Sky.

Sweetpea and Me

This is me and my girlfriend Kaitlyn Coholan.
She's a sweetheart.
Here we are in Jasper, up a huge hill.
:)
I put the camera on a rock and used a timer.
The grainy-ness is because of high ISO and it was really dark so I lightened it in Photoshop.
Tip: take the picture right the first time.

More pics and descrips

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Here is a tree I saw outside the Nancy Appleby Theatre in Athabasca. Not much too it, the "v" just looks cool.



















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This is a pole and some wires. The blue is relly intense and the perspective is cool... sorta anyway.















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These are some fire trucks I saw at the Grassland Homecoming (be warned with that link LOUD voice over) party last weekend.
You can see the story in the Advocate here, and pics here (I'll update when they go up)

















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Who's this duesch bag you ask? why he's none other than my co-worker Jeff D'Andrea. And he's not a duesch he's an ok guy lol.
He enjoys beer, sports, and females. Feel free to face creep him.
This is him at theGrassland Homecoming when we were enjoying a beer.
















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This is some cool sky. not much too it. I was too lazy to fix the off angle.

















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This is a cool sunflower outside Jeff's house.
















Isn't photography fun?

I really don't expect anyone to ever look at his but if you do, you can buy them! I'll print on and mail it to you in a frame... somehow.

Check this guy out. Pretty much ultimate photography. Artistic stuff though...

What's more is that you can check out the field notes on the individual photos. You'll notice that for some pics, he waited as long as 14 days! what a trooper.

It's good not great. To me, it's photojournalism that rocks since at its best it melds art and journalism to convey a message that is powerful, potent and timely.

I found this, the 2008 National Press Photographers Association's best photojournalist award here. These are the big guys whose papers send out more than I think 115,000 and are dailies. . I wonder how much they get paid, and how.

Cool Pictures

I've decided I'll post various cool pictures on my blog so they don't get lost in the aether of digital photography. I've taken probably 5000 digital photos at least since when ever i started doing so, so here it goes. I'll label them as photos so you can just look at them later.

This one I took while in Jasper on a garden tour with my girlfriend who was covering it for the Jasper newspaper the Fitzhugh.

I pretended to be somehow affiliated with them and just floated around taking pictures.

This flower... I believe a white peony was my favourite picture with the tone and what not. I couldn't get the background all cool, as in i was trying to get that white triangle to line up perfectly but whatever.










This photo is just some trees near the Alice B. Donahue Library in Athabasca.

My Hero

This woman, Shannon Loutitt ran from Edmonton, Albterta to Athabasca. A distance of more than 100 miles. It's pretty much the coolest thing I've ever had the pleasure of being a part of.

For a week or so, the story I wrote will be up here, and the photos here.

Here are a few pics that I didn't put in the paper or the website.

The story in a nutshell is that 100 odd years ago a man named Billy Loutit was a mail runner for the Hudson's Bay Company. He was extremely good at this job and on his off time enjoyed dancing, singing and general merriment.

In 1904 the was a flood in Athabasca that threatended to destroy some important goods in the area so word had to be sent. The sent Billy and a guy on horse.

Billy beat the horse by an hour. Amazing.

So anywho, years later, they want Billy to be the mail runner to and from Edmonton and he obliges, eventually becoming sick. He died in Edmonton, and due to lack of funds his family could not afford to bring him back.

Fast forward 100 odd years and you get a few nice Athabascans wanting to make a triathlon. They're thinking that they want it to be both athletic and fun so they do research to find someone who fits the description and lo and behold, it's Billy. No big deal to them.

Here's the website for the Billy Loutit Triathlon.

So anyway, after a few years all these Loutitt's (two t's it's a long story) start showing up interested in the family history.

Eventually this one woman in particular comes along, that being Shannon, smoker, general lazy person and she wants to run this triathlon just to prove her self.

She comes in third.

Tries again, comes in first.

She's so inspired she runs the Boston Maraton.

Of course she's happy but it's not enough. Knowing the story she feels she has to complete the cycle, that is bring her great-grandfather's spirit back home.

So then she embarks on this whole journey. Runs it in 24h 45m.

Incredible.

I'm just so happy I could even meet her and speak with her several times.

On the note of inspiration, Ray Zahab, also one of the friggin coolest people on the planet.

Check out his website. The guy ran across the sahara desert in 111 days. Matt Damon made a movie about it.

That's it. I didn't post the pics yet. but just check out the links, those are the best ones anyway.

graveyard shift

Last night... no two nights ago I shot a few shots at a graveyard in town... kinda cool not the light I expected. They are photos on the way, at and on the way back from the yard.

Before you think I'm strange for shooting in a graveyard I was really more interested in lighting than disturbing ghosties.

I was surprisingly bland to take photos there. It was really cloudy so I didn't get any cool effects.































the coolest one was not at the grave yard at all but on the way home:













what'd ya think?

out of boredom comes...

Hello to anyone who cares...

I've decided to start my blog again. Nothing in particular. Post pictures, links that sort of thing. Remind people why I kick ass.

Enough with the intros, let's have at 'er.

I recently purchased a used Nikon D200 with an 18-200mm lens from a dude in Edmonton who words for McBain Camera. It was a pretty sweet deal I think seeing as it cost only a little bit more than a new D200 to get a lens that goes for like $700. I also got the battery grip so I can look all professional.

I work at the Athabasca Advocate, and I'm not sure what the etiquette is for posting photos that are published so in the meantime, just go to the site and click on photogalleries or whatever and look for photos by me. Note: it may say my name is Adrew de Souza.

Anyway, I got the camera, so I'll show you some pictures.

Well just one picture, namely this one. There's more at the bottom.

It looks cool eh? Of course it does! But that being said DO NOT go out and spend a shit tonne on a camera just because you think it'll give you better photos. It won't!

How do I know this? Check out my new heroes Ken Rockwell's website. And in particular this article about how megapixels, or your camera in general doesn't matter.

That being said I of course just spent $1400 bucks on camera equipment, more than I've ever spent on anything and possible more than I've ever had in my life prior to this job.

But it's really more about timing and technique not camera equipment. A bunch of my friends are amatuers and occaisionally take awesome photos like this one, which is one of my favourite pictures ever, featuring yours truly. I think it was taken with a D70, and some sort of 24-150 ish mm camera. It's all good, you probably could have taken just as good a photo with a D40 like my girlfriend does like this one. (I can't find one yet when I do I'll post it.)

Whatever though just read Ken's site for more info, I'm not really an expert.

I would just say go out and take pictures. Contrary to what I previously believed, leave it on AUTO. isn't that weird I used to be all about the manual thinking I was good but hey, Ken, once again changed my thinking.

Generally I'll be putting personal photos up, not ones that go in the paper as my job.

Here's a few more.

Many are taken with my Olympus E-510 with the lens it came with... a 14-42mm. And they turned out fine I'd say. Can you tell the difference cuz I can't.