Merry Christmas From My Little Pussy

Posted on December 26, 2008 by Gabriel

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My favourite Christmas moments are mostly a collection of memories of having fantastic sex with my girlfriend on my parents’ living room floor, couch, kitchen counter and staircase while my family were at mass on Christmas Eve. But those photos are kind of blurry and the composition is a little hurried, so I don’t feel right about posting them here (I kid). So, instead, this is Maytag.

Technical Stuff: Taking naked photos of someone you love is never a good idea. The first time I/we did it was in the pre-digital age so I used colour film, which meant someone at the photo place got to see my naked girlfriend… the second time was with Polaroids, which were insanely expensive and the quality was limited. But my objections aren’t over quality, it’s about respect… unless you, like a friend of mine, are an artist using your girlfriend as a model, when you take these kind of shots you’re basically admitting to each other that, once your lover’s out of the room you’re going to sit there and do obscene things to their memory… but, the way I see it, sharing those kinds of photos might be okay. So you can email me yours if you’d like.

I still have those Christmas memories… not so much because of the few fully-clothed snapshots I have left of her in a shoebox in my closet, but mostly because my girlfriend was really into arts & crafts and she made a dozen white, knitted angel ornaments for my parents tree where, for the next dozen Christmases, they’d hang… like little ornamental reminders of Christmas orgasms past.

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Posted in Animals, Family Events, Occasional Events, Photography, Special Events, Vankleek Hill Photos | 4 Comments

Never Before Has Such A Thing Been Seen

Posted on December 8, 2008 by Gabriel

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Remember the day when someone handed you your first camera and you thought all those adventure dreams — the ones with you and James Nachtwey taking photos in war zones and famines and blown out husks of cities and towns during the day, and drinking into the late evening with locals — remember when you thought all those stories you dreamt about would finally have a shot at coming true? Remember how that first camera made you feel? Well I took this shot with my third camera.

Technical Stuff: In order to get a shot like this you first have to get some amino acids, nucleotides to somehow come together into macromolecules, it’s vital they find a way to replicate themselves. Now wait about two billion years. If the flowers come out blue just start again. It gets easier once you’ve done it once or twice.

I like these flowers so much this is the is the second time I’ve posted them. The last one [link] had a honey bee in the centre, while this one has a modestly interesting perspective. Neither one showcases the inhuman things man can do to man and his environment I could have shot in exotic places around the world with Nachtwey… but hey, on the upside, right after taking this shot I was able to go rent some movies and on the way home I did light some school kids on fire.

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Posted in Experiments, Nature, Photography, Vankleek Hill Photos | 3 Comments

Portraits Of People Who Can Make Me Smile 002

Posted on December 5, 2008 by Gabriel

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This is my friend Camilla, she was born and raised in Finland but lived in Canada for a few years while she was in university. The first time we met was during a game of pool in a bar in Toronto’s Little Italy. Over the next year Camilla and I had many, many late night conversations and visits in her backyard listening to raccoons. But the only thing I could think of to get our first conversation started was asking what kind of bear was tattooed on her lower back. The “lower back” being just above a person’s ass our conversation was just as awkward as it sounds. I think it turned out to be a brown bear. [it was a brown bear, and it was on her shoulder. Which is even more awkward… now.]

Technical Stuff: There’s something ‘elemental’ about this shot. I cropped it to get rid of some dead space. I took three shots altogether, basically separated by a few seconds. I would have taken more, but the flies were already getting to Camilla and I was pretty sure if she had stayed there any longer brushing flies away from their eyes the horses were coming through the fence.

There’s a very defined edge to my little village… once you get past the last row of houses you’re walking into miles of open fields surrounded by acres of forest. So on the western edge of town, in between two houses, is a space where these horses can come right up to the street, and the only thing keeping them from breaking into the village and into a murderous rampage from weeks of having their eyes packed with flies, is a rusted wire fence suspended between rotted out stumps. Their attack is inevitable, which is why I think we should be building walls to keep us protected. Think of the children.

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Posted in Animals, Favourites, Friends, From My Wall, Photography, Vankleek Hill Photos | 4 Comments

Preparing For The Oink Attack

Posted on November 27, 2008 by Gabriel

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There are lots of stories about why and when cops started being referred to as “pigs”. My personal favourite comes from the 1960’s and how cops looked while wearing gas masks, but apparently the expression has been used for like 400-500 years. You’d think they’d have gotten used to it by now. But no… they’ve got guns, bulletproof vests, clubs, numbers and the full power of The State behind them and one little word still gets their jockstraps in a knot. Oink.

Technical Stuff: This was with the Minolta and the 35-70mm lens, and direct flash. As long as they know you’re working, and not a threat, the police will pretty much let you do whatever you want with your camera. Be friendly, and act like you belong where you are and everything will be cool. This shot has been cropped to lose some empty space on the left.

Under the jumpsuits they’re wearing hockey equipment. The Ottawa police used to wear the same stuff, only on top of their uniforms. These guys are the Sûreté du Québec, or the Quebec provincial police. A couple hundred construction dudes had taken over the downtown bridges between Hull, Quebec and Ottawa. The SQ actually did a great job dealing with the very large protesters. But just when everything was cooling off the Hull city cops showed up and waded into the crowd, where they beat on random dudes for maybe a couple of minutes. Then they walked away… laughing. Weird. Weirder. Weirdest.

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Posted in Cool Stuff, Favourites, Photography, Pre 2004, Protests | 1 Comment

Self Portraits I Can Barely Tolerate 004

Posted on November 24, 2008 by Gabriel

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This is the third or fourth time I’ve taken shots like this in their lab. Essentially, because there’s no swivel screen option on my little pocket digital, I take them blind. Being able to guess beforehand how a subject will be framed, even though it’s two feet away and at a different angle, is something I worked on after owning this camera for a couple of months. It’s not an issue I remember coming up very often while I was using the larger SLR’s.

Technical Stuff: That’s my arm, and my blood. I edited this photo to remove some stuff on the vial. The camera was set on “center focus” and “multiple exposure”, and I took two sets of three shots. The first series had both her hands in the frame, but the shots were fuzzed. Of the second series two came out perfectly. It was her idea to spin the vial so my name would be showing.

When you want to take shots of someone doing their jobs, you can’t be afraid to ask them. Carrying a camera with you is only half the process. You have to be willing to whip the thing out and wave it around. If they’re cool then put it right into their face, let them touch it, maybe even hold it as long as they’re gentle. I’ve never had someone say no when I reach down and pull out my… ahem, camera.

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Posted in Everyday Stuff, Favourites, Occasional Events, Photography, Self Portraits, Vankleek Hill Photos | 4 Comments

Happy Birthday Little Brother

Posted on November 21, 2008 by Gabriel

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It’s my little brother’s thirty-seventh birthday today. Congratulations little buddy, only a few more to go. Way back in the day a friend of ours had a house party. I think you might have been seventeen. About halfway into the evening our friends older brother came up from the basement with a bottle of homemade red wine. He uncapped it and took a drink. Then you took it from him, said something like “that’s not how you drink” and you proceeded to take at least half the bottle in one slam.

Technical Stuff: This is actually the first of three shots I took which, in reverse, look like we’re about to die. In their proper order, however, it looks like he was initially responding to something horrible, but which then turned out to just be a mild and harmless hallucination involving trees. The first thing you need to get a shot like this is a little brother with a drivers licence. If you don’t have one I suppose you could try adoption.

Not too long afterwards you were sitting on their front steps puking stuff that stained their walkway red for days. When my friends and I were ready to go I went to find you and you were passed out on the living room floor, and people were flicking bottlecaps at you. So I picked you up and put you in the car with us, and we took you home, where we put you in bed. We were leaving but someone said we should flip you onto your stomach, so if you puked again you wouldn’t choke on your own vomit and die. I agreed, and we left you lying on your stomach and you didn’t die… so you owe me.

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Posted in Family, Favourites, From My Wall, Photography, Vankleek Hill Photos | 1 Comment