course, Ole Cockee knows that bad weather means his smaller avian friends will be working overtime at the feeders and this translates to some pretty good pickens for him at ground level. Sure enough, in he comes with the regal strut worthy only of the king of the walk.

And just as fast that early morning light came, it went.

Hey, Mr Byrne: Up yours; I’ll welcome winter with a smile on my face as it warms the heart and soul.

Evolutionary Process

 

Darwin said it best, and I paraphrase: Get on the turnip truck or roll off and be lost.

For reasons that are very clear to me I still prefer the smell and feel of a finely crafted coffee table book, its pages creaking with delight as if beckoning the explorer to slow down and enjoy. I’ve only placed my nose up to a monitor once to get a whiff of a new e-book, and that on an older CRT screen. The sound that evolved was me cursing and swearing as I got a zap of static electricity through my right nostril that fully embedded within the grey matter. The result was fatal and lasting – it would seem I have climbed aboard the turnip truck.

And so, with this first post I certainly want to make it clear that it will not be my intent to offer words of philosophical wisdom and meanderings as I believe we often take life too seriously. We should loosen up and smell the daisy’s from the topside, there will be far too much time to lament and correct the woes of the world when we view that same daisy from the bottom side.

Hopefully, as this blog evolves, I will be able to share my photographic experiences and locations with you.

First up is the annual aerial ballet that occurs every late summer, usually peaking around 20-25 August along the mud encrusted shorelines of the Bay of Fundy. Although several species of shorebirds will be intermixed, the star attraction is the semipalmated sandpiper that will appear on the horizon in a long defensive formation that dances, twists and turns it way across the sky as only a gymnast can make a length of ribbon come to life.

By the thousands, and indeed tens-of-thousands, they will gravitate to the receding Fundy tide and newly exposed shoreline to feed on the resident mud shrimp in preparation for their 4000 kilometre nonstop flight over open water to South America.

Key locations to observe and photograph this incredible natural attraction are Mary’s Point and Cape Dorchester in New Brunswick, and Evangeline Beach in Nova Scotia.

Now that I have shared these locations with you I have but several requests: Stay off the beach itself so the birds will land (feeding is crucial for their survival), don’t leave any garbage behind, and enjoy one of the most enjoyable and naturally natural displays to be found in eastern Canada.