1/60s | f4 | Av | 17-40L@29mm | ISO1600

1/125s | f4.5 | Av | 17-40L@40mm | ISO1600

1/40s | f4 | Av | 17-40L@40mm | ISO1600

1/160s | f4 | Av | 17-40L@17mm | ISO1600

1/30s | f4 | Av | 17-40L@40mm | ISO1600

1/125s | f4 | Av | 17-40L@40mm | ISO1600

1/25s | f4.5 | Av | 17-40L@17mm | ISO1600

1/160s | f4.5 | Av | 17-40L@26mm | ISO1600

There was a time when I really tried to snap some interesting and different pics to win some sort of recognition in photo contests. But when I realized that you give up your photo(s) to be used in whatever way the contest organizers want, I decided that my attitude had to change and stopped submitting pics. There comes a time in every artist’s life when they decide whether to share their art for profit or pleasure. I’m sure there are some out there that are thinking, “why can’t it go both ways?” Well, I’m the one writing and you’re reading so just stay with me here.

I consider talents and skills to be gifts. They can be given at any time, and taken away just as easily. And if you view art as an enterprise or business, then I don’t think it’s art anymore. Like if in the process of creating you ponder how you can make money out of this thing you’re making, then I think you’ve crossed that line. It’s not bad that you’re in that profit zone, but I think that’s misusing your gift. It’s just my opinion.

Don’t get me wrong, I love photos and videos. It’s a gift that I’m passionate about. And I’m fully aware of where that line exists in my life. When I get inspired, it’s full steam ahead. I do the best that I can, and as most of you know, I am my worst critic. But where I have been lacking in is in the area of critiquing my attitude when it comes to these gifts. Trying to keep it centred around ’service’ and ‘encouragement’ is a struggle. Because at the end of the day, I cannot exercise my gifts for the money or glory.

So, when I looked at these photos, I thought about submitting them to a couple local contests. It didn’t take long for me to do an attitude check and figured they would do me much better in a frame in my home. (these were taken from my backyard after that wicked nasty storm a few weeks ago)

My regular blogging goal has obviously failed. There’s been a lot on my plate lately and it’s beginning to catch up with my bowels. I had an egg mcmuffin today for brunch and I felt awful for the rest of the afternoon. Plus we went to church this morning… and it’s been probably a good month since we’ve been to a service. So much of the past little while has been pretty chaotic.

Reflecting back on the fact that summer is over, I tried to take inventory of the good things that I’ve experienced. One of the highlights was the airshow. I have missed quite a few years of this annual event and grew somewhat bitter that I could hear the roar of the jet engines but failed to see them in close proximity. There’s something inside of me that gets really excited and gitty when the jets rumble my chest. Perhaps that’s something all men resonate with.

I found it really challenging to photograph these jets because the bright sky kept washing out the jets. Plus they zipped by fairly quickly from where we were sitting. And a note to the geeky, the focusing on the 5DmkII isn’t as good as the 50D… and all these shots were taken with my 70-200L f4.

With that, I’m pretty tired right now and just need to play catch up — with my pillow.

This was that something new that I was working on… and that’s been in the works for just over 9mths. Baby was born just before 3pm, Serena and I were there just after 5pm and couldn’t get ourselves to leave until close to 8pm, then I just couldn’t stop editing until 11pm. I think this is the kind of same-day-edit that really inspires me to tell a story in only a couple short minutes of video. And I’ll share some of the technical constraints that I mentioned in the previous post at a later post. Enjoy!

Yup. I’ve been busy. Got a few projects on the go and just finished one now that’s taking forever to render. I think it’s because I didn’t convert the file from HD to SD for FCP. Did you get all those abbreviations?!? In the meantime, I got to take a few pictures of Sarah and Rodney a little while ago and haven’t had the time to post them. So, I’ve got this one that I thought was funny.

But stay tuned… I’ve got more stuff to share done in the toughest lighting conditions ever… talking about ISO3200, +2/3 exposure compensation, grainy like beach sand…

I thought long and hard about posting this video of me making a fool of myself. I mean, some might consider it an insult to their culture. Others wouldn’t waste their time. But I came to the conclusion that if you can’t make fun of yourself, then you’re not really human.

Andre and Emily asked me to share a few words at their awesome wedding this past weekend. When I told them that I would help out in any way they needed, I didn’t expect to be asked to speak. This is the first (and probably the last) time that a videographer has been asked to share a speech for a wedding. Nevertheless, it was an honour to be able play a part in their special day. Serena and I had a lot of fun putting it together… she romanized the text and added those phonetic symbols to help me with the annunciation. She did a great job. I just made a mess of it. But I’m glad that Andre and Emily appreciated it… that’s all that counts. It’s what friends, both Chinese and Japanese, are for.

Let me know if you want to hear the rest of my speech… I have a feeling that listening to my Chinese is about all anyone can take. Enjoy!

One of the things that I love about weddings is how different each one is. Having a creative role to play is pretty excited yet overwhelming at times. It’s taken me a good week and a half to complete Jeremy and Stephanie’s wedding videos – this was quite a challenge to complete after work each day. For those technical people, the challenge was colour correction. The church was the biggest challenge with natural, incandescent, and florescent light to mix together. And then trying to do that between two different cameras — that’s just a nightmare of editing. Some people may not care or notice but I sure do and it’s very annoying.

Another challenge was with the 5DmkII footage… 1 incorrect setting and I lose the 16:9 aspect ratio. I tried to stretch and crop the video but it has to do with the anamorphic pixels. This was definitely a challenge because, again, I was dealing with light that went from cloudy to sunny within minutes… it was that crazy weather day with a tornado that touched down in Markham. That day was just nuts.

After all of that, we have a short summary of fun shots for their wedding day. In many ways, this could’ve been a SDE (Same Day Edit) but not to my satisfaction with the colour balancing and so on. Anyways, enjoy!

EDIT: Sorry about the video — I’m still having some problems with the file… there were 7 versions of this video and I think Vimeo is trying to overwrite each of them… should be working now.

Had a great time at Jeremy & Stephanie’s wedding this past Saturday. Usually on Mondays I’m feeling recovered and ready to get the week started. But yesterday I was exhausted and feeling like I needed a week to get back to normal. Well, such is the life of a videographer…

This video took a very long time to piece together because it was the first time I’ve used my 5D mkII in such a project. Syncing the audio, colour correction and matching, and just piecing together their story was quite a challenge. I know there has to be an easier way to do this but I can say that the work was well worth it. They have such a cute story and you can tell that they will continue their marriage adventure encouraged and supported. What an awesome couple! Enjoy.

We are quite fortunate to have a decent variety of wildlife in our backyard considering where in the city we live. I’ve posted a bunch of photos of this squirrel that visits almost daily. There have been other awesome birds and now we have a bunny. It was so cute. It started eating some of the leaves off a potato Serena left outside and then found some of the squirrel feed. I snapped a few pictures before it noticed and ran away. In case you’re wondering, the red in the photos is from the chair I was sitting on. The light sensitivity at 1600ISO can get annoying.

I mentioned how one of the things I have a very difficult time with is drool. It’s just something that makes me tense up. Even when I drool in my sleep, I just have to flip the pillow over to avoid getting any of that wetness on me. And I remember this scene in a movie when there was this string of spit going from these two people after kissing. Ugg!

My niece, Kazumi has been drooling less but not enough for me yet. This past Sunday she actually fell asleep on my cousin and left her mark on his boob. Funny stuff.