Yanik’s Photo Blog

I feel really lucky! I’m off for 2 weeks! I’m going to a photography workshop in Calgary, Alberta. Of course the workshop is only 2 days so I’ve rented a car and I’ll be on a photo safari traveling to Lake Louise, Banff, the Badlands and many other natural treasures! I’ll be sure to share some of my photos when I return. Not to worry, I have a few posts ready for you. I’ll be updating the blog while I’m away to keep your brain fed. And just before my holiday I took a 3 day vacation last week with my girlfriend! We went to see some friends in Varennes (on Montreal’s south shore) and we topped it off with a day on Île Perrot (about 30 mins west of Montreal). We stayed at a lovely B&B that I would recommend highly called Angell B&B. Nicole is a great hostess and the breakfast is to die for! Miam, miam!

On the island, there’s a small park with an old windmill that looked really cool. I wanted to shoot it at dusk to get a dramatic sky and to play with my SB-800s. Of course, the park was closed but we snuck in (as any self respected photographer would do!). So we got to the windmill and I started doing my test shots (n.b. all shots are straight out of the camera without post processing except for the final image). Fist, I took a shot in P mode and I came up with Continue Reading »

It’s that time of year again! Time to get out the suntan lotion, the bug spray (lots of it if you’re up here in Canada!) and to fire up the BBQ. It’s also time for lazyin’ around in lawn chairs, hammocks and sitting under trees; perfect places to relax and read a good book. And since we all love photography so much, a couple of great photography books is a must have to keep ourselves happy. I’ve compiled a few of my favorite books for you so that you don”t have to wade through and waste precious time in the sea of photography books. All these suggestions are Continue Reading »

I know you’ve been waiting for this article after reading the “5 Reasons to Upgrade to a DSLR Camera”. Since my powers of persuasion are beyond those of the best hypnotists, you’re just itching to buy one! But before you rush to the B&H store to purchase your new toy, you need to go through most if not all of these 10 steps to make sure you purchase the right camera for YOU. These steps aren’t in any specific order.

Step 1 - It’s a Question of Feeling: The first thing you need to do IS to rush down to your local photography store! Yup! You gotta take those cameras for a test drive. Ask to see the various models and hold them. Feel them in your hands. Look through the Continue Reading »

I’ve had quite a few students in my “Intro to Photography” workshop ask me why they should upgrade to a DSLR and I always answer back with this question: “What do you dislike about your point & shoot (P&S) camera?” and I often get the same 5 answers. So I thought I would share those answers with you. So you see, this isn’t even coming from me. It’s coming from my students! I’m letting them do all the work today.

Before we go at it, let me just explain basically what a DSLR is. DSLR stands for Digital Single Lens Reflex. DSLRs have interchangeable lenses while P&S have Continue Reading »

I’m an animal lover. That’s one of the reasons we moved out to the country last year. And since then, I’ve been blessed by having the best neighbors in the world: animals! Of course my camera’s been going crazy shooting anything that moves around here. I’ve often been asked, “Yanik, how do you get those lovely bird shots?” and I thought I would share with you a few tips to help you shoot birds or any other critter from a distance. Here we go.

1 - Patience. Yes, that’s right! Patience. These aren’t models in your studio that you can just direct… “move a little more to the left”, “tilt your head to the right”…. you have to wait for them. And once they’re there, you have to wait for the right pose, the right branch, the right light. I can take hundreds for chickadee shots a day but only have Continue Reading »