A winter shot – the ferry that moves vehicles across the Peace River at Tompkins Landing, Alberta has been pulled from the water and rests dormant until spring. Liking how this image works in several ways.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – ‘The whole point of taking pictures is so you don’t have to explain things with words.’ – Elliott Erwitt

Listening to – a song from the ‘I Am Sam’ soundtrack, the Beatles’ ‘Nowhere Man’ as performed by Paul Westerberg.

At 6:00 a.m., my daughter’s flight was underway, I watched the jet having its wings de-iced and then taking to the air. My daughter returned south to University. I wouldn’t return to sleep. I gathered photo gear, left the hotel and got on backroads between Sexsmith and La Glace, Alberta. These morning images are from a bright, early winter’s day in November.

Then, I drove the four hours home.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – ‘One doesn’t stop seeing. One doesn’t stop framing. It doesn’t turn off and turn on. It’s on all the time.’ – Annie Liebovitz

Listening to – ‘Such Great Heights’ from The Postal Service’s album, ‘Give Up.’

I follow the photography of an Alberta Facebook group called Aurora Chasers. Close to midnight on my return from Yellowknife, the Aurora was active, significant and striking in colour, shape and brightness. I watched them dance between Enterprise, Northwest Territories and Indian Cabins, Alberta. At Indian Cabins, I pulled in and tried as many as ten shots of the Northern Lights – the one presented here worked out well. Since then, I have received encouragement to set my ISO and Aperture to accommodate a 1/800 of a second in shutter speed … a next project.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – ‘I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn’t photograph them.’ – Diane Arbus

Listening to – the Primitives’ ‘Summer Rain,’ ‘All the Way Down,’ and ‘Thru’ the Flowers.’

On my return to High Level, Alberta I fuelled my truck at the Cherdon Enterprises truck stop at the highway corner where you can gain access to Fort Providence, Northwest Territories. I took some time to drive in to the settlement and get a sense for its size and how it was laid out. Many of my students are Dene and have Providence as their last name. It is set on the northern bank of the Mackenzie River and looks onto Providence Island and then Meridian Island behind it. The Mackenzie River is quite wide, almost twice the width of the Peace River as we find it near Fort Vermilion, Alberta. The Deh Cho Bridge that crosses the Mackenzie is impressive – I did two or three photo-stitch images of the bridge at sundown and am looking forward to printing one of the images out. Here, you’ll find images of the Deh Cho Bridge, the Our Lady of Providence Catholic Church, a look out to Providence Island and the Mackenzie River.

Quote to Inspire / Consider – ‘The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.’ – Dorothea Lange

Listening to – Roxy Music’s ‘More than This’ and Of Monsters and Men’s ‘King and Lionheart.’

I am an Ice Pilots TV series fan – what the pilots of Buffalo Airways face in terms of extremes of cold and flight reminds of bush flying as a teacher moving between fly-in communities and airports with road access; each pilot has my respect.

Sunday, following the photo walk, before returning South, to High Level and a Thanksgiving meal, I found my way to Buffalo Airways at the Yellowknife Airport. One of my bucket list goals is to fly in a Buffalo Airways DC-3 or DC-4 from Hay River to Yellowknife and to tour the Yellowknife facility. It nearly happened this past summer. Here, I was able to photograph these aircraft that were a part of my father’s travel in the early sixties. I am looking forward to what might be possible next summer.

Also, to note is that I am an Ice Road Trucker TV series fan because winter road conditions I drive upon in Northern Alberta hold many of the same perils that are encountered on bush roads. What was surprising was to find Ice Road Trucker, Art Burke, dining at the Gold Range Bistro on Saturday before the World Wide Photo Walk. Very cool.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – ‘Photographs open doors into the past but they also allow a look into the future.’ – Sally Mann

Listening to – Stan Rogers’ ‘Northwest Passage,’ ‘Canol Road,’ ‘Barrett’s Privateers’ and Sigur Ros’ ‘Glosoli.’

This year’s Kelby World Wide Photo Walk occurred on Saturday, 6 October 2018. Were you out for the photo walk?

The walk in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories was led by photographer and teacher, Brent Currie. It began at 1:00 p.m. at the Rotary Centennial Park, took our group along ‘Ragged Ass Road,’ made famous by way of Tom Cochrane’s tune of the same name. There was good discussion about photography, several discoveries about what is possible when using a camera, sharing of ideas in question and answer, encouragement to try the same/similar shots and a momentum of photographer camaraderie built through the few hours we spent together. The walk ended with an opportunity to quaff ale or sip wine at the NWT Brewing Company. It was a time to talk through and about photos, consider the need for gear and explore/share in people’s work and endeavors. A good, good crew.

In terms of locale, this second photo walk in Yellowknife was an opportunity to explore Old Town Yellowknife with the group and then, later, on my own.

Yellowknife is a city on the Great Slave Lake, the tenth largest lake in the world with a maximum depth of 614m. It is also a city set on the Canadian shield, on rock that has been smoothed by glaciers (last ice age). The landscape is an intriguing setting for me, a flat-lander. I went to the Bush Pilot’s monument and worked through two photo-stitches from the monument terrain leading out across the lake to Joliffe Island; the image holds most buildings on either side of McDonald Drive – businesses with names like Yellowknife Courier Service, Dancing Moose Café, Aurora Geosciences Ltd., Old Town Glassworks, Bayside Bed and Breakfast, Yellowknife Garage, Old Town Warehouse, Aurora & Inukshuk Olive Company and Yvonne Quick Heritage Wharf. The Yellowknife bay holds the curiosity of houseboats, all are colourful, each is a residence that allows its owner to avoid land taxes.

These images are the first I have edited – have a look.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – “To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place …. I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” – Elliott Erwitt

Listening to – U2’s take on an Aussie Folk song, ‘Van Dieman’s Land’ and ‘The Miracle (of Joey Ramone).’

A Sunday afternoon out, hours north from High Level finds me at Indian Cabins, my first visit to a Dene burial site where the deceased are laid to rest in a grave and provided a burial house for shelter through each season, a sacred practice common to Indigenous peoples in Alberta’s north. Further on, up the road the Alexandra Falls in the Twin Falls Territorial Park (Northwest Territories) provides opportunity to practice filter use for blurring water falling over these falls.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – ‘Each of us is an artist of our days; the greater our integrity and awareness, the more original and creative our time will become.’ – John O’Donohue, ‘To Bless the Space Between Us.’

Listening to – U2’s ‘Running to Stand Still,’ ‘In God’s Country’ and ‘Where the Streets Have No Name.’

A Teepee frame on the valley floor at Dunvegan, near the Factor’s house, the Peace River and the Dunvegan bridge; a late evening sunset during harvest, a family operation … almost done; a forest trail panorama – looking for greens on an overcast Sunday afternoon in late September; and, a vintage grain truck – up for sale, on the side of the road. All are opportunity to find fall colour and to become a stealer of moments.

Reminded well of Dar Williams’ album ‘The Beauty of the Rain,’ and of one particular song – ‘Fishing in the Morning.’ The first lines run … ‘Let’s go fishing in the morning, just like we’ve always gone. You can come inside and wake me up, we’ll pack and leave by dawn.’ It’s a song about taking concrete steps in Life and Lives towards hopes, dreams and goals. It’s a song about appreciating time on Earth.

Quote to Consider / Inspire: “Photographic technique is no secret and – provided the interest is there – easily assimilated. But inspiration comes from the sould and when the Muse isn’t around even the best exposure meter is very little help. In their biographies, artists like Michelangelo, da Vinci and Bach said that their most valuable technique was their ability to inspire themselves. This is true of all artists; the moment there is something to say, there becomes a way to say it.” – Ralph Gibson, from his book ‘Déjà vu’ [cited in Creative Camera December 1972, p. 401]

Listening to: Dar Williams’ song ‘The Beauty of the Rain,’ a song fretted / learned with my FP-325SRC reading tablature shared in Acoustic Guitar magazine (now played with my L’Arrivee L-03).

An overcast, autumn September day – we, my wife and I, drive up Watt Mountain behind Hutch Lake. I get out of the truck while she is content to read in the cab. Down a cut-line and then a couple of paces into trees I find this image (among several) – colours found, the fall of each tree, the textures and the wisps of moss remind of Cathedral Grove and my parents’ home in Qualicum Beach, British Columbia.

Quote to Inspire / Consider – ‘Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever …. It remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.’ – Aaron Siskind

Listening to – Brubeck’s ‘Take Five,’ a tune my father played both on his Heintzman grand piano in vertical form and on his Marantz stereo with Dual turntable … good memories, grateful.

The last few months have been a time of deep learning with photography, paying attention to tools and their use, composition and light. It’s been a time of becoming more familiar with what to do in a given situation and how to problem-solve along the way. It’s been a time of seeing what more I can do with editing in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. It’s been a time of making time for photography whether it’s the decision to pull the truck over a grab the image I’ve been gifted with or planning time in the mountains with my camera or to participate in a photo walk. Longstanding computer issues have been resolved, the monitor is calibrated as best it can be and now it’s time to print my photos and share my photos. One of the highlights occurred last summer when a canvas print sold for $900 … a record for me. And, that event highlighted understanding of how meaningful an image can be to others. I am grateful for the encouragement and the opportunity to have done so, right here, in High Level, Alberta, Canada.

A Saturday’s drive to Grande Prairie netted these images. The Dunvegan bridge is something I photographed in a photo-stitch and as a single image using a 10 stop (Super Stopper) Lee Filter. The photo-stitch was a curious experiment – I used a 16-35mm lens for the stitch of eight photos. The distortion of the lens created something curious looking and less that real, but a good example of why working with a 50 mm prime lens would be the better choice – I am learning and have learned. Working with a 50 mm prime is my plan next time I am in and around Dunvegan. I did gather a good shot with the Super Stopper filter and was rewarded with smooth water as result following a four-minute exposure. At day’s end I shot a windmill water pump between La Glace and Sexsmith, Alberta. On a grey sky evening, the sky opened between clouds and I got these images – I’m liking the colour, the texture, the light and the cloud work.

Quote to Consider / Inspire: “When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.” ― Ansel Adams

Listening to: Still Corner’s ‘The Trip,’ Flock of Seagulls’ ‘I Ran,’ Midnight Oil’s ‘Beds Are Burning,’ Gord Downie’s ‘Introduce Yourself,’ Joe Strummer’s ‘London is Burning,’ Bob Dylan’s ‘Wiggle Wiggle’ and Laura Cortese’s ‘California Calling.’ And, of course, there’s been Dizzie Gillespie’s ‘School Days.’