Sunday, December 22, 2013

Snow Day

Friday was one of the nicest snow days that I have seen in Vancouver, as you have read about in my post on my morning snow run, we had a few inches in downtown overnight. First thing in the morning was so beautiful before the pristine snow had been unsettled by morning commuters. I really wanted to ride to work for my last day, but with my skinny road tires on, I decided it was prudent to take public transport. As always on a snow day, Vancouver goes into shambles. It doesn't snow this much often in Vancouver, so well over half the cars are not equipped for the conditions and as you can expect, total shambles ensues.
Based on past experience I rushed breakfast and got out the door early. This was a good move as the busses were already behind schedule, and the line ups at the bus stops were growing. That being said, we got to work quickly because we left early. I don't think I can say the same for people who left at their normal time.
I decided to get off the skytrain one stop later today, so that I could walk back to work through the suburbs and take some photos of the Mt Pleasant area covered in snow. 3 years ago when I had my interview with Image Engine, I walked almost the exact same route, on a snow day too. SO it almost seemed fitting being my last day, and retracing the steps I took to my interview that landed me on this life changing path. I made sure I photographed all my favourite areas. It is so nice to have all these images captured in all the different seasons.


Friday, December 20, 2013

Early Morning Snow Run

I woke up this morning, looked out the window and saw shitloads of snow. My first thought was no way am I running this morning. Too slippery, back to bed you go, whilst I'm pulling on my running tights! I decide against it and jump back into warm bed. I lay in bed for a few minutes with that early morning want to keep sleeping battling my obsessive nature that wanted to go running. Finally I think, this is probably the last time you will get to run in the snow in Vancouver, don't be a wuss, get out there!
Back out of bed! Gear on! Out the door. Five mins of warm up on Pendrell St the off I go. I headed down Pendrell towards Stanley Park, left at the Sylvia, then right onto Beach along the Southern Sidewalk. Here I keep running into Stanley Park and to Second Beach Pool.
I was the first person to run many of these trails. A few inches of pristine snow covered everything. The city was still sleeping, and the Park had that beautiful muffled sound you get when it snows. It was so beautiful and peaceful. From Second Beach I headed North to Lost Lagoon then around the Lagoon trail. The snow here was deep, a few inches at least. No one else was around, it was so peaceful.
After my loop of the Lagoon I was heading South again, back to Second Beach Pool and onto the seawall, to head East back to the West End. The sea wall had a good inch or two of snow covering it, and all the rocks in the water were covered in snow, making for beautiful abstract art with with white mushrooms dotting the inky black water; it was still dark at about 7:20am. I continue my run along the sea wall, hook a left up to Bidwell St, Right onto Harwood, left onto Cardero, across Davie and back down Pendrell. Home.
The run was one of the nicest runs I have ever done. It was a moment to be calm and to think. To immerse myself within such a beautiful environment. It was a similar experience to my early morning run at Cape Disappointment, Washington. These are the experiences that I will carry with me forever and I am really trying to make the most of while I am in Vancouver.

Lady On The Bus

It was my last day of work, one of the deepest Vancouver snow days I've seen, and I end up on the C21 instead of the C23 after getting off the Skytrain. I was feeling a bit humbled. A lot of people had said a lot of nice words to me at end of year drinks, and I had had some great conversations with some great work colleagues.
I sat down in the C21 next to a middle aged lady, maybe mid 50s. After a few minutes she starts talking about the snow and how it was meant to be melted by afternoon, but there was no chance at all of that! I agreed and then we started talking about the chaos of the public transport system that morning. It sounded like I had left for work a bit earlier than her, and needing to get out to Burnaby, she had felt the brunt of the snow. Apparently the bus up Robson had not been working as it couldn't negotiate the slippery hill, the Skytrain had been working intermittently, and hearing all this I was stoked I made an effort to get out the door early today!
We continued talking, and a few words I uttered gave way to me being an Aussie. She asks where I'm from, and then she starts telling me that she had lived in Darwin in 82 for a year, and then Sydney for a few months. Darwin had been a pretty wild town back then she said, especially for two young Canadian girls who turned up in Darwin as they didn't have enough money to get any further than that after time in South East Asia.
She commented on all the kind people she met in Australia, and I likened the Australian people to Canadians and why I had found it so easy to settle in over here. This got us to talking about life experience and how it is such an experience to go and totally immerse yourself within a culture, and to not try and impose your culture, but to absorb theirs. Even if you don't agree with it or enjoy your experience, you are in a foreign culture, you put yourself there, and that is what is the fun part of that experience. Make the most of it! Immerse yourself within it and understand that you put yourself there so make the most of it.
I got off that bus at Beach and Bidwell. I asked the lady to pull the bus stop cable for me so I didn't have to be rude and reach over her. I bid her a great evening, thanked her for the conversation and walked out into the snowy cold, quite likely that I will never see her again, yet we shared such an intimate conversation.

Last Day At Image Engine

What a bitter sweet day. The prospects of moving home and continuing my life with my wife in Adelaide are so near; albeit I never saw myself leaving Image Engine. I have always felt so comfortable here; a very integral part of the team. I am going to miss IE a lot, it has been a fantastic place to work, full of amazing people and great ideas. The work that comes out of Image Engine is second to none. The opportunities here and the knowledge that I have picked up has been amazing.
Elysium was such an amazing experience, and to be offered an opportunity like that with only a year of film experience is absolutely amazing and very flattering. I have made such a good group of friends here, which is one thing that makes the place unique. Everyone here is so friendly and they have a great core team which ensure that the place keeps developing and evolving to produce amazing work more efficiently. Not only have I made great work friends here, but also great friends out of work. I find that most of the people that work here have such interesting lives outside of work, and there is always an excuse to catch up for sport, a nice meal, a film or coffee.
The knowledge that I have picked up here will serve me well for my career in the future. It has set me up with a profound knowledge of how a VFX pipeline works and a great thought process to deal with solving problems, not only in VFX, but in any industry. I know that IE will keep producing amazing work and I can't wait to see what looms on their horizon.
The photos below are from my last day lunch at Chutney Villa. Pretty much everyone in the photo is from IE :-)

Little Old Lady

On Wednesday I needed to go for a walk at lunch to get out of the office for some fresh air, and I decided to head to my favourite community garden to just sit and contemplate.
After a few minutes this nice old lady walked by and made a comment about how I was game to be sitting in the garden on a cold day like that day was. I made a bit of small talk and that was it.
I noticed that she was preparing to do some gardening so I asked her which plot was her's and how long she had had it for. She has been gardening at that plot for 15 years, originally from the praries, she moved to Vancouver because her sister lived here.
She told me stories of wading through waste deep snow to school, and how their parents property was on a big hill that they would toboggan down in winter. However now, her parents house is right in the middle of downtown, and all that land is no longer free, but instead covered with city blocks.
We discussed gardening in Canada versus Australia, and its differences. She explained the way they plough in the winter so all the snow fills the plough tracks and melts in the spring, soaking the ground and making it the most ideal growing conditions.
Finally she expressed her dismay at the state of the food we eat and how it is so hard for the youth of today to be able to easily make healthy choices. The idea of genetically modified foods scared her. We had an interesting discussion on this, it must be hard for someone like her, now at, I'm guessing, 80 years old, to look back and see the differences in society and the way we consume. From having had the freshest most delicious produce, to now having unknown chemicals and who knows what else applied to our food. Not to mention all the processed food that is pushed at everyone.
It was a very wholesome lunch, and it shows that next time you have the opportunity, start up a conversation with a stranger - you never know how rewarding it will be.

Monday, December 16, 2013

Walk and Reminiscing

I decided to go for a long wander around downtown Vancouver on Saturday. It's funny when you start walking aimlessly, taking in your surroundings and taking photos along the way, that you find that you don't get far that quickly. Or maybe time kinda disappears cos you become so absent minded that when you realise how long you have been wandering, and realise where you are, you are amazed that you didn't get farther. What I'm trying to say is that when I aimed to walk all of downtown, I quickly ran out of time without realising it, and only made it to Coal Harbour.
I love going on aimless walks, and especially right now as we are nearing our departure as I reminisce on the fun times that Kate and I have had in Vancouver. We have spent so much time in the city that most parts of downtown have some memory attached to them. Wandering around Coal Harbour, there is the restaurant that we went to with my mum and dad on their last night in Vancouver, Carderos. There are the Harbour Air Sea Planes which we flew back from Victoria in. Then there is the Pan Pacific that we stayed in on our first night in Vancouver over 3 years ago.
All these little things cross my mind when I am wandering. It is also a time to try and clear the mind, relax and not think about work, training or having to converse with anyone. It's like my zen time, just me and the camera to zone out and not care about anything else. It's free time to be creative and see what I can come up with; to see if something I have photographed many times before can be made more interesting from a different angle, or with a different light.
You really see a place when you go on aimless walks like this; maybe stop at a new corner cafe and find that the barrista there makes an awesome latte, then just chill and watch the world go by for a while. It was a great day, and with my time off coming up I'm sure there are going to be a lot more aimless walks and aimless blog posts.
Training
West End Door
Shipwreck
Shipwreck

Saturday, December 14, 2013

Jantastic

So Marathon talk is hosting Jantastic, starting Jan 6th 2014, and running for 3 months, with the idea of kick starting every ones new year of running. I have just signed up and it is exciting to be a part of the Marathon Talk community. They always have an amazing podcast and it has always been fun listening to their different events, so to be involved this time around is great :-) Can't wait to see what it entails. My goal for January is to run 3 times a week, which is a good amount to be starting to increase too after returning from injury.
Just an update that now Kate has too joined Jantastic and we will be repping a team as hubby and wife called "The Forbsies". It's gonna be such a fun way to get out running together.
http://www.jantastic.me/ The Rules

Jody Wisternoff

What a beautiful set! Great progressive tunes. I love the way that the electronic music genre is headed these days, and this set is a nice intertwined selection of house, electonica, progressive and mellow trance. I could listen to this all day.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

365 Project #2 Ideas

I am currently brainstorming for my second 365 project. I have come up with my first set of rules. I decided to go for a different rule each day of the week, then this is repeated 52 times. I thought it would give an interesting challenge to have rules to abide by, but it wasn't as limiting as one rule for the whole project. Also over the whole duration I hope that I can see obvious differences in the sequence of the photos from day to day.
monday
foresight, an image exploring the coming week. What do I want to get out of the coming week? What changes do I want to make? What will the week hold?
tuesday
patterns, an image exploring patterns, natural and man made.
wednesday
colors, an image exploring the amazing world of colour.
thursday
still life and details, an image exploring the stationary world and all of it's details.
friday
motion, an image exploring the moving world.
saturday
vibrance, an image exploring the vibrance of the world we live in. This is a very broad topic but great for a Saturday as it is an easy day to get out and about.
sunday
reflection, an image exploring the week just passed. How did the week go? What would I have done differently?

Rocanini Coffee Roasters

This is hands down my favourite coffee in Vancouver! They have a lot of different varietals, and roast right there in the shop, so when you buy a bag of coffee it is so fresh. The guys that work there are also super helpful and are so particular about how they make coffee - you can tell they have a passion for it - and thats why I have never had a bad coffee there. They are also super happy to talk coffee and impart some knowledge about the world of coffee! I have been loving their recent Rawandan and Panama coffees, brewing them at home with a simple pour over setup. I wanted to take some pics of Rocaninis as it is a place that I will miss when I leave Vancouver, I will be taking a few bags with me for sure.
Rocanini
Rocanini

First Snow

Yesterday saw our first snowfall for the year in Vancouver. It's always an exciting day, although it does make the ride to work a little sketchy! It is amazing what a little snow does to make it really start to feel like Christmas, with out Christmas tree and poinsettia now decorating our apartment we are well in the mood.
It is funny though seeing Vancouver drivers transform from shit and fast to shit, slow and overly cautious the second there is a slight dusting of snow!
First Snow

Monday, December 9, 2013

Canadian Forex

I can't believe that there are not more reviews on this company online! Hand's down they have saved me so much money vs a bank wire transfer. They conduct their services in the most professional manner and are so onto it with keeping you informed that you never once are concerned about your transaction.
If you need to transfer savings between countries for relocation, as I know a lot of young professionals do these days, definitely do not hesitate to use these guys, Canadian Forex. You will be absolutely stoked with the rates they offer, it makes me laugh at what the banks offer their "Valued customers".

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Green Smoothie

I made an epic green smoothie this morning. After an hour of core and leg work, and a hour long run, I felt like making something super healthy and nourishing. The following resulted:
                             Elements of a Green Smoothie
Elements of a Green Smoothie
Green Smoothie

Icicles

It has been really cold in Vancouver over the last week. So much so that ground water running out of the cliff faces around Stanley Park has frozen as the most beautiful icicles. I saw these this morning on my run, and managed to walk back out this afternoon to take some photos. I thought is was too nice of a scene to not make the effort to take some photos.
Anyways, it was spectacular to see these up close unlike today when I was quickly running by. Hope you like.
Stanley Park Icicles
Stanley Park Icicles
Stanley Park Icicles
Stanley Park Icicles

Sunday Morning Run

Wow. What a morning for a run! I got out for another easy run - walk session. Still being very cautious and easing back into running to make sure I don't flare this injury up again. 3min run, 1min walk repeated for almost a hour. It's good incorporating the walk as it forces you to take it easy and to pause and get your body in check to make sure you don't do anything dumb like run through the pain that you are trying to fix, and just make it worse again.
Just as I headed out this morning the sun popped through the clouds to make for the most picturesque morning on the sea wall. It was ridiculously cold, but finally I have my winter attire dialled in so I was toasty. The most amazing thing was a beautiful display of icicles hanging off the cliffs around Stanley Park. They were just beautiful and very Christmassy. I hope to get out later to take some photos if they haven't melted, but otherwise it is just a really nice memory.
The sun is out....gonna get outside.

Jacobs Bucks Show @ Bitter Tasting Room

Last night was Jacobs bucks show at Bitter Tasting Room. What an awesome night, nice and chilled, great group of people and Jacob was well and truly sloshed in his pretty pink princess crown and bachelorette sash!
The server at Bitter was a gun dealing with all our orders, and the food was wicked - we ate a lot of scotch and deviled eggs! There is loads of beer to choose from there and a great range of draught beer as well as bottled.
No pics this time, but good memories.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Elysium

This is a reel of the awesome work that Image Engine did on Elysium. You can see a lot of my rigging work in this reel. All of the droids and any vehicle was rigged and seen through the pipeline by me. Enjoy :-)

Sunday, December 1, 2013

Out and about on Sunday

Today was a day of varying and amazing atmospheric conditions. Some nice moody fog over Lost Lagoon provided for a beautiful black and white landscape with Vancouver West End in the distance. Whereas a few hours earlier the sun came out and I snapped a shot of the West End at English Bay, just a 2 min walk from where we live. Such an amazing city.
Lost Lagoon
English Bay

Wildlife Day in Stanley Park

We went for a walk today in Stanley Park. It was meant to rain all day, but when the sun came out we decided the opportunity was too good to miss. We had finished baking and our daily chores, so we headed for the park to enjoy what may be the last sunshine we see for a while. It was beautiful out with an amazing contrast between the warming sun and these dark menacing storm clouds.
Anyway, the wildlife in Stanley Park decided to put a show on for us. Raccoons, playful Piver Otters in Lost Lagoon which we watched for a good half hour as they caught and ate fish. We also saw some graceful Herrons and inquisitive squirrels. Did not imagine such an interesting walk when we left.
Raccoon
River Otter
Herron
Squirrel

Thanksgiving Bread

Yesterday was a day of baking. Doing two different loaves in one day takes a bit of management with different rising, folding, shaping and baking times. The two different breads I made were a Pain au Levain, a classic French Levain white loaf, made using a stiff levain sourdough as the basis. The second loaf I baked was a Hazelnut, Fig and Fennel seed loaf, also baked using a stiff levain sourdough.
It was a bit of a nightmare as I ran out of white flour right at the crucial time of shaping, so the dough was fairly sticky and it became a nightmare to control so some of my loaves don't look as nice as I hoped, but I guess you can say I was going for the rough and rustic look. But all in all, I think they turned out pretty well, the scoring could have been better though.
As of now I haven't tasted them, but will post back once I have news to report on the crumb and flavour.
Fig and Hazlenut Levain
Fig and Hazlenut Levain and Pain au Levain

Shot Management Tool Development

I have got around to continuing some work on my asset management tool. I am breaking it down into modular pieces of code so that I can work on one part at a time. It makes the task a lot easier to manage and makes it seem like a smaller task than it really is. Also it makes it very easy to adapt, as in adding in new functions, removing old functions or really altering the way the code works.
For the moment I am still nailing down the project and folder structure that I want to have for me project scenes. I have something that I like for now that is building nicely. This morning I tightened up this code, reducing my line count by probably a hundred lines, and then implemented custom scene saving with versioning. The next step is to save out an image on scene save so the the management tool will display an image of the scene, and then following that I will enable the UI to read all the versions and display them so you can choose to open which ever version you require.
Slowly but surely this is coming along. I hope it will only be a week or so until I can start using the first rudimentary release to manage my own personal and freelance shots.
Images/Video to come once it is all wrapped up a bit nicer.