Change of Scenery

My niece got married a couple of summers ago, during a torrential downpour which prevented her from getting some photos with her favourite horse. Enter Uncle John, camera in hand, for a restaged photo session with Robyn all done up in her wedding dress and fancy hairdo, a freshly scrubbed horse, and some perfect early evening sun the other night.

This was my first try at a portrait involving a horse. It was a lot of fun, but tricky. Horses are big, often dark, and don't stand still. Especially when there are big flashy lights going off in their face. Must remember that for next time...

Bigger IS better!

It has always been a big source of frustration to me when I see some of my photos reduced to tiny thumbnails on some realtors site. I work hard on my images, and to see them reduced and compressed until they are almost unrecognizable is heartbreaking sometimes.

It's not the fault of the realtor. They don't usually have a choice when dealing with sites like realtylink.org and website templates designed by Ubertor and the like. They were all built with bandwidth costs in mind. It's a lot cheaper to display a small, compressed image than a large, high resolution one. But that's not a big issue any more. Bandwidth costs are relatively cheap, and according to one recent report, 87% of home buyers are using the Internet to search for homes (I would have thought it was closer to 100%). And, based on the comments of virtually all of my realtor clients, good quality photos play a huge part in generating interest for properties.

So it looks like someone finally heard my whining and built a realtor website application that can handle big photos. Judith Matheson just showed off her latest listing here using a template designed by VisualTour.com . According to Judith, it's so easy to update that even she can do it!

Looks to me like this Flash application determines the size of your monitor and delivers the largest possible image to you. Which can be good or bad, depending on the quality of the photos. In the case of Judith's listing, I sent her the usual size images, which are pretty small, so as a result they look a little fuzzy on my 24 inch monitor. We're going to have to fix that. Here are some of the same images from that shoot, which by the way, is a stunning townhouse in Richmond.

Less is More

I was pretty impressed when I walked into this L'Hermitage condo in Yaletown yesterday. I thought the staging was really well done -- lots of white to avoid distracting from the spectacular view, splashes of bright colour here and there, and no clutter. Then I found out from ace realtor Dale McGauran that it always looks like that. No staging, just real life. I can't understand how people can live like that. I mean, where do they put all their stuff? Everybody has stuff. Don't they?

Classy reno

If you've ever dreamed about having a big studio in your home to pursue your artistic passions, here it is. This east side beauty includes a coach house in the back yard big enough for you to finally build that scale model of the Eiffel Tower out of toothpicks. The rest of the house has been beautifully renovated too. Check out the complete listing on Lorne Goldman's site.

The Big W

I have shot many places in the Woodward's building in the past. There was a lot of turnover last year, when the construction was finally completed. This latest condo has the best view that I have seen from there though. On the 23rd floor, it has a huge wraparound deck, giving you a view from Coal Harbour to the big W. Which is pretty cool, unless that thing is lit up at night. Is it?

Wet Dreams

I fnally have some down time to get caught up with blog posts and other indulgences, like sleep. May has been non-stop shooting, with over 40 properties, 3 weddings (one of which was in Prince George, fer cryin' out loud), a birthday party and some product photography. Not that I'm complaining. I still remember late 2008 when I thought my phone was broken because it didn't ring for about a week.

Got a lot of new clients this month too, particularly on the North Shore. I shot two waterfront homes in Deep Cove recently. They don't come on the market very often. I think Deep Cove has got to be one of the very few places where you go in the front door, and walk down a flight of stairs to get to the living area.

Both of these places pack a lot of house onto a small property, with multiple levels. And of course lots of windows on the water side.

Here are some photos of the first one. you can see the complete listing on Patricia Houlihan's website








The second listing is just down the road, and can be found on Eric Christiansen's site.

Portrait session: Jason Cohen

Local musician Jason Cohen and I were going for a gritty, urban look for his portrait session, to match Jason's style of music. So we decided on an evening shoot somewhere in Gastown, and since it was raining we opted for an indoor location. I mean, we're both dedicated artists, but come on, it's cold and wet out there.

We agreed to meet at the Lamplighter, which, I recalled from the lost days of my youth, was a pretty run down pub with quite a few windows for light, a perfect backdrop. I guess I don't get out much any more, because when I got there I found that it has been converted to a relatively upscale sports bar.

But we went for it anyway, trying hard to avoid the dozens of plasma TVs lining the walls, until management noticed my Speedlights popping off in the corner and politely asked us to leave. Not the first time I've been kicked out of a bar...

So we ended up in the back alley, thankful that the rain had stopped, leaving a lot of shiny bricks and concrete for our backdrops. After a couple of hours we retired to Salt Tasting Room to warm up.

To get enough light I had to shoot at a high ISO, which meant lots of grain on the images, but that just added to the look we were going for. Both Jason and I were very happy with the results.