On Photography and a New Eye: Nikon D40
So after I lost the battery recharger for my trusty Sony point and shoot and realized it would cost over a hundred dollars to replace, I decided to finally do that upgrade I had been planning in anticipation of travelling in the summer.
When I first bought the Sony camera, photography was a hobby I wasn’t sure if I would really enjoy, not calling myself a photographer or taking myself really seriously. I set up a Flickr account and began posting experimental shots, mostly food photography of recipes I was experimenting with or food that I ate in great restaurants on my travels. Since food is such a transient thing - I really like taking a photograph of memorable meals as a way to journal about the experience. Especially when I’ve put lots of work into the recipe. Also since I’ve become vegan and food has been a much more rich experience for me, my food has also become much more colourful - making food photographs even more worth seeing. Lots of people laugh at my food photography, but I really enjoy capturing what I eat as a beautiful (and tasty) part of my life. Recently, the online travel guide Schmap short-listed several of my photographs to include in their online interactive guides of Montreal and Toronto. They ended up choosing a photograph I took at Fressen in Toronto of the very lovely raw lasagna, giving me photographic credit. While I am still far from considering myself a photographer, I really enjoy taking photographs as a hobby.
It’s also a long term learning process. Now that I have a digital SLR that allows for a lot of complexity, I am taking a few books out of the library to start learning technical photography skills so I can manually focus and all of that good stuff. For now, I am getting used to the lovely feeling of holding and shooting with the Nikon. With the camera I got two lenses (18-55 and 55-200), two tripods, and many other fun accessories. So far I can tell that my photographs are of much better quality due to the hardware itself, and I am especially loving the ability to capture the nuances of light and shadow.
A three part portrait of J, caught writing in his journal:
Seen across the street while waiting for my bus, a man wistfully clinging to the bus stop pole, traffic passing by. He longingly looks in the direction of the bus’ pending arrival.:
I have been making so many recipes since I woke up to my love of cooking - too many to even post about, but I will share some photographs:
Cholent, recipe from Veganomicon - a Jewish “beef” stew made with lots of hearty proteins - kidney beans, lentils, textured vegetable protein (tvp) - plus the regular stew fare of potatoes and carrots. Served with toasted walnut bread spread with vegan margarine.
At a recent dinner party and made by my good friends Jill and John: Sweet Potato Chili from Eat, Drink and Be Vegan (the new amazing Dreena Burton cookbook creation)
New recipe from my friend Katie - a delicious brown/wild rice pilaf containing apricot, cranberry, toasted pecans, cilantro, etc. plus an amazing dressing. I will post the recipe soon once she figures out which cookbook she got it from.
Delish Date Squares from Vive Le Vegan. These are the bomb - I have never had such a delicious date square, and since making the recipe once I have already made it again three or four times for different potluck events. Such an easy and healthy recipe; the lemon added into the dates makes their sweetness more mild gives it a great flavour. The crust is perfect. Pictured here using spelt flour instead of white, atop a Coconut Lime cookie from the same cookbook (also delicious, but I learned that if you want the chewy white fluffiness for this recipe you must use white flour, not spelt).
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