178/365: Caffeinated Pen Flowers.
Stopped for dinner at Artisan Café in Burlington. They had these cute flower pens with coffee beans making the “soil”. Very cute.
177/365: Cattails.
Finally got back out for a run tonight. It’s been too long. To make sure I keep up the routine I went back to my favourite running spot – Terra Cotta. Now I’ll be honest here, when I got to this spot and saw the backlit cattails basking in the late day sun, I really wished I had my DSLR instead of my little Fuji point and shoot. However, since running with my D800 would probably destroy it (+me) and my little Fuji is shock proof it was the camera I had on hand. This is a wonderful time of year to go for a run.
176/365: Clover Upon Credit.
The clover is in full bloom along the Credit River in Georgetown. This is another view of my favourite lookout point at Armstrong/Sinclair.
175/365: Blowing Up Fort Erie (Again).
Went down to Fort Erie today for some 1812 commemerative celebrations. The day for us started with the Grande Parade leading to the Olde Fort, and then we explored the Fort and followed along the historical tour there. Along the way we learned that in one battle between the British and the Americans here the powder keg was lit accidentally leading to the complete demolition of most of the Fort structure. After the tour we watched as a Tattoo was performed on the grounds and that was followed by a fireworks show. I got a few great photos and also learned that there’s a lot of people that think a point-n-shoot with the flash on is how you photograph a fireworks show.
174/365: Portal.
Had a difficult time picking today’s photo, having taken several hundred pictures throughout my day today. In the end, I rather liked the effect of this one the most – it’s a photo of a building on the south side of Square One Shopping Centre in Mississauga, as viewed from the top of the parking garage. I had a little fun framing things in the rather large “port holes” that adorn the parking garage.
173/365: Stormy.
Today our heat wave had it’s back broken by a vigorous cold front. I knew the associated storm front would arrive during the evening commute but alas I wasn’t able to get out of the urbanized part of the city before it went through. Here’s a view of the storm between two cells, as seen from Old School Road in Caledon. After taking this photo I learned the storm had vigour as well, taking several trees down with it and damaging a barn roof. Impressive for a worst first gust front type storm. I pulled this into PS to tweak the levels with a gradient layer mask to pull the ground up a bit.
172/365: In Camera Editing.
Found out something interesting about my D800 the other day, that tends to muddy the waters for the “in-camera purists”. Every once in a while I get grief from someone here or there about the fact that I tend do post process my digital camera files – like Ansel Adams did, I treat images from my camera as a raw material to be transformed into my artistic expression. Now, with the new camera, I can apparently do some of that post processing right in the camera if I want. This selective colour image had the exposure tweaked, the selective colour applied and the 8×10 crop performed all inside the camera using the “retouch” menu on board. Interesting. The subject by the way are the petunias in my garden planters.
171/365: Buzz On.
Took a stroll around the Barber Mill in Georgetown, but stayed outside the fence today. Tucked around the back I found a few of these flowers, and the local bees visiting them as well. Fired off a few handheld shots with my 18-200, concentrating on the bee more than the flower. A bit cliché of a photo, but I’m still enjoying it.
170/365: Bird Off A Wire.
Stopped to take a photo on the way home of something else, but happened to notice the red winged blackbirds hanging out on the wires nearby. Soon, they became my muse for the day.
169/365: The Melting Pot.
Took my wonderful wife out for her birthday tonight, with her mother. The restaurant choice was hers, and I was more than agreeable – The Melting Pot, a fondue restaurant that we discovered in the USA, has opened a location in Richmond Hill … so that’s where we went. Here’s a photo of the table just as the third course was starting – the entree portion. I took other photos but the chaotic yet organized show on the table keeps drawing my eye back to it so that makes it my photo for the day.