Rolled on down to Duncan on Wednesday night for a shoot with Barbara Adelborg. After some directionally challenged map adventure, I pulled over and asked an elderly lady watering flowers in her front yard for some assistance. She laughed and guided me to the OTHER side of town… where I found Barbara’s office building. Door locked. Buzzer not working. A quick skirt around the building led me to a hair salon where they would let me in through the back door.. success!

You can see the care that Barbara takes in all facets of this office.. providing a good venue to meet new people, help them feel comfortable, and then when you’re ready - you’ll go through the back door in her office to a cozy room where she flexes her expertise - hypnotherapy.

“Life is flowing more easily and joyfully for me, day by day”

These are the words I chose from Barbara’s bag of positive thoughts before I left - she offers them to anyone that comes to visit as a parting gift of sorts. Not only that, but as we walked out of the building together - she wished me well in my endeavors and offered to pass my name on. She confessed some prior nervousness at the whole idea of a photoshoot, but that I made her feel comfortable and confident in my ability. I must’ve drove back to Nanaimo the slowest I’d ever gone - and I don’t even remember hitting one traffic light. THAT is how relaxed I felt.  Things do appear smaller in the rear-view mirror.

Carol lives on Saltspring Island, which is located in the Southern Gulf Islands, up against the east side of Vancouver Island, about half way between Nanaimo and Victoria.

We had arranged to do the shoot at her sister’s residence up in Lantzville, as she was visiting her this week. Arrived about 7:30pm, just as the sun was easing up on the beautiful garden out front. From the front of the house, you could see way out across the Winchelsea islands - a beautiful view indeed! I used the natural light, and just added a touch of portable studio light where it was needed for soft, but natural looking images. Carol was a smidge nervous at first, but that lasted all of two minutes, and soon we were more challenged by squinty-faced laughter… but there’s nothing wrong with that! As usual, I varied the styles a little, from very clean and basic portrait, to some with a little more drama and play with light and shadow.

After our session, I couldn’t help but feel like I should take a visit over to Saltspring soon, and I may just do that next week, as I think we’ll be arranging a shoot with her husband… more on that later!

“A day of entertainment and crafts in a family environment, promoting the integrity and safety of women, children, youth and families.”

A wonderful event full of performers, artists, sunshine and food! I’ve never seen Deverill Park so alive! [Wow, that’s the second post in a row I’ve made about the South-End potential!]

The slideshow is below, please leave your comments below this post - and contact me if you’d like an image emailed to you for print! Also, this would be a good time to book me for a family portrait that you can send out at Christmas. Some folks at the show asked me about this, and I was certain to tell them September books fast for this reason! [Mention this blog post for a special rate!]

Early this week, I had the pleasure of meeting with these two gentlemen at their beautiful little home in South Nanaimo. [An aside, I know, but that area has SO much potential - the character of the homes down there are akin to those in certain very well-to-do neighborhoods around Vancouver… only here, you’re pretty much waterfront, and still have the wonderful small-town neighborhood feel.]

So.. back to the story… Their home is an eclectic sanctuary, it seems every item in the home has a history or a story behind it! My curious nature spawned some interesting conversations. I would be photographing these guys for a new magazine being published in the very near future.

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First would be Paul Parent - he will be writing a column on Guided Gardening. We took a few different shots for articles that he foresees writing for the magazine, including the one you see here of Paul planting a Blueberry Bush. The one he planted last year has already produced a few berries… which, as I know, is unheard of in the first year. In fact, his whole garden is just young, but my untrained eye wouldn’t have noticed! There is a sense of order and peace in the garden, it seems he comes by this gift naturally.

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Paul Biscop is a Cultural Anthropologist and a Spiritual Medium. A keen thrift-shopper too! We discussed some various thrift finds, and it was reminiscent of a conversation with my partner when she gets back from the thrift store full of excitement. We shot this wide-angle image out in the garden, then returned into his home, where I photographed him next to a piece of his artwork. It is a fractal painting - but the notable part, is that he didn’t recognize it as such when he created it. He has since taken a keen interest in this type of art - where it originates from and why? There’s another story here, but I’ve just got to hold off on that one, he might decide to share that in his column…. I’m just building the suspense here…

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This is part of a much larger project. Stay tuned, as more are on the way! A healer, an intuitive energy worker, an astrologer… and much, much more.

Meeting unique people is the ultimate perk in this business!

After almost two weeks off the road doing the clutch in their driveway (which spawned a whole lot of other repairs)… Joe’s partner, Rebecca, was having pipe-dreams of a shiny-new, leased vehicle… Joe sweated, busted knuckles and cursed his way to completion, and while she was down at school in Victoria - he got the car all cleaned up and got me to meet him for a photoshoot.  As I unloaded my gear at the site that Joe picked, I think it surprised him a little at how involved this would be!

…but the best part is….. I think we renewed the love:

Rebecca Ballam wrote
at 11:06am

…Oh wow. I’m speechless. That picture makes me want to take back all the times I ever cursed at that car. I’m in love with my Integra all over again! Thanks Sean!

So, my lady participates on this wardrobe_remix group on flickr from time to time… a really cool group of funky-styley people! As you could imagine, “Can you snap a picture of me?” turns into a full-out production in no time flat!

I’ve been working very hard on a ‘look’ for these types of images - and I think I’ve got it!  I’ve found that the lighting really has to compliment the processing, and vice-versa… “post-production” is a lot less ‘post‘ than it seems - You’ve got to have the vision from the start!

In a world of desaturated/grunge photos that are all the rage right now… I of course, want to try the other end of the spectrum.. light..crisp..bold..punch-you-in-the-face-with-colour!

Your thoughts?

I was invited to photograph a press release the other day for the RDN.

“The funding will pay for extensive upgrades to bus shelters and transit exchanges throughout the region, electronic fare boxes on buses, transit priority signaling on buses and intersections, and Smart Cars to be used for transit service. “

Some Guests:

* Ron Cantelon, MLA Nanaimo-Parksville
* Susan Gimse, UBCM President
* Joe Stanhope, Chair of the Nanaimo Regional Transit System - TBC

“As Hot as It Gets”

Well, the show wrapped last night, so I felt it was time to put my nose to the grindstone and get some pictures up of the show! Although the show definitely is a “you have to be there” kind of thing - I believe my images capture the essence well enough for those of you that missed it, and serve as a great memory for the cast, crew & those who attended the show.

I loved how dark and brooding the show was; A dark history, a dark story, Tom’s trance-inducing intro, the intense battle scenes, and the accompanying artistic visuals were a beautiful combo.

The image above is likely my favourite of the bunch - why? I love how it captures the death of the miner - the ghosting is so appropriate here. Javva stands in the back with the flag waving, and the other unsuspecting miner works away as his coworker is wrapped in the (HBC?) blanket and taken away.

Let’s take a look at the slideshow…

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

To the cast & crew: BRAVO!

(ps. I took the time to organize all the photos into scenes, but somehow got garbled on upload to the web, it’s almost 4am, think I might call it a night and reorganize another time!)

Whizzbang: Stoked! by Sean Fenzl is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 Canada License.