Admission is free and performances range from this weekend to the Easter weekend. So pick the date that works best for you and don’t let one of the attractions our region has to offer escape you!

The results and feedback I received left me more than speechless… Your generosity in kind words almost left me curious to read to the end and find out who these words are about; because it sounded too good to be me. I am most humbled that I was blessed to be of help to some of you and that we are one step closer to the dream of a united artists’ community in our region.

Some of the kind words that stayed with me:

“Along with great energy and excitement for the arts, Stefan brings light to seemingly complex aspects of photography to his students… his friends.” [...] “Everyone is welcome and everyone is a great artist in Stefan’s circle. His passion for photography is contagious, even more so when it comes with constant praise and encouragement to those around him.” [...] “Personally, Stefan has given me many tools to be the photographer that I am. I still have a lot of work to do and lessons to learn and Stefan remains a willing phone call or text message away.”

Back in 2009 when I came back from a trip in British Columbia and was excited and inspired by the fact that the photographers there would meet up (in spite of their busy schedules) on somewhat of a regular basis in order to socialize, photograph together and inspire one another, I expected my attempt to implement that here in Kitchener/Waterloo to be a long process, to be hard, to be perhaps successful eventually, but I did not expect someone to nominate me for it. I am rather speechless and I owe you a big thank you and a cup of the best espresso in town!

Since this topic is up anyway, I will take this time to plug some of the things that I got the nomination for:

As for photo walks, please join the Facebook or the Google+ pages to be notified of times and locations.

Email me at stefan@stefanchirila.com or contact me on facebook

As of February 2013, Canada is no longer using their one cent coins. Boo. In memory of it I am making a 2 wallpapers set available (1600px wide, colour and black/white versions available) here.

Since on the topic of relationships, I’ve been thinking about you guys (and gals) lately – you people who read my blog and visit my site. I feel like today is my new year’s eve rather than Valentine’s Day, having decided on a few resolutions meant to improve our relationship. My own take on relationships is rather tunnel-sighted: openess is key. I gotta admit, I was a bit reluctant about blogging a lot of things in my life, especially debating whether they are relevant to a photography web site… I do want to provide you with interesting reading material and I am sure you will be forgiving with my slow process; guess being comfortable carrying a heavy camera and torturing models for extended periods of time in scorching summer heat or blistering storms doesn’t necessarily make one a good blogger too. =)

I’ll tell you about the past days….
It started with a horrible week. Let me tell you the dirt on my Nikon D700 sensor issue kept me up at night (mostly literally). I am so glad it is over with =|. Then followed a fantastic week (how do these extremes always end up together head to head?) where I got to meet up, and spend some quality time with some people I didn’t get to see in a long time and some new people I am glad I can now call my friends. I discovered a new coffee shop called Death Valley’s Little Brother, which I ended up going to almost 5 times in a row. They have fantastic espresso and the atmosphere is also lovely. I am about to finally implement the new web site theme that I have been working on since forever and I met another night olw like myself (an owlet – but that’s a story for another post =P). There was also a snow storm and I hope it’s the last one of the season (no, I am not a big fan of shoveling large quantities of snow).

As for the web site, I am looking forward to your input on the navigation improvements. I would like to encourage you to comment on the blog posts …because …well it makes my day, and it encourages (ahem …reminds) me to update this place more often, knowing that people read about it. And if this doesn’t float your boat and you’re more of a Facebook or Twitter kind of guy or gal, then by all means, contact me there (the links take you to my accounts).

It all started with me noticing some specks on some images …usually taken with my macro 70-300 Tamron lens at higher f values such as f16. I thought it may be dust in the lens and left things the way they were for a while (since that is not my main lens anyway). Recently though I was playing with my DIY softbox and I noticed the specks appearing again …this time both with my 70-300 and the 50mm f:1.8. This time I took a look inside and noticed that indeed you could see specks on the sensor itself. I was a bit worried so I did some research. Some people spoke about potential grease spots on the sensor from oil squirting from various mechanisms inside the camera on certain models but nothing about the Nikon D700. I then applied the standard dust removal procedure: 1. I used the built-in dust removal function of the camera a few dozen times (did nothing); 2. I applied a handheld air pump to try and blow the dust out (did nothing); 3. then I did something that I do not recommend anyone do, I tried to move the particles using a lens pen (something every photo store will tell you not to do!) and all that caused was for the specks to smear. It was then clear to me that the specks were NOT dust but liquid.

I then called Nikon Canada, who told me they are more than willing to try and clean my sensor for $200 and if that does not work, to exchange it for $600 (because the filter in front of the sensor, removable for the sake of cleaning or replacement in case of cleaning failure, is not removable on the D700 but built into the sensor). I felt disinclined to do that …so I went to Henry’s Camera over in Cambridge, Ontario, where I bought the camera from and asked their advice. They said the same thing, except they also recommended this place to me, over in Guelph, called Pond’s Photo Source, which cleans sensors with both dry and wet methods. I made my way over there to find some very friendly and highly encouraging customer service that promised to attempt to clean it every way possible and only charge me if that succeeds.

I came back the next day to pick up my camera, rather excited, since on the phone I was told the cleaning went great! The first thing I did …to the surprise of the person who handed me my camera, was to take my lens off and take a look at the sensor. I was surprised that marks were still showing on the sensor, but the man proceeded to reassure me that in actual photos, nothing shoes, and he pulled out two 4×6 samples, a before and after, and no surprise, the way he shot them, even the before didn’t show anything. When then I proceeded to tell him about the ways of telling if there is dust on a sensor he gave me the most confused look ever. For the record, to check if there is dust or anything on the sensor, shoot at f16 or smaller, shoot a clear surface, as bright as you can with out overexposing, and set your lens to the minimal focusing distance. Okay so he didn’t know about how to properly photograph the dust, nor did the sensor look clean …but maybe the sensor dirt doesn’t actually show up …somehow …any more. I made the mistake to pay the man the $50 he asked for (claiming he did his job and the sensor, as far as he is concerned, is clean) and left. I was pretty sad, but luckily, my friend Dalia (who lives in Guelph) met up with me and showed me this awesome place to eat, called The Cornerstone, which cheered me up a bit, in spite of the terrible cold outside. Of course, at home, repeating my experiment, the traces showed up, granted not as strong as before, but nonetheless there.

I was pretty desperate and was considering paying Nikon the money they wanted, but first, I called Henry’s again, this time the other store, over in Waterloo, Ontario. Over the phone, a very helpful man whose name I do not remember, told me that I could come in and he would help me use their $20 liquid cleaning kit and that it would probably work even on oil stains. Long story short, next morning I went over to Henry’s and $20 later, the sensor was clean! I am pretty hungry right now and the story is pretty much fully told …so I will leave you with this: do not waste your money; go to Henry’s and get their $20 cleaning kit and ask one of their friendly staff members to help you.

Here’s what my sensor looked like before and after the Henry’s store cleaning:

And here’s the original story:

The setup

Here’s the login behind what you see there: I used white board around the subject in order to have it bathed in light coming from all directions (yes it works). The soft box is broadcasting the light mostly on to the right side of the subject as well as behind it; the boards then reflect the extra light back at the subject. The verdict? It works! Note: It is worth noting however, that the flash I used is an old film flash which I think is stuck on maximum output …so you can only control the intensity of the light by moving the soft box back or closer, as well as changing the ISO and aperture of your camera. The shutter speed usually has a max of 1/200 sec on most cameras that it can work on. I used ISO200 and f:16 at a shutter speed of 1/200 and it worked well I think. I also tried a different approach, with a black + white backdrop. Further experimenting is needed, but all in all I find that it was a success. And here is “El Donqui” which my musician friend Juan David brought back for me from Colombia.

While processing the images and browsing The Hobbit movie soundtrack I came across this tune, which I find very well embodies the awe and wonder of being a bit nearer to nature.

Wishing you all the best, and thank you for making 2012 a wonderful year for me.

Stefan

I was blessed to begin my sore throat and congested-ness endeavour only after having been to Toronto and spoken at Centennial College (York campus). That was one of the most interesting experiences of this year. It all started with my dear friend Roxy, who happens to be studying photo journalism there, once again mentioning me to her class, as usual in way more flattering terms than I am worthy of. This time she did a whole photographic assignment on the topic of me, which intrigued her photography teacher enough to invite me to come and speak before her class. The promise of having an excuse to visit Toronto, drink coffee with my friend, and speaking in front of people about photography (those who know me, know that I enjoy listening to myself speak), was irresistible, so of course I said yes.
 

The day started like most of my visits to Toronto; with very little sleep (due to a mix between excitement, anticipation, and work done during the night), except this time, sitting on the Greyhound bus made me feel like I was about to enter Silent Hill; the fog was out of this world, at least until we left Kitchener. Once in Toronto it felt like the fog had never been there. Weird.

I was rather excited to witness an arrest being made as soon as Roxy and I entered the subway system. This must be a common experience for Toronto people to witness, but for us people of Kitchener, it is quite the experience, considering that we don’t even have a subway system to begin with…
 

We spent most of the day in the Greek neighbourhoods close to Pape station (map) where we visited this fantastic bakery, Serano Bakery, where I would have gotten myself into debt eating a little bit of everything if we had not been on our way to a sushi place Roxy wanted to show me. We also walked by this fantastic church, whose name I can not remember, nor the neighbourhood it was in. It was under construction, otherwise I would have tried to get in.
 

The college itself was very cozy; there was comfortable seating everywhere and as far as I understood it was open conveniently open 24/7 for studying convenience. I came across some interesting models that the students made, I assume for the purpose of later scanning and animating them on a computer; as well as an old door with a quote by Terry Fox on it. I found it amusing that the washroom stall I used had a message written on the wall, and that seemed to continue being the theme of the day, considering that every single washroom I visited (a total of 3 throughout my stay in Toronto) had some interesting message on the wall. The students, as well as Roxy’s teacher, were very welcoming and talkative, which helped a lot. It is not a new thing for me to speak about photography, but usually people don’t ask me to speak about it in the context of my own past and how photography developed (no pun intended) in my own life. It was a bit of a personal experience. I have to say I very much enjoyed it and hope to have the opportunity to do this sort of thing again sometime. My only complaint is that two hours pass way too quickly when you are having fun.
 

Before I move on and finally let you see the images, I need to mention the subway station that was under construction. It was so beautiful …in an industrial, movie set kind of way, that I regret only having caught so many images of it before my iPhone battery decided to call it a day.

As for today, it was a beautiful snow day in the early morning hours. You might wonder how come I was so far from the comfort of my bed at such time of day. The reason is that, as I recently found out, my church RCF – Romanian Christian Fellowship, started a bible eduction program in collaboration with a Bible College in Romania and are now offering courses. The idea intrigued me and there were really not many reasons in my mind, other than the obvious dislike for the early morning hours, for as to why I would not attend. It was a beautiful experience that I do not regret waking up early for. Actually I didn’t have to wake up early, I had found myself unable to fall asleep during the night, so I ended up working on HTML until I only had 2 hours left of sleep …which I casually napped through.

I hope the presentation will be worth it.

This one is also available in wallpaper size for your computer if you click here. Now that was dangerous, but did they listen to me? -no

Standing there looked a lot closer to the edge than it really was …honest!

Introducing Emily Frances June

We found this bad boy here hanging out on the fence by where Maria was posing. I am terrified of spiders, yet I can not resist the temptation to photograph them up close …really up close.

The wedding took place at the Elm Hurst Inn, Ingersoll, Ontario.

Looking at it I feel it speaks very plainly and frankly about the nature of being a photographer, detailedly described in shades of gray. It is one of those images that you end up producing every now and then, that really shock you coming out of your hands, and stays with you somewhere in the back of your mind; and you never fully manage to credit yourself with the creation of it, almost as if photography itself took it, by means of your hand. At least this is the case for me with this image and other ones.

What I feel this image would say if it had lips is: “The nature of the photographer is that of the warrior who is not out to kill, torture, or destroy; but out to do a job just as important, as demanding, as engaging, as exciting and as relevant; to be the eyes of the world” or something like that.

On Wednesday we did a fashion shoot with the lovely Emily Frances and her custom designed dresses over at St. Jacobs, Ontario; and on Saturday we organized an outing to Websters Falls to visit the location where it all began.

Besides the fact that I had tremendous fun photographing with some very talented and passionate fellow photographers, I also had the pleasure to meet some lovely volunteer models who once again proved to me that inspiration, fun and a great attitude can easily trump experience. A big THANK YOU goes out to you all: (in particular order) Fernand, Kim (our princess for the day), Maria (Mae), Alissa (it is a remarkable coincidence that you came out on the first day of this week), Miss Frances June (your designs are wonderful!), Fran, Hannah and Sarah and last but not least, Juliana, as well our guest photographer all the way from crowded Toronto, Miss Vicky.

A more detailed post is coming out one of these days, but as I said, I overdosed on shooting and have a bit more raw material to process than I can chew on; so thank you for your patience.

I plan on writing a more detailed entry about this week, about the October First celebrations, but the week isn’t over so not yet. Last night I did something that I’d like to share here, mainly because I haven’t done something of that sort in a long time and it was nice dabbling in that field again; I helped my photographer friend Marko Kovacevic design a watermark for his images based on his signature.

Okay, okay I will also post a sample from the fashion shoot we did today in St. Jacobs, Ontario.

and this image has changed my life forever. Firstly it was the catalyst for meeting my friend Alyssa, who is one of the most influential on me of all photographers I have yet met. She taught me everything I knew at the time about portrait photography. The second thing this image did for me was to move me to think about why it was that it looked pretty, compared to all my other images at the time. This was about the first time that I ever questioned whether there were any guidelines, or things that I could do in order to more or less for sure produce a pleasant looking image. As a result, my present two photography workshops were born Photographing Consciously and Photography as Perception.

So on the week of October 1st, I plan on organizing meetings, talks, photo shoots, with the purpose of inspiring and raising awareness about inspiration and what it can do in people’s lives. Read more about October First 2012 Events.

For Monday’s meet I put together an ePamphlet on inspiration in photography. Download it here as a PDF or view it in your browser as images below.

And here is a group portrait we did at the end of the session. We had a lot of fun, especially because Laura (in the center of the image below) decided to join in as my assistant today.

In this workshop, RAW files, pixel-based-images, layers, levels and curves, along with other notions, are explained in a, mostly, one-on-one environment (small groups of 5 to 7 persons) where questions and discussions are encouraged. For more info check out Twitter and Facebook.

If you’d like to support this workshop, click here for a large size version of the poster below, print it and post it somewhere people who would benefit from it can see it =).

This is Margaret. It was very bright today and the sun was rather blinding, but that didn’t hold us back!

We explored the urban environment around Victoria Park as far out as Highland Hills Mall. We found some wildlife and many many abandoned shopping carts.

All in all we had a ton of fun and even got away without getting too wet in spite of the rain.

Then in the afternoon I met the Scharlach family whom I got to spend an awesome evening with, documenting their love for each other …and skipping stones along the Grand River Trail in Kitchener.

After so much excitement, in spite of my (mostly) lack of sleep from last night, I decided to spend the better part of tonight working on images. It was a productive night, but I spent most of my energy on processing the images and what I am left with only suffices for the posting of a short preview. A full post, covering both photo shoots will follow soon of course.

I’m not sure yet about her results, but as far as I’m concerned, I decided to only bring my iPhone 4 along. I have heard of other photographers doing entire photo sessions with only an iPhone + post processing, but I had never done it myself. The results are below. I gotta say that the amount of customizing that the iPhone allows, in terms of shutter speed (by tapping on a desired area to meter from and thus locking exposure, which also locks focus on that object), is not ideal; however, if one is stuck with their smart-phone and one needs to shoot …I’d say it is far from a hopeless situation.

Technical: oh the iPhone I used the native camera app with the HDR function on (for most images), as well as the Hipstamatic App (Loftus lens + Blanko Freedom 13 Film). Otherwise, the images were loaded into Gimp 2.8, processed and resized. Gimp processing involved different things for some of them; some colour channel tweaks, but mostly just Colour Curves (changing the blue curve to yield more golden light tones) and Levels.

I met up with some local awesome photographers in order to put our strengths together and more efficiently torture a couple of extremely beautiful and cooperating models:

I finished the other portraits of Janice:

I got sun-burned while having fun in the sun, in a pool at a birthday party; and figured out how to tie my shemagh properly:

And I discovered a new, rather lovely, spot at the Grand River, here – http://goo.gl/maps/A0YO:

I have worked for a very long time to create the infrastructure for this web site; and for an even longer time worked on figuring out how to get HTML and CSS code to do that which I want it to do, picking and choosing elements from different photography web sites and trying to adapt them to my own. There are very few good designs on the web that are freely available to be downloaded and used (most of the ones available are from Tofurious, who is a wonderful human being), so this is what I will do. Now before you ask me for the link, it’ll be a few days before I get everything sorted out in terms of packaging up the files nicely, but they’ll be out soon!

Make sure to check out the main page for more details about the new theme!
Cheers!

A few days ago was such an instance. Here’s one of my favourite padawan learners, I mean students, Braedy and my friend Ashley, who kindly agreed to model for our first attempt at portrait photography.

I gotta say this year they really went out of their way to make it really special. The sound and lighting equipment at Forward Church were equally impressing as the amount of talent present in the voices and band members.

My very own favourite part of the evening was when they sang How Great is Our God (by Chris Tomlin) in a variety of languages, performed by members of the Kitchener-Waterloo community of various backgrounds. It was very touching. Here’s some images I captured tonight.

Stefan Chirila | 519.580.0699 | stefan@stefanchirila.com

Click here to Download the Unit Plan

Finally! After some four months of planing and researching and writing, the Photography as Perception is finished. The official launch party will be this Saturday February 4th at Cafe Balzac (corner of Charles Street and Victoria Street, Kitchener, Ontario) at 4pm. Join us there for a coffee and a chat about photography and post processing!

Now, why the title “Photography as Perception: the analytic interpretation of things as they are”? The idea came to me while watching Ansel Adams, an American experience where the famous landscape photographer talks about his realization about how the camera is fundamentally unable to reproduce the way nature looks; one of the main reasons being the inability to record the entire dynamic range of light, from pure black to pure white. He then concluded that there is more potential in photography when instead of attempting to replicate nature, one replicates the mood that the view inspired.

Well, decades later we are not far from where Ansel was, our cameras are still restricted by their nature and we are still unable to replicate exactly what is seen; but perhaps that is not that big of a dilemma, it gives us the opportunity to notice the power that lays in interpreting that which the camera sees through post processing and adding the spices that make the image as interesting as the moment was to us when we experienced it.

The workshop is all new, it is hands on, it will have you walk away with a bag full of new skills. Click the link to look at the info and contact me (519.580.0699 | stefan.chirila@gmail.com) to find out when the workshop starts and to sign up!

No really, it did, more or less. A long time ago, I can’t really remember when, but sometime between the creation of the universe and me thinking of writing this blog post, was the first time that I read a photography tutorial and heard of photographers teaching their craft to others. That is when it occurred to me that not only are these things useful to look into, but might be fun to actually do myself. I spent a while, a few years, dreaming about how that might be pleasant, and then one day, when this idea nearly slipped into the realm of the forgotten, I went over to a fellow photographer’s house, a friend of mine who is as much (if not more) of a fan of the Moleskine notebooks as I am.

On his shelf, next to his beautiful 1940s Leica rangefinder camera, I found a barely-written-into Moleskine medium sized notebook with an obvious binding defect in it. Long story short, my friend noticed the flaw, emailed Moleskine and of course due to their impeccable customer support, received a replacement swiftly. He never got around to throwing the old one out. Well …there I was, thinking exactly the same thing you are thinking now. Why throw it out? He agreed to let me have it after tearing out the few pages he wrote on. I was very pleased!

After a little sticky tape treatment, the notebook was not as new, but was usable, and in my view looked stylish, in an old used kind of way. This sparked an idea in my mind. This notebook was going to be the home to my very own photography workshop that I could share with others interested to learn. After a lot of thinking as to where to start, I decided to make it, not about techniques per se, but about approach. I personally find that as long as what you do with your camera is done on purpose and for a reason, aka you aim to leave as little to chance (in terms of camera settings) as possible, you will be closer to get a desired result than if you just set the camera to Auto mode. So I named my workshop “Photographing Consciously”, I took a whole lot of notes on separate sheets of paper (in order to not fill the notebook with temporary scrap notes) and once I was done I started writing. I gotta say it was a lot of fun. Every now and then I would bestow upon my favourite notebook blessings of coffee, some by mistake,at first, some later on because I noticed the marks left looked cool. Here are some iPhone photos (taken with the Hipstamatic app) of the notebook, still surviving and still just as cool. If you feel inspired, check out the details about the Photographing Consciously Workshop.

gWrite displaying a document with text and an embedded image

gWrite displaying the HTML code for the embedded image …the image got converted into base64 code in order to be included directly into the HTML file and thus making the need for RTF (rich text format) pretty redundant.

gEdit with two files open; one HTML document and (showing) one CSS file. Note the syntax highlighting. gEdit supports some 40+ programming language and script type syntaxes.

This is more or less the code for it: <img src="data:image/gif;base64,/9j/4AAQSkZJRgABAQEASABIAAD/2wBDAAMCAgMCAgMDAwMEAwMEBQgFBQQEBQoHBwYIDAoMDA"….and a lot more……. />

In order to turn your images into base64, use an online convertor, or a program like GWrite.

So here is the image: ll

A portrait of Kitchener, Ontario musician Juan David(facebook), as a part of a portrait session for the promotion of his upcoming CD.

This story begins in the year 2004 when for the first time I met someone entirely off of the Internet; my friend Isabel (check out her blog, she knits and crochets http://wwwisabelandbenson.wordpress.com/2011/10/02/my-friend-stefan-is-a-talented-photographer/ where she kindly enough wrote about this portrait session that you will shortly see images from).

That summer I went to visit my relatives in Romania for a couple of weeks. According to Murphy’s law, the very day I left for Romania, Isabel, a fellow artist whom I met on deviantART, flew down to Kitchener (from her home in Mexico city) to visit her grandmother and cousins here in town. Luckily, by the time I returned she had not yet left for home. I am so glad we managed to meet up and spend the next three days exploring all of Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge by bicycle and rollerblades.

Years later, Isabel decided to pursue the mathematics program at the University of Waterloo, from which she graduated, not only with a lovely masters’ but also her boyfriend Ben! And this is where our story gets richer in photography. I met up with them a little while ago and we did a photo session. I really wanted to meet this Mr. Wonderful since every time I would talk to Isabel she would mention him, in a way, something along the lines of, “…oh and did I tell you about Ben? he is SO beautiful!”.

They were a little shy at first…

…but in no time we had tons of fun!

Isabel really seems to have a thing for Ben’s beard. She wouldn’t let go of it!

Love that defies gravity. It takes two people (both with a masters’ degree in mathematics …and), in love, to figure out how to get that one done.

We also went down to the railway tracks where Isabel got to try her hand at portrait photography. I’d say she has quite a promising talent and I am glad she decided to attend my Photographing Consciously Workshop.

Isabel taking pictures of us.

A very well composed portrait of me by Isabel.

Then when the two became somewhat adventurous and I had to fear for their well being I decided to call it a day and to drive us to the closest Starbucks and fill up on caffeine.

Such an awesome couple! Now that I shared this with you I can go finish my preparations for tomorrow’s workshop class.

First of all, what is Software Freedom day anyway? According to Wikipedia: “is an annual worldwide celebration of Free Software. SFD is a public education effort with the aim of increasing awareness of Free Software and its virtues, and encouraging its use.” And of course then, what is this software that is Free? Also according to Wikipedia: Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do these things and that manufacturers of consumer-facing hardware allow user modifications to their hardware. Free software is generally available without charge, but can have a fee, such as in the form of charging for CDs or other distribution medium among other ways.

So let me put it in a nut shell for you; when we talk about Free Software, we talk about freedom, and not lack of a price tag necessarily. Freedom to do what you want with the software you buy or download, freedom like the ability to install it in all 4 computers in your household, as opposed to a non-freedomy-software like Microsoft Windows, which once you spent the amount of $ with them two zeroes at the end you only have the consent to install it on one machine.

Software that comes with freedom is not only useful if you have your own business and get yourself an assistant, and you realize work happens way more effectively if you work at the same time on two different computers rather than taking turn on the same one, and then you rejoice in the fact that your software gives you the freedom to install it on more than one computer.

Software Freedom is a concept that enables us to grow in ways that we could not without it; in ways like …universal schooling allows us to grow in. It was a big change when a few hundred years ago (or in some cultures not even all that long ago), it had been decided that all children should go to school and learn to read and write so that past experience could be passed on and …well people don’t need to keep reinventing the wheel, so to say, all the time; especially if they are not at the top of the monetary resources pyramid.

Well it was at some point that some people though “we could do this with software too!” and Freedom started to become an option. There are those, even today, that just don’t get it and think that if software doesn’t cost a lot, and the person who produces it doesn’t do it in order to get rich off of it, then it can’t possibly be too good of a product. But free software has produced some of the most cutting edge technology within the past 20 years. By giving programmers the chance to publish projects under licenses that allow others to jump on board; difficult problems are solved quicker and more efficiently. Just to prove a point, the Linux operating system, one of the most straight-forward Free Software examples has revolutionized the security standards for software, being adopted by numerous countries’ governments as their standard system of operation, including Germany’s air traffic control. The Linux based free software development model has produced superior computer generated renderings using computer clusters (some 350+ computers wired together sharing calculations), making the creating of entire movies on the computer alone, and the best example for that is the Shrek films.

“But where’s the profit,” you ask? And it is true, we are used to think of things that way, like if it doesn’t bring a person immediate profit, why on earth would they invest time or effort into it? Just because their participation can improve a project that thousands can benefit from (including them themselves)? Why not? After all, way back in the day, when we perhaps didn’t yet realize how much money is in it, medicine used to work that way, and medicines were invented in order to cure diseases, and people wouldn’t think about dropping their research unless they have the promise of earning big bucks.

Well now that you get the idea, let’s look at what I was asked to speak about. Raw Therapee, a photo processing program. A free photo processing program. For those of you who are not photographers (whether pros, amateurs or even as a hobby), since you were, you’d know, let me tell you, photography can get quite expensive. Not only do camera bodies cost a lot (if you decide to get a camera with detachable lens), but the lenses often end up costing more, and you end up eventually facing some serious temptation to upgrade; but there is something else still. The software. You may think that someone who shoots film cameras may not face the need of software, but they too might want to get their favourite shots onto facebook, twitter, flickr and rest of the gang. For that we need software to scan, resize, retouch, edit; and the industry knows it. They also know that if you spent a lot of money on your gear, you probably can afford to spend a little more and they are not ashamed to ask for it. Adobe Photoshop is on top of the popularity list in terms of photo processing. Let me tell you Adobe does a really good job at what they do, that is why they are up there and by no means am I at any point in this article intending to claim that Photoshop is not worth paying money for it, but $700 can be a lot to some people. Now some will say “I can just download a pirated version.” Which is true, there are few items of software less popular on the pirate market than Photoshop or, just for the record, Microsoft Windows, but let us assume you have a problem with yourself doing that. Then you are at a difficult spot. What do you do?

Well you have a bunch of options, the most comprehensive being The Gimp. This is a photo manipulating program that can handle most things ranging from scanning in images, resizing, colour correction, printing. It is free software and comes with most Linux distributions but can also easily be installed onto Windows or Mac OS.

But if you are a professional photographer to whom image quality is paramount, or even just a very dedicated amateur, you will want your expensive camera to give you all it has to give. Speaking in terms of technology that translates into shooting RAW instead of JPG. What is the difference? When shooting JPG, your camera applies presets to the data that comes out of the light sensor. The presets are those options that you choose in the menus when you select Vivid Colour, or High Contrast; whereas RAW files contain no post processing done by the camera and thus need you to do it afterwards on the computer. RAW files are big, they clutter your memory cards, take a while to work through, but do they ever give you more detail and quality, especially if you make mistakes along the way that need serious fixing.

RAW processing was one of those niches that was only covered by highly expensive software such as Adobe Lightroom. Besides the fact that it costs a lot (of course it depends on what is a lot to you, but for low budget photographers going above $200 can be a lot), using Lightroom on an alternative operating system such as Linux would require a translation program that would simulate Windows, which would slow things down a lot more than the usual high RAM and processor usage that is specific to handing large files such as RAW files.

Slowly free software started to get its hands dirty in that field and developed plugins for popular programs such as The Gimp that could handle the opening of RAW files, but did not offer a large variety of processing options and often times the in-camera results were better tweaked. In 2004 Gabor Horvath started a project dedicated to RAW image processing called RAW Therapee. Although free (of charge), the program was not Free Software until 2010. That is likely because by 2008 the project was taking up a lot of time, growing in complexity and it had hovered on version 2.4 for quite a while. Assumptions aside, the facts are that in 2010 Gabor decided to open up the source code of his project to interested potential collaborators, and guess what! Within a few months, RAW Therapee had grown a whole lot, getting to the point where it is quite the rival to Lightroom.

Among the tings that RAW Therapee counts as its highlights are: the ability to use a secondary monitor as a preview screen, while using the main one to manipulate settings, as of yet, 7 different demosaicing methods including the acclaimed Amaze algorithm recently released into open source, copy/paste editing, presets, the ability to work either in an RGB or a LAB environment, sharpening, noise removal and the ability to save in TIFF (both 8 and 16bit), JPG and PNG (8 and 16bit) formats.

The existence of this project is a real game changer for photographers. Suddenly you no longer need to have a large budget to become a photographer, nor do you need to cheat your values and download illegally.

What: Kitchener Software Freedom Day Celebration Where: at the Working Centre (downtown Kitchener, at the intersection of Queen Street and Charles Street) When: September 17th 2011 – 9AM

Requirements: The model can be either male or female (I will be needing both since I will feature both individual shots as well as staged couples’ poses). The model needs to look presentable and be confident. No previous modelling experience is needed, however a willingness to work with directions and improvisation is appreciated. I do not require a specific style of clothing, but a generic solid-colour based wardrobe is recommended.

What is expected of you: Dress elegant, not extremely formal but neither casual. Look your best, whether that involves makeup or not. Have a positive and confident attitude; keep in mind I have your best look in mind, I am not going to post or use images that make you look bad, since I don’t want my photography to be put in a bad light either.

What you can expect: Expect a relaxed and welcoming atmosphere. The purpose of this endeavour is to produce beautiful images, but I am by no means a slave-driver. The way a person feels directly influences the way a photograph of them turns out so I will make sure you feel comfortable and that you have a fun time.

How much? To be part of this, you will not have to pay anything. For your efforts of modelling you will receive digital copies of your portraits that you will be able to use online or make printed hard-copies of up to 4″x6″ in size.

When: I intend to have do the photography session at the end of this week, on Saturday September 10th 2011.

What to do? I need to know who you are; so write me a short paragraph of who you are and why you want to be part of this. I need to know what you look like. Not that I want to discriminate people according to looks, but there is a certain style that I am interested to go for and of course there also is curiosity. So along with the paragraph about you, add up to 3 images of you (preferably full body) to give me a general idea. Submit those to me in an email to the following address stefan.chirila@gmail.com. And I will get back to you shortly.

For those who don’t know it yet: the Photographing Consciously Workshop is going to start once again, this September 6th. It will be 5 sessions long and feature two outings. You can find more information on the Workshop page here.

If you are interested in photography yourself but find that you don’t know as much as you’d like to know about it, consider coming out this Friday Sept. 2nd for the Workshop Introduction. Also, if you happen to know someone who could benefit from this, don’t hesitate to let them know.

Useful links:

The Photographing Consciously Facebook Group

Music: Leonard Cohen Vocalist: Stefan Chirila (me)… around 2005

(you need firefox or an HTML5 compliant browser to play this – if it doesn’t play automatically try to right-click on the frame and click play)

This is, however, one of the most beautiful places in town. Of course, not if you measure beauty by the diversity of products that you can buy in its vicinity, but if you enjoy raw nature, a road paved over rolling hills and not “through them,” by levelling them, having fields grow on either side of you, and having the opportunity to see trees that almost seem to have a personality of their own. This is Plains Road. But not for long. For a while now, plans have been made to scrap all of the above and put a shopping centre in its place.

The first step was to get rid of the farm that was at the intersection with Huron Road. You can see clearly in the image below that this has been quite successfully brought to completion.

It is only a question of time; regrettably, until all that I can do is wrote a blog post titled Plains Road, remembered. So if you happen to read this and the thought, “Oh my, I could do something about this, I have a say in this!” goes through your mind; then please, don’t let this piece of heritage, this living memory of what life was like around here in the past, be lost. And if you only happen to know someone who may be able to do something about this, please, share this with them. Don’t think “we only live here, we cannot change things around here.”

That is us, artists, at our worst. Here’s one who was many things but not that; Johnny Cash. He was known as ‘The man in black.’ People like his music because of the steady rhythm, his unique baritone voice and some for his dark and sombre style. I personally like to think of him as the artist who can make acoustic music sound dark and heavy (Rusty Cage by Johnny Cash). I like the artist Johnny Cash because of the way I find he sang his soul into the songs he recorded. Although the music he recorded in the beginning of his career is considerably different from that at the end, there is considerable common ground. Johnny Cash has always been at crossroads with himself. His deep personal convictions in regards to right and wrong, his faith in the divine, were in conflict with his human weakness and the choices that life offered him. He did not waste the skill of producing a unique sound, that fate endowed him with, but enriched his songs with the deeply human content of his own struggles which made it impossible for any who had an open ear to relate to him.

A satisfied mind, by Johnny Cash | one of Johnny’s later songs

He very clearly expressed in many of his songs the pain of reaping the consequences of negative choices in life (Folsom Prison blues – below).

And Johnny Cash made sure to keep coming back to the foundation of stone that his person was based on, his faith in God (The Wanderer, Redemption day and There ain’t no grave – below),

Aint’s no grave, by Johnny Cash | one of his latest songs and in my opinion one of the most explicative as to who he was deep inside.

as well as an ever-honest testimony of perhaps one of the most human emotions, the uncertainty of that which is to come (Where I’m bound – below).

Can’t help but wonder, by Johnny Cash

Also, if the dad the gift is for has an inclination for photography, consider the Photographing Consciously Photography Workshop

First of all, a little explanation: me using the word orphan refers to the fact that the main character of my story became abandoned by his owners (yes, owners, not parents); I felt it important to mention this in o order to prevent your minds of having the image of a little kid as the main character. This is not a little kid we will talk about, we are talking about an old timer, at least in terms of this moment’s dominant social ideology, which defines him as such. And while on the topic of the moment’s dominant ideology, we may as well look at the unpleasant topic of how the old are viewed and often treated; as mostly useless, often not even put up with and pushed from corner to corner until time and dust take their toll and they are no more at all, or until one may come along and rid us of them.

Before you close the window in rage of my radical opinions, keep in mind the following mention I am about to make. I am not talking about a person in this post, I am talking about Martin. Martin is an old laptop computer; in fact more precisely an IBM Thinkpad. And so his story goes:

_{Un peu d’espoir by Joyce Jonathan}

I met Martin for the first time about a month ago, at a friend’s home. My friend introduced me to old Martin, describing him as old and practically unusable, due to the viruses collected by the friends who visited numerous web sites, every now and then when visiting and being offered Martin as a web-surfing computer, since there was little if none other use for him. My friend knew that I might be interested in such a scenario and offered Martin to me freely. Excitedly, I accepted! I felt that odds were in my favour that “practically unusable” would not be the description for Martin after a little work on him.

At first sight, Martin was dusty, that is the best way to describe him, I’d say. It was rather obvious that he hadn’t enjoyed anybody’s attention in quite a while. He gladly accepted the power source cable of my old Toshiba laptop (since Martin came without one, it got lost at some point in his life) and started up without much trouble. Some minutes later (since he was running Windows) I got to see the windows desktop with the usual icons. I went to the Control Panel > System in order to determine his pecifics.

The processor, a single-core Pentium III running at 1.1GHz. The RAM memory measured ~340MB, then later in the BIOS it measured 380MB, and eventually the new operating system called it 390MB, so in other words, somewhere between 350 and 400. I wiped the hard drive clean and initially installed the latest CrunchBang Linux distribution, which although fast is Debian Linux-based and I wanted to stick to Ubuntu Linux; so soon after, I installed a minimal system of Ubuntu Linux 11.04 and configured it from there.

_{This is Martin, the IBM Thinkpad, after installing Crunchbang Linux on it.}

When configuring it, I had to keep in mind that the laptop had a total of ~300 and something MegaBytes to work with in terms of RAM, so wasting any RAM on fancy graphics was not something that I wanted to allow myself to do. So a lightweight window manager was asked for. I decided for the Fluxbox window manager; here are some examples of what Fluxbox can look like. I then had to look for some examples of nicely put together designs featuring this window manager. I found this one and liked it a lot!

Modern Fluxbox by ~Mloodszy on deviantART

In the description of it you notice the link to all the pieces that fit together make it look this way:

WM: Fluxbox GTK theme: Litestyle suite by ~weakhead [link] Fluxbox theme: olive – fluxbox theme [link] by me Icons: Faenza [link] Wallpaper: Floorboard and Wall (modified by me) [link] Conky: Aller Display Conky Clock by me [link] Font: Aller

Apps: - conky - wbar - Sonata - Pidgin

Conky is (one of my favourite applications) a system monitor application, that displays all kinds of data onto the desktop directly, ranging from the time, to the amount of processor used, to how much RAM the computer has, how much is used, how much remains … in this case, only showing the time and date. (It uses very little RAM to run …as opposed to other applications that display data on the desktop, like the Mac OS or Windows 7 gadgets)

wBar is a launcher application that holds icons that can launch an application when clicked on or just run a script (similar to the dock in Mac OS X, but of course using very little RAM to run).

Tint2 is the bottom panel (that contains the task bar, where the running applications show). Once again uses very little RAM to run.

These put together, along with a custom wallpaper and the icons and themes listed above show below in what came out once I finished the installation and customization. In the end all put together used roughly between 50 and 80 MB RAM. That leaves quite a bit of RAM for other applications to run, like LibreOffice, which uses about 40MB alone to run. So now, by means of Linux, this old orphan got new life breathed into his old nostrils.

_{Martin, running Ubuntu Linux 11.04, wbar, conky, tint2 panel, using only ~50-80MB RAM to run.}

Before I end this statement I’d like to make it clear that I did not mean the previous as a reproach toward my friend’s actions regarding his computer, instead I am making an observation on what seems to be a general attitude towards the not-so-new-any-more; mostly when it comes to objects, but regrettably often times when it comes to people as well.

< / end of my rant >

]]> http://www.stefanchirila.com/blog/2011/05/16/new-life-for-an-old-orphan/feed/ 0 http://www.stefanchirila.com/blog/2011/05/08/video-blogging-and-westfield-village-outing/ http://www.stefanchirila.com/blog/2011/05/08/video-blogging-and-westfield-village-outing/#comments Mon, 09 May 2011 04:53:06 +0000 stefan http://www.stefanchirila.com/blog/?p=1066 Continue reading →]]> Today was quite the busy day! Not only is it Mother’s day, but it is also the day I took my bicycle out into town for the first (make that second) time this year, as well as the first time this year that I went to Westfield Heritage Village. The weather was fantastic! Too bad I don’t have any images from the bike downtown, but I discovered a new coffee shop called Balzac. The barista working there, a very talented (she made an exquisite espresso macchiato) young lady mentioned how the Balzac coffee shops started out in Stratford, Ont and now have a few locations including Kitchener and downtown Toronto. In fact as I thought a bit more about it I realized I had been to the one in Toronto before, when visiting the Distillery District, and got stuck there over night. I wrote a post about it.

I do have some images from Westfield though, where I went with my friends David and Katrina, whose wedding I photographed in 2009. I had the opportunity to photograph a very special family portrait session with them, of which I shall post once I get their permission! … AND I have it =). So here are the images:

Also, as I mentioned in a previous post, I intend to flood my blog with videos in the future; and on that note, I found some videos I posted on twitvid.com a while back. Totally forgot about them!

Translation: we grow organic food with passion!

In this video, Juan David, rehearsing for an upcoming gig!

I was so upset that Kitchener City Hall would allow all that. I don’t even want to think about it.

Music: Hurt by Johnny Cash

So if you liked what you heard, or maybe didn’t but you think Karaoke if something for you, come join me Thursdays at Little Bean Coffee Bar, downtown Kitchener at 8PM to enjoy some karaoke with Karen (Karenoke)

_{End of Childhood – Jane Eyre Movie Soundtrack by Dario Marianelli. Once again I found an awesome soundtrack and I am quite excited to see to what extent the film will create the same emotions as the music alone.}

Teaching Workshops: As you may have noticed recently, at the top of this page you can find a link that takes you to my Workshop page. For a long time I had wanted to put together workshops on different photography topics and teach them. I have this thing, you see, about sharing the things that I care about with other like-minded people; or maybe it is me having a thing for hearing my own voice while having a bunch of people watching me (that would definitely explain my frequent visits to Little Bean Cafe on Thursdays for Karaoke). Either way, the Stefan Chirila Workshop series is here and it is here to stay, with a few additions to be expected during this coming summer.

The Blog: Some of the more radical changes that are to come will in regards to the blog. One of the things I mind the most about it is the very fact that it is a blog, and not much more than a blog. At the very least I would like it to be more of a site, where people can get a more varied spectrum of information on what to expect from working with me as a photographer, and perhaps something for those who want to know more about me the living, breathing and sometimes biking, person. Besides this, I would also like the site to be a place where not only people looking for a photographer can find something useful to read; but also photographers themselves (tutorials, reviews) and art lovers (artwork critique). I am even thinking about moving towards the idea of a video blog, but for that I would have to first get over a few elements of my shy nature, so don’t get your hopes up too soon.

Either way, in order to accommodate these notions, a new design is needed. I insist on something simple and intuitive, where the command controls do not overpower the mood that the web site is meant to set. So in other words, due to me being so picky, I am bound to design the new interface, again, from scratch, as I have for the one present now. Here is a sample of my creative design process for the new look of the blog/site. It doesn’t look too incredibly different, yet anyway, since there are some integral parts of the present design that I like quite a lot and that I will keep.

The menu, however will be slightly different, which, regrettably, is a part of the design not showing in this image. It will however be rather intuitive and accommodate both the standard screen sizes as well as the ultra-large Mac monitors (that I am so jealous of), as well as mobile devices such as iPhones, or some of the more modest screen resolutions (such as 800×600).

Fund Raiser for world-wide education

A friend of mine who is an aspiring journalist, Brigitte Szucs pointed me recently to this video that she made in regards to a fund raiser.

It is possible to donate directly through this web site.

New images: Now, for those of you who have been hungering for some new visual material from me, here are the images:

Pianist: Beatriz Boizan

Pianist: Beatriz Boizan

With a few friends, Maria, Robyn and Juan David at Hilton Falls, Ontario | We were roasting some sausages, some shrimp skewers and shared a bottle of rose wine. It was a great way to spend a day celebrating love and togetherness.

Maria – At Hilton Falls, Ontario

Corinna – At Hilton Falls, Ontario | Corinna is from Germany; visiting Canada, after having been to New Zealand and the U.S.A. We met at Little Bean Cafe about a month ago at a game of Foosball and quickly befriended. She is not as dorky as I am when it comes to photography but loves it nevertheless.

Corinna – At Hilton Falls, Ontario

Corinna

At Hilton Falls, Ontario

Squirrel At Hilton Falls, Ontario | When we entered the park we were given some seeds to feed the birds. That squirrel however, proved to have been way hungrier than any of the birds. In an excess of courage, it attacked the seed bag that was on the pick-nick table next to us. I didn’t even have the camera handy at first, but the squirrel kept coming back, so eventually I got lucky.

Taken March 16 2011, 4 days before the full moon. The moon was the closest to Earth that it had been for 20 years during that time. Buy this as a high quality enlarged print here.

I embarked on an unforgettable afternoon with some of my best friends to Hilton Falls where we hiked, explored, discovered, loved, laughed, (of course) photographed, grilled, ate and felt like we belonged together. It was wonderful, awesomely amazing and unforgettable. I will post images …tomorrow! Tonight I am debating whether I have enough energy left to crawl into bed, after having woken up at 8AM, having hiked, eaten, drive, then eaten again, karaoked until my last breath AND picked a friend up from the side of the Highway 401 where her Greyhound bus had lost a tire…

But before I say good night; here’s to celebrating the great moments of the past and the hope that the future can hold. Indeed, long live all the mountains we moved, we will be remembered =)

As part of the workshop, we also went on two photowalks; one to Hilton Falls, to do some nature photography and the second to University of Waterloo, to practice documentary photography. Here are a few samples from the photowalks:

A big THANK YOU goes out to everyone who came out each week and turned this into a fantastic experience! I am very much looking forward to next time (sometime in April most likely!).

Also: More information about the Photographing Consciously workshop, as well as the dates of the next instance can be found if you click below:

What changed my mind were two elements. At first, coaxed by my girlfriend to take self-portraits, I learned the craft of photographing people, and eventually went on photographing others than myself, only to find that so easily and well done photograph would put a smile on an otherwise sad face. That very much impressed me. I started to see value in this people centred way of doing photography. A second element was the realization that indeed, as frail and insignificant as it may seem, at first sight, to freeze a mere 1/100 of a second for the future to look back upon as representing a whole summer or a whole year, it is magnificent to live through the experience of coming upon images, forgotten, that attest to a time, now well in the past, that your mind attributes great valour to. Even if the images are only two or three. They can bring back more than just other images that would fill in the gap of other events in a day; some things you may have thought would be buried in your memory forever, irrecoverable.

I later stumbled upon street photography and eventually documentary photography/photo journalism which took me further down the path towards greater appreciation for this craft. “Why photograph war? Is it possible to put an end to a form of human behavior, which has existed throughout history, by the means of photography. The proportions of that notion seem ridiculously out of balance, yet that very idea has motivated me. For me, the strength of photography lies in its ability to evoke a sense of humanity, if war is an attempt to negate humanity then photography can be perceived as the opposite of war and if its used well it can be a powerful ingredient in the antidote to war.

” – Photographer: James Nachtwey

Photograph by James Nachtwey

Download the documentary War Photographer, about James Nachtwey

It is obviously his passion and hope for change that drive this man to go to the places where others dare not, and where for others it is not safe, in order to raise awareness.

On that note, that of passion, I would like to share some thoughts that I’ve had today in regards to a piece of visual art, the film Black Swan. For those who have not yet seen it, I do not wish to ruin it, so I will go straight to my point. The film brings up the notion that sex, as in seduction, has a very big impact within art, giving it greater amplitude. This notion has brought me back to a line of thought that I had walked a long time ago and that had remained somewhat unanswered for me. Do elements of seduction, or elements hinting at sexuality really make art more likeable?

To be honest, I am a bit bothered by the thought. Just like I feel treated like an animal when I see a commercial advertisement on television featuring a woman in a seductive pose next to the object advertised, not having much or anything to do with that object; simply for the purpose of creating interest in the object advertised. For example:

I am wondering, could one not create very appealing artwork without the sexually seductive element in it. Does sex really play such a vital role in art; or perhaps there is another element that is present and which can be isolated and implemented in other, non-sex-based pieces of art. My eventual conclusion was that it was the element of “passion” that I was looking for. Passion is the element that creates excitement when encountered in artwork. Whenever the viewer can detect it, in the eyes, or actions of the characters in the piece of art, the viewer relates to it and that passion is awoken within his/her heart. That is why, if you notice in the images above, all of them powerful artworks, but not all of them featuring potentially seductive themes, at least not the last three. Whenever passion is present, art is enriched. But where then do the sexual elements fit in, in all this and why do they seem powerful? Although it may not necessarily be the fact that they contain sexual material that makes them powerful, they do however contain material that inspires passion. Sex is after all one of those things that really easily affects emotionally. One enjoys art when one can easily relate to it, and this overused means to create emotion is one that is easy to relate to.

The Photographing Consciously Workshop eBook

The other day there was supposed to be a huge storm. Advertised as Snowpocalypse for Southern Ontario, I most certainly wanted to document the tremendous damage it would create. The storm came, while on its way to New York, barely hit us and caused it to snow non-stop for a night and a day. Fair enough, more snow fell during that night and day than usually, but it wasn’t anything all too impressive. In fact I would have felt better off staying at home that day if it weren’t for the following image that I managed to capture while on the bus.

Here are the rest of the images from that day:

And because I can’t just make a post without a photo, here’s Omar (on the left) and Oranmiyan (on the right):

This is a workshop for the intermediate photographer who is interested in getting to understanding how and why his/her camera reacts the way that it does when shooting in diverse situations and how to help the camera deliver the result the photographer is looking for.

The workshop addresses issues in the field of camera functions, photographing techniques for various situations, as well as post processing techniques.

By the end of this course, the participant will be more aware of his/her camera’s strengths and weaknesses, which is the first step towards learning to push one’s equipment’s limits and get the most out of it.

To read details about the workshop as well as the location and time, please click below!

The other day I pulled one of my famous all-nighters. I spent half the night in agony, convinced that one of my favourite shoots of the year was forever lost due to me thinking it was backed up and then deleted the only copy. Luckily though, it was merely a case of misplacing a folder into a place where it most certainly didn’t belong; GIMP (my image editing program), however, keeps a history of files edited and where they’re stored and I was able to find it. This however motivated me once and for all time to properly sort my backup files. Oh and, just in case that you’re getting bored reading and not seeing any prettiful images, here’s one from that shoot; it was a photowalk I went on in November with my photographer friends Marko and Christian @ Webster’s Falls, Spencer Gorge, Ontario.

Other than looking for those images, I also looked at images by two photographers whose works I enjoy a lot, Richard Avedon and Henri Cartier-Bresson and watched a documentary on Henri here.

So inspired by these fine fellows, I embarked on a walk down memory lane putting together a small collection of images from the past 12 months (in more or less of a chronological order). Enjoy =)

Kitchener band: The Weak Need

panorama of Caves @ Elora Gorge, Ontario

On a very strange and foggy morning at 5AM

I have very talented friends …

Some can bend their bodies in ways that it hurts me just to think about it

Others are exceptional interior decorators

Great [looking] musicians

Kitchener Latin pop-rock singer: David Juan

The unmistakeable Lady Jazz Williams

Others are just plain fun to be around

Later in the year I got to photograph the CD launching concert of one of the area’s brightest latin music stars, Glenda Del E

I witnessed the baptism of one of my dearest friends, Roxy of Toronto:

And met a fellow Kitchener photographer [Aaron Schwab] who initially I confused for Johhny Depp in Pyrus Cafe, downtown Kitchener one night. Can you blame me? Probably …my eyesight isn’t what it used to be.

To celebrate colour, here’s one of my favourites, and I know at least one person who will tell me how this picture gives her headache, but nonetheless …I guess “It is a fool who looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart” (according to Ulyses Everett McGill from Oh Brother Where Art Thou), I love this picture. I posted it a long time ago on my deviantART account as a wallpaper. Now why I named it “regret”, I do not remember any more. Here below is a re-edit, scaled down. If you like it and would like it as a wallpaper for your computer go here.

And here is a song I’ve been listening to recently; it helps with the brainstorming and goes well with the image.

Music: Michael Nyman – The Promise (From the The Piano movie soundtrack)

Christmas Concert: Stefan Hrusca

Stefan Hrusca is one of the icons of Romanian folk music. I grew up with his songs and it was a delightful walk down memory lane going to this year’s Christmas concert. But apart from my personal pleasure, the fact that, Stefan Hrusca is travelling the world singing traditional folk Christmas carols for Romanians everywhere, has a yet more significant role.

Stefan Hrusca’s musical career started in 1981, during the Communist regime in Romania, under the guidance of poet: Adrian Paunescu who in spite of the anti-religious stance of the Communist regime, managed to collect and maintain Romanian Christian folklore so as to avoid it being lost forever.

In this day, when Romania is no longer Communist and the political regime is no longer restricting religious rites, Romania is still in danger of losing its Christian folklore due to the ever growing digitalization of life. Stefan Hrusca, however, is still around and I predict will not let the heritage of ages go down any time soon!

Family Portraits: The Rabens

Alex, you can see him below with his girlfriend, has been a close friend of mine since grade 10. His parents asked me if I could come over on December 26th if I could come over and do a portrait session with them. On my side it was a huge pleasure, I don’t however know about him, he usually hated having his picture taken and therefore I’d like to extend a huge “Thank you!” to him for going along with all the “torture” I put them though, moving them from one chair to another. What a beautiful family! See some sneak peeks!

Sibling love…

Mr. and Mrs. Raben …and Riley, the awesomely cute Hungarian shepherd dog, the newest addition to the Raben family

Spending an outrageously fun time with friends!

Bringing old technology back to life

I have been a Linux enthusiast since 1999 when I first accidentally read about it in a magazine. Recently, as my friend Alex (you can see him in images above) purchased a new laptop, I had the chance to “bring back to life” his old laptop, which he was ready to throw in the garbage.

The machine is a beauty, branded Ferrari. It features a 2GhZ 64bit processor, some 1GB of RAM and a 15inch screen. Sure, it is rather heavier than most machines bought today, gets warmer, quicklier, but hardly ready for the garbage bin!

Below you can see images of it, as I brought it home and placed it on my work desk. It was originally running Windows XP (no wonder it was running slow). At first I popped in a Ubuntu Live CD to see how much processing power the machine really had and how much hard drive space I get to work with.

The Ferrari laptop. Featuring: one 2 GhZ processor @ 64bits; 1GB of RAM; 100GB hard drive space; 15” screen @ 1680px X 1050px native resolution.

[CLICK TO VIEW FULL SIZE IMAGE] The laptop running the Ubuntu Linux 9.04 off of the Live CD, before making any changes to it.

Once I noticed that the laptop was quite better than I expected (you can see the details highlighted on the screen), I proceeded installing a newer version of Linux on it. Ubuntu 10.10 – 64bit edition. This should take full advantage of the 64 bit capability of the processor.

[CLICK TO VIEW FULL SIZE IMAGE] The laptop running Ubuntu Linux 10.10 64 bit edition

I am very impressed with how the laptop responded after the installation! As expected, it got warm rather quickly, as back when this machine was built, dual cores were not yet popular, nor were the fans particularly efficient. The mouse-pad doesn’t work either (no idea how that ended up broken) and the screen has a small cut, but nothing that should really be an impediment to performance.

What a success story! Perhaps I will go further and install an extra gigabyte of RAM in it so I can easily edit two RAW files at once.

As a sidenote: My blog post was on the beautiful “Lady” Barra, which is more popularly known under the name of Barra Castle, a 1930s architectural masterpiece in Gothic style, which regrettably ceased to exist altogether in November 2010 after a few months of partial demolition under the plan of keeping its façade; which apparently changed sometime in the meantime and the City of Kitchener managed to entirely neglect the historical value of this building.

When Marko came across my blog post, written on January 27th, it was already summer time. I found it quite intriguing, considering I had never before acquainted someone over the internet under such conditions: them looking up information and thus finding me and being interested to getting to know me. In the following year and a half Marko and I became good friends, worked on projects together and I believe, broadened each other’s spectrum of interest when it comes to photography. I’ll be honest, if it weren’t for my friend Marko, my appreciation for film photography would be a lot less than it is now. He introduced me to both the physical machine that the Leica Rangefinder camera is, as well as the rangefinder ideology and philosophy, which puts the majority of the weight, when it comes to a photograph’s quality, on the content matter of that which is photographed, as opposed to the technological aspect details, like sharpness or dynamic range. But yeah, I’ll quit the dorky photographer talk; here’s the results of a photo-walk that Marko and I went for a few months ago, part of which became a portrait session. Due to his infatuation to the “film photography look”, I felt compelled to attempt to offer Marko images that would satisfy his high standards. I believe they did.

Marko Kovacevic

We ventured deep beneath the colossus that is the University of Waterloo, in the famous “tunnels” that link most Arts department buildings

We got lucky, at the end of the day to encounter the train passing through Uptown Waterloo, ONT by the Market Square

Every once in a while we get together and do a portrait session. Recently I wanted to practice black and white photography, so that is this session’s theme. I also absolutely love the old look of the area they live in, so of course I took advantage of that! Enjoy:

By the way, (if you can see the video above) this is the first time I get to use the new < video > tag in HTML5 supporting web browsers and show this video. This video is hosted on my web host, no need any more for Vimeo.com or Youtube.com, although they are neat for other purposes =)

When it comes to black and white photography I find myself attracted to the high contrast style. In some way I feel that way I can be a Johnny Cash of photography. Through his sombre image, Johnny Cash, I find, was a sober voice of reason, that had the authority to openly speak of the nature of human struggle; human weakness, need, passion and temptation, as well as the constant fight to return to the path of righteousness.

I am by no means a Johnny Cash! I do however feel that in high contrast black and white photography I find a hint of the fascinating flavour that I love in his music.

Photo essay – “The Fly” Location: Waterloo Park, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada Map: Google maps: 43.467105,-80.531254 Images shot on Date: 2010-07-08

Photo essay – “Quack – insight to the world of a duck” Location: Victoria Park, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada Map: Google maps: 43.446158,-80.497253 Images shot on Date: 2010-06-27

On Saturday November 20th 2010 there will be an in-house-sale. It’s like a garage sale, except it will feature some of the large pieces of furniture in the Begisholli household that they had to leave behind when they got deported.

The money earned through the sales of these items will go directly to them, in order to provide for their everyday needs (like streaming hot water, which is scarce and expensive in Kosovo right now) as well as items of food.

Location: 34 Ingleside Drive, Kitchener, Ontario
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Some of the items that will be fore sale you can see below:

A 4 month old matress that was $2000 in value when bought

A full six chair dining table set

There are two of these beds for sale.

Dryer

Washer

The irony comes from the lesson that life has taught me, in this last little while, about the very nature of war and the suffering of people during such times. Let me explain. This epiphany started to form in my mind with the taking out of the public library of a wonderfully insightful book called “Larry Burrows – Vietnam”, a book about a war photographer and his journey through the Vietnam War. I love reading books such as that, seeing stellar photo journalism at its best and hearing about the thoughts and opinions of the photographer …it can really make my day. While looking through the book I was rejoicing at the fact that I can call myself a Canadian citizen and …unless I choose to… I am not forced to go to a war zone and fear for my life. At the same time, I also concluded that, however, without immersing oneself into such an environment it is very hard to practice war photography.

These thoughts came back to me today, November 11th 2010, Remembrance Day. At 5 AM this morning I was woken up by my phone. It was my friend Lumé; and she was crying. She received a text message from her father. He was in a prison cell, already in for four hours, no food, no water, after a 9+ hour flight. That’s when a light went on in my mind. I realised, I had practised war photography less than 12 hours ago.

Lumé (Fatlume) Begisholli is a young lady in her early twenties. I met her and her sad story a little more than a month ago through my photographer friend Sarah Lisk. Sarah had been a part of Lumé’s hopes to save her family for a while now. Lumé, her father, mother and two brothers arrived on Canadian soil roughly five years ago, having escaped a place where none of us wouldn’t like to be (unless they were a photo journalist with a lot of courage), the battlefields of Kosovo. For the past 5 years they had strived to please the Canadian government’s criteria and be accepted as refugees in the country that so proudly introduces itself as the safe haven of all those who are no longer safe in their country of birth, the persecuted, the mistreated.

Recently Lumé was informed that, having been the only member of her family who received the status of citizen, she would be allowed to stay, while having to watch the rest of her family be sent back into the smoking crater of that war volcano that Kosovo is, any time ready to erupt anew. For a while she had tried every single means of appealing the deportation that she could think of. In fact a week ago I was part of a fund raiser event organised in honour of her family, in order to help them pay their legal fees.

But it was all in vain. Yesterday, Wednesday, November 10th 2010, I was there with Lumé and the Begisholli family at the Toronto Pearson airport, as with tears in their eyes they were forced to say good bye.

But this was not the story I wanted to tell you. I wanted to tell you how for this family, the horrors of war, featuring insecurity, harassment, disrespect and fear, were not as far as we originally thought; in fact they were not overseas at all. They were right here in our beloved country.

Mr. Begisholli posing for a portrait that I took for his daughter. It would not be easy to say when they would see each other again in person.

Lumé’s little brother

A family portrait. Their greatest reason for joy at that moment was that they were still together and not quite yet apart.

Above: As we arrived at the luggage check-in, the first unfortunate turn of events occurred. The government letter of deportation expressed that they would be able to take with them double the amount of luggage that they are now told they are allowed to. Some of the extra luggage can be paid for, but rearrangements need to be made …unpack, repack, on the spot, quickly! Both Mr and Mrs Begisholli are in tears.

Arjan once again. Always a smile handy even when his parents are in tears.

This is Arjan’s favourite companion. His brother calls it a teddy bear but Arjan insists it is a dog. One has to cope somehow.

Above: At the deportation department, in the airport, after walking through a door that we had to show deportation papers to a hidden camera in order to get in, and taking an elevator from a small room that looked like it was from 1945, we get to a narrow hallway divided by thick glass, where, we wait.

Eventually a rather rude officer looks at, and confiscates Mr Begisholli’s university diplomas along with other documents, carelessly folds them into four and announces that we will receive them at the gate. Of course nobody was there at the gate with the files. Lumé later inquired about the documents; the response was that Mr. Begisholli would get them back once they land on foreign soil. (why?)

Lumé after her family was no longer in sight.

Chapter 2: After a 9 hour flight, the Begisholli family lands in Warsaw, Poland. The Polish customs officers declare their documents invalid. Treated like criminals, their hand luggage is confiscated and they are placed in locked cells. For 4+ hours they received neither food nor water (keep in mind the two boys are 12 and 14 years old). Mr. Begisholli manages to use the Blackberry phone that his daughter bought him to contact her and share his situation with her. That is about the time when my phone rang last night at 5 AM.

What Now? Poland is sending the Begisholli family back to Toronto due to their lack of a Shangen visa. The Canadian government is then planing to send them right back on their way via a plane route through Vienna, Austria instead of Warsaw, Poland. If you care, and are willing to exercise the right of freedom to speak up, which we are so proud of having in our free country, then come out tomorrow Friday November 12th to Toronto Pearson airport! The airplane that will carry the Begisholli family is scheduled to arrive there from Poland at ~6PM.

Something NEEDS to be done! Join us in helping them here! Also! Their story will appear in the Waterloo Region Record Newspaper on Friday November 12th. Read their whole story and make the phone call that may save them from having to go into potentially worse conditions!

Now, here’s the deer story! It all started with me having a usual night …staying up editing images and talking to friends on far away continents where it isn’t night yet. Before I knew it, it was 8AM and tiredness had finally caught up with me. Well …more like I concluded that it’s about time to go to bed if I want to be able to wake up at a reasonable time (which of course I ended up not doing; that was one weird day). So I bid farewell to the few people who were still online and went to get a cup of milk in the kitchen; when then I noticed it. Beautifully reigning over my backyard, a glorious sheet of fog! I immediately concluded: the time for sleep had come and gone! It was fog-photography time!

And so I did; put a jacket on, grabbed my camera, tripod, shoulder bag and out I was through the back of the house. I got some interesting shots on the street and some in the woods near my house, but I had no idea what awaited me further down the trail. I crossed Old Chicopee Drive North-West-ward, and was about to shoot a nice panorama of the trail+reeds, when I heard some noise… and before I knew it something emerged from the fog that looked like a horse to me. At second sight, it was a deer. Cool, I thought, and put the camera to my eye and shot a picture. Before I could shoot another one, I noticed the horse-turned-deer started galloping towards me. Odd, I thought, deer are supposed to be scared of people and, if anything, run away from someone, not towards one. Well this rebellious deer refused to conform to the status quo; and I was not ready to put up with the consequences in case its intentions were other than friendly. So …I ran; for a bit, then turned around for another picture; of course the deer picked up the pace again. I wanted to stop again but I could still hear it galloping, so I ran across the street, hoping the deer would cower away, afraid of the road …or if nothing else, that some car would hit it and save me (how terrible of me thinking so selfishly, but that is now it was). No car came, and the deer was by no means afraid of the road. Lucky for me, though, the deer was more interested in getting to the other side of the road and continue its trek on the trail, than in making me a martyr. Later on, zooming into the pictures I shot, I noticed it was a male, with quite the antlers. I was not nearly as scared at the time as I should have been!

Here’s the deer that attacked me

And here’s the deer up close. I wish I had the 300mm lens on my camera when I shot this, I would have a way clearer picture! …it was in my bag. No time to pull it out, had to run