A postcard project - on the pleasures of good old fashioned pen and paper...... from me to you....

Picture Postcard Country

I am back from my Christmas holidays, and doing some work. Well, that's what I tell my family...

I have visited so many picture postcard places that I feel it is time to mention my postcard project.


It began in Vancouver.

My son asked me to send him lots of real postcards when I left the country, and my first choice was from the Vancouver art gallery.

Vancouver

I chose it because it has many things in it that appeal to my photographic eye..... a big tree, power cables, an urban scene.

I posted it, and suggested he send me a photo of it at the other end.

He duly obliged.

And there began a project to keep me amused in the lonely hours when I have nothing to do but play with my camera.


I send a postcard.

The recipient sends me a photo of it at their end.


Choosing postcards and writing them has been a source of much pleasure.

Postcard from Glenorchy

Postcard from Ranfurly

Ranfurly is art deco country.

They have a little museum.

I have to diverge for a moment to show you the device for storing eggs that the locals used before egg containers were invented.

There was a rather nice photographer in the museum

mr right

and I rather fancied the woollen swimsuit for when he invited me to the beach.

Anyway, the point is, that I have no idea what will come from this project. It is the doing that matters right now.



I have written from Moeraki with a  flat white.

Moeraki postcard

Stewart Island with the worlds best battered blue cod and some water.

Stewart Island postcards

I have discovered the art of Grahame Sydney and fallen in love with Central Otago and the Maniototo plain.

Grahame Sydney postcards and beer 

I took his postcards out to the Maniototo region that he loves to paint.

Central Otago

Maniototo

At Stewart Island we discovered the muttonbush plant, that was used legally for writing letters until the 1970's.

Muttonbird scrub bush, Ulva Island

Muttonbird scrub leaf postcard

I tried writing my own, but didn't have the right ink ( resin from the Rimu tree)

It has a lovely leathery texture.

Muttonbird scrub leaf letter

I will save the postcards at their destinations for another day.  There is more work to be done with these, and I don't want to influence recipients in how they choose to photograph their cards.

If you would like to be involved, and will be happy for me to share your photo when the project comes to fruition, then please message me via my Facebook Page.


I will leave you with another from Maniototo.

Still here after all these years - learning how to see without a camera.

proof of my existence

10 years ago this month I started treatment for breast cancer. It was not fun. I thought I would die.

5 years went by and I felt really, really lucky. I felt as though a coin that had been flipped up in the air , rotating slowly for 5 years had finally come down on my side, as I knew from the outset that I only had a 50% chance of still being well after 5 years.

10 years passed this week, and again I found it really hard to believe.

Oh me of little faith.

I AM a survivor.

It has been photography that has sustained me through those years, as a way to express my gratefulness for being alive and as a way to find inner peace.

As a consequence of small celebrations I have been gifted a new camera; see above.

I have been challenged to create something special with it.

The gauntlet was thrown down thus......

"They say a decent photographer can make something beautiful with any camera, so let's see what you've learnt over the last 10 years"

I have yet to decide how to respond; there are no instructions with the camera, and it has a flash, but I have no idea how many times it will fire. I will take my time.


Here are a couple of my favourite quotes from other photographers that feel appropriate right now.

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“The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.” - Dorothea Lange

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“A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed.” 

― Ansel Adams

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Here are some fish, from the Mediterranean sea.

I am not sure I'll be able to create anything like this with my little Kodak; this was taken in a harbour in the Med last weekend on a mini break with my other half.



He took my portrait.

 wife with old stones........... 

As you can see, I am fully alive .

And still married to a man who would rather I took more pictures of a conventional nature; in focus and preferably with an old rock or two in the foreground.

We both can dream.

confessions of a photographer ................ Pecha Kucha Rye 02

self portrait with grass © caroline fraser 2013

It's tonight

It's free

It will be fun

I will confess.

There will be grass

Pecha Kucha Rye 02

Hope to see you there.

what if money didn't matter...........moments with a marmot

I came across this video today.

It made me stop and think.

I shared it with my youngest. It made him stop and think. 

I asked him what he would do if money didn't matter.

He came up with a lovely concoction of activities involving sporting activities, the sea, mountains, photography and being creative . All of which are eminently achievable, but maybe not as one job, unless he becomes a guide for photographers who want to surf, climb mountains and make beautifully illustrated books.

He asked me what I would do.

That really made me stop and think.

I came up with "wilderness photographer"..................... partly triggered by my revisiting John Muir's quote that says  

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.”

Having hiked the John Muir trail into Yosemite some years ago I remember the joy of waking up in the middle of nowhere in my tent with frost on my flip flops outside the tent and a marmot sitting on the rock outside in the sun.

Such moments are never forgotten. 

Wilderness to me means a place of quiet, far from civilisation and where nature really does give strength to body and soul. I can think of many places still to be explored. To do so with my camera would give more pleasure than anything else I can think of right now.

All I have to do now is to make it happen.............

                             

And in case you are wondering, dog has made a miraculous recovery. And the new vitamin pills, despite being a conventional shape and not bone shaped, have gone down a treat, without me even asking.