Re-tasking a Vehicle – Its Promise

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Re-tasking A Vavenby Ford, Vavenby, British Columbia

Re-tasking A Vavenby Ford, Vavenby, British Columbia

Perhaps the most interesting feature of vehicle restoration is the re-tasking of a vehicle and its parts. Fenders, engines, radiators and transmissions are swapped out as one fails and another usable one is found to be used in its place. A three-quarter ton truck with a rusted out box may have the box removed to be replaced by a new one or perhaps the truck is now made into a flat deck. Here, an old Ford no longer has its hood or box; yet there are still the active working parts that point to its future potential and that define what history it has had and its former purposes. I find solace, here, with one arm in a sling as muscle fibers fuse/grow back together following a bicep/tendon tear. Now, six weeks on, I’m impressed that this body continues to repair its fifty-one-year-old self. For a time, just like this truck, I’m having to remain stationary before I will move in more substantial ways. I can see the promise that this truck still holds.

Listening to U2’s Stay (live from Toronto).

Quote to Inspire – “A photographer is an acrobat treading the high wire of chance, trying to capture shooting stars.” – Guy Le Querrec

The Cargo – A Book or A Ford’s

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Ford Among Fords - Vavenby, British Columbia

Ford Among Fords – Vavenby, British Columbia

A truck has as its intended purpose that of providing its owner with the opportunity of carrying or moving a payload from point of origin to an intended destination. A book does something similar, transporting its reader from point of origin or initial setting through the twists and turns of plot through to a closing destination. The cargo is human in imagination’s resemblance and there is something the author proposes to be learned/understood as one participates in the book’s movement of mind to its conclusion and denouement. This Vavenby, British Columbia truck does have me consider how it was used and the peoples and cargos it has transported. I appreciate its owner having given me permission to photograph it – thank you, Marvin Ritchie. The photographic respite you allowed helped make the long westward drive more doable.

Quote to Inspire – “If a photographer cares about the people before the lens and is compassionate, much is given. It is the photographer, not the camera, that is the instrument.” – Eve Arnold

Listening to – U2’s With or Without You, Mysterious Ways and Elevation (as viewed from the Live at Boston DVD).

Snapping Photos – Robson’s Yellows, Purples, Shapes and Textures

Best Practices - Photography, Canon 30D, Canon Camera, Flora, Light Intensity, Lookback Photos - One Year Ago, Project 365 - Photo-a-day, Season, Summer
Mount Robson's Valley

Mount Robson’s Valley

Son left at home, a summer job securely held in hand. Day two on a summer’s long-distance drive from High Level, Alberta to Qualicum Beach, British Columbia, nets a few moments driving respite in the valley beneath Mount Robson, Canada’s highest peak. With camera on tripod, I move behind the visitor’s center to find a field with yellows, purples, shapes and textures – all at hand. Everyone snapping photos – people in this place, recording their moments, here.

Quote to Inspire – “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.” – Robert Capa

Listening to – Dave Matthews’ Bartender.

Walking the Scene Glimpsed

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Close to Jasper - Jasper, Alberta, Canada

Close to Jasper – Jasper, Alberta, Canada

The matter of looking around for potential images often happens when I am driving. And, the real work of the photograph is that of stopping my vehicle, safely, and walking the scene to determine best point of view. You need to find what it was that you glimpsed while driving. In winter this might mean walking through varying depths of snow and shooting as snow falls. In summer as this photograph demanded it means descending the river bank to find the right point to capture the image. Having a good look around and doing so through the camera lens prior to the shot help one to find the best shot.

Quote to Inspire – “Photography is more than a medium for factual communication of ideas. It is a creative art.” – Ansel Adams

Listening to – Tim Reynolds’ fretting Betrayal, a song first heard in concert with Dave Matthews.

Between Tide’s Push and Pull

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Sundown - Parksville, Brisith Columbia

Away from Dad’s home – a July summer’s evening looking out over the water from a favourite Parksville, BC beach, a beach both our kids shared with their grandparents. Always a family destination, this beach was the place in which my son and daughter and I perfected our sand castle engineering in the hours between the tide’s push and pull of the ocean. In early morning, while everyone slept the beach was a calm, quiet destination for fretting through intricate tangles of melody and rhythms on different guitars, Celtic rhythms in 9:8 time in DADGAD tuning or the bass and rhythm riff of a Dave Matthews tune. Where are You Going and Crash in to Me are songs I first fretted at this beach.

Quote to Inspire – “Photography is one big scrapbook of your Life.” – Lisa Jones

Listening to: Big Jet Plane by Angus and Julia Stone

Moose, Moleskin & Bison

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Are you someone who does this? Do you keep an idea file for photographs you’d like to try?  I’ve found myself doing this at times when travel cannot afford the time to stop and snap a few photos.  At other times, I will realize that the subject of a shot works but that the conditions may not work ideally.  And, if I’m lucky I’ll be able to ask my daughter to write down a note in a moleskin notebook while we drive about location and subject and particulars;  the moleskin stays in the vehicle and I can refer back to it. Wildlife photographer, Moose Peterson in an interview on Shutter Time with Sid and Mac (Sidney Blake and Maciek Sokulski) spoke of being encouraged to keep an idea file for photographs and to revisit the file and plan for opportunities to make the shot or shots happen. The bison at Elk Island National Park (east of Edmonton, Alberta) are subject for one set of photographs found here.   The bison have been a part of my idea file since I’ve been listening to Sid and Mac’s exploits in repeated and regular photo sessions at the park.  For me, in terms of the camera work the learning is about shutter speed.  Within the golden hour of sunlight and with the continual movement of the bison in their grazing there is a need for a faster shutter speed in terms of capturing crisp images.

The issue I am grappling with when traveling is that I will often be days or weeks from my photos before I can edit and see images.  I am still considering the value of a laptop from the perspective of allowing greater immediacy of editing while traveling.  There is learning to be derived from the editing process and it may be that working with a laptop with different subjects will foster good results in second or third visits/photo sessions.

The remaining pictures are catch-all – images that have been kicking around, interesting to look at;  the vintage late 30’s sedan, the T-bird and the late sixties Dodge Dart were parked outside Ricky’s All Day Grill and are the work of one person.  Imagine being able to say to two of your best buddies, “Hey let’s take a few of my cars for a spin,” and then take them out to breakfast.  Cool!  Beyond these, there are other renderings of the fifties one-ton truck, a rusting relic.

Listening to – John Mayer’s Queen of California, a song reminding of the Doobie Brothers back in the seventies.

Quote to Inspire – “All photographs are memento mori.  To take a photograph is to participate in another person’s (or thing’s) mortality, vulnerability, mutability.  Precisely be slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time relentless melt.” – Susan Sontag

Reflection – Rain-soaked and Waxless

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One Ton Truck - Edmonton, Alberta

One Ton Truck – Edmonton, Alberta

Of the renderings considered, this image of the one ton grain truck (or perhaps utility truck) from the fifties intrigues by way of its waxless reflection brought out by its being rain soaked.  The image’s colours are late summer’s end-of-day colours.  Night isn’t too far off, the shot taken within evening’s Golden Hour in Edmonton.  John Grisham wrote A Painted House, a growing up novel written about a boy’s witnessing America’s move from the farm (a cotton plantation) to its cities in America’s fifties; this is the kind of truck that might have been found within Grisham’s narrative.  I hadn’t thought his narrative (as autobiographical as it is) might be considered sibling narrative to Jack Kerouac’s On the Road until now.

Listening to – what is seemingly a rural truck reminds of Lucinda Williams’ Car Wheels on a Gravel Road.

Quote to Inspire – “The goal is not to change your subjects, but for the subject to change the photographer.” – Anonymous

Carpe Diem, Conundrum & Mosquitos

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Conundrum – how to manage a photo-a-day blog when away from home, computer, software and the Internet. Is it a matter of taking a computer with you? Or is it about caching photos taken during vacation for presentation later on, in look-back fashion? I’m only now sitting down at my computer to review photos, some three weeks later to discover this present gem of an image, a one-ton, late fifties truck that pops noticeably because of the wet reflective surface provided courtesy of the rain. Reflection is a neat thing for adding light to a subject and in so doing, highlighting the subject’s lines and shape. Here, an extraordinary combination of clouds, sun and rain at day’s end allows the opportunity to explore textures, shape, reflection and background. In taking this photo, there was the scramble to the scene (a reasonable distance) in order to make use of the setting, light and background.  And, in this same scene while there has been that aspect of Carpe Diem, there too were the mosquitos within the wet, warm weather to contend with. But, a gem is a gem and I like each of the four renderings of this photo.

In truth, though, it has been hard to sit still at day’s end, the household asleep and to find that I’m awake without the tools for editing photos, writing a post and blogging. The issue is about workflow and what I really value doing with my/our time on vacation.  Photography is intended to assist vacation recall … not what the vacation should be about. Next year, perhaps a laptop … perhaps not.  Perhaps focus will remain on enjoying and capturing our vacation with my camera.

I haven’t withdrawn from my blog so much as I’ve been presented with the separation of vacation from the routines of daily life – sort of a forced withdrawal that’s likely to bring benefits with regard to energy and perspective.

Listening to – Shawn Colvin’s All Fall Down.

Quote to Inspire – “A photograph is a moral decision taken in one eighth of a second.” – Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet

Tunes – Lunch Break

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Sunset & Plant - Fort Vermilion Turnoff, Fort Vermilion, Alberta

Sunset & Plant – Fort Vermilion Turnoff, Fort Vermilion, Alberta

On lunch break between summer tasks, I play tunes my daughter has had us download in iTunes – Smash Mouth songs, Megan & Liz songs and songs from the Glee Cast. She’s had me track down the original of The Zombies – She’s Not There, a song sung on Glee. Another song from the Glee repertoire is Tears for Fears’ Mad World; we find the Michael Andrews and Gary Jules version of the song that encapsulates the theme within the Donnie Darko movie; it contains a straightforward set of lyrics about Life’s absurdity in being there but not there, almost a ghost within a world where you can be seen but not known, recognized but not affirmed, speak but not be understood. Our listen through with iTunes two nights back brought out several songs by The Who which we download – Won’t Get Fooled Again, I Can See For Miles, Behind Blue Eyes, My Generation, Pinball Wizard and Baba O’Riley. My daughter recognizes Pinball Wizard, a song she’s heard, and I wonder where she would have heard it – questions to ask.  For now she’s happy to have our downloads and to have the songs loaded on her iPod.

One lingering photo is this, taken at sunset, a plant with maroon and gold stem and shoots; it sways in the breeze as I try a macro shot. I’m liking the colours despite its movement.

Quote to Inspire – “No, the camera can’t steal the soul.  But it can occasionally hold it hostage.” – author unknown

Listening to – The Who andMy Generation.  Also listening to Smash Mouth’s Walkin’ on the Sun and All Star.