Being that this was his first time having dinner in a restaurant on his birthday, he didn’t know what to expect. After polishing off a Kid’s Crab Legs dinner and half the items from mom’s plate, it was time for dessert.

The staff brought out a warm chocolate chip cookie with ice cream on top, with a single candle lit while 3 servers sang Happy Birthday to Brodie.

Overwhelmed with happiness, Brodie couldn’t contain his emotions and was brought to tears. He was so very appreciative of such a simple gesture of a single dessert accompanied by a song for him. As parents both Tracey and I welled up (she more than me) with pride. It’s nice to see such a simple thing have such a huge impact on somebody.

Brodie saved the candle and the bill (The server wrote him a happy birthday note on the back) and they now reside in the “secret” drawer in his room, where he keeps things that he feels are important.

On the way home, still feeling emotional, Brodie let us know that this was one of the best days of his life.

It’s the simple things….

I love you Brodie.

This year really was a step up. I was given access to take photos from the bench and from within the rink after the game. Having that close proximity to the players allowed me to get some great shots.

Spending the weekend down in Brantford also gave us the opportunity to meet a lot of the players on the other View Askew teams.

Aside from taking pics, I also designed an iPhone app for the tournament that featured all of the View Askew teams. I will do a post on the app in the next few days.

I just wanted to drop a huge thanks to Ming Chen he really is the MVP of the View Askew organization.

All of my pics from the tournament, can be found here:

Day 1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eplatero/sets/72157624205809682/

Day 2: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eplatero/sets/72157624218270814/

Day 3: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eplatero/sets/72157624218380378/

Friday, January 15th, I had the great pleasure to attend the CD release of “no ghostless place” by Raised by Swans.  I have been a very big fan of the band since hearing “Violet Light” on the CBC Radio3 Podcast 4 years ago.  Their first CD “Codes & Secret Longing” has been a favourite of mine since the day it was purchased, and sits in my list of top albums of all time.

I have been eagerly awaiting to hear some new material, and after 4 years, the band has release their new CD. I ordered mine via online pre-order hoping to receive my copy the day before the show.  I can review this album with one word: AMAZING.  The new CD is on par if not better than Codes & Secret longing.  I cannot recommend enough to anybody reading this post, leave my site right now, and click on this link to buy this album right now!

I almost didn’t make the show as our babysitter fell through at the last minute, but my wife, Tracey decided to stay home with the kids so I wouldn’t miss the show.

Moving on now to my review of the show.  If it has not been made clear, I am a fan.  The band played a solid 14 song set, that featured heavily the new material of “No Ghostless Place”.   The new material played very well live, some songs like “Hail of Arrows” and “Secret Garden /S.C” sounding more rounded out and driven than the recorded versions.

Sound at Call the Office has always been a problem in my opinion, and there were times where the vocals did get lost in the wall of distorted mud that is Call the Office’s sound system.   According to interviews with the band, they are about to embark on a coast to coast tour of Canada, so it was nice to have them playing in front of a hometown audience before embarking cross country.

I managed to take quite a few pictures of the performance, you can view the entire set on my flickr page here.

Setlist from the show: (Show Highlights bolded)

We Were Never Young
Hail of Arrows
Relentless
Easier
Capable of Cruelty
Old Fires
Longer Shadows, Shorter Days
Sandcastles
The Waitings Over
Still Inside You
There’s Hope Yet
How do These Hearts Unfold
Violet Light

Band Website: www.raisedbyswans.com

A few weeks ago, Tracey, her brother Marshall and I took the kids to see the fabled Saskatoon Street house here in London.  It was all of our first times visiting the house, and it didn’t disappoint.

Here is a quick video that I shot.

Music is “I love NYE” by Badly Drawn Boy

I also did a quick long exposure shot that didn’t quite turn out.

Our time is running out…

Choosing my project for the National Photo Book Month. I originally chose to do the theme of long exposure photography.  Being that I could only take photos in certain lighting conditions, the idea became very difficult to finish, and I ran out of time.

This morning, November 30th, I was out of time, and could not finish the project.  Disappointed in myself for procrastinating, I gave up.  I was kicking myself for not choosing a theme that was easier to execute.  Then it came to me.  I am a big procrastinator, and time always seems to be against me, so I thought, what if I did the entire project in one day, documenting the time in between shots.  Using time as my theme now, I picked up an alarm clock and went out shooting.  The time that is displayed on the clock, it the actual time of the photo.

All Photos were taken on Monday, November 30th, 2009

I present to you my entry into NaPhoBoMoDay.  Download my book in PDF format here.

View the entire photoset here on Flickr.

What is NaPhoBoMo?

National Photo Book Month

A photographer’s take on NaNoWriMo, the goal is to produce a 50-picture photobook in a month, from start to finish. This includes taking the photos, creating layout, editing for content, post-processing, all of it. In 30 days.

Visit the NaPhoBoMo website, here.

]]> http://edwardplatero.com/2009/11/30/naphobomo/feed/ 2 http://edwardplatero.com/2009/11/28/victoria-park-lighting-of-the-xmas-lights/ http://edwardplatero.com/2009/11/28/victoria-park-lighting-of-the-xmas-lights/#comments Sat, 28 Nov 2009 05:39:25 +0000 Edward http://edwardplatero.com/?p=446

I haven’t been to this event since I was Brodie’s age. I have to admit, driving up to the park I though that this was going to be pretty weak, but in the end, we had a great time. I remember being Brodie’s age and being pulled on a sled through the park thinking that the lights were the greatest thing ever.

Tracey and the kids had a great time. As much as I hate the stuff,snow would have been a nice touch.

View all of the photos taken here.

I was happy that I was able to grab some more pictures for my National Photo Book Month (NaPhoBoMo) project.  It was nice becuase I have fallen a bit behind with my progress.

We finished our adventure together with a trip to Spaghetti Eddie’s downtown, a first for both of us.

To view all of our photos from the month’s photowalk, you can view our Flickr Set here.

I started shooting some video, but was losing light quickly so I abandoned the idea.

This past Saturday I attended the 7th London Photowalk at Fanshawe Pioneer village.  This was my first photowalk with the Canon 7D.  While I have become very familiar with the camera as a video DSLR, it is radically different than the Canon T1i that I was shooting with prior. I am still learning where everything is on the camera.  I like to shoot in manual mode, and all of the buttons that were on the t1i have are not even close to where they are on the 7D.

I shot around 200 pictures, and I was satisfied with around 20 of them.  Old architecture isn’t really my thing, so drawing inspiration from old historic buildings was challenging.

My photos from today are in this set on Flickr.

During the walk, I did shoot some video and have compiled it here.  I was curious on capturing natural motion and a wide colour palate in 1080 24p.

This past Saturday, Brodie and I attended the sixth London Photowalk.  The photowalk took place during the LOLA festival this year, and after a brief walk downtown we headed over to the park to check it out.  Brodie and I caught the set by Final Fantasy, making this our first concert together.  Across from the stage was the art piece Sidereal Time, where we took some pictures and video.

For a look at all of the photos that we took during the photowalk, visit our flickr set.

On Saturday I attended my first London Photowalk with Brodie. After sleeping in and waking up at the 7am start time, Brodie and I hopped into the car, cameras in hand and after a quick stop at timmies, we arrived at Westminster Ponds in time for the Photowalk.

We had a great time, and plan on making a point to make it out to future photowalks. Brodie took some great pictures and kept on telling me how much fun photowalks are. We also managed to grab a quick Geocache while in the area.

Brodie taken by DonnaCIB

For a look at the pictures that Brodie & I took at the Photowalk, click here.

Thanks to Kevin & James, the organizers of the event for making us feel welcome. Check out the Official London Photowalk site for more info.