A great way to add color to your holiday photos in big cities is to use store decorations. On this street in Old Quebec, a shopkeeper installed a small shrub filled with tiny white and purple lights.
You simply position your camera through the lights, taking care to focus on the main subject. By limiting the aperture of the camera, you get a decorative blur effect in the foreground.
You don’t need digital processing software to add color to photos. Use existing merchant setups!
In the foreground, on the right, the ramparts of Old Quebec. From this height, you can access the Porte St-Jean which is certainly more difficult to access in winter, but which offers a perfect viewpoint to photograph Place d’Youville. You can see the very popular skating rink. A section of the German village is located this year at the end of the rink, waiting for the work near Quebec City Hall to be completed.
The photo above includes several photos juxtaposed on top of each other to provide an HDR effect. The darker areas of the photo are better exposed, while the brighter lights are dimmed to provide a more balanced photo. As always, there is life in Old Quebec! Click on the link for more photos of Quebec City in Winter on my blog.
End of December 2022. It’s hot in Quebec City. The city was first swept by a storm that left hundreds of thousands of Quebecers without power, some for more than a week. A heat wave then swept through the province of Quebec for several days.
One positive aspect of this warm air is that it melted the thick layer of ice and snow that had accumulated on the roofs of homes during the December 23 storm, resetting the clock for the remaining portion of the winter to come.
But when it comes to winter sports, it’s a different story. One had to walk around town on the last day of 2022 to see the changes in just a few days.
Passing by the public skating rink maintained by the municipality on the Battlefields Park, I took this picture that sums up the situation: a warm rain falling on the snow and accelerating the melting to the point where a thick fog sets in, puddles of water several centimeters thick covering a layer of ice.
I use this water to add the reflections of the skaters in the photographic composition. Fortunately for them, the sportsmen benefit from a mechanically cooled ice rink to continue practicing their favorite activity.
I took this picture of the houses in Old Quebec one day before the great storm of December 23, 2022 that left hundreds of thousands of Quebecers without electricity. At the time the picture was taken, the winds were already blowing pretty hard and the windchill factor was around -20C. The tripod had to be held securely to avoid unnecessary vibrations.
The scene captured during the “blue hour” consists of three photos superimposed in order to obtain an HDR result .
As I finished the shoot, I saw a young couple walking up the snowy slope in the foreground in the photo above. The young man approached me and asked me to make a video of the proposal he was about to make to his girlfriend on his cell phone. She didn’t know anything about it.
He got down on one knee, proposed and she said yes. Then came the ring, the kisses and hugs. Without gloves to hold the cell phone for several minutes, I was hoping for the most concise ceremony possible. A few moments later, half frozen, he came back to get his cell phone. Everything had gone as he had planned. You never know what to expect when you go out for a photo shoot!
The two pictures below show advertisements for cars that were found at the time in various magazines.
Old advertisement of a big american car
Old advertisement of a Pontiac Bonneville american car.
These old representations of a new car favored very bright colors to catch the reader’s eye and increase the chances of a sale. In the two photos above, red and orange are found on cars, buildings, dresses, faces, etc.
Vintage Cadillac parked in Victoria, British Columbia
When I spotted this old Cadillac in 2018 in Victoria, British Columbia, the two previous photos came to mind. Again, several elements of the same red and orange colors are found in the photographic composition: the Cadillac, the motorcycle, the umbrellas, the post office box, the chairs and tables, and even part of the menu. It almost looks like an artificial set-up for an upcoming advertisement!
Click on the link for more photos of Canada and Québec on my blog.
The Mexican Mountain Virtual Landing Strip (42MX) under Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 (MSFS) is located in the United States, in Utah. It is a 1800 x 40 feet dirt runway, sloping slightly to the west.
The MX42 Mexican Mountain airstrip with visitors (MSFS)
The surrounding landscape is characterized by large cliffs and mountains whose peaks reach 6900 feet.
Airborne from the 42MX Mexican Mountain airstrip in MSFS flight simulation
Virtual scenery around the 42MX Mexican Mountain airstrip (MSFS)
Once on the ground and near the campfire, we can hear the fire crackling and the RC Plane activities through the walkie-talkie left on the table. We can’t tell if anyone will be there when we arrive. This time, a young couple was enjoying the good weather and had taken the time to light a fire in my absence…
42MX Mexican Mountain visitors taking a break in MSFS
One final note from the company: pineapples on pizza are not allowed on the site.
If you have purchased the Bushplane Campout 42BC, the simulation will be all the more realistic.
Café La Maison Smith on l’Île d’Orléans and autumn colors
Not yet ready to leave the beautiful colors of Fall? Here is one of the last pictures of this season in 2022: the “Café La Maison Smith” on Île d’Orléans. When you want to take a leisurely tour of the island, this is the first place you stop for a good coffee and a croissant to go.
As soon as the visitor enters the café, the relaxation begins. Then comes the ride around the island, the “42 milles de choses tranquilles (42 miles of quiet things) ” of the singer Félix Leclerc. A few hours later, you leave the island fresh and relaxed!
There are many beautiful flowers at the Domaine Cataraqui in Quebec City. While examining the interior of a flower from close up, I noticed a very active ant which eventually stopped moving long enough for me to take a chance at macro photography. I used an old Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 USM lens and got an interesting result.
There are only a few leaves left in the trees of this clearing in Quebec City, but the scene retains all its charm. The broken tree cuts the landscape diagonally and guides the eye to the center of the photo where a small pond reflects part of the blue sky.
For me, this peaceful place represents the opposite of what we keep seeing as a standardized representation of autumn, without losing interest.
An alley cat that has been in a few fights, judging from its bruised eye. Surprised by the sound of the camera’s shutter release, he stopped dead in his tracks, assessed the danger, and continued on his way.
I framed the animal tightly to avoid visual distractions. The ball in the background represents leisure time, while the cat is in a totally different mindset: he must fight and find his food.
