Kevin Oke Photography

Thank you! New Brunswick

kevin — Sat, 12 May 2012 16:27:18 +0000

Good food in New Brunswick

I just returned from a fabulous 2 week trip to New Brunswick. The primary reason for the trip was to attend the Travel Media Association of Canada (TMAC) annual conference which was 3 full days of meetings with Industry members, personal development sessions and countless opportunities to meet other Canadian media members. For this reason alone the trip was a success!

One thing New Brunswick is known for is their hospitality and they certainly didn’t disappoint. From fantastic food to pre-tour and post-tour trips visiting interesting places of historical and natural beauty the 2 weeks were full of adventure. Many thanks to all of you that made it possible.

One can’t beat the Maritimes for photography either with countless subjects available from beautiful old buildings and interesting cemeteries to the classic images of lobster boats and covered bridges. It will be a while until I manage to sort and label some 2,700 images but here’s a taste.

The highlight of the trip for me? Must be riding the world’s largest lobster in Shediac. I’ll never look at a lobster the same again!

Many stories and images are in the works, stay tuned!

Riding the giant lobster in Shediac

Lobster boat in St. Martins

Saint John, New Brunswick

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Music Gallery Web Site

kevin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:00:09 +0000

I have wanted to build a web site dedicated to live music and photographing music for some time. A few aborted attempts have been made over the years but…. I finally have something coming together. While the music gallery site has a ways to go, one has to start somewhere so here it is.

www.musicgallery.info

My plan is to promote local music as much as my photography so there will be lots of content about musicians based on Vancouver Island and the Vancouver area as well as the many festivals that take place here every year. As well, visiting musicians that I have photographed will be added. One of the cool things about the internet is the ability to link to performers web sites and music clips so this site will also be a good place to explore the great music that is available to us.

This should be a fun project so be sure to check back in regularly!

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Islands Folk Festival – New photos and stage lighting

kevin — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 21:31:34 +0000

I’ve finally managed to upload most of the galleries for the Islands Folk Festival that took place at Providence Farm in Duncan in July 2011. I mentioned this huge job previously back in February, Islands Folk Festival – Editing the Photos. As often is the case I try to learn from my experiences with the idea of making myself a better photographer for future assignments. What did I learn from this job?

2011 Islands Folk Festival Photographs

The Islands Folk Festival used a new sound and lighting company for the 2011 event and while the presentation was spectacular the light created real issues with the sensor on my Nikon D300. I knew of these issues previously and it certainly isn’t limited to my particular camera or even Nikon in general (let’s not have a Canon vs. Nikon war!) but this year just seemed harder to cope with than what I remembered from previous years. Certainly the lighting was way more contrasty. When shooting I was often compensating the exposure by up to -1.3 EV or even more, a substantial amount. By comparison, the previous year I rarely compensated by over -0.7 EV. This was primarily for the red and yellow lights, always an issue with digital.

Islands Folk Festival Lighting

With the 2012 Islands Folk Festival coming up I started looking at this scenario a little closer. Better to figure out how to deal with this before the big event this year!

Comparing the actual shooting in 2011 to the shoot in 2010 didn’t really lead to anything, the same camera, same lenses and same metering. On a hunch, I started to compare the light placement on the stage. The exact same lights are being used with the location of the front lights the same. What did change was the location and number of the rear lights with the 2010 lighting having the rear lights further forward on the stage and 6 per side while the 2011 lights are set further back and only 4 per side (see photo above). This might explain a little, the 2010 rear lighting providing more of a fill light than a back light and in addition, 2 more lights per side. Possibly not as good for the audience but certainly easier on the photographers.

Urban Folk Quartet, Islands Folk Festival 2011

More than anything, the person responsible for turning the lights on and off will determine the outcome of the photos. Over the years I’ve noticed the lighting getting more contrasty and punchy as the evening performances go on. This does makes sense as well as the Islands Folk Festival becomes quite a bit more raucous as the evening progresses with some pretty rocky bands late in the evening. Wild dancing, flashing lights and smoke machines, it makes for a great show and fantastic although difficult photographic opportunities.

Scott Jeffers, Traveler, Islands Folk Festival 2011

What’s the point of all this? I found some of the editing very difficult when working on evening images from the 2011 festival. Being a photographer, we often end up in situations where control of the lighting isn’t part of our gig and we just have to work with what we have. For 2011 this is what I got.

I’ll be shooting this years festival with my new Nikon D800 and I’m expecting the RAW files will be easier to work with for a number of reasons. The high ISO quality of the D800 should be superior to my D300 with far less noise and a higher dynamic range. Most of the evening images are shot in the ISO 1600 – 2000 range. As well, I expect having over 36mp images will allow for downsizing to give the appearance of even less noise when needed. This is something I’m really eager to explore. What would I change if I could shoot the 2011 images again? I might try shooting in 14 bit color rather than 12 bit color to see whether this would help but… I don’t expect it would under these circumstance.

Tribe of One, Islands Folk Festival 2011

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Time Lapse Video Images from DSLR’s – Yosemite

kevin — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 15:01:01 +0000

I have taken the plunge and ordered a new D800. In my previous post I discussed the need (or lack thereof) for a 36mp camera but after analyzing my camera body situation of a very tired and beat up Nikon D300 as my primary body I decided an upgrade was in order. One aspect of these new cameras that I’m looking forward to exploring is near professional quality video. This will be an entirely new area for me as my video shooting history is very limited and well, my editing of video is even further behind. Never to old to learn new tricks!

One interesting feature of the Nikon D800 and D4 as well as some of the high end Canon cameras is high resolution time lapse video. I’m sure the technique to produce spectacular footage is more difficult than one might expect but the results… I’ll let you judge. Project Yosemite, a collaborative project by Sheldon Neill and Colin Delehanty is embedded below. All timelapses were shot on the Canon 5D Mark II with a variety of Canon L and Zeiss CP.2 Lenses. Pretty impressive, especially in high resolution.

Hopefully my Nikon D800 will arrive soon, gotta give this a try!

Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite on Vimeo.

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First Chemainus Sawmill 1862 mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 18:19:33 +0000

First Chemainus Sawmill 1862 Mural, Painted in 2003 by Sylvia Verity Dewar. Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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Keywords: British Columbia, B.C., BC, Canada, Western Canada, Vancouver Island, Cowichan, Cowichan Region, Chemainus Valley, Chemainus, Chemainus Murals, Mural, Murals, Art, Arts, Painting, Paintings, Festival, Festivals, Festival of Murals, First Chemainus Sawmill, Sylvia Verity Dewar, Sawmill

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Letters from the Front mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 10:19:33 +0000

Letters from the Front Mural, Painted in 2002 by David Goatley. Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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Keywords: Vancouver Island, Chemainus, Art, Murals, British Columbia, B.C., BC, Canada, Western Canada, Cowichan, Cowichan Region, Chemainus Valley, Chemainus Murals, Mural, Arts, Painting, Paintings, Festival, Festivals, Festival of Murals, Letters from the Front, David Goatley

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The Lumber Barons mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 02:19:33 +0000

The Lumber Barons Mural, Painted in 1992 by Constance Greig-Manning, assisted by Bill Manning. Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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The Volunteers; “Ribbon Cutting Chemainus Style” mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 18:19:33 +0000

The Volunteers; “Ribbon Cutting Chemainus Style”, Painted in 2007 by Dan Sawatzky, Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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The Hong Hing Waterfront Store mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 10:19:33 +0000

The Hong Hing Waterfront Store Mural, Painted in 1982 by Paul Marcano. Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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Tags: Chemainus, Canada, Murals

Keywords: Chemainus, Murals, British Columbia, B.C., BC, Canada, Western Canada, Vancouver Island, Cowichan, Cowichan Region, Chemainus Valley, Chemainus Murals, Mural, Art, Arts, Painting, Paintings, Hong Hing Waterfront Store, Hong Hing, Paul Marcano

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Leonora Mines at Mt. Sicker mural, Chemainus, BC, Canada.

kevin — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 02:19:33 +0000

Leonora Mines at Mt. Sicker, Painted in 1988 by Peter Bresnen, Chemainus, British Columbia, Canada. – Photographs of the Chemainus Murals from Kevin Oke Photography

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