I was playing around with my macro lens and the orbis ring; I was taking photos of another subject when my wine caught my attention. I wanted to see how the light would react with the liquid and the crystal. Today's photo is the result of that little experiment.
After a pretty busy weekend, I woke up Sunday not feeling very good. It was pretty much a day of meds, catching up on "Chuck" and snuggling with the pups. It's all I could handle.
The dogs love to snuggle, especially when I have a blanket. At one point, Mags decided she wanted to be on my shoulder. Truthfully, they do make me feel a little better.
Mike and Wendy had us over for dinner and a night of gaming and UFC. We broke out the new ascension set and it wad pretty fun. The first picture s of Mike and Wendy, and our first game. Maggie hate being left out and is constantly at my side, begging to sit on my lap.
Sometimes, it's annoying. Sometimes, I think it's pretty cute.
Friday night, I had the privilege of playing with a great group of guys at the Hope Mission. We had an hour and a half set. It was pretty fun and the opportunity to provide worship was amazing. I even got to sing a couple of songs. Can't wait to do it again!
Continuing on the theme from yesterday, here is another one of those "mistake" shots of Maggie. While yesterday's photo makes me laugh, I actually think this one is pretty cool. I love how her eyes look all marbley.
Okay, I know I made up that word, but it fits!
It's funny how you start out thinking you are going to take pictures of one subject, and then something happens like this one and it just makes you laugh.
I had setup my camera with my zoom/macro lens and my orbis. I had gotten the shots I thought I wanted and saw my Mags sitting so pretty. So I thought I would capture a couple shots; it's not like we really need more pictures of Maggie or Leo!
The orbis really took the red eye to extreme. This was one of the first shots. I was expecting that nice little ring catch light. I know technically, it's a mistake in the photo but it made me laugh.
Sometimes, you just never know what you are going to get.
This is my Leo. The first photo shoot I did with him, he was a rock star. Many photo shoots later, I'm lucky if he sits up and looks at me. This is one of the few good shots while using my orbis that I got of him. still. I think he looks pretty cool.
I guess I need to find some more volunteers to be my model!
I'm cheating a bit with my photo today. It's not even a photo that I've taken. But I figure, it's my blog. :)
Today is a tough day. It's the anniversary of my mom passing, my sisters choose not to remember this day, and prefer to remember just good memories. I don't know why it's important for me to remember but it is.
It's been four years. Sometimes it feel like only four years, and other times, it feels like she has been gone forever. I miss her so much. Four years and there is still a dull ache in my heart. It's just so tough. I miss how my family was before she passed. I miss knowing that she was there, somewhere, loving me and believing in me, and praying for me. There is so much that I would have loved to have shared over the past four years and I miss that I can't.
So, I'm taking this day to allow myself to feel that loss completely, right or wrong.
I miss you Mom.
Along with project 365, another goal for 2012 is adopting a healthier lifestyle. It's been a lot of hard work. I was disappointed in the results over the first two weeks of the year, so I decided to be more aggressive in my workout plan. My food dairy had also shown at I saw over my calorie goal about 45% of the time.
So I had decided to do the ten day Zumba workout plan and track my diet closely. I knew we were going to go out for dinner on Saturday, and with weekends being my toughest time, I had to be careful. It was tough; I ate really healthy all week and worked out six days. I said no to cake, donuts, homemade cookies, Chinese food and pizza (and that was JUST Friday!) If I wanted my favorite chicken burger Saturday, I had to say no to other stuff.
I knew we were going to Red Robin on Saturday, so I planned ahead what I was going to eat and planned my other meals accordingly.
And it worked! I'm happy with this weeks results and do not feel deprived at all! I'm feeling inspired to reach my goals!
This is DJ and this photo is for Saturday night. He's the reason that we have our Leo. We puppysat him over a weekend to see how if a bichon-shi tzu would be are on my husband's allergies. By the end of the weekend, we were looking for a dog of our own.
DJ loves the heat lamp. It's so cute how he walks up to it, checks to see of it's on and then relaxes. It kind of reminds me of the RCA dog, the way he looks at the dish and cocks his head to one side.
We had a great night visiting with DJ's owners. It was a great way to spend Saturday night!
Tonight, I had a rehearsal with several other musicians because we are playing at the Hope Mission soon. We had to prepare 1.5 hours worth of material and we worked on some songs tonight. It was actually a lot of fun. It was the first time I didn't feel completely lost. I must be learning!
This is a picture of Richard!! and me at rehearsal. Rock on dude!
During the ice walk last weekend, I took several HDR photos of the ice sculptures. Again, I really wasn't sure how they would turn out.
The dragon that we greeting everyone as they entered was particularly cool. I really wanted to capture the colours when they turned to blue. I had to wait a while to capture the right colour. The HDR does make them pop. I'm not sure I would be able to capture it any other way.
I still can't say that HDR of ice is my favorite but a few of my shots were pretty cool.
Chinese New Year is fast approaching, and 2012 is the Year of the Dragon. At the ice festival last weekend, there were several sculpture with a Chinese theme. In my opinion, they were probably the coolest sculptures there, apart from the ice slide. Unfortunately, Edmonton had been in a warm trend when the festival was on and they were having troubles preserving the sculptures.
I thought I would try taking some HDR shots of ice. I wasn't sure how it would turn out with the translucent and reflective surface. While they don't have the depth and texture of other HDR shots, it was fun to experiment. My only wish is that we were there a little bit later in the day so the colours would pop in the darker light.
I'm pretty embarrassed to say I've lived in Edmonton all my life and I never knew where to get on our streetcar, let alone taken a ride on it. In our walk around Whyte Ave on Saturday, I found out exactly where to catch the car and how much it cost. Who knew.
When I went to Italy, one of my favorite days was spent wandering around Florence just taking photos. I stayed in a spot as long as i wanted, and just let my feet take me in any direction.
A new goal for 2012 is to spend a day in Edmonton doing something similar; I will look at our city as a tourist wandering around our city enjoying the moments, and capturing them on camera. Who knows what else I will discover. Taking the streetcar will definitely be apart of that day!
I think I'll wait until summer though!
During our photowalk on Saturday, I saw this really cool mural across the street from the farmer's market. I thought it might be a cool shot to get a photo with it in the background with the Canadian flag that were there in the foreground.
It took a lot of shots, but I got a couple of cool ones. This one was probably one of my favorites.
Today started rough. I got very little sleep because my alarm clock app changed features and I was worried it wouldn't wake me for worship rehearsal. As a result, I was up every hour. Turns out I was right but it was user error; I had my iPad on mute.
I get to rehearsal to discover my bracelet my husband gave me wasn't on my wrist. I felt sick. It was a 40th birthday present. He had picked it out special after I spent a day with one dolphins in Florida. It was very sweet and I lost it. I'm sentimental that way. Luckily, it fell off at home, and what was lost was found-only after a few tears though.
After a much needed nap, we went to the Oilers game, where we won in overtime. He shoots, he scores! It was a better ending to a tough day.
I guess all in all, it was a good day. First world problems for sure! And really, they weren't problems.
Today's photos are of the missing bracelet and our seats at the game. They were pretty sweet!
Today, I spent the afternoon at a Photowalk organized by McBain camera. I was joined by my sister. We met up for lunch and then met up with Robert, from McBain, at the Walterdale theatre. It was a little chilly but not too bad.
We wandered in and around the farmers market for a couple of hours, and then went to the ice sculpture festival. It was starting to get cold towards the end. I'm warming up with Godiva liquor and coffee.
I took a lot of pictures and we will have to see what is on my role. In the meantime, the following picture caught my eye.
My poor pups had to sit through more photos so I could use my new Orbis flash. It was pretty cool. I love the ring look in their eyes.
Today's photo is of my sassy Maggie.
Today was a pretty great day. I picked up my Orbis flash and got to work with it. Dennis and I discovered a new Vietnamese restaurant in our neighborhood and it was yummy. Plans for Dennis's birthday are coming together. I had the fortitude to fit in a workout.
Icing on the cake; today was my "Friday." I have tomorrow off.
But the best event of the day was having my friend Christy over to help me work on harmonies over lunch. It was a lot of fun and pretty cool of her. I think I have a good game plan; now it's time to execute that plan!
To top it off, she agreed to be the subject of my first photo using my new Orbis flash adapter, and she is even letting me post it.
Happy Day!
I have to start off by saying today's photo is a screenshot of my iPad's web browser.
This is Orbis. It turns your speed light flash into a ring light. It's also my first purchase from the mecca of photography stores, B&H out of New York.
I'm so excited. I've been waiting for a week for this baby to arrive. My Purolator app indicates delivery was attempted today, which means that I probably will have to wait until tomorrow to get it.
That is probably a blessing since I have some practice to do tonight for this Sunday's worship. One more sleep!
This is my little drama queen. Maggie is full of sass and attitude. She actually decided to strike some poses when I set her up in front of my speedlite setup. I think the shot captures some of that attitude.
Once again, I took this photo using my off camera speedlite with a soft box. The more I use the setup, the more I like it.
One of my goals for 2012 is to make fitness and activity part of my lifestyle. My goal is to make as part of my routine as brushing my teeth. I figure if I can do that, I can make some permanent change. I'm hoping I can make some strides by the time we go on vacation for my husband's 40th Birthday.
Last week, I worked out four times and tonight, I did my first workout of the week. I'm really loving my Zumba dvd's. They are fun and challenging and I forget that I'm actually working out. For the most part anyway. I actually like the feeling that I've worked really hard.
And yeah, I always get this red when I workout.
Today was awesome!
I played piano for the first time with the worship band at church. Up until now, I've been playing strictly keyboard. I took classical piano when I was a kid, but this is a whole new experience for me.
I was pretty scared earlier in the week; I didn't know how to handle the fast songs. But a lot of practice this week and it turned out to be a lot of fun. I loved every minute of it. It was so much fun and the band was really supportive. It was a great confidence booster.
Today's picture is of me right after rehearsal before the service started.
Today's photo may look like one I posted already but it is not. The photo taken on January 4th was lit using studio lighting from Lightrein. I wanted to compare lighting systems and the results they produce. I set up the same staging and used a speedlight on a stand with a Firefly soft box.
I'm pretty happy with the result. I love the speed and the adaptability of the speedlight. I can buy equipment in smaller sections and build up my gear without spending huge amounts all at once. I would love to see how a larger softbox would work, and one will be on my list of purchases.
To make an easy comparison, I've reposted the January 4th photo, followed by today's picture. Let me know what you think and which shot you like better!
I spent the afternoon at CFER East. While I was there, a delivery of pipe arrived. The truck driver had a gorgeous dog named Haywire. He was a little camera shy but very sweet. I'm pretty sure he was a bull mastiff. My friend Wendy would love him.
I'm late posting Thursday's photo. In some ways, it is courtesy of my coworkers.
Just before I left for the day, a few of us were talking about the cool, geeky shows we used to watch in the 80's. The consensus was we loved "Quantum Leap" and "McGyver." Somehow the topic of cartoons came up and I mention my favorite, "Battle of the Planets" and one of my coworkers actually remembered it. I told him I have them on DVD. He was shocked they were available. He was more shocked when I told him the main voice was Casey Kasem.
So Chris, if you read this, here is your proof! All six DVD's!
I know; I'm a geek and proud of it!
2011 was the year I really discovered photography. My job needed me to start taking more photos, and invested in some lighting equipment and a new camera. I even took a studio lighting course. I am hooked.
I got the same camera for home. I love my Canon 60D. I'm lucky; I have at my disposal a studio light set and a speedlite set at work. Before the holidays, I was taking a lot of photos in the lab and I decided to experiment with Speedlites. They are fast, extremely mobile and versatile, and I have some pocket wizards that allow for triggering via radio frequencies. It's pretty amazing.
I've been wanting my own studio light system for quite awhile. I loved the class, and face it, the big equipment is down right cool. But now I'm not so sure which is the best investment for home. The studio lighting is really cool but takes a lot to set up, is expensive, and I find it tough to get subjects to sit for me.
This brings me today's photo. I had a free rental from a company called Lightrein. Once again, poor Maggie and Leo were forced to sit through a photo shoot. They weren't too cooperative but I did get one or two shots. This is one great shot of Leo that I touched up a bit. The equipment was great but now I'm starting to think I'd use the speedlite system more, especially right now. Plus, while it won't be cheaper, I can buy the equipment a bit at a time. There is some cool stuff out there too.
Before we take the tree down, I'm going to take similar photos using my speedlite and a soft box, and then compare the two shots. I'm hoping the experiment will help me decide what to get.
Yeah, I'm one of the thousands who, after eating a copious amount of turkey, have made a commitment to get back on track in 2012. So, it was back on the treadmill today.
I try not to make resolutions. I make lists of goals, and at the end of the year, I see how many I was able to accomplish. One of my goals is to make physical fitness part of my lifestyle.
Today's photo is the first step. Pun included.
It's the last day of vacation. I can't believe how quickly the holidays flew by. We maybe saw 4 movies in the theatre all year; two of them were during the break including the new Mission Impossible today.
We had friends say it Mission Impossible was better than the new Sherlock Holmes. I tend to agree...
We rang in the new year at Mike and Wendy's house. Along with Dale and Tammy, we rang in the new year with awesome food, great drinks and even better board games. I didn't win but we played my favorites "Ascension" and "7 Wonders." I don't think I've ever won the latter.
Today's photo is the first of 2012, so I felt I had to use it. It was taken shortly after midnight. I was trying to FaceTime with my sister and Dale wanted a photo. The iPad camera sucks but the photo had to be done! Gold crowns are courtesy of Christmas crackers provided by Mike and Wendy.
