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Sometimes I cry so hard I think the tears will never stop. ​ Sometimes I feel so tired I want to lay my head down and sleep forever. ​ Sometimes I feel absolutely nothing and wonder if I will ever feel happy again. I wrote those words in a workbook when I was feeling particularly overwhelmed and vulnerable a few weeks after a health crisis in my family. No matter who we are, we all face life challenges. No matter what crisis we face, we all struggle with a range of feelings. Through images and words, I wanted to share my journey with others, in hopes that it may help someone else deal with their own struggle through difficult times. In the weeks and months following my husband's stroke, I spent most of my daytime hours at the hospital. When I returned home in the evening I would sit in an exhausted daze, my mind alternating between frantically racing around, or totally void of emotion. In an effort to turn off my worry and feelings of helplessness, I turned to photography. I wasn't up to shooting with my camera, but I used my own photographic library to create images that depicted my feelings. An introvert at heart, I am not usually one to talk about my feelings with other people, so I used my artistic process to express my feelings and help myself heal. Some of the images are composited self-portraits, pictures of myself inserted into situations of my own creation. I call this series "Stroke of Emotions". This series was inspired by the work of photographer Brooke Shaden. Some of the images are composited with pictures of trees and birds, a more symbolic representation of similar emotions. I believe trees represent growth and strength, with roots to ground us in our traditions. I see birds in flight as symbols of freedom, with the power of dreams and life renewed. Together, trees and birds create powerful images of inspiration and tools to heal the soul. I call this series "Roots + Wings". This series is comprised of 14 images and includes verse to pair with each image. We featured Sara's work in our SPRING/ SUMMER 2020 - Photography + #Mental Health edition. GET IT DELIVERED IN PRINT or Check out the DIGITAL EDITION See more of her work online: www.saraharley.com Instagram: @saraharley.photos #novascotia #womeninphotography #photomanipulation #experimentation #photographycanada #fineartphotography

Photographer Vicky Lam has a pretty sweet job creating eye candy for clients By: Briar Chaput Photographer Vicky Lam's work can easily be identified by its carefully crafted, detail-oriented, and graphic style. From large corporate advertising campaigns to colourful creative projects, Vicky creates images that have an impact on a national audience, all from her Toronto studio. Early on, Vicky considered photography "a cool way to travel the world and meet new people." But, once she began creating images in the studio, the meditative nature of the work, as well as the control she had over her environment and subjects, helped her discover her love for a more illustrative form of photography. As a commercial photographer, Vicky must produce work that satisfies not only her but, more importantly, her clients. When speaking about the challenges that come with this type of work, Vicky says that the clients are usually great to work with once the project's concept is settled on. Most "demands" are only small things, such as a client wanting an excessive number of props in a shot or additional shots that weren't initially agreed on. If any larger issues arise, Vicky takes comfort in the fact that she can reach out to the team at Westside Studio, her home base, to discuss ways to solve the issue - one of the perks of working in a shared studio space. In Vicky's words, "commercial photography is a lot of problem solving, but it's worth it to see my efforts out in the real world in a tangible form that I can share." One of her most recent and largest accomplishments was creating images for a Google product launch. Vicky's photos were featured in a public campaign that included images taking over Toronto's Yonge-Bloor subway station and the stories-high digital screens at Yonge- Dundas Square. Contributing to a billboard was one of Vicky's goals when starting out, and accomplishing that goal means that her work is truly out there for the world to see. When asked about what advice she would give to new and emerging photographers, Vicky says, "hang on! There will be moments where work is slow, where you might feel isolated (especially working in a studio), but keep going. Get outside, meet new people, explore artists and different types of art from your own, be persistent, and be patient. The work will come." Vicky especially loves art gallery experiences and illustration work, and it shows. For inspiration, she often looks to artists outside photography, such as large-scale installation artist Olafur Eliasson. This Icelandic-Danish artist creates work that suspends audience attention by using simple elements to produce spatial experiences for all the senses. Looking ahead, Vicky is experimenting with stop-motion animation and is excited to keep giving everyday objects a new and exciting life, crafted in her Toronto studio, before being ready for the world to see. Find this feature and more in our STUDIO MAGIC - ISSUE #54 We SOLD OUT in PRINT - but you can get the goods in our DIGITAL ISSUU

In case ya missed our TORONTO 2018 PHOTO INSPIRATION Pecha Kucha Event - or wanna see it again - photo-based emerging artist Sage Szkabarnicki-Stuart talks about how tv shows like Jackass inspire her to create images to stop viewers in their tracks. In case you're not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really fun... If you're a Sage Szkabarnicki-Stuart fan (as we are!) you'll LOVE the RISK-TAKERS issue - IN PRINT! GET YOURS TODAY! (we don't have many copies left!) #womeninphotography #emergingartists #fineartphotography

Jean François Dupuis’s visions come to him in dreams. He is passionate about producing art, and his images sing of mystery and colour, and celebrate creation and the human form. Dupuis takes us into another realm and leads us to question reality, as we know it. His images are “no longer a crisp representation.” They hint at the familiar but introduce a world beyond what we can normally see. The Sherbrooke, Quebec–based photographer embraces experimentation. He is also an abstract painter and melds photographs and paintings to create intangible and alluring dreamscapes. “An intimate three-dimensional world of detail on the surface of the image belies what we are taught to experience within the two-dimensional language of the camera. A visual tension is born, as glimpses of a ‘photographic reality’ slip in and out of view, toying with what is known, perhaps reminiscent of a dream, a place of timelessness,” he says. The viewer is transported into a world of memory and colour. Particularly alluring are Dupuis’s multiple exposures and combined images. Symphonie Urbane explores the rush, noise, and movement of the city by looking at New York’s architecture, street scenes, neon signs, lights, and road and pedestrian traffic. Multiple exposures and slight movements of the camera repeat elements in the scenes to create movement in each frame. Dupuis works digitally, but he shot the frames that make up Symphonie Urbane in-camera, on film. There is an echo of Harry Callahan’s “Detroit (1943)” in these images, but the exploration in-camera has extended to a significant body of multiple exposure work, rather than just one fantastic iconic frame. Part of Dupuis’s vision is to push the boundaries of what we recognize as photography. He wants to transport his audience out of its everyday reality. The tools at his disposal, whether they be in-camera experiments or the use of digital postprocessing, allow him to share what he sees in his mind. For this self-professed “colourholic,” the creative life is endless. His imagination has no boundaries thanks to his photographic knowledge and the new tools available to him. Dupuis studied photography at Matane for three years. He graduated in 1993 and then moved to Montreal, where he worked as an assistant to Louis Cantin and Patrick Lessard. Dupuis now teaches photography in Sherbrooke, Quebec, where he does commercial work, while also maintaining his art practice, his first passion. Dupuis admits that he is more in love with photography now than he was when he started. He remembers being fascinated with his father’s camera, a magic image box he was not allowed to touch. As well as being a photographer, Dupuis spends a great deal of time on abstract paintings, which he sometimes fuses with his photography, creating digital art. Médium Mixtes is a collection of work that includes painting, fractal art, and digital art. The striking image of a woman is a prime example of everything Dupuis embraces and reiterates in this series. This work fuses pure white, red lips, red paint, and just a streak of rich yellow. In this and many of his images is the hint of the sensuality that Ralph Gibson also imbues in his work. The audience of this image observes the artist’s reverence, appreciation, and respect for the female form. Dupuis clothes the woman with colour. Dupuis also produces posters, reproductions of mixed-media pieces incorporating photographs and painting, that are much more commercial in nature than his fine-art work in Symphonie Urbane and Médium Mixtes. “Imagine a world with no visual information. A world void of pictures, a world where communication is restricted to speech and the written word. Imagine this and the power — indeed miracle — of photography becomes apparent, a tiny fraction of a second captured, frozen and preserved for the enjoyment of many,” wrote Dupuis in his artist statement. “As a photographer I am privileged to have the opportunity to harness and share this power.” www.arts.jfdupuis.com We published Jean François Dupuis’ work in our 2010 PHOTO ART issue. If you're up for checking out more creative Canadian content - Get the RISK TAKERS edition in PRINT! #photoart #JeanFrancoisDupuis #canadianphotography #experimentation #fineartphotography

As dedicated black and white darkroom-based artists since the 1970s, we’ve witnessed the zenith, subsequent near-digital death, and unbelievable renaissance of our medium. Back in 2004, as Ilford Photo sank into receivership, we panicked, emptied out our local photo stores, and hoarded supplies in our giant freezer. Today, Ilford is thriving and introducing new products. Offbeat materials manufactured in Eastern Europe and Asia help us live without faded giants Agfa, Kodak, and Fujifilm. Boutique shops provide raw ingredients for inventive homebrew chemistries. The film/darkroom department at our favourite store in Vancouver (Beau Photo) is growing. Gently used equipment is cheap and plentiful. Incredibly, we have never seen a better range of available cameras, films, papers, and chemistry. In 2013, almost by chance, Langara College recruited us to reboot their languishing black and white darkroom program. We were surprised to learn that most institutions in Vancouver were tearing out their darkrooms. Langara was threatening to follow suit if their darkrooms couldn’t be better utilized. Thankfully, we were given that chance. Our vision is to take the darkroom arts to places far beyond traditional imaging, to find the nooks and crannies where digital can’t go. Today, our black and white program is expanding: our entry-level course was waitlisted this past spring for the first time in over a decade, and our students are continuing on to advanced courses for the first time in years. Most of our students are young people, rebelling against the perceived automated, touchless, bland flavour of digital photography. We have found them to be highly creative, experienced digital photographers turning to the darkroom because they want to be more directly involved in the process of image-making. Our mature students include art teachers upgrading their skills in response to demands at work, art school grads seeking more proficiency in this medium, professionals from outside photography desiring a hands-on creative outlet, and even self-taught darkroom workers wanting to up their game. The steampunk nature of film and the darkroom is fun and tactile, but extremely demanding. Mistakes have real consequences. There is no “undo,” no “chimping,” and every exposure costs money. We emphasize the need to create taut, repeatable, personal processes within a huge scope of possible chemistries and materials. The prize is worth it: prints with a unique and hard to copy identity. Of course, getting to unique takes time, energy, and the expenditure of much film and paper. It is no surprise the best results come from students who spend the most time shooting and working in the darkroom. Fortunately, Langara is generous with darkroom access, and our best students use the darkrooms every chance they get. We tell all of them, “1000 prints is what it takes to get really good at this.” The subtle characteristics of films and silver-gelatin prints remain impossible to digitally imitate, in part because no digital printer can reproduce the tiny features of film grain. Film grain can be hard-edged or fuzzy, oblong or round, big or small, regular or irregular, and no two film and developer combinations exhibit the same pattern. Film also has an extraordinary dynamic range: 14 or 15 stops is easily attainable. Further techniques enhance edges, exaggerate contrast, and make grain even more grainy. Our students celebrate these features and incorporate the unmistakable look of film into their personal visual languages. Silver-gelatin printing is ancient and beautiful, and remains the dominant darkroom-based black and white medium. Silver gelatin prints need not be black and white; in fact, it takes careful processing to get a truly neutral-tone print. Our students explore many different chemical toners to produce a huge range of colours from sepia to purple to red to blue … even shiny metallic silver. Toners can be applied serially or selectively to create multiple colours in a single print. The variations are endless. This is unexplored country, so diligent workers have a fighting chance at inventing something completely new. Out of the gate, we stress the importance of community, cleanliness, and precision in the darkroom. The Langara darkroom experience involves communal chemistry in communal trays. The fastest way to failure is sloppiness. So, we base 50 percent of final grades on work habits. We like to joke that it is possible to pass our class without shooting a single frame or making a single print — just so long as students are tidy. We pair students and assign each pair a chemical to prepare for the entire class. We’re always there to catch errors, but it’s amazing how precise and careful everyone is, knowing that a mistake will be a disaster for the whole class. We’ve experienced zero actual disasters and just about every student develops printable negatives on their first try. Of course, their steampunk equipment might misbehave, and we’ve seen quite a few problems with old cameras: chiefly, light leaks, inaccurate light meters, slow shutters, and non-functional aperture blades. We’ve had to advise a few students that their cameras will cost more to repair than they are worth. But, even as replacement is often inexpensive, valuable cameras can still be repaired in Canada by one of the world’s top mechanical camera techs, a Vancouver resident. Our students frequently remark how much their darkroom experience has helped their digital photography, as they learn to trust themselves and their decisions. They see firsthand how many of the tools in Photoshop come straight out of the darkroom and how the darkroom procedure is often faster and more forgiving than Photoshop’s equivalent; our classic example is dodging and burning. We show simple ways to do most dodges and burns with just a few basic tools and bare hands. With practice, the whole operation is accomplished in seconds. The last stage of our darkroom journey goes into the wideopen, unexplored spaces of experimental photography and homebrews. Our students examine offbeat ideas and chemistries, and some come up with entirely new imaging techniques. Russ is no stranger to homebrew, having invented a process that records a 25+ stop dynamic range on film for a project capturing the sun crossing the sky. Of course, we emphasize chemical safety above all else. It is amazing what homebrews can be made with supplies acquired from our local grocery and drug stores. Last semester, students made film and paper developers out of vitamin C and coffee, created a reversal-print process with limes and hair bleach, and amplified film grain with hot washing soda. Next year, we’ll explore a developer made with Tylenol; we like every class to be different. After completing our courses, a significant percentage of our students install personal darkrooms or join community darkrooms. We’ve helped them with darkroom designs and often place free equipment needing a good home. We see our community growing stronger every day. Digital photography has freed film photography from the chains of commercial production. The darkroom arts have finally taken flight as a pure art medium, with still-unimagined new horizons. The sky’s the limit. See more work by Rusell and Wendy Kwan at: www.NewMythographs.com Russel and Wendy are internationally awarded and published photographers and educators. Their prints have been exhibited in commercial, museum, and academic venues in Canada and the United States. They lead the black and white darkroom program at Langara College in Vancouver. If you're up for more amazing ANALOG... check out our RESILIENCE OF ANALOG edition - IN PRINT! #alternativeprocess #blackandwhite #filmexploration #experimentation #analogfilm #RusselandWendyKwan #darkroom #BritishColumbia #photoart #fineartphotography

In case you missed our CALGARY 2020 PHOTO INSPIRATION NIGHT event at the CALGARY CENTRAL LIBRARY - check out our video featuring Ali Ledgerwood from NPAC. The News Photographers Association of Canada celebrates and champions quality and ethical photography in journalism, continually raising the bar of industry standards. Ali Ledgerwood shares her passion for Canadian photojournalism + some behind the scenes stories in a live presentation to an audience of over 350+ Calgary photography lovers in Pecha Kucha format. If you are not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. #canadianphotojournalism #documentaryphotography #womeninphotojournalism #Canadianphotographers WANT MORE?! Check out the more videos from our PHOTO INSPIRATION nights HERE. + LEAH HENNEL's presentation HERE. IF you love Canadian documentary photography in PRINT, you'll love our DOCUMENTARY edition - IN PRINT NOW! Our DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY issue features: Resources WE LOVE Christine Love Hewitt’s Wanderlust Representing with Dignity. A panel discussion moderated by Laurence Butet-Roch Morgan Sears-Williams' Queer Love and Care Ears, Eyes, Voice: Black Canadian Photo journalists 1970s–1990s by Dr. Julie Crooks Chris Donovan: Complicated Maritime Clouds Paul Seesequasis’ Indigenous Archival Photo Project Patti Gower: From the front lines to leading the next generation JAYU- Photography + community good, by Joshua Cameron Cover by Chris Donovan

In case you missed our CALGARY 2020 PHOTO INSPIRATION NIGHT event at the CALGARY CENTRAL LIBRARY - check out our video featuring award-winning photojournalist - LEAH HENNEL. @leahhennelphoto has traveled the globe to create stunning visuals, but it’s been in her own home province that she has captured her most striking stories. We're hyped to have featured her live presentation to an audience of over 350+ Calgary photography lovers in Pecha Kucha format. If you are not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. #womeninphotojournalism #Canadianphotographers #womeninphotography #portraiture #femalephotographer #makeportraits #portrait_vision #yycphotographer #yycarts #womenphotograph WANT TO SEE MORE?! Check out the more videos from our PHOTO INSPIRATION nights HERE.

In case you missed our CALGARY 2020 PHOTO INSPIRATION NIGHT Pecha Kucha event at the CALGARY CENTRAL LIBRARY - check out our video featuring commercial photographer, designer and art director - Heather Saitz. @heathersaitz is a triple threat! Photographer, designer and art director. She rocks it all + we're hyped to have featured her live presentation to an audience of over 350+ Calgary photography lovers in Pecha Kucha format. If you are not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. #Canadianphotographers #womeninphotography #portraiture #femalephotographer #makeportraits #portrait_vision #bandphoto #bandphotographer #musicphotographer #musicphotography #yycphotographer #yycarts #vintagevibes #womenphotograph WANT TO SEE MORE?! Check out the more videos from our PHOTO INSPIRATION nights HERE.

In case you missed our CALGARY 2020 PHOTO INSPIRATION NIGHT Pecha Kucha event at the CALGARY CENTRAL LIBRARY - check out our video featuring commercial photographer - Julie Vincent. From real estate to real people, Julie Vincent is a real pro all-round shooter who creates images with impact. Julie shares her 'How I got here' story at a live presentation to an audience of over 350+ Calgary photography lovers in Pecha Kucha format. #Canadianphotographers #womeninphotography If you are not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. WANT TO SEE MORE?! Check out the more videos from our PHOTO INSPIRATION nights HERE.

In case you missed our CALGARY 2020 PHOTO INSPIRATION NIGHT Pecha Kucha Event at the CALGARY CENTRAL LIBRARY - check out our video of Marlene Hielema/ ImageMaven.com. Marlene shares her passion for LUMIX, skateboarding, and teaching photography, at a live presentation to an audience of over 350+ Calgary photography lovers. If you are not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. Thank you LUMIX for supporting Marlene & this event! WANT TO SEE MORE?! Check out the more videos from our PHOTO INSPIRATION nights HERE.