Back in the Saddle Again

Well the Holiday break is finally over, the kids back in school and the cars fixed (which means I'm not sitting in a waiting room) so it is finally time for me to get back to work!

I do hope you had an enjoyable Christmas break. For us Christmas is bittersweet since we are so far from family, but as always the church family is there to help celebrate. Everywhere we have gone our newest church family is wonderful and helps us to feel a part of something bigger, feel like we're home.

This is also the time to look back and remember those things I was blessed enough to enjoy: the Weeting Steam Festival, low-fly spotting in Wales, Spring Break in Loch Ness, a winter trip back to Alaska and the general euphoria that comes with being a photographer. 2009 promises to be no less exciting with Spring Break slated to be spent cruising around the Eastern Mediterranean, more trips to Wales and a couple of possible trips I'm keeping under wraps for the moment. This year will also see us leaving England for (as of now) parts unknown so another adventure of moving the family across the globe is in store! I'm almost excited about that. Almost...

So here's hoping that 2009 will bring fun, adventure and laughs to you (OK, me too).

Best wishes,

James

The End of 2007

Another year has finally come to an end. Friends have been made and lost, the landscape of many locations around the world changed. Today as I write this I have just finished the last piece of artwork to be created by me this year. Somehow it is fitting that it has both an English theme, the flavor of travel and the feel of techniques of the past.

Captured by a digital camera, this image was converted to black & white and then altered to have the grainy feel of high-speed film. Because of the long exposure time needed to render the flame, ghostly images of people moving about the memorial have made their way into the scene.

As we're a long way from home, travel over the holidays helps to take our minds off not being with family and friends. Thanksgiving was spent in Paris having fine French wine and croissants instead of roast turkey with oyster stuffing and hours watching the Macy's parade. The connection to our temporary home country of England is obvious.

Titled "Ghosts Around the Flame" this is an image of the Princess Diana Memorial in Paris , France at night and as I stated, the last artistic piece I will create in 2007. It is available for purchase at my ImageKind gallery.

I wish everyone a safe and Happy New Year. Leave your bad memories and bad habits in the past where they belong, treat the upcoming year as the new creation that it is; devoid of mistake and folly until we bumble along into it. May God bless each and every one of you.

~James