Archive for August, 2010

Montréal, Quebec | Canada

I’m here in Montréal, trying my hardest not to draw attention to my (very American) lack of multilingual talents. I’m resolving to learn Spanish, Italian, and French so that I can easily travel to Canada, Europe, and Latin America with ease. Plus, I just think it’s charming when people can switch between languages like it’s nothing. SO DAMN CHARMING. I spent the last day and a half walking and bicycling around the city with the ever talented Timco and his absolutely fantastic cousin and photographer (our host) Monique. So far, my favorite area is the Old Port. It reminds me of Paris meets St. Augustine meets San Francisco. I can’t exactly put my finger on it, truthfully. It reminds me of a memory, like from a dream, that I just can’t pinpoint.

Tomorrow we have a day of rest to gear up for the wedding on Saturday. It’s going to be quite the adventure. I hope to have many stories to regale you with afterward. If I survive. ;)

Montréal is lovely though and the weather is like a dream. Here are some images from the last two days around the city all shot with the 50mm 1.2L (because it’s all I had on me)…

I’ll be out of the country till late Sunday night with no phone access and limited access to email so thanks for your patience as Nate and I’s response times will be slower than normal until I get back.

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My new camera from NYC is the Mamiya RZ 67 pro II. It’s a medium format camera that you can use with film, instant film, and digital by just switching out the back half of the camera. We bought both film and instant film (polaroid) backs for it so I can do both. To be completely honest, while Nate’s ever growing collection of vintage cameras has sparked by desire to shoot more film, shooting polaroid is still my favorite. I shot a bunch with my 1960′s SX-70 Alpha while we were in NYC and it’s so funny to see how big of a difference there is between those and these. These are on Fuji FP100c Pro film (excuse our dusty scanner, ew). The saturation in these is incredible. The greens are, for lack of a better word, intense. And the images are creamy and otherworldly. I kind of feel like fairies and gnomes and all manner of mythical creatures should be magically showing up in these images because of how dreamy they look when they develop. They are completely different feel from the muted, 70′s look of the SX-70 Polaroids.  I can’t wait to try out the black and white pack I have waiting for me. I’ve been dipping my toes in shooting with this camera with the normal film back but, I just can’t help feeling pulled toward the instant film. It’s also nice to shoot and then be done. No editing. No retouching. The moment, as it is, as I captured it… completely organic. I can’t wait to start working on some personal projects I have in mind. :)

I’ve been a bit melancholy lately. So I’m happy that these photos are a bit un-sunny. Funny how when I don’t alter the images at all in photoshop they seem to tell a lot more about what I was feeling when I took them. A few of you asked for my newest playlist that I’d been working on and let me tell you, it is sooooo good. Here it is:

I LOVE Beautiful Melodies Mix

Click on it to be taken to the list in iTunes where you can buy the songs.