Wild Drake Photography

Tag: black and white

  • Art in the Park at the Sooke Car Show

    Art in the Park at the Sooke Car Show

    I’ve been with the local Arts Council for the past couple years and have slowly been getting more involved. I’ve had a couple showings through them this year and just finished participating in one of our “Art in the Park” events. This one was held at the Sooke Car Show.

    Some of my prints at one a SAC booth

    This was the first time I’ve set up a table at one of these events and it was definitely a learning experience. In the future I should have a much better setup and now know what to expect. It was a beautiful day for the event, but the one thing that made life a little difficult was the wind, although I didn’t have any serious issues with it. The worst that happened to me is a couple art cards blew off the table. Others had paintings and prints blown down and one person had a large glass pane from a framed print smash when it blew over.

    At the end of the month I have a print at the largest juried art show on Vancouver Island, then in early August I have another Art in the Park event, which should be much bigger. It looks like a busy summer! I’ll leave you with some photos from today at the car show.

  • Photography on Display

    Photography on Display

    Lately I have been more active in the local art & photography community. It’s something I enjoy and is definitely beneficial to my photography, as I feel encouraged to get out with my camera more often and enjoy the ability to show some of my work. One of the things I am involved in is as a member of the board of directors at the Sooke Arts Council. It is through SAC that I had the opportunity to hang six of my prints in the lobby of the Richard Blanshard Building, which houses BC Ministry of Health offices.

    A trio of photos hanging on display

    A group of three of my prints on display

    Along with four other artists work (painters and photographers) my prints will be hanging there for December 2018 and likely January 2019 as well.

    Waves crash on the rocks at Botanical Beach in Port Renfrew

    Fresh off the press

    I had a number of mid-size prints around that I used, as well as having the one, shown above, printed just days before the hanging. Normally, I have my images printed on some variety of fine art paper, then frame them, but for this image, I chose to have it printed on canvas by a new, local printer, VI Spectrum. I’m very pleased with the results. At 24″x36″ it’s also the largest print I have on display. Images smaller than 13″x19″ I generally print myself, as was the case with the two 8″x11″ prints I hung. A fantastic photographer I know (check out his wonderful images here) spoke highly of the Hahnemühle Matte Fine Art paper I used for these prints, and since trying it earlier this year it has become one of my favourite papers to print on.

    B&W image of a rocky shoreline

    One of the images I self printed

    I encourage everyone local or who is visiting Victoria to stop by the lobby of the building, at 1515 Blanshard Street, to check out my work and that of others from December, 2018 through January 2019. Thanks for reading my blog. I hope you enjoyed it!

  • A Vancouver Photowalk

    For some time now I have been getting out with my camera less than I would like, so when I saw that there was a “Valerie Jardin’s Hit The Streets Photowalk” taking place just across the Salish Sea, in Vancouver, I thought it would be a great photographic opportunity and a chance to meet some other photographers.  The photowalk lasted about two hours and went from Granville Plaza, near the waterfront, around the Vancouver Art Gallery, past the Vancouver Public Library (VPL), Central Branch, and back to Granville Plaza.

    Canada Place, Seabus terminal, mountains, trains, partly cloudy
    A Bit of Everything

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  • A New Place and an Old Favourite

    I recently learned of another park nearby; the Blinkhorn Nature Park, which has a wooded trail surrounding a small lake and today was the perfect day to check it out.  For most of the way around the lake, the trail was far enough away that you could only catch the odd glimpse of the water through the trees.  There was one nice approach to the lake that offered an interesting view, though.

    a mirror image photograph of Blinkhorn lake, partially covered in ice
    Looking across Blinkhorn Lake

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  • Further Developments

    Last week I wrote about developing my first roll of 120 film.  This was kind of like crossing a bridge on the trail that is leading me from using a film camera again, to actually developing the film.  This week I had it scanned and now can see the results.

    a small bridge on a road in the forest
    A Bridge to Cross

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  • Developing Story

    I am excited to have recently developed my first ever roll of 120 film (Ilford HP 5+). The last time I developed any film (it was 35 mm B&W) was just over 30 years ago! I will be writing a more lengthy post once I scan the film, but thought I’d give a quick peek at my experience.

    120 format film
    From the first roll developed

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  • My First Time… Entering Prints at a Fair

    This year was the 103rd edition of the Sooke Fall Fair and it marked the first time I have entered prints in any competition.  While I entered many of the categories, I really didn’t know what to expect for results.  I was not disappointed.

    sff-winners-collage
    Setting the Bar 

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  • Phogtography in the Forest

    I planned on taking another hike down to Mystic Beach this weekend and the day started off in the beautiful sunshine. Half an hour later, I had driven through three separate areas of fog, including at my destination, which made me quite happy. I love the atmosphere fog gives to photographs!

    black and white photo of rays of light illuminating fog in the rainforest
    Sunbeams slice through the fog

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  • A Hike to Mystic Beach

    After a couple weeks of hot weather some clouds rolled in and kept the temperature at a reasonable level for a hike through the woods up and down some very steep inclines, to Mustic beach. The hike down to the beach was around 35 minutes, and for much of it the ground was covered by interwoven tree roots.

    roots bw
    Interwoven roots carpet the rainforest floor

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  • Things are Developing

    I know it’s been a month since my last post and that’s way too long. Once again life has been hectic and it’s been hard to find the time I’d like for my photography hobby. There have been a few developments (pun intended 😉) related to it, though. I now have pretty much everything I need to develop B&W film (but not to print or scan it yet) and once I run a couple rolls through my camera, I will be giving it a go.

    film developing chemicals by Ilford
    Basic Chemicals to Develop B&W Film and two rolls of 120

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