World Wide Photo Walk 2010

What do you get when you have 33,000+ photographers located around the world on a specific day with cartre blanche to photograph whatever suits their fancy? You get World Wide Photo Walk and I took part in it this past Saturday. The group from Ottawa was assigned a specific route to follow and we made our way around the Byward Market taking photos of  random things that caught our eye. I managed to get lost a couple times but finally met back with the group for brunch for a review of our morning. It was pretty cool to see what everyone came up with and how they could see similar subjects with such different perspectives. I've included a couple shots that I submitted to the forum from the day.

How can I control my life?

...when I can't even control my hair?

Perfect summer days...

Weekends come and weekends go... but summer weekends are carefree, calmly and perfect in every way.

Zigging and Zagging

My belief is that if you are pursuing photography as a career because you want to become insanely rich & famous with it, then you've most likely made a mistake. Most people who have had great success in this field have done it by continually pursuing their passion, their next fabulous photo, working doggedly to perfect skills and knowing full well that the journey is filled with obstacles. The financial  returns can be few and far between.

It's also filled the most memorable of occasions. Those Ah-Ha! moments where vision, passion and learning collide to produce images that excite the bejeebee's out of you and validate your investment. As in any profession, you do the best you can, make judgements that don't always pan out, land on your feet, land on your ass! but always hope for the best. I'll continue to zig and zag my way along. My goal has never been about the pot of gold. It's about loving the labor.

Now I've gone and done it.

Oh Oh! I think my camera is mad at me. Not my very lovable Panasonic Lumix. The older sibling. This week we had the most brilliant lightning storm and I knew if I was going to get the very best shots I was going to need more camera power. I hauled out the big guns (well in my world anyway!!) and carefully and skillfully added and adjusted all the paraphernalia required to catch a two second lightning bolt racing through the sky. I waited and waited and..there it is...click...NOTHING. Whatttttt?

Long story short, after 10 minutes of scrutinizing what I was doing and re- checking all my settings and hardware I could find nothing wrong. Now I'm thinking maybe karma was coming back to whack me in the touche for all the praising of baby point and shoot. I'd basically done nothing with my Nikon in two months and now I was paying for it. It's as if some deliberate act of defiance was being waged against me and there was nothing I could do.  So today I'll post a brilliant shot my fabulous Nikon D90 captured that I doubt any point and shoot would ever have the competence to do. *wink* And I have made a promise to take the week and shoot exclusively with the Nikon and hope we can get this relationship back on track. Geez. So moody!

Lazy days of summer?

I think I'm going to have to get a cape. My photography is keeping me in a constant state of discernment with innumerable things I've yet to finish or figure out. The least of which is how I am going to manage even half of them in a 24 hour day when they will guaranteed require three times that much. People have been asking us what our summer plans are. I wish I had some wonderful adventure of a island getaway with lazy mornings and careless afternoons but the reality is that our days are so jammed with to-do's and must-do's that it looks like our holidays may well be a few stolen hours on the porch, a round of golf or a leisurely stroll for ice cream or dinner on a patio.

We had one of those afternoons yesterday and it was wonderful. Steve and I shared a smile as we strolled around the Byward Market when Jordan confessed how she loved exploring the city without a plan. Hope so! That just might be the extent of our summer stay-cation.

Commonwealth Games and Guest Blogging

  As I mentioned previously,  I had a great assignment a couple weekends ago where I got the opportunity to photograph an event for the Commonwealth Games Mission Staff. A group of about 100 team coaches and managers, medical and media staff, former Olympic athletes, executives, sponsors, RCMP and Coordinators were in Ottawa to review plans for the upcoming Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India. 

  There were days of discussions and planning but also they bonded as a group in team building events that were great fun like zip lining in Gatineau Park. My role was as photographer but they really made me feel like part of this big family that was working together to ensure the Canadian delegates have the best experience possible at the Games.

Harry Nowell asked if I would do a guest blog about my experience and he posted it to his website on Friday. Check it out!  http://www.harrynowell.com/blog/