Graduation Weekend

by Vicki Richard

Having a niece who graduated this year made this weekend extremely busy for me, in both aspects. I didn’t get much time to take personal pictures over the weekend, but I did manage to get a few here and there when I had a bit of downtime.

Monument Notre-Dame de l’Assomption, from a short distance

The monument is a local historical landmark, and I personally never get tired of taking pictures, although it doesn’t change year after year.

A closer shot

Flowers on the side of the path, and a statue next to the grotto

Today, while waiting for the next round of grad preparations, I was able to walk around taking a few different pictures as well.

Two different flowers, love the dandelion bokeh on the second one.

As far as I know, next weekend shouldn’t be quite as busy as the last few weekends, and I should be able to apply more time to my personal photography. I still have a few scouted locations I haven’t been able to visit yet because I’ve been overly busy with work and family life. Here’s to hoping for a quiet weekend.

Weekly Posts

by Vicki Richard

Considering I’ve been working long hours during the week, and I don’t even have the time or the energy to pick up my camera until the weekend, I’ve decided that I would officially post weekly, instead of trying to post daily, and failing miserably.

Since we finally had a nice and sunny weekend, I’ve been able to bring my camera outside and run around. By doing so, I was able to find a few good shots.

Picked a beautiful flower

I was a bit busy on Saturday, with some friends from out of town who were visiting for the weekend, but I ended up making up some time lost on Sunday.

Found a little bird hiding in the rhubarb blooms.

A bee landed on a dandelion in my path

Saw a bee flying around these blooms, noticed the bug after I uploaded the picture

Since I don’t get to see my daughter as much now, today was spent almost entirely outside, so it definitely gave me a chance to shoot quite a few different kinds of pictures. Although not all of them were good, or interesting enough to upload, I still thoroughly enjoyed my day.

Somebody else had lots of fun.

I’m hoping that once I’m used to my new job, I’ll have a bit more energy when I get home from work and I’ll be able to apply myself to my photography more often, since I felt a bit out of practice this weekend.

Busy Week

by Vicki Richard

It’s been a very busy and tiring week. Starting to work full time after being off for 7 months is hard, for more reasons than one. I miss spending my days with my daughter, and I miss having the opportunity to run around with my camera, especially since the sun rises as I’m on my way to work, and I’ve seen some amazing “Kodak Moments”.

We ended up getting hit by a post tropical storm over the weekend, so Saturday wasn’t a very good day to take pictures. It rained a bit today, but we’ve had a few clear breaks, so I was able to get out and get a few pictures.

A quick shot of a lake on the way home

Most pictures, I ended up taking as we were driving, so even when it was raining, I was still able to get some clear shots. And the dark clouds made a nice looking sky as well.

A shot from the top of a hill

I noticed dark and rainy days can produce some amazing pictures. I barely need to work on post editing, and the colors still pop. Light greens are especially bright in this kind of light.

Just had to fix the exposure a tiny bit to get this picture fully edited

I had fun just taking pictures without really trying, and ended up with a few good shots, including the first picture I posted, and the next picture.

Through the branches

Of course, I had to straighten out the pictures so they looked normal, handling a heavy camera with one hand can be a bit hard, especially in a moving vehicle.

All in all, today was a great day, and I can’t wait for another day off so I can do it again.

Happy! Happy! Happy!

What A Beautiful Day

by Vicki Richard

Today was a good day to take pictures. The sun was bright, it was warm, and we had a bit of a thunderstorm. Unfortunately, I was still unable to get a shot of a lightning bolt, but I managed to get some good shots of dark clouds.

Storm clouds moving in

It had just started raining when I took this picture. The storm moved in and out so fast, it ended up lasting about 10 minutes. I’m still hoping for another huge thunderstorm like we had Friday so I can try to shoot some lightning bolts.

The sun was out most of the day today, giving me the chance to run around my hard finding some new blooms. My aunt and neighbour has a lilac bush, which I ended up shooting, since I’ve been wanting to find some lilacs for a while now.

Beautiful Lilac flowers

Because it was a warm day, we ended up spending most of the afternoon outside, meaning my daughter became my little model once again.

I know it’s a cliché shot, but it’s just such a beautiful pose.

I try to stay away from cliché props and poses, but I couldn’t resist having her blow on dandelions. Post processing ended up taking longer because I had to take myself out of her sunglasses’ reflection.

I didn’t get a chance to make it to the tall ships this weekend, but hopefully our region will have several events I’ll be able to shoot over the summer months. We do have an air show coming to Miramichi later this summer, and we’re planning a trip to the zoo, so those are two great locations for my photography.

I’ll leave you with a random spider shot, I ended up liking it (I’m usually afraid of spiders) because of the design on its back. It was definitely different, and I can almost call it cute.

Almost looks like a cartoon bear face on its back.

New Job, Less Time

by Vicki Richard

I started a new job on Thursday, so I’ll have less time to dedicate to my photography. I’m not giving up on it though.

Last night, there was a huge thunderstorm in my area. The thunderbolts were amazing. Unfortunately, because of my lack of night time photography practice, I wasn’t able to get a good shot. Because of this, I promised myself to start taking more pictures at dusk, and at night, that way I won’t mess up my next chance for an amazing capture.

There’s a Tall Ships festival in Miramichi this weekend (that’s about 30 minutes from where I live) that I’d like to go see. A photographer friend of mine took some pictures yesterday, and the ships look amazing. Theodore the Tugboat is there as well. If I get a chance to go up in that area over the weekend, I am definitely bringing my camera.

I’d love to have some new pictures to post here, but with my new job, I haven’t had time to even think about my camera. The good thing about it is that I won’t be working shifts, so I’ll never have to worry about schedule conflicts if I do schedule a photoshoot.
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On an (completely) unrelated note, I have recently joined BzzAgent, which allows you to join campaigns and try out new products. I was lucky enough to be chosen in a campaign which will allow me to try out International Delight Iced Coffee. My kit includes 2 International Delight tumblers and 9 FPCs (Free Product Coupon). Due to a packaging error, the kit I received was missing the coupons, so BzzAgent are resending them to me.

After I get a chance to try all three flavours (Vanilla, Mocha & Caramel Macchiato), I’ll be leaving a short review here to let you know what I thought of them.