I enjoy playing with back-lighting, which in this case lit up the drops of early morning dew on the grass. The uncoated lenses on the Heidoscop require careful shading to avoid flare in back-lit situations. I hope this image captures the calm I enjoy in the Parc du Bois-de-Coulonge in Quebec City.
Original slide on Provia 400X taken with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop at 1/15 sec. at F25 on August 9, 2014.
The dew on these moon vines at sunrise seemed to give them a silvery sheen. These vines are located at one of my favorite parks in Quebec City, Parc du Bois-de-Coulonge, which housed of the residence of lieutenant-governors from 1870-1966.
Original slide on Provia 400X taken with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop at 1/6 Sec. at F25 on August 9, 2014.
I shot the USBG earlier this year during the day, and it is a smorgasbord of post-industrial steam-punk vs. wilderness 3d imagery. I returned last month to try and capture the magical evening light, which makes the place look even more mysterious than it already is. I was hampered by equipment problems (in part of my own making), and did not get very many shots. This is one of the better ones, taken about 5 minutes after the “magic” lighting had ended. (Equipment failure prevented pictures during the magic 15 minutes!).
Then, on the drive home (about two hours highway driving), my car broke down near Culpeper, about halfway home. Michele and Jet had to come fetch me in the middle of the night. The car was repaired in Culpeper over the course of three more weeks. I only got it back just recently. All in all, an ill-fated photo mission.
Sputnik, RSX 400 film, f16 probably, 30 seconds exposure.
Just another dull foliage shot?
I’m including a wide angle from my twin Sigma rig, to give you a sense of scale…
What do you guys make of it?
“Mother Earth” was one of the centrepieces of the Mosaicultures International exposition of horticultural art held at the Montreal Botanical Garden in 2013:
http://www.mosaiculturesinternationales.ca/en/
Original slide, taken with tripod-mounted Heidoscop at 1/50 sec. at f25 on Sept. 1, 2013.
This self portrait of my wife Marie-Claude and me plays a bit more on the theme of mirrors. This time I chose a mirror with a very visible frame to emphasize its presense. The larger size allowed for greater stereo overlap within the mirror itself compared to the smaller mirror used in the previous set.
Original slide shot in Montreal in the gardens of St. Joseph’s Oratory on September 16th, 2012 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop (as you can see) using Provia 400X exposed at 1/60th at f25.
This photograph was taken in the small chapel above which Saint Brother André lived in Montreal, an icon of whom can be seen in the mirror. He led the construction of the huge St. Joseph’s Oratory, and the plaques of thanks to Saint Joseph can be seen on the back wall behind the crutches left by pilgrims. Here is a link: http://www.saint-joseph.org/en_1033_index.php
Original slide shot September 16th, 2012 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed for 3 sec. at f25
I am hoping that the stereo depth enhances the sense of the microphone array being frozen in space. Original slide shot at St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal on September 16th, 2012 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 400X exposed at 2 sec. at f25.
Today, we’re going back to the ice but we’re not going to move much once we get there. All of the images here were made within 50-feet of each other. The subject is a fairly stable ice cave. I say fairly because it was created by an active creek so there is water flowing into it. The ground is mud, silt, ice, and gravel and is sliding into the cave and under the glacier. The ceiling is made of ice and is full of mud, silt, and gravel and is falling onto the floor. While I was working, some nice ladies stopped in to visit the cave. I used my Fuji to get a set-the-scene snapshot.
Deep V
In The Groove
Just inside the cave, the layers of the ice are obvious. The younger ice is above, the older ice is denser and is funneling the melt water out to the edge. The running water has carved a Deep V in the ancient ice. The mud and sand is trapped between the layers of ice and is being washed down and dropped on the floor. When working under the ice, the water running down your back is really mud (of various dilutions).
A little to the right, and closer to the ice, In the Groove better shows the layers in the ice and the sand and silt trapped between them. We can also see melt water pouring in to join the creek farther inside the cave.
Farther in the cave but looking a little up, we can see Below the Surface(BW). There is sand and silt embedded inside the ice, and the layers are evident from the back just as well as the front. (Now’s a good time to wish we had carried a helmet with us. The roof is melting, remember?) Finally, we can move a little farther in and get in close. That sand in there has been trapped in the ice for a couple hundred years. It’s just itching to get out so it can slide down into my camera.
 Below the Surface (BW) |
 Below the Surface |
All images were created with a tripod mounted TL120-1. I don’t record exposure times but the fastest time used was 1 second. They were shot on Provia 100F, Provia 400X, or Ilford HP5.
Tom Noddy and the Tornado Bubble
In the last loop, I included a shot of my friend Tom Noddy with one of his marvelous bubbles. That was shot with the TL-120 and some bounce flash, but when I tried to figure out the exposure, I made some gross errors. So why did the pictures come out okay? I apparently made a whole bunch more errors in making my settings. Yes, I’m an idiot. But I’m an extremely lucky idiot.
This year I did some test shots before inviting Tom over again. There’s black velvet hung behind, because the DOF is extremely shallow. I think we had sharpness between about 28 and 32 inches. I had several flash units triggered by slaves, mostly bouncing off the ceiling here. (I’ve been reading the strobist blog a lot lately, and trying to learn more about the use of flash.)
To create this, Tom blows a bubble and catches it on the wand. He blows a second bubble below it, filled with smoke, so the smaller smoke bubble is attached and hanging below the clear bubble. Tom sticks a wet straw through the wall of the top bubble and blows gently, so the air is swirling inside. Then he break the membrane between the 2 bubbles, so now the smoke is inside the bubble with the swirling air, and the smoke is still somewhat concentrated. Finally, he opens a hole in top of the bubble, so the bubble deflates like a balloon, forcing out the swirling smoke. I shot a bunch of these. Every time you shoot one, you watch what it continues to do, and you think, “Dang! It got even better after I fired!”
I like the detail of the swirling smoke, and the saturated colors on the top of the bubble.
Wrought iron staircases are typical of Montreal, and I like the way Santa parked his sleigh on the top of the wrought iron staircase in this tableau.
Original slide shot December 13, 2008 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop on Provia 400X exposed for 2 seconds at f22 with fill flash.
Most of the homes in Verdun are simple brick rowhouses that all look much the same. With limited opportunity for originality in the architecture of the home, the people of Verdun go wild decorating their homes at Xmas and Halloween.
Original image shot December 13, 2008 with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop on Provia 400X exposed for 2.5 seconds at f22 with some fill flash. (There is no flash sync on the Heidoscop so I just set off the flash during the long exposure.)