I know it’s corn, not wheat or sunflowers, but I think it works just the same.
Slava Ukraini
I know it’s corn, not wheat or sunflowers, but I think it works just the same.
photography
Writing Retreat 2026, days 3–5
Let’s see here:
Wednesday
Wednesday was rainy and cool. I did some editing on the paper printout of There’s Nothing Good at the Top, and finished reading Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson and started Fearless Jones by Walter Mosley. I also discovered that Fargo is available to me on the TV, and so I watched the first few episodes of season 1.
Thursday
Thursday was a better day; the sun came out and the temperature cracked the mid-teens. I wore shorts when I walked over to Poor Michael’s book emporium, where I had a mocha and picked up some books for a friend (I have enough books of my own, thanks). Back at the house I entered my edits from the paper manuscript into my document, and made a few more updates. I still need to add a few scenes and update a few dream sequences, I think; make a few things more explicit. The first draft is you telling yourself the story[1]As Sir Terry Pratchett put it., but by the time it’s a second draft (which is what I’m working on) it should be ready for others to read it too.
The sky was still clear after the sun went down, and it’s quite dark ’round these parts, so I set up my cameras in the yard, one facing north and one pointing pretty much straight up. The north-facing one got about 2½ hours worth of 5‑second exposures for star trails (above); the other one snapped a bunch of 30-second exposures of the Milky Way. I made time-lapse videos from both sets of photos.
Friday
That actually bled into Friday; all the photos were taken before I went to bed at about 1am, but all the processing happened today. I’ve also read some more, and I plowed through all of season 1 of Fargo too, which told a taut story.
And now I’m going to have some supper, and then work some more on my editing. Tomorrow I have to be up early, so it’s probably for the best that it’s cloudy and rainy—I’ll be less tempted to try and get more nighttime photos.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | As Sir Terry Pratchett put it. |
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Bike Ride Photos, May 10, 2026
On Sunday, I took my camera on a 30km bike ride, and got a few photos.
My favourite photos, 2025 edition
I took a lot of photos in 2025. Here are some of my favourites, in no particular order.
Continue reading “My favourite photos, 2025 edition”Aurora in the city, Nov. 12–13, 2025
The aurora data looked pretty decent last night, but I was tired. So I set up a camera in the spare bedroom, pointed east, and let it click away.
I ended up with 3000+ images in a bit over 4 hours. The timelapse video below is, as usual, 60× normal speed, so that 1 second of video is 1 minute of real time.
Remembrance Day light show
The aurora was everywhere. These photos are taken facing in all directions.
The top photo is a 7‑image panorama, facing due west. The photos of the trains passing are both facing south.
Continue reading “Remembrance Day light show”The Milky Way at an abandoned church
Last night the sky was clear and my batteries were charged. I loaded up my gear and headed to a spot I found last fall: an abandoned church south of me.
For almost the entire time I was there—about 10:45pm till 2am—it was just me and the fireflies and the crickets. A truck drove by at one point (very slowly, because I’d seen them coming and turned on my car’s lights), but other than that I was alone under the stars.
Look at all those fireflies.
I did up a multi-photo panorama, too, before I left.
Below is a timelapse of the night. It’s made of 169 still images, each one a 30-second exposure at 11mm, f/2.8, ISO800.
It was almost 3am by the time I got to bed. It’s been a while since I stayed up that late. I think it was worth it, though.
Update
I just spent 90 minutes or so stacking 16 images from my 2nd camera into this image of a portion of the galaxy.
Bike Ride Photos — May 19, 2025
I went about 15km today with my camera. I set myself up with a challenge: try to use the 35mm lens and the filters I bought at the Dunrea Flea Market[1]Which, as I’m sure you’ve figured out by now, takes place in Boissevain. a few years ago.
I set myself up with a polarizing filter and a red-blue filter (ie, one that will let through red light or blue light but not, it seems, both). It was a cloudy day and I figured I might get a bit of drama from the clouds by polarizing the red / blue light.
Did I succeed? You tell me.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | Which, as I’m sure you’ve figured out by now, takes place in Boissevain. |
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Birthday Aurora
Yesterday was my birthday, and the sky was clear and the aurora data were pretty good. So about 10pm I hit the road, and got these photos about 15 minutes from my house.
Above: an 11-photo panorama stretching from west to east.
The stars were sharp and clear, too, in the cold air, so I snapped some photos of one of my favourite constellations, Orion.
And because my cameras were nice and still for most of the time, I have a minute or so of timelapse video for you. Each second of video is a minute of real time.
Writing Retreat 2024: The End
I went for a bike ride today, and got a couple of panoramas: one of the hillside to the north (above) and an interesting tree along the trail (below).
Then I cleaned up the cabin, packed, and headed home.
So how’d I do?
I deliberately didn’t set myself any goals this year. I took my bike, my laptop, my cameras, and a bunch of books; this, I decided, would be a vacation vacation, not—as it’s kind of turned into over the years—a working vacation.
I read Rules for a Knight by Ethan Hawke, a book I didn’t know existed until Corey Redekop posted about finding it at a used book store; I read Annihilator by Grant Morrison and Frazer Irving; and I read about ⅔ of Kurt Vonnegut’s Bluebeard[1]And once this is posted, I’m probably going read some more.. I wrote about 3000 new words, I think, in my “derelict starship” story. Since the cabin owner have Disney+, I watched a season of The Mandalorian. I took a lot of photos.
It occurred to me, earlier today, that this “writing” retreat was really about 65% photography by weight, and I’m OK with that. Should I call it a “photography retreat”? An “art retreat”? Maybe, but I’m not going to. I’m the one writing these posts, after all, and I’ll title them as I see fit.
Good night, and good luck.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | And once this is posted, I’m probably going read some more. |
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