Best Dressed

Last night for our combined Young Men's/Young Women's activity we had a Kub Car rally. Ben and I had fun working on our car together. As soon I showed Ben the box of supplies that we had to work with he was adamant that we make one to look like Lightning McQueen. It took us a little while but we finally got it done.

I Last night at the rally we only lost two races the whole night ( I didn't tell Ben we only ran two races before we were knocked out though). All was not lost however. We ended up winning the best design award. When I told Ben he was so excited. So excited in fact that he took the car to school today to show his teacher.

Where Has Time Gone?

It's hard to believe that Sarah is already 9 Months old. She is standing on her own and is growing so fast.

A Walk In The Park

This wast weekend we decided to do something fun. For Des that was going shopping and for me it was taking pictures. So we headed down to Medicine Hat and I dropped Des and Sarah off at Costco while I took Ben and Rachel to Kal Tire to get some nuts on a tire re torqued (evidently, I learned that the Kal Tire by Costco is not very busy so you can get in and out really quick). After a while we came out of the store a little heavier and headed down to Police Point Park (first time for me, one of many for Des and the kids). Des took me to a place that she thought would be perfect for pictures. When we arrived at the location I saw what she was talking about it was perfect (some shade, a path, a bench and lots of over hanging trees).

On the way back to the van the kids found a hollow stump/log and had fun climbing in and out of it.

The sun was going down and the light was good so we took advantage of the opportunity for some more family pictures.

As a side note,

I learned that Sarah is a very easy baby to get to smile for the camera even when no one is behind it. I think it might be the flashing light.

For those that have not been, I would highly recommend going to Police Point Park in Medicine Hat. It's beautiful this time of year.

Are You Ninja Enough?

Under the veiled mist and darkness the ninja moves stealthily towards his victim. The unfortunate soul is only able to glimpse his attacker before he is silenced forever.




This is what happens when you get a 7 year old that can't wait for Halloween and his father that is equally excited get together and take pictures.

I couldn't help it. What are you supposed to do when your son comes up to you and asks you to take a picture of him as a ninja? You pull out your camera and start shooting that's what!



If you are interested in seeing how I did this shot check out my Photography Blog for the full story.

Grow Baby Grow

Stroke You Scurvy Dog

This past week Ben and I went on the canoe trip with some friends down the Milk River for two days while Des camped at Writing on Stone (our final destination). It was a blast… at least until I realized to late that I had neglected to put sun block on my legs above the knees. Long story short, they're red… really red… and sore. Other then that the canoeing portion of the trip was great! Ben, I mean Captain Ben, is quite the task master. For two days straight I was repeatedly told “stroke you scurvy dog, stroke” and “faster you dog faster.” I think we’ve got to get Ben to stop reading books about pirates.

The one night we camped along the river we found a flat piece of land, set up our tents, made a fire, ate and then crashed.

The following day we reached Writing on Stone and had some fun on the beach. Des and a few of the ladies went down a mud slide

while the kids had fun playing in the mud themselves.

The next day we went on a short hike in the hoodoos with friends to see some Petroglyphs.

Click on the image to see the detail.

All in all it was a fun trip that we will be sure to remember.

Happy Birthday Rachel

Yesterday we celebrated Rachel's 4th birthday. she had a fun day of fun, games, swimming and cake. Life is great when you're 4!

9 Years

Yesterday was our 9 year anniversary! yea for us!!!

We have come a long way and we have gained a few pounds (OK I have gained a few pounds and Des has pretty much stayed the same) as we have seen the years pass. We have lived in different towns and Cities through the years. We have been to the tops of mountains with grand vistas and we have traveled along winding paths in narrow valleys. We have had our differences but have always worked things out...eventually.

I love you Des, And I look forward to spending countless more years with you.

Take me out to the ball game

We registered Ben for T-Ball this year but due to his age he was placed into Minor Baseball! He is doing pretty good considering he has never played organized ball before.

Even though there wasn't play at home plate Ben still chose to slide (either for dramatic effect or just because he's a boy and likes to get dirty, we can't tell).

look at that extension, look at that form... look where your throwing the ball Ben! if there is one thing that we need to help Ben with is throwing straight and actually catching the ball (OK that's two things).

that's our little slugger

Rich has moved out

Rich has moved his photography posts to his Blog (which he has had for some time but has never posted on. If you'd like to continue to read about and see his work head on over.

Water

Thanks Des

This year Des and I decided that it was just easier for each of us to buy our own anniversary presents and pretend it was from the other person (much easier that way). Des got herself some fitness equipment and I bought a... lens (I know big shock).






for those that are interested it is a 50mm f 1.8 lens. at 1.8 it has a really shallow depth of field so you can isolate parts of your subject really well. In addition, it is 4x faster then the "kit" type lenses that come with cameras, meaning it lets more light into the camera. it's not the most expensive lens (actually it's one of the cheapest lens canon sells) but I wasn't prepared to spend 4x the price on the next best one (f 1.4) or 12x on the top of the line one (f 1.2).

Here is a sample shot I took to demonstrate to Des why I bought it:



And again for those interested. Here is how I shot the above image:

I used an old cardboard box, 2 sheets of white paper, 2 sheets of glossy craft paper and some flashes. I cut holes in the sides for the light to shoot through and covered them with the white paper. Then I cut a hole on the top and covered it with one of the glossy pieces of paper in case I need to have light come from above in the future. Than I taped the last glossy page to the back wall and let it curve toward the camera to create a seamless background.





Thanks again Des! How did you ever know this was the lens I never talked about but wanted you to buy?

Ben's place?

Ben and I were driving home yesterday after baseball practice. As we pasted the local bowling alley (which is currently closed and for sale) Ben and I had the following conversation:

- Dad, when is that bowling alley going to open again?
- I don’t know, I think it needs a bunch of things fixed before it can open again
- What needs to be fixed? The thing that sucks the balls up?
- I don’t know, I just heard that there is bunch of things
- How about some of the signs?
- Maybe
- Or the floor where the balls roll down?
- You mean the lanes?
- Ya the lanes, it must be the lanes that are broken!
- That’s possible
- Why don’t you buy it and fix it up so we can go bowling?
- I think there is a lot of stuff to fix and I don’t have enough money to buy a bowling alley and fix it up
- Go to the bank and ask them, they’ll give you money
- How much money do you think I’ll need to ask for?
- Oh I don’t know, maybe $163 dollars, that’s a lot of money
- I’m not sure but I might need more then that buddy

Oh to be young again and to think $163 is a lot of money. Who knows, the bowling alley has been up for sale for a while. Maybe I’ll finance Ben and he can make an offer on the place. He wouldn’t even need to change the sign out front.

I can see it now…
Hey mister, I’ll give you $163.50 cash right now for your property. What do say?

Old Wheel

Here is an example of what you can do to fix a blown out sky. On the day I shot this the sky was overcast and gray (not to interesting). I couldn't sit around waiting for the clouds to break up so I composed the image and planned to spruce it up in post. If the sky did look like this when I took the picture I would have used a graduated filter (or 2) to get the same effect.

To get the final image I brought the original photo into Photoshop, cut out the sky and brought in the sky from another photo. Once the photos were layered on top of each other I used a digital graduated filter to get the effect I was looking for

The way I look at is if you know what you would have needed to do in the field to get this shot if/when it presented itself then you can create what you saw in your mind when it doesn't. Does that make sense?

Here are the images I used

here are the layers involved

A Day At The Museum

On Monday Des and I took the kids to the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller. Ben had been asking us all Sunday if we could go to Dinosaur Provincial Park (which is close by) and we thought if we were going to see dinosaurs we might as well see lots of them in a warm environment (Monday was cold).

One of the funniest part of trip was when we got to a part in the museum that covered under water creatures. In that area they have a glass floor so you can see the creatures underneath you. Rachel could not understand how we were able to walk across a room that appeared to not have a floor. she was shuffling her feet until she would get close enough to take a huge step onto one of the support beams in the floor. Then she would take another hesitant step off the beam thinking she was going to fall through the floor and unto the creatures. We tried to get her to touch the floor and told her it was glass but she wouldn't listen until we were out of there.

All in all we had fun. Until Ben got chased by some Valasa Raptors and we had to leave.

4 months and 17 days old

for those interested: shot with Canon 40D (1/250 @ f 2.8, 70mm), Canon 430EZ flash

(camera right attached to DIY beauty dish), triggered with pocket wizard plus transmitter.

Note to grandparents:
I will be posting pics of your other munchkins in a few days as soon as we can get them to stay still long enough. That's the nice thing about Sarah, she's not mobile... yet

A little time on my hands and my run-in with the law

I went to the church last night to see if any one would show up to play some basketball but no one showed. Life happen and so does the weather. So I took advantage of the dark and gloomy clouds that were hanging over Brooks and armed my self with a few supplies and headed out.

My first stop was a field on the East side of town. I was driving by the field earlier in the day and saw something that seemed peculiar... a fire hydrant. A big red metal hydrant (here in Brooks most of the hydrants are painted like cartoon characters or gumball machines amongst other things) just sitting there in a prairie field. Of course the fist thing that I thought of was photo op! (I know I'm strange you don't have to tell me, just love me the way I am). So when I found my self with a little time on my hands (hence the title) I took advantage of the opportunity with the following results:

After I spent some time alone in a field with a camera, a light up ten feet in the air and people driving by looking at me with a "what the" look on their faces, I decided to head down town to another spot that I have been wanting to shoot someone.... wait that didn't come out right. Aaaaaannnyyyy waaaayyyyy, I headed down town. Since I didn't have a ready subject I decided to shoot my self...ah crud I did it again.

during this time I had my run-in with the law. Come on, is it a crime to hang out in a back alley looking like this....

OK... maybe I did look a little sketchy.

In reality I think the officer that drove by a few times and then eventually parked across the street was was just interested in picking up a few photo tips... really.

I later walked over and showed him a few of the images and he just laughed.

Stuff

Well I haven't blogged in a while. I'm sure you have have been going through withdrawal and have been terribly worried about us ;) Here are a few of the moments from the past month we thought we'd share:

we did Sarah's 3month picture

Ben lost some more teeth and now looks a lot like a Halloween Pumpkin

Ben turned 7 and he had a few friends over for a party. Ben wanted another pirate themed party so Des had the kids make irate hats and they looked for hidden treasure. Des and I decided to send the kids home with a t-shirt this year rather then the usual goodie bag.








And this past week I got together with one of my friends from work and shot some pictures during our lunch break

My friend shot this photo of me shooting the owl we were watching. (The nest is just a few km south of Brooks)

And this is one the resulting photos that I shot