Jennifer Holden

Freshwater Bay

2011-06-05T14:36:00.003-02:30

A few shots from a walk we took yesterday to Freshwater bay:

Smoke Art

2010-11-26T08:44:00.005-03:30

Photo of the week #52: As my final entry in my photo of the week challenge, I decided to try shooting the smoke from a stick of burning incense. I had been planning to try taking these photos for quite some time now but never actually seemed to get around to doing it:

You may have noticed that this blog post is very late. I have to admit that I had a really hard time motivating myself to post these photos (even though the photo was actually taken at it's proper potw time). Maybe I'm a little sad to be finishing up this challenge - despite having to really force myself to carry on with the challenge sometimes it has been very helpful to me overall. In fact, I would definitely recommend a potw challenge to anyone who is looking for a bit of inspiration.

Currently, I'm taking a bit of a break from photo challenges. It's been a very busy few months for me both photo-wise and otherwise and so it's nice to de-stress a little. I do have plans for another challenge starting in the new year though that should still be challenging, but in a different way than the photo of the week. Stay tuned!

Finally, as a bonus, I'll end with another smoke shot:

Fall Colors 2010

2010-11-08T10:23:00.005-03:30

Photo of the week #51: This is a shot that I took at Bowring park a few weeks ago. I'm actually dealing with quite a backlog of photos at the moment but I'll try to catch up as soon as possible!

Here's a few bonus shots from the same day:

Lonely Tree

2010-11-08T10:21:00.001-03:30

Photo of the week #50: Another shot from the sunset at Loch Alsh on the last day of our photo tour in Skye:

Even though this is a very simple shot, it's one of my favorites from the photo tour!

Sunset over Loch Alsh

2010-11-01T19:57:00.004-02:30

View across Loch Alsh on the last evening of our photo tour. This shot was taken with Eilean Donan Castle at my back - everywhere you looked in Scotland there was something beautiful to photograph!

A few close up shots:

The Old Man of Storr

2010-10-27T10:16:00.003-02:30

A couple more sunrise shots from Skye. This shot was taken after a fairly challenging hike (This shot by Geoff gives an idea of how far we actually had to climb - the hike took approximately an hour and was quite steep in places). Both the weather and the landscape was amazing though, totally worth the effort!

This second shot was taken next to the small puddle that you can see in the center right side of first photo:

Bonus shots from Elgol

2010-10-26T14:49:00.002-02:30

I'm slowing making my way though all the photos we shot while in Scotland. Here are a few bonus shots that I took while watching the sunrise at Elgol. They're both good examples of why you should also look around you instead of just focusing on the sunrise/sunset :)

Eilean Donan Castle

2010-10-22T14:40:00.003-02:30

Photo of the week #49: A shot from the first evening of the photo tour that we took as part of our honeymoon. Eilean Donan Castle is apparently one of the most photographed castles in Scotland and with good reason!

Here's the same castle from a different angle:

After spending an hour at the castle we finished our drive to the Isle of Skye. The first place we photographed once on Skye was the beach at Elgol. We were there for a beautiful sunset that night:

And then returned for the sunrise the next morning:

Definitely more to come!

Citizens of Shrimpopolus!

2010-10-02T08:41:00.005-02:30

Photo of the week #48: The Shrimpopolus is finally populated! Here are a few shots taken with my new 60D - at ISO 6400!

Also, here is a video taken with the 60D. Clicking the arrow button in the bottom of the screen gives a full-screen high-res version of the video.

Igor

2010-10-02T08:22:00.003-02:30

Photo of the week #47: I took this shot on my cell phone while we were driving home during Hurricane Igor. The car in the front was stalled in the giant pond of water on Prince Phillip Drive - we made it though!

Shoes

2010-10-02T08:19:00.002-02:30

Photo of the week #46: My new wedding shoes!

♥

2010-09-09T22:26:00.003-02:30

Photo of the week #45: Definitely not my nicest photo technically, but I think the sentiment is correct!

Another Flower

2010-09-06T21:16:00.002-02:30

Photo of the week #44: A shot of a flower that I took at Bowring Park this weekend:

A Girl's Best Friend

2010-09-06T21:06:00.007-02:30

Photo of the week #43: Turns out that taking macro photos of jewelry is harder than I would have expected. This weeks photo is a failed experiment in trying to get a photo of my beautiful new engagement ring! The photo was a bit of a flop, but the ring itself is definitely a success ♥:

Here's a few others that didn't quite work out either:

Reflections

2010-09-06T21:01:00.004-02:30

Photo of the week #42: It's been a busy few weeks for me, so I haven't really had much time for posting photos. But even though I've been late posting, I have managed to take a photo each week! Photo for week #42 is of a water droplet on one of the petals of our African Violet:

Shrimpopolis!

2010-08-15T19:02:00.009-02:30

Photo of the week #41: A few weeks ago, Geoff noticed a slow leak in his 20 Gallon fish tank. Since this turned out to be a relatively quiet week for us, he decided to take this opportunity to not only reseal his tank but also to redecorate it as well. I won't go into the details of the work he's been doing (I'm sure it'll eventually show up here), but suffice it to say that it's an on-going and a time-consuming process. After watching all the work he's been doing, I decided to do the only sensible thing - create my own planted tank!

As some of you know, my current office consists of a windowless cubicle (a bit of a drag during the bright summer months to say the least). In fact, I see so little sunlight in my cube that I'm having trouble keeping plants alive! So, for the past few months I've been toying with the idea of putting together an office fish tank. My main deterrent thus far has been the fact that even the simplest fish tank can involve a great deal of upkeep. During Geoff's tank remodel, I was doing a bit of reading on the subject and realized that a shrimp tank might be a great solution to my problem. Shrimp are extreme environmentalists - they're bioload is essentially zero (ie, the amount they eat almost completely balances the amount of waste that they produce). This is in direct opposition to many fish that you normally see in a small tank. Also, a shrimp's diet basically consists of anything that will fit in it's mouth (ie, shrimp are perfectly content to eat the algae and waste material that form in the tank). This means that they require very little in the way of feeding and that they do a great job of keeping a tank clean. The real selling point for shrimp though was the fact that Geoff already has some in his 20 Gallon. This is great because it means that if my tank suddenly becomes unstable and turns into too much work, my shrimp can easily find a new home in Geoff's tank and I can just disassemble mine.

That brings me to this week's potw. The evolution of my shrimpopolus is currently well underway! I've already started setting up the 1.5 Gallon tank that I picked up last week. So far, my set-up includes some aquarium sand, a rock and three different varieties of aquatic plants (that's right - real, live plants!):

The next step unfortunately requires a fair bit of patience and self-control, which aren't necessarily my strongest points. For one thing, I'm currently in the process of boiling a piece of driftwood to sit in the tank in front of the tall grass. The wood is being boiled (and will be for the next few days) because unless it's pre-treated properly driftwood can leech tanins into the water. These tanins won't hurt my shrimp in any way, but it will turn the tank water an ugly yellowish tea-color.

Also, since the plants came from the pet store, there's a significant chance that they may accidentally have transferred some snail eggs to my tank. Personally, I think that snails are adorable and actually wouldn't mind having a few in my tank (they are also very low bioload). But, the pest snails that you can accidentally acquire on live plants are unfortunately very prolific breeders (ie, you might start with one snail but end up with hundreds). Since I don't want my tank to look like a snail bomb went off in it, I've decided to quarantine the plants for a few weeks before adding the driftwood and shrimp. The best case scenario will be that a few weeks will go by without any snails developing in the tank. If that's the case I can just go ahead and finish populating the tank. If however I do end up with snails, I'll need to look at ways to kill them off before moving forward. Most treatments that will eradicate snails will also kill shrimp, so it's very important that I don't add shrimp until I know that I don't have a snail issue to deal with. That said, I think the tank is already off to quite a lovely start:

Puffins

2010-08-14T21:36:00.004-02:30

Photo of the week #40: Another late post! Last weekend, Geoff and I took a road trip. We were fortunate to spend the first night of our adventure in Elliston, which is both an awesome place to view Puffins and the root cellar capital of the world! As interesting as it is to see all the well-preserved root cellars, the Puffins are definitely the best part of any trip to Elliston. They're practically tame! When we arrived in Elliston Friday evening, the weather was drizzly and a bit chilly. There wasn't much to do at our B&B so we decided to go check out the Puffin Island for the next morning (when we intended to photograph the Puffins). Lucky for us, when we got to the Puffin site the Puffins were hanging out on the mainland - turns out that cold, drizzly weather is very helpful when photographing in the Puffins because when it's sunny and hot they like to hang out on the island in their burrows instead. We were able to stand approximately 6 feet away from them!

Unfortunately, I'm a little behind on processing the photos from the weekend, but I'll try to get a few more posted next week. For now, here's my favorite shot that I took of the Puffins:

And here's another:

I think both are definitely an improvement over the only Puffin shot that I was able to take on the Zodiac Tour that we took a few weeks ago!

Basement

2010-08-05T20:16:00.004-02:30

Photo of the week #39: This potw is a bit of a cop-out (and is also a week late). it's a quick snap that I took of the new laminate floor that we laid in the basement. It was never intended to be a potw, but unfortunately by the time last Sunday rolled around I hadn't taken any other photos:

Hopefully this week's potw will be a bit better thought out :)

Scott Kelby Worldwide Photowalk

2010-07-29T19:54:00.001-02:30

Last Saturday, I participated in the Scott Kelby Worldwide Photowalk - this is the only shot that I liked from the walk. I'm definitely starting to feel like it's time to get motivated to take photos of something other than flowers again though!

ECO Tour

2010-07-23T20:44:00.006-02:30

Photo of the week #38: On Monday night we accompanied our camera club on a whale/puffin watching zodiac tour. Unfortunately, Geoff was feeling a bit under the weather so after snapping a few quick shots of the whales, Geoff and I got dropped off back at the shore.

Some of the others club members captured some amazing photos of the whales breaching (apparently they were much more active later in the evening). I'm definitely looking forward to trying again next year, but with some Gravol :)

Salmonier Nature Park

2010-07-18T09:16:00.003-02:30

Photo of the week #37: Yesterday morning we took a drive out to the Salmonier Nature Park. Unfortunately, I didn't really take any shots that I liked of the animals, but I did take this photo while walking along the path:

MUN Botanical Gardens

2010-07-11T12:31:00.006-02:30

Photo of the week #36: Since yesterday was forecasted to be a very hot day, Geoff and I got up early and spent the morning at the MUN Botanical Gardens. I took this shot in one of the greenhouses:

I had a little trouble deciding between two versions of this photo, so I thought I would post the alternate version as well:

There were tons of flowers in bloom yesterday. I took this shot of a Pitcher Plant while Geoff was getting his shot:

I also liked how bright these yellow flowers were:

And finally, here a random photo of a duck that I took earlier this week on a walk around Quidi Vidi:

Bowring Park

2010-07-08T20:28:00.002-02:30

Photo of the week #35: An unopened Lilac blossom that I saw on our recent walk through Bowring Park. It was a very beautiful day and the light was fantastic on the flowers. Hopefully we'll see more days like it very soon!

Another shot from the same tree in Bowring Park. I think it's interesting how much different the light was in this shot as compared to the other, even though the flowers were just a few feet away from each other:

This shot was of flowers just starting to bloom on a different tree:

And finally, this is a blended exposure that I created using The Lightroom Enhance Plug-in. I decided to give the plug-in a try after seeing the beautiful shot that Brian took at Cataracts Falls. I've only tried a few photos so far, but I think that the plug-in was definitely worth the small donation fee.

Drizzle Boys Adventure (Part II)

2010-07-05T20:34:00.011-02:30

As part of our visit to Cape St. Mary's, we made a number of extra stops. Our first stop of the day was Ship Cove:

Next, we visited Gooseberry Cove:

After visiting Cape St. Mary's we headed to Point Lance:

and finally, we ended the day at Cataract Falls:

Cape St. Mary's Ecological Reserve

2010-07-04T19:09:00.006-02:30

Photo of the Week #34: Last weekend we took a trip out to the Cape St. Mary's Ecological Reserve as part of a Drizzle Boys Adventure. The weather was amazing and we had a fantastic time. Unfortunately, I didn't take very many shots that I liked while at the bird sanctuary. I did like the composition of this one though, despite the fact that it's a very dramatic crop:

One of the features of the bird sanctuary is 'Bird Rock' - a large sea stack that is completely separate from the surrounding cliffs (there's quite a scary drop-off immediately after the large rocks in the foreground):

Even for those people who aren't bird lovers, Cape St. Mary's is worth visiting for the scenery alone: