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One of the area’s biggest geological features in the Niagara Escarpment, covered in ancient Carolinian forests, is instantly recognisable and helps new arrivals navigate the area always looming over Milton. Hidden deep in this forest is a lake that holds many secrets, distant voices from the past that allows us to see into the times before my ancestors arrived on this content. This week I went for another hike in my second favourite Halton park, Crawford Lake. The Niagara Escarpment was formed at the end of the last ice age, a massive limestone cliff that runs from the Niagara Penisula to the Bruce Penisula. AlongRead More →

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When it comes to films that are not designed for normal pictorial use, I’m not one to shy away from them. That being especially after I went through three of the FilmWashi offerings, one of them being an Optical Audio Recording film. Even before I had loaded up Washi S into a camera, I had been approached by the Film Photography Project to beta test a new film they had acquired and were planned to release after collecting some developing times for the film. The name was FPP Super Sonic, and like Washi S, is an optical audio recording film. The idea of recording audioRead More →

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I never heard of the Duex before as I scrolled past the cameras being offered up for free on the Toronto Film Shooters Facebook Group, and this camera certainly caught my eye. One of the first things to catch me attention is the design of the camera, it screams art deco and saw the production during the height of the style’s popularity. The camera itself is asking to be used amongst the amazing architecture of The Loop in Chicago, Illinois or Manhatten in New York City. But since we’re in the time of plague still, it’ll have to be more local. The Duex is oneRead More →

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There’s nothing better than a hike in the wood during the winter, especially when there is a decent snow cover, good sunlight and blue skies. The prior week saw fresh dumping of the white stuff on the ground, which resulted in several days worth of awesome photographic opportunities. And while I took out my new digital camera more than a film camera (because new gear). But Saturday provided Heather and me a chance to head out to one of our favourite parks. And I’m not talking about Niagara Falls, but rather Hilton Falls. One of the many parks around Milton that provides an escape fromRead More →

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I love a good mystery. Even when it comes to film with limited available details, it’s always fun to crack the code. So when I arranged to gift my Nikon F2 to a fellow local film photographer, he offered up a roll of Tasma Type-25L (along with a couple of other rolls of film). Now I have worked with Tasma film before, having shot a roll of NK-2 that yielded results exactly in line when what I have come to expect from Russian films, that being lots of grain. After a bit of searching online, I landed on two sites, the first being the officialRead More →

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There is always a bittersweet feeling when you wrap up a project. You’re proud that you completed the project and hopefully worth the effort you took to complete it from beginning to end. But you’re also sad because you cannot keep working on the subject. While this one, compared to some of my two recently history projects, was far smaller. The Anglo-American War of 1812 and Canadian Confederation were exhaustive topics filled with all sorts of twists and turned. The Welland Canal is far more straight forward, which is why I could complete the project in such a short amount of time. I guess learningRead More →

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When it comes to all the posts I’ve written about the Welland Canals, this one is probably the most important. The reason is that if it hadn’t been for the efforts to save the historic Welland Canals, this whole project would not have been worth creating. The reason is that there would be nothing left of the first Canals at least in original forms. Sure there might have been plaques installed eventually, and some sections of the earlier Canals may have survived, but I don’t think in any meaningful sense. The preservation of the historical Welland Canals was the last thing on the minds ofRead More →

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I have this memory that recently floated up to the surface of a camping trip I took many years ago with my dad and brother. We were camping at Sherkston Shores a camping resort half-way between Fort Erie and Port Colborne. While I have excellent memories of swimming in the old quarry and the three waterslides, but less clear is a visit we made one trip to the Welland Canal. We’re all unclear as to what lock we visited. My brother remembers stores. And there was also the stranger who gave us chocolate bars (through our dad) on that same trip. I’m sure buried inRead More →

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Back in the Summer of 2013 when APUG was the place to get your online fix of the analogue photography community, I noticed a post in the Toronto local board that there weren’t enough meetups for the film photography community. Which was at the time partly true, sure there had been a couple of FPP/APUG meetups in the area in the past, I had even helped coordinate one in 2011. But there had not been anything since. So I took it upon myself to plan these events, at least four, in a year. The first one dropped in July 2013, had a decent turnout andRead More →

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Out of all communities formed along the Welland Canal, both large and small, the ones that are most important to the Canal are the ports. It’s easy to tell which communities along the Canal remain or are former terminuses or access points onto the Welland Canals as most of them carry the title Port in their name. Welland for example offered through the first two Canals access onto the feeder canal that exited at Port Maitland (which I will not be covering today, sorry). While once-thriving communities with some level of municipal independence all save Port Colborne are a part of a larger city today,Read More →