A letter home...from Meg Campbell-Back

She comes out of the sun in a silk dress...

...running like a watercolour in the rain... Al Stewart, The Year of the Cat)

I just marvel sometimes at the lyrics waiting to be discovered in a song. Yes, many are simple and banal, but some songs have the most exquisite poetry hidden within them. I'm one of the many people who have started to really enjoy music again thanks to i-tunes, and we downloaded "the year of the cat" a while back when AJ was studying woodwind instrumentsat school, and needed examples of tracks with the saxophone. 

When it was nearly time to shoot Danielle and John's wedding the weather forecast was for rain. Note that I didn't say the weather forecast was "bad", because over here it's not bad to have rain on your wedding day, indeed it's considered good luck or a blessing. And I wasn't too concerned about photographing in the rain, not because of my gear, that IS a worry in the rain, but because of the couple themselves; I knew they wouldn't cower in a corner looking miserable, indeed I had a picture in my minds eye of Danielle in the rain laughing, and I was quite inspired thinking of the images that might lead to. During that week before their wedding I also came across the aforementioned track on i-tunes. Actually it's the only track I have in the "folk" classification! and I listened and listened to it, especially the lyric "she comes out of the sun in a silk dress running like a watercolour in the rain". My Libran brain mused the various ways you could interpret it, but I had a picture in my minds eye of Danielle (who I had met over a coffee at the time of booking) running in a sun shower in the rain with the sun behind her, laughing, and in a silk dress... and just that thought was making my heart sing with excitement.  

Sure enough the day dawned sort of fine, but as we waited for Danielle's arrival on the "Raikivi" the clouds rolled up and then the rain started....

John kept waiting and playing the guitar as long as he could...

But as the rain increased and increased we were driven indoors where John was heard to say "Oh my Lord, why are you blessing us so?" (!!)

Finally there was a slight lull in the downpour and Danielle and her Dad, family and other guests came running in off the boat to where a relieved John was waiting. She was wearing a hand painted silk dress, and was running in the rain laughing, with the sun shining through the rain behind her...

After drinks and yummy looking food it was off on the "Raikivi" heading for Treasure, with a new take on the classic Titanic poses...

It's still raining actually, but spirits are high and jubilant... love that... especially as they transferred to Treasure Island (well who could blame them there?!)...

More sun, more rain, more happiness, more photos. Eerily I noticed another similarity to the "year of the cat" lyrics as I edited them.

"By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls

There's a hidden door she leads you to"

Well the door IS painted blue (if not tiled)... 

Look closely in all of these photos and you can see it's still raining... and why would you want it any other way I wonder?! Besides swimming in the rain with family and friends looking on is fun.

Lots more pictures of this fabulous day over at our page on facebook... but not the more risque shots heh heh... and for those of you who are too young to know what the heck I am ranting on about with the Al Stewart song... here it is. They made songs for the radio longer in those days, so it's just over 6 minutes.... 

Awesome huh? what other tunes do you reckon have great lyrics or sax solos that I should maybe add to the i-tunes? Because music is art. and art is inspiration. and John and Danielle's wedding reminded me how exhilarating inspiration (and love and fun) can be, and well sometimes we all need more of that...

keep door close and off the light...

I read a post at "The Online Photographer" today which oddly enough reminded me of Fiji. This is unusual for a blog about photography (to remind me of Fiji), so I thought I would share why here: the writer asked if curmudge could possible be used as a verb, and the question was followed up by this cartoon...

How does that remind me of FIji? Well Fijians are exceptional linguists, with many of them speaking four or more languages (their dialect, standard (Bauan?) Fijian, English, Hindi...), so dumbo's like me who only speak one language fluently could never criticise; but they have some really cute language idiosyncrasies. One is that, like Calvin above, they like to "verb words". My favourite is "off". As in "could you off the light?". The classic at the buffet is when the waitress tells you "you can help yourself out". Also they use plural forms sort of backwards, like "don't worry about your luggages" and "are the childrens at school?" vs "please respect host privacy"... I think it's very cool (except when AK is using her full-on fiji english accent and I worry that it may be permanent); and I really enjoyed reading great examples here, choice Fiji Slang here,  and (if you're really brave) the label "rude" here...(very educational but nsfw: not suitable for work)...

Another laugh out loud moment was reading an interview on the same blog this morning with the writers of another of my faves fij blogs: "Lunch in Suva", the only food review site I have ever seen that suggests good curries must carry a cholesterol tax. But watch out, there is a little bit of bad language there. Not as bad as "Outrageous Fortune" but there. Certainly today's interview goes a little way towards explaining to me why "Lunch in Suva is such an entertaining read. They have not yet reviewed the Air Pacific fare, but I can report that our flight to Christchurch had excellent food (we had "the chicken with the gravy sauce")(waaaaay nicer food than Air NZ despite the odd title).

Finally as seen on other people's blogs is this funky little word generator. It takes the content of a piece of writing (or your blog) and analyses it to create a word collage with the more frequently used words larger. So I did it for my blog and my comment would have to be: really? I mean really?!!

So to final news: I am officially a dauveitaba (wedding photographer, commercial photographer, fiji photographer, yes I'm teasing the search engines...) over here: Isoa and Leilani Tokalautawa have hired me, and i have the stamp in my passport to prove it (small cheer!). If you are on facebook please! head on over to our page, and sign up as a fan, thanks! Website to come. as soon as I get over hating all my images...except the one above eh Danielle and John!

It's a bit dark isn't it?

I wrote this post, then lost it... which of course meant it was another 3-4 days before I could be bothered having another go. So this time I won't waffle and will keep it short and sweet. and throw in a couple of clips...

So we had earth hour again, like last year, and again it was a lot of fun. There is always some worry that it will clash with the Hong Kong Sevens, as it did; however this year the radio stations stressed that it was all about turning off lights (and the TV could stay on). I was never sure about this light bulb business, despite the fact that Treasure changed all it's light bulbs to the eco friendly ones several years ago, but it made sense after watching this clip (below). Sadly it also exposed some short givings in NZ's prime minister...oh man! I voted for him! But then again what is a "blue-green" to do? basically I want to vote for someone who lowers taxes except for polluters...

Anyway so I popped some of the photos from earth hour, taken in candle light, into the above story board (thanks to "dress it up" for the action) for Katrina to post on the Treasure Blog... and the GM said "er it's a bit dark isn't it?' (hulloooooo? it was dark?). I told him it's nothing the D700 won't fix...

In the meantime here's one more related video. enjoy. remember on the slower connections press play, then press pause and wait for it to load. Then you can watch straight through...

where the wild things are...

{Is this my best side?}

Those who have been to the island where we live know it is a nature reserve and full of wild endangered animals. Lately the two parrots have been down by our place eating the tavola nuts, and we've been taking photos. It's not like they're playing hard to get, they yell when they arrive "rarrrrrk! rarrrrrk!' then strike many varied poses showing us their various profiles. 

  

{or is this my best side?}

{would you stop posing and eat your dinner?}

These are of course the Fijian Kaka parrot, but we also have the endangered bird known as the "Bici" which is a banded rail bird, and threatened on the mainland by the introduced mongoose. AK and I went out to take photos as she had an art assignment. It was a good thing I didn't have to hand mine in as I used the 85mm f/1.4 wiiiiiiiiiide open.... and you didn't get to see a lot of bird...

Some of the other wildlife here on the island include the endangered Hawkesbill turtles which nest here (so cool!) and the iguanas. John and Danielle and their guests wanted to have a look at them on their wedding day, especially Danielle's mum who loves wild creatures (Danielle is thinking I'm going to put a photo of her Dad here ...but I restrained myself): isn't this just the nicest mother and daughter and  iguana photo ever?

and here's one of the turtles...

Those last pics were pretty much straight out of camera (and it's on the laptop, hope the light is sort of ok), and of course there's lots more from the wedding to come, some amazing beautiful sun and rain shots (I really really like them), but we'll finish with one more sighting of wild things... not on the island luckily...

I think maybe Debra needs this sign for the boat...

Yes, I think I might email it to her...

Finally I know you are all now wondering how AK's bici photos turned out... well they were great! She used the D70 on sports mode with the 70-300mm lens and sat quietly and waited for the birds to get curious and walk up to her. Here's one she then tried out the topaz filter on to taste. Her taste. It's wild and I like it! Goodnight!

Times they are a changing...

Or should that be the more things change the more they say the same?! Who was it said that anyway?

Anyway apologies for having lost my blogging mojo, yet again... I continue to struggle with my portfolio review for my website, or rather to put it in plain english I currently hate all my work and am having a small crisis of confidence (a big one would take too much energy and I need to save that for the wii fit). But things keep on happening, so letters home must be written!

The country of course has been hard hit by the floods and the consequent loss of tourism business. Even out here has been quieter, though not last week when we entirely stopped participating in the recession and had the resort so full we nearly ended up with guests in "bure 67" (Amy's room). But prior to that it had been quiet. Actually AJ asked why John Travolta didn't stay here on his trip to Fiji? Well we were already full of course!

For AJ's birthday in March (which coincided with Prophet Mohammed's Day, a public holiday over here) we went back to the Hard Rock Cafe in Port Denerau. Amy had a lovely time, her presents were JUST FABULOUS (!) and we made party favours with really funky little coffee cups from one of those chinese shops in Lautoka filled with little goodies (I don't favour lolly bags, so very little sweet stuff in them). The kitchen at Treasure Island created the sweetest little two story cake with love heart shapes, just so cool, Vula and Bogi are very clever...

{story board action from Dress it up Photo}

The only damper was the Hard Rock itself. Previously birthdays there have been lively special affairs with staff singing and having fun with the kids. This time the waitress couldn't even get someone to help us sing happy birthday! I have never ever in all my time in Fiji seen that... Don't get me wrong, we had a great fun time. But all the HRC provided for that was a place to sit and food to ear (albeit yummy food). Here's my opinion. I know that times are tough. But don't drop the special points of difference that cost little and make the experience for your customers. 

Amy's birthday went on for several weeks as she got more gifts, including having breakfast at Bulaccino (she won the January lucky draw)- that's the half size pancakes in the first picture; and a mother and daughter 3 hour spa pamper (mmmmm! thanks Senikai!!!). In fact it had really just wound up with a very cute present from Veronica, and during that time things had really picked up economically with more visitors, shops reopening and then... things changed again over here...

Most of you will know that Fiji has not been a democracy since Dec 2006, when a military c0up overthrew (is that a word?) the government. Well in the words of another blogger Fiji's interim government managed to ingeniously overthrow itself. I won't go over those events as I can post links to explain the whole shebang far better than I can, and I have no opinion beyond assuring our visitors it's still safe to come over. But my other favourite blogger quote was Wilson saying 

"In the meantime, Bainimarama has assured the public that there will be no "disruption to law and order". I quickly banished thoughts of looting the local shopping mall during the imaginary riots." 

Really despite the Fijians ability to laugh and joke it isn't any joking matter. The long awaited devaluation has lowered the Fiji dollar 20%, which will affect food costs as so much of it is imported, including wheat as the cartoon below shows... and fuel of course....though it will make it more reasonable for tourists to holiday here as they get more bang for their buck.

This of course isn't a recent cartoon. But it goes well with a comment from the letter to the editor here lately: food for thought:

Economic solutions

IT is common knowledge that Fiji is part of the global economic crisis. To solve this problem, we need to take some steps that will benefit the government and the public. Here are some ways in which Fiji's economy can be boosted:

Buy locally grown vegetables and products (e.g. butter, milk, garments, footwear instead of buying imported ones.

Export more products, that is, garments, tuna, kava, cassava.

Boost tourism industry through: a) organising art festivals or cultural events which will advertise Fiji's handicrafts, local dances. b) promoting eco-tourism through setting up endangered birds and animal parks in various towns across the country, and encouraging tourists to take tasks such as hiking or mountain climbing. 

Recycle plastic bags, bottles, papers and even food waste for de-composing so locals can buy local mad manure for growing vegetables in their own backyard. 

Plastic bags should be eliminated and reusable bags should come in place.

Encourage farmers to do more cash farming.

Encourage production of more local products and vegetables.

Try to improve human resources management.

Many people are getting unemployed because of this governmental factor and crisis while they can take jobs that improve standard of living and increase productivity. 

Any unemployed person can work as a street sweeper, rubbish collector, delivery boy, craftsman, artist, baby sitter, poultry farmer, private tutor, handyman, or carpenter to name a few.

I hope the public will make some changes in the economy so all of us benefit.

ANA MARIA ASIOLI
Suva

In the meantime as always life goes on as normal out here, the sun is shining, the sea is clear and full of fish, the people laugh and the cost of flour isn't yet stopping us from eating delicious Bulaccino pancakes; even if democracy is seemingly a first world luxury I still feel as safe standing at the money machine as in any city in NZ (ok safer than Rotorua, but then that's a whole other story)... Like the rest of the world we watch American Idol (on "Bollywood Xtra' channel!!) which frankly amazes us less than some of the sensationalised travel warnings we have read... though why does Adam where that black nail polish? The kids suggested he's a happy Emo? is there such a thing? Or does that make him simply a goth?

 

Next up: Earth hour photos... but first better get back to the task at hand (the dreaded website)(nb I have had a work permit for over a week now, yay! I'll post about that soon too)...

Oops

I forgot to add one photo to the last post, the photo that was the climax, the photo that was both sunset and rainbows (and all round odd...)! doh! So here it is... now I'll go back and edit it into the other post...

...sunsets and rainbows...

**warning** very little artistic merit in the following images! Fijian sunsets and rainbows- you have been warned**

Recently over at Tony Bridge's site a lively discussion broke out in the blog section, including the suggestion Tony be "rubbed out"... so now you're wondering what caused this? Well it was a discussion of what constitutes a great landscape photo... While I definitely know what I like (yes I sound like Kath and Kim visiting an art gallery don't I?) it's certainly quite a different matter to define what actually makes a great landscape... 

Here's the quote that started the discussion, but definitely pop over and read the rest if you have an interest in landscape photography or even art in general...

"Here’s a question for you, taking into consideration that it has been noted that the perfect scene as described by people worldwide contains all of the following, a horizon, a lake, mountains, trees, animals, and people.  However if this was taken as to be considered applicable to the perfect picture, then a big Mac and fries would have to be the perfect meal!

So what do you think makes a good landscape ? Is there actually such a thing ? And what can move you in a landscape?

Doc"

(click on the "Doc" to go to his site)

Which is funny as I had actually promised less photographic navel gazing for a few posts (sorry Lee!), and here I go again.... so I will just get right on to the subject of this post. I don't really do sunsets. I don't really do rainbows. I don't race out at night to capture the sun setting into the sea out here, even though it is pretty damn amazing most of the time. But it's late summer here, near autumn, the temperature and humidity have just started to drop over the last few weeks, and as if it knew it was its last chance for the year nature started to really throw out some great rainbows. And of course some really out there storm sunsets. This is the summer pattern: out here in the west of Fiji in summer we tend to get very calm clear mornings, and them storm cloud afternoons, sometimes with heavy rain just in the evenings which damps things down nicely... so for the lovers of pictures of sunsets and rainbows here they are.

Above: coming into Treasure with a rainbow. It may have a rainbow, but I like to think the wide angle and noisy processing make it a little less sissy. Or something... Now don't worry, there are only two more! In the next one I hopped on a South Seas Cruises boat at Port Denerau one day recently thinking I would be home in 50 minutes. Of course I hadn't realised the timetable had changed and getting home would in fact take three hours! But the sun was low and as we pulled up to Castaway there were sun-showers and... rainbows! 

Doesn't it look pretty sitting there? (I posted this especially for Rachael who used to live there, LOL)...then there's always the classic, a sunset AND a rainbow!! I forgot to add this actually, I've had to edit to add it. This does not bode well for my brain...

 

Finally of course the storms have created some amazing sunsets here. This one has been posted as part of a story board, but here it is full size. Storm sunset over the Treasure Island Pool. If you're into that sort of thing then... enjoy. And if you're not then look on the bright side. It must be an OK landscape, as may not have a lake, but it does have horizon and water!

Some days...

...it's harder to get to school than others...(yes, those slightly odd outfits are the school sports uniform, not Fiji fashion). Some days the boats are out for servicing (surprisingly the boat really was out for servicing, it wasn't a euphemism for "broke down")... but luckily we could catch one from another resort. It took on a bit of water. But that's ok, we had bought our own voice activated bilge pump...

...we call him Osea... Some days you can't find a taxi back to where your car's parked after catching the other resort's boat... so you catch a "carrier" (as seen in the first photo)...

But it was all worthwhile, because it was swimming sports day, and the kids had a ball- well except maybe Alice whose tennis game was cancelled when it started raining, she found watching the others swim a bit boring. But I didn't, it was great! The kids are not the best swimmers, but no matter where they came they hopped out with big happy grins on their faces. And it was super well run, no waiting between races or hours and hours and hour sitting in the sun and heat, infact just after two we were relaxing with flat whites at Vuda... niiiiiiiiice... (Dot did we tell you Feroz is there now?)

Here's Tom's moment of glory. M is actually an incredible swimmer and had won all her races... but this race is different, this race is the "subskate" (also M is probably now worn out from winning so many races). Tom says his secret is "going underwater".

...and yes, he won. One event was a real crowd pleaser. Swimming with the darkened goggles on. It's actually really hard to swim straight when you can't see, apparently; I have swum in circles in several triathlons with normal goggles on, so I can understand that!  

After a long day travelling it's always nice to be home on the island too, especially when there are returnees here. Here's Alice with her good friend H, they've been facepainting, and I thought it might not be fair if we didn't post a photo of her too....

... what do you mean not that photo? too late, it's published (but we can always edit)! hmmm different skin tones (one inside, one outside) that I can't be bothered adjusting either. Because I'm going to finish now and find our candles and kero lamp for earth hour...before the lights go out!

as promised....

Well I promised a few posts ago to share a video clip I really enjoyed, and finally I'm getting around to doing that. It really spoke to me, and to have someone like Zack Arias admit to occasional loss of confidence really made me feel better about my own self flagellation... anyway why keep talking, have a look for yourself. If you're on a slower connection like me then press play, then press pause. Let it load for a while, then it'll play straight through.Or if it really won't play very well watch the original here...

Pretty cool huh! Also very timely for me, as I'm working on building a photography website, is his website critiques which of course confirmed I'm not quite on the right track!! OK but probably what I'm doing is appropriate for the market here.... But do have a look at the critiques, they are not only really informative, but Zack and Meg are really funny! I'm talking about Zacks wife Meg there of course, not me (Over here Meg and I would call each other "yaca" (yah-thah") which means namesake, to save confusion...). 

One of the points Zack made was that when he opened some of the sites (he used different words of course) he couldn't tell what they did, what sort of photographer they were, so how was someone going to know whether or not they should hire them? This question of what sort of photographer came up a few months ago for me. I have oddly for some reason thought that like many of my fellow mwac's (mom with a camera) that I was a child and family photographer. I offered to take some shots of this family for practice (and thank heavens not for a hefty fee) but when we got out there it suddenly occured to me that despite fine fine training from QCCC I actually hadn't taken a family photo in a long time, so why on earth did I think I was a child and family photographer?! And I knew I was no Tara Whitney... But it was good practice...

So similar issues come up building a website though it's interesting to see a style and type of photography emerging despite myself. Sometimes I can see such a distinct improvement, and other times I discover stuff I like so much from a few years back that despite the lack of technical know how I had then I wonder in despair if I've actually gone backwards! 

Talking of technical know how this cracked me up...

 

This is Richard from the fabulous Red Leaf taking a workshop at the recent Beyond get together. Desiree who took this inspired shot says to tell all of you they (redleaf and their photography, textures or workshops) are well worth checking out...

Finally I found the first photo of this post deep in the archives, and it has the most wonderful grain! It's from the D70 and I've looked at the exif data, but I'm still at a loss as to how I achieved that... This is basically sooc (straight out of the camera) with no work done, it was shot as a jpeg., though my save for web has altered the grain a little (never mind for these purposes). What I did have to do was take out all the spots from all the muck on the sensor! oh my word! No wonder I liked the 50mm f/1.8 lens so much back then, I'm sure going below an aperture of 2.8 was the only way to hide those damn things!! 

Best go now, coming up soon will be pretty scenic pictures of Fiji and the kids. Because we haven't had enough of those lately and it will give a break from all this navel gazing...

...and some more

So as you can guess I'm sitting at the computer with photoshop open and having the usual crisis of confidence. Zack Arias described it beautifully in a clip I am going to embed in the next post, but in the meantime I'll just say (again) how hard it is to look hard and objectively at your own work as I've had to do lately (in the process of building a new website)... What am I getting around to? Well I thought it might be nice to take a break and post some photos I really love. No, not because of any great skill on my part, simply because it was the most stylish and lovely wedding (the sort where frankly it's pretty hard for a photographer to fail) of two really nice people. Did I mention that Lisa sent me pineapple lumps and beautiful organic coffee? Really I should have paid them... here's some more...

{leaving the chapel}

yes, everyone was crying, actually Chad was crying too. But I won't post those... beautiful emotion...ok, I was crying too, I'm terrible like that. A wedding should be as good as a blockbuster movie no? I think it's a real privilege when people allow me to be their wedding photographer...

OK I'll stop now... no, one more, just to show the beautiful reception set up between the pool and the sea, influenced by Lisa's design skills...

Congratulations again Chad and Lisa, what a beautiful day...

(PS a note on the last photo... I took along my 8 year old to act as a voice operated light stand while I did some shots of the reception set up. It didn't work as well as it should have. In this photo I had to crop/clone him out. He has walked into the frame with the sb800 and pointed it at his own face which really ISN"T big enough or white enough to act as a reflector! the terrible thing was I didn't notice this until I downloaded these shots...but there's enough and they're fine)