Friday, January 29, 2021

Do-Overs

Because we're supposed to stay home with the latest pandemic lockdown, and because the cold weather has finally come to Ottawa and has not made me want to go outdoors, I've been giving my cameras a bit of a break.

But because I've been getting used to new photo-editing software over the past month or so, I've been going back to photos I have already processed, going to the original RAW file, and re-processing them.

Exploring the features in Luminar AI, I've discovered a portrait AI tool that lets me quickly retouch my model photos. When I edit my model photos with PaintShop Pro, it can take up to 10 minutes to give my subjects more glow, to bring out the colour of eyes and lips, and to remove any unflattering blemishes.

With the Luminar app, the AI automatically corrects shadows in the face, smooths the skin and hides blemishes, and even lets me artificially slim lines—which I personally would never do to my subjects.

I looked through my photo library and decided to use photos of Dutch model, Fredau. I've worked with her a few times but chose photos from our first shoot, back in 2014, when we focused on low-light and high-key nudes, using white and black backdrops, and various types of lighting. I've shared some of these shots, previously, in The Brown Knowser.

Oh, by the way, while the photos I share in this blog post are only implied nudity, they are probably not safe for work anyway.

The following is a photo that I edited, in 2014, using Corel AfterShot and PaintShop Pro.


Here's the same photo, edited with Luminar AI.


I then chose a photo that I hadn't edit before and did it now, with PaintShop Pro 2021.


And again, with Luminar AI.


Which editing tool did a better job?

Truth be told, editing photos of Fredau is relatively easy. She already has strikingly beautiful blue eyes, so I didn't really need to manipulate them. When I edited the photos in 2014, I used AfterShot to increase the luminosity and saturation of her eyes and lips, then moved the photo into PSP to complete the editing. Her skin was naturally smooth and blemish-free, so a photo would take less than five minutes to edit.

But with Luminar AI, it took less than a minute to apply a pre-set template and the portrait features. The most time-consuming task in editing the high-key photo was to set the white balance and remove the marks that were on the white backdrop, which had been dirtied and marked from years of being walked upon. But even with Luminar AI, that process was faster than with PSP.

Just for an experiment, I used the slimming tool to see what it did, but because Fredau already has a perfect figure, using this tool on her detracted from her natural beauty, and so I cancelled that action.

These photos with Fredau have been my first experiments with using my new software. I'll have to try more photos with different models, where removing blemishes was required.

While I'll continue to use PSP for most of my photo editing, I may switch to Luminar AI for my future model photos. That is, if this pandemic ever ends and I can take photos of people again.

Happy Friday!

Thursday, January 28, 2021

Happy Birthday to My Bro'

I originally wrote this post 11 years ago, in my now-defunct blog, Brownfoot Journal. Because my brother's birthday fell on a day where I had intended to post a Throwback Thursday piece, I thought I would combine the two by adding a past post that was a birthday greeting, too.

I've updated the post to account for the time difference but the message is the same.


My baby brother turns 42 today—Happy Birthday, Chris!

From the time he was born until his teens, Chris was known by the second-half of his name, Topher. Our family thought it was original at the time, but since then I've heard the name used a couple of times, most notably with American actor Topher Grace (That '70s Show, Spider-Man 3). Our Topher changed his name to Chris in high school.

As a kid, Chris loved to dress up in costumes, be it a tricycle racer (see photo), cowboy, clown, centurion, superhero, or terrorist (seriously, there's a photo somewhere of him wearing underwear, Billy boots, and another pair of underwear on his head, and he's wielding a toy machine gun—if I could find it, I'd post it!).

Happy Birthday, Chris, with love from your big brother!

Tuesday, January 26, 2021

Far From Perfect

There are days when I look at The Brown Knowser YouTube channel and wonder if I'm going to keep it going. After all, I'm a writer, not a videographer, and I take far better stills than I do of video.

I also hate how I look and sound in front of a video camera.

Still, I persevere because I would like to know more about recording video and I do still enjoy reviewing beer, which is what I largely do on this YouTube channel.

At least, until I can get back into my kayak.

On Sunday, I set out to record another Beer O'Clock review. As with all other beer videos, I start out with a beer that I've already tried, one with which I've already made notes about the flavour profile and have already formed an opinion. In the recording, I try to appear as though I'm trying the beer for the first time.

Is that dishonest?

Anyway, as soon as I've selected the beer, I start thinking about how I want to present it. What I want to say about it. I try not to babble too much, as I'm sure my audience just wants to know about the beer itself and what I think of it.

As soon as I have an idea of what I want to say (I never write out a script), I jot down a few notes about what I must say and then I start setting up my equipment. Usually, I use DW's Canon EOS M50 mirrorless camera as my main camera. It's easy to use and has a viewscreen that flips around so that I can see what it sees while I sit at our island counter in the kitchen. This camera is focused on me and the beer as I hold it up.

I also use a second camera to capture the beer can (or bottle) and the glass that will hold it, and this camera rests at the countertop level. I've used my Insta360 camera a couple of times, but when I found it wasn't focusing properly on the beer, I went back to using one of my Nikon D-SLRs, which I first stopped using because of its massive size.

My last two reviews included my Nikon D750, which has never let me down.

A lav mic runs from the Canon camera to me, though I have a telescopic mic that is on the second camera, just in case the lav mic fails me (and it did, once).

Finally, though I usually turn on the overhead lights in my kitchen, I also have a video light that I use to fill in any stark shadows.

The overall setup looks like this:


No matter how many times I check the equipment, something always seems to go wrong when I'm ready to begin recording. One time, I forgot to turn on the video light; once, the lav mic wasn't plugged all the way into the camera; another time, the battery in the second camera died halfway through the recording.

I've always been able to work around these errors or the backup systems have saved the recording.

Not Sunday.

On Sunday, I decided to change some of the camera angles, and I was going to rely heavily on the second camera to cover the beer while I talked about it. While I talked specifically about the beer, my eyes were off the primary camera and it looked like I was looking toward someone off to the side, even though no one was in the room.

As usual, when I'm ready to roll, I press the Record button on both cameras, sit down, compose myself, and then clap so that I can align the two videos in production.

I recorded my review, as always, in one take. If I screw something up, I just say it again and cut out the bad bits later. There are lots of obvious cuts in my videos but I've always hoped that they weren't overly distracting.

When I was finished, I packed everything up, took the SD cards from the cameras, and downloaded them onto an external hard drive, ready to begin editing. It was here that I discovered my screwup.

Though I thought I had pressed the Record button on my Nikon, I mustn't have pressed it properly. When I tried to retrieve the video file, I discovered that the card was blank. Nothing had been recorded. My Nikon D750 didn't fail me so much as I failed it.

I didn't panic. I didn't scrap the project. I told myself that I could salvage this review. All I had to do was reshoot the second camera.

I still have another can of this beer. Though I had lost the ambient light that had been coming through the windows, I could always record again, later.

Today, perhaps.

When I viewed the primary video, I discovered that the camera's focusing was off. In the viewscreen, a box follows my head, which tells me that it's focused and following me. And though I could see it when I was sitting at the counter, it wasn't truly focused on me.

Can I live with this? Can my viewers live with it?

I may reshoot the whole review. This one will be far from perfect, and while I've never felt that any of my videos have been perfect, I've been satisfied enough to share them.

If I'm going to continue with my YouTube channel, if I have any hope of drawing more viewers, being simply satisfied won't be good enough.

Stay tuned.

Monday, January 25, 2021

A Sad Day for a Scots Poet

For more than a decade, it's been a lunchtime ritual.

Except for today.

Lunch would start with a pint of Scottish ale. A small snifter with a dram of whisky would also be brought to the table but I would keep that aside, to wait for a toast.

An amuse bouche of haggis on a crust of bread would be offered. I would accept it, happily. There was no question about what the lunch would be. On this twenty-fifth of January, it would be what it always is: a small bowl of Cock-a-Leekie soup; for the main course, a plate of haggis with mashed potatoes, mashed carrots, and mashed turnips, with a mushroom gravy generously covering it all. I wouldn't touch the actual mushrooms: they were the only thing on the plate that turn me off.

Throughout the soup, the piper would play his bagpipes, just as he has done since I've first attended this tribute to Scots poet, Robert Burns. The owner of the restaurant and host for the event, Ken Goodhue, would welcome his patrons and have us raise a glass to the revered poet. The whisky glass was lifted high and "Sliante!" could be heard throughout the room.

A plate with a large, rotund haggis would be held up high by another man in kilt and full tartan. In a thick brogue, he would dramatically recite Ode to Haggis in the Scots' tongue. It's so much better in the Scot's tongue.


Coffee was offered, as was a slice of cake with white and blue icing—the colours of the Scottish flag. It was a meal that would make any Scot proud (and like the seventeenth of March, where anyone who partook in the celebrations is an honourary Irishfolk, celebrating Robert Burns' birthday makes you an honourary Scot).

Today, on January 25, 2021, I'm mourning a loss. It's a sad day for Robert Burns. The great Scottish pub of Ottawa, The Highlander Pub, sits with its doors locked, its windows blocked from viewers. Last summer, Ken announced that because of the closure of Rideau Street, due to the construction of the LRT line (whose doors opened directly across from his pub) and due to the forced closures because of COVID-19, the pub's 18-year run was coming to an end.


This was one of my favourite pubs in Ottawa. Often, Ken would walk around, greeting his patrons and striking up conversations. I had had some exchanges with him over his vast selection of single malts and blends—The Highlander had the best selection of whiskies in the city. In one conversation, when I mentioned that my favourite malts come from Islay and that my absolute favourite is Laphroaig, Ken excused himself for a moment, only to return with a small glass of a rare 25-year-old Laphroaig for me to enjoy.

He didn't ask if I wanted it. I refused payment for the glass. It was one of the best malts I've had the privilege of tasting and Ken was simply happy to be able to share it.

I'm going to dearly miss this pub, especially on Robert Burns Day. Today, I won't have haggis. I will, however, raise my glass to the great poet, to The Highlander, and to Ken.

Slainte Mhath!

Friday, January 22, 2021

Friday Fiction: The Berlin Plan

The following is a draft excerpt from my novel, Gyeosunim. If you haven't read my previous novel, Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary, be warned that while there are no spoilers, you may be missing some context.

 

June 1, 1988

“The same damned clothes? Are you bloody mad, Moore?”

“Easy now, Charles,” Sir Harold Kent cautioned. He was not a man who seemed accustomed to raised voices. He was sitting at the head of the boardroom table, which was made of thick, shatterproof glass, suspended on a chrome, tubular frame. The chairs were a black leather, supported by similar chrome tubes. Sir Harold was dressed in an oak-brown Herringbone Tweed three-piece suit with a crisp white shirt that had barely distinguishable brown pinstripes, and sported a dark brown Savile Row bow tie to complete the look. He flicked the ash from the end of his cigarette into the glass ashtray that appeared to be suspended in air. “Berlin is Nigel’s territory and therefore, quite rightly, the plan is his decision. You’ve merely been invited to provide support.”

“I’m just not sure that Nigel’s up to such a sensitive operation. This plan sounds ludicrous. Field agents want to blend in, to seem invisible. What he’s doing is hanging bloody neon signs on their backs.”

“Steady on,” said Nigel Moore, rising from his seat and running a hand through his thinning hair, obviously agitated. His words seemed hesitant, contrary to his actions, as though he wanted to show that he was in charge but was afraid to stand up to Charles. It was as though he was a teenage son, challenging his overbearing father for the very first time.

“Someone is going to get killed; perhaps, all of them,” continued Charles, unaffected by the protestations of Sir Harold and Nigel. His face was reddening and blood vessels at his temples were starting to swell. This was the first time in which I had seen him lose his temper. I have heard him speak in frustration, but for the most part he had always kept his cool in our Ottawa office. As if to let out steam, Charles unbuttoned his charcoal twill waistcoat, having already removed his matching jacket and draping it over the back of the chair next to him. At least his silk tie was a brighter red than his face.

“We’re going to get everyone out,” insisted Nigel, who composed himself. He was wearing the same suit as he had on yesterday but this time, like Sir Harold, Nigel wore a bow tie. His was an Irish-green that looked like it was patterned with dozens of tiny sunny-side-up eggs. The hand that had combed his hair ran over his moustache and then dropped at his side. He took a slow, deep breath and then sat down again.

“Gentlemen, as Nigel presented to me, the plan is to create confusion. While the men bear little resemblance to one another, wearing identical clothing may make it difficult for anyone who may be following Gunther to keep track of him. The men will meet near Alexanderplatz Station, they will walk amongst one another before they all get into their respective cars and drive away, each car going in its own direction.”

“All of the automobiles will be tracked,” said Charles.

“The drivers have a set route,” countered Nigel. “They each have a second car waiting at a predetermined location. The agents will quickly swap vehicles and continue on their routes. The cars without Gunther will make their way to the Autobahnen and head out of East Berlin. One car will head to Leipzig, another to Dresden, and the third to Magdeburg. There, they will ditch their vehicles and make their way to safe houses that we have in each city. Over time, we’ll get them out. I don’t need to go into further details.”

“Eight agents, plus Gunther,” chuckled Charles under his breath. “If the KGB catches them, it will be a mighty blow to London. Moscow will be rubbing it in their faces till the end of time.”

“There’s a risk, of course, but we’ve thought this through, Townsend old boy,” said Sir Harold. “Nigel and I have been discussing this plan with his team for weeks. We’ve weighed the risks and, though bold, we believe it will work. And then we’ll be laughing at the Ruskies till the end of time.”

Charles became silent, though I could see the way his eyes met no one else’s that he was in deep thought. The veins around his temples said that he was still outraged. Though he was no longer the head of the Berlin unit, nor was he an employee of the British Foreign Intelligence Office, he appeared like a man who still had a lot of clout. Or, at the very least, thought he had clout. But for the moment, Sir Harold Kent and Nigel Moore seemed like they had the upper hand.

For my part, I sat in an armchair in the corner of the room, away from the briefing room table. I was an observer only, not part of the conversation or the plan. Dressed in an inexpensive grey wool suit from Tip Top Tailors, in Ottawa, with a white and blue-striped shirt with a matching blue tie that had tiny polka dots, I didn’t even look like part of this team. Only so often would either Sir Harold or Nigel look in my direction, seemingly surprised to see me, as though they had forgotten that I was in the room. Now that Charles seemed defeated, he looked over at me in his anger. In return, I could only offer a sympathetic smile. I was on Team Townsend, though we both knew that we were on the losing side of the match.

Thursday, January 21, 2021

An Old Friend in South Korea

In 1996, a friend of DW's and mine (she's practically a family member and I often think of her as a sister from another mister) learned of our plans to travel to Korea to teach English, and she was intrigued. She had recently divorced from her first husband and was at loose ends, and thought this would be a good experience.

She researched various cities and institutes from which to teach, and having found one that was much more organized than the one that DW and I chose, found herself in Korea two months before DW and I left, at the end of February in 1997.

Our friend was living in the small town of Ichon, about an hour and a half or so southeast of Seoul. The town is famous for its unique ceramics. In 1997, it was one of those small, obscure towns where if you blinked, you'd miss it. From Google satellite imagery today, it looks much bigger than I remembered it.

Shortly after DW and I arrived in Chŏnju, we reached out to our friend and met up with her in Seoul. It was our first time exploring the capital city and our first time getting away from the Chŏnju area, but wouldn't be our last. We would meet up with our friend in her town during the Ichon Ceramics Festival, she spent a weekend with us in Chŏnju, and we had a great vacation together in Gyeongju, on Korea's southeastern coast, and the temple of Popchusa, where a wonderful monk with perfect English gave us a private tour, treated us to lunch, and gave us bread to feed the koi fish.

And, of course, we met several times in Seoul, where we introduced her to our friend from the Canadian Embassy, and they became friends as well.

On her visit to Chŏnju, we treated our friend to the surrounding sights of our province. Because our hagwon (language institute) had a car that the teachers could use, we drove to the top of Chiri Mountain (Chirisan), the tallest mountain on peninsular South Korea. It was a challenge for our little Daewoo Tico to get up, but we managed it.


When our friend finished her contract at the end of 1997, we were sad to see her go. We already lost our dear friend, Brad, who we met a couple of weeks after arriving in Chŏnju and have been close to ever since. We knew that in 1998, we'd have to find new friends.

But in our first year, it was certainly nice to have someone from home.

Happy Throwback Thursday!

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

A Conversation That Stinks

Photo credit: cyano66
We rarely go for long walks anymore: usually, it's a brief walk around the three streets that make a circuit around our own. It's a 15-minute jaunt that DW and I take at the start of our lunch break, before we make something to eat.

Conversations are usually about the pandemic, about the government, about politics, and about current affairs. Sometimes, we talk about future plans: where we want to go and what we'd like to do once the pandemic has ended. Or where we might want to end up living when the kids have left the house for good.

Rarely do we talk about silly nonsense, but that changed on yesterday's walk.

DW: "Last night, on my walk" (sidenote: DW has resolved to reach 10,000 steps a day and often goes for evening walks to attain that goal) "I passed a house and I could smell weed."

Me: "Somebody on his or her front steps, blazing up one?"

DW: "I think so. I didn't see the person. Anyway, it got me thinking: if I can smell the weed, does that mean I'm inhaling that person's particulates?"

Me: "From exhaling? Good point."

DW: "I know, right? This is why we need to wear a mask when we're outside."

Neither of us were wearing masks, by the way.

DW: "Somebody that I work with used to keep track of the people that he saw in the bathroom who wouldn't wash their hands after coming out of a stall."

Me: "What, did he publish the list for all to see, to shame those offenders?"

DW: "No, but I remember having a strange conversation with him, where he said, 'If you're sitting in a stall, next to someone, and you can smell their shit...'"

Me: "...Are you breathing in their fecal matter?"

DW: "YES!!"

Me: "I had a similar conversation with <a former friend> years ago." (This person, by the way, was a germaphobe.) "We were talking about all of the foul smells we breathe in and how we inhale some nasty particulates. At one time I said to him: 'You know, if someone farts and you can smell it, you're breathing in their shit.' His eyes grew to that deer-in-the-headlight look and he went silent."

DW: "Oh my God, you freaked him out, didn't you?"

Me: "Oh yeah, big time. I had to calm him by clarifying that those particulates were probably too small to carry anything that could harm him and that humans have evolved over millennia to handle breathing in other people's farts."

DW: "So, I'm safe." (She didn't really say that but I couldn't pass up a good punchline.)

DW (for reals): "But if I could smell a joint from a long way off, could COVID—particularly, this new, highly contagious strain—be carried to me?"

Me: "Like you said, we should be wearing our masks outside."

DW: "I should always have one on when I'm around you." (Again, she didn't say that, but I had to end this with another witty quip. CUE THE RIMSHOT!)

Monday, January 18, 2021

Funk This Pandemic

Image credit unknown: Google

I'm moving at a snail's pace, these days.

What typically takes me a few minutes to complete can now take about an hour; what usually can be done in an hour or two will take me most of the day.

My energy levels are at an all-time low. Even sitting at my desk, banging out this blog post, I could feel gravity pulling me lower and lower into my chair, the weight on my fingers making me struggle to hit the keys on my keyboard.

Every winter, I feel the blues, but with the COVID lockdown in place, the many grey days of January, I feel it all the more. Each day is another battle against myself.

I struggle to get out of bed in the morning. My alarm goes off at 6:30 and the cheerful sound of Bixby tells me in a British woman's voice the time, the current temperature, and the day's forecast. No matter how cold, how cloudy or foggy, she ends the morning announcement with "Have a lovely day!"

Fuck you, Bixby.

Since I've returned to work—after a 17-day holiday, at home—I've been lucky if I've dragged myself out of bed before 8:00. Some mornings, I have finally arisen for the 8:30 news and have moved, slowly, into the home office, not bothering to change out of my pajamas. On my lunch break, when I'm at my peak levels of energy, I use the time to shower, shave, and get dressed.

I've been ending my workday by pushing myself to get on my spin bike, to continue on my challenge to virtually cover the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail. On a good day, I'll cover nearly 20 kilometres, which isn't a long ride by my usual standards. On a bad day, I'll skip the bike and only add the less-than three kilometres that I cover simply by walking around the house.

And then I'm spent for the rest of the evening, becoming a lump in front of the television.

It's the pandemic that has put me in this funk. This virus should have died out months ago, but government inaction and lax policies, mixed with stupid people, have dragged this pandemic on.

It makes me mad. And brings me down. And saps my strength.

How are you coping?

Stay safe. Stay home. Wear a mask.

Image: Google


Friday, January 15, 2021

Friday Fiction: Brad and Wilma

The following is a draft excerpt from my novel, Gyeosunim. If you haven't read my previous novel, Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary, be warned that while there are no spoilers, you may be missing some context.

Photo: Google Maps street view
Though my friends worked in the downtown district of Myeongdong, which is on the north side of the Han River, their company placed their residence on the south side, in Gangnam-Gu, a swanky part of the city. Modern highrises were clustered together in this newly renovated part of the town and was one of the cleanest neighbourhoods that I had ever seen in Seoul, if not all of Korea. Judging by the Porsches, Mercedes, Land Rovers, and Maclarens, this type of resident would not stand for burning garbage on their streets. As our taxi headed to their apartment, I even spied a Lamborghini dealership.

Money, indeed.

“We live right by a subway station for a line that takes us to Myeongdong and even has a stop just to the north of Insa-Dong,” explained Brad, “but the line weaves its way under the south side and has so many stops that it’s faster to take a cab. We use the subway to get to and from the office but it gets packed between the two destinations.”

The cab let us off along the Nambu Expressway, near the wide boulevard that is Yeongdong-daero, at the southern end of Gangnam-Gu, and despite protestations from Brad and Wilma, I insisted on paying the driver. I wanted to break in my T-card, and I discovered that this trip took almost all of the money that I had on the card. We walked a block further along the expressway to a 7-Eleven, where I was able to recharge the card. This time, I only added another ten-thousand won to the T-card, vowing to only use buses and subways. Wilma confirmed that this would be enough to last me my time in Seoul.

My friends’ apartment was massive for the two of them, covering about five times the size of my largest apartment in Chŏnju. We stood on the top floor of the fourteenth-floor unit that occupied the northeastern end of the northeastern-most building—number 208—in the complex. Like so many apartment buildings in Korea, the hallway for each floor had units on only one side: the hallway for the floor ran along the opposite side of the building and ran with glass windows that looked outward. They could also slide open, allowing air to circulate. From this view, I could see more apartment complexes through which I could just make out bits of the Han River. The view mainly displayed the massive buildup of highrises that sprang up in this modern half of Seoul.

“Make yourself comfortable, Roland,” said Brad, leading me into their ample living room. The view only afforded similar buildings in this apartment complex. “Wine? We have a full-bodied Shiraz from Australia.”

“Sounds lovely.” When we lived in Korea, in 1997, finding decent wine was difficult, if not impossible. When I speculated that my friends brought wine back from a visit to Wilma’s home country, I was told that there were lots of wine stores in Seoul that offered quality wines from around the globe.

I looked around the living room while I waited for Brad and Wilma to return with wine and snacks. Several traditional Korean folk masks made various faces at me from above a leather sofa that rested along a long wall. On a shorter wall was a stand upon which an elaborate stereo system was set. Brad was a serious jazz aficionado and I could see a vast assortment of CDs and vinyl, alike. A large stand, opposite the sofa, held a 65-inch flat screen TV. Both Brad and Wilma loved movies of all genres.

“Your company sure puts its teachers up in fine digs,” I said as we sipped the wine.

“Teaching is such a small part of what we do now, Roland,” said Brad, who was reaching for a cracker and some Brie. “I direct our Seoul office. Wilma is the administrator for all of our teachers. There are eight full-time teachers who come from around the globe. Wilma and I teach one or two classes a week, or fill in for a teacher who is sick. I mostly look after advertising for the business and promoting it. Wilma takes care of hiring the teachers, scheduling, and course material.”

“So the teachers don’t live like this?”

“They have nice apartments but they’re smaller.”

“Not that he’s gloating or anything,” added Wilma with a smile on her face. It was obvious that they were happy about their living space and their careers.

“It’s a far cry from living and teaching in Chŏnju, that’s for sure,” I said.

“I shudder when I think of the shoe-box of an apartment that was offered by Happy Time,” said Brad, recalling the hagwon where both he and Wilma had worked in 1997. “A bedroom, a bathroom, and a fridge. That was basically it. Now, we have a living room, dining room, full kitchen, large bathroom with a full tub and a walk-in shower, a guest bathroom, and two spare bedrooms. You should have taken our offer to stay here, Roland.”

“You said you had a guest room but you didn’t mention how palatial this place is,” I said. When I had booked my flight, Brad told me not to get a hotel room, that he and Wilma had a room for me. I thought of the old place where I stayed with Jamie and Jody, and wanted something bigger, to myself. Also, when Brad had mentioned that they were on the south side of the Han River, far from the downtown core, I told him of my intentions to see some of the places I had missed and how I wanted to be right downtown. Looking at their living arrangement, I may have accepted their offer, had I known.

“Long-gone are the days of cheap hagwons in dumpy neighbourhoods, Roland. We’ve gotten to a point in our lives where living well is paramount.” He put his arm around Wilma to stress the point.

Dinner was a grilled T-bone steak with rice and vegetables, with lots more of the Australian Shiraz. Dessert was an upside-down pineapple cake with Ethiopean coffee. When we were finished I offered to help with the cleanup but Brad insisted that I sit and keep Wilma company while he rinsed the plates, loaded them in the dishwasher, and packed up leftovers.

Wilma and I reminisced over past trips we had taken together, over the years, our most-recent one being in Venice, in 2016. It had been all of our first time in this part of Italy, though we had been to Rome and Tuscany together, in 2004 and 2009, respectively. We had stayed in a privately rented apartment, in the Arsenale district, away from the tourists but a short enough walk to Piazza San Marco. While we marvelled at the architecture and culture, we found that Venice was our least-favourite city in all of our travels, to date, in Italy. Restaurants served mediocre food at extortionist prices and the service was contemptible. My biggest disappointment was the gelato, which was a huge disappointment, especially when compared to the quality of Florence and San Gimignano.

What had made that trip so enjoyable, despite these disappointments, was the company. Wilma and I reiterated that no matter where we were, we always found joy when she, Brad, and now Fiona, and I were together.

When Brad returned from the kitchen, he had a bottle of Connemara in one hand and two tumblers in the other. “I know you like single-malt Scotch,” he said, “but I have Irish blood in me. This is a peated, single-malt whiskey, and I hope you like it.” Indeed, it was good. Wilma stuck to wine, having displayed her dislike of malts, be they from Scotland or Ireland, when we all lived in Chŏnju.

As the evening drew to a close, I thanked my hosts for a wonderful afternoon and evening, but said I should get back to my hotel for a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow, I was going to set out for Chŏnju.

“Are you going to seek out Mr. Kwon right away?” asked Brad.

“I’m going to wait a couple of days,” I said. “I’d like to see if I can find Mr. Lee, if he still lives in Chŏnju.” Before I left Korea, in 1999, Mr.Lee—my student from Kwon’s hagwon and later, a private student—and I had exchanged addresses. For a while, when I was living in Ottawa, he and I exchanged letters every couple of months. Mr. Lee had always been better at written English than spoken English, though I learned, over time, that it was more an issue of confidence than anything else. Mr. Lee was a proud man who didn’t want to say anything and appear to sound foolish.

When I sold my Ottawa home and returned to Scotland, I wrote Mr. Lee and provided my new address. I never heard back from him. Whether he had not received my letter and was still using my Canadian address or not was never discovered. Finding him now, after all this time, was going to be difficult. I still had his old address, in Hyoja-Dong, but there was no telling whether he still lived there or had moved. For all I knew, he may no longer live in Chŏnju.

When Kwon had met with Brad and Wilma, last month, he provided them with contact information to pass on to me. Though I had made the decision to come back to Korea, I hadn’t convinced myself that I would reach out to Kwon when I got here. I also had Soo-ah’s contact information, and I told myself it would be good to see her again, but I suspected that in doing so, she would reach out to Kwon.

“I also have plans to visit Jeonju University,” I said. When I worked at this university, there were a couple of western teachers who planned to make a life’s career with the Foreign Languages department. I wondered if they were still there. “I still have my identification card.” I reached into my wallet, no more than an RFID sleeve that was filled with credit cards and various identification, and pulled out the old plastic card. The print on the card had faded and the photo was dulled. With my Korean hair cut, I looked younger than the thirty-three years that I was. I was also about thirty pounds lighter, and my younger face showed lean lines from a year of having already lived in Korea.

“I don’t think they’ll accept it,” joked Brad.

“If I meet anyone I know,” I said, “I’ll show the card. It’ll be fun.”

“Where are you staying?” asked Wilma.

“I’ve rented a small apartment near Gyeonggi-Jeon, in Chŏnju’s Hanok Village.” Chŏnju had its own traditional neighbourhood, just like Bukchon Hanok Village, that surrounded the old Chosun Dynasty palace. In 1998, it showed its thousand-year-old age, with crumbling roads and cracked foundations. Over recent years, the city revitalized this neighbourhood and turned it into a tourist destination, with the ancient palace maintaining its reputation as the jewel of Chŏnju. “I’m looking forward to rediscovering that old kalguk-su restaurant." This was the restaurant that I was shown on my first day in Chŏnju, in 1997, when I was too jet-lagged to remember its location. Over that year, I had sought this noodle restaurant out and finally found it some months later. It became one of Tanya’s and my favourite restaurants, and we would go to it with Wilma and Brad as a special treat.

In 1998, I introduced it to my fellow teachers at Jeonju University and we would visit it at least once a month. The thick noodles in a spiced broth was a hit.

When I made my plans to revisit Chŏnju, I searched the Internet to see if I could find the restaurant. I typed kalguk-su into Google, along with best restaurants in Jeonju, and discovered that the restaurant still existed. The old, traditional-styled house had been torn down—it had always looked dilapidated, as though it was bound to be condemned—and a new building took its place. The restaurant was even given a name: Baetaerang, which was the Korean pronunciation of Veteran. The sign on the grey-painted siding, above brown bricks on what was now a square building with a flat roof, read that the restaurant had been established in 1977. I had found the kalguk-su restaurant’s exact location by using Google Maps street view. My rented apartment was less than a ten-minute walk.

“I plan to have dinner there,” I explained to my friends. “It was the first meal that I had in Chŏnju in 1997; it’s going to be the first meal that I have in Chŏnju in 2019.”

As the evening drew to a close, I thanked my friends for their warm hospitality and rode the subway back to my hotel. I had to change trains at Euljiro Station, where the second train took me to City Hall, just a few blocks away from my hotel. The long day had caught up with me and I had no trouble drifting off to sleep.

Tomorrow was going to be another big day.

Tuesday, January 12, 2021

Strange Dreams (Are Made of This)

If your dreams are anything like mine, these days, they quickly turn nightmarish when either someone gets too close to you or people aren't wearing masks.

Just the other night, I dreamt that some of my coworkers gathered in my backyard for happy-hour drinks, much like we do, virtually, through Google Hangouts. But in this dream, I started to get stressed when my colleagues started filling my backyard and I noted that some of my colleagues, who live in Québec, shouldn't have crossed the border to be with me in the first place.

The most distressing part of that dream was when I discovered that my beer fridge was nearly empty, and the remaining cans were seriously dented or half-crushed and could not be opened.

Yeah, a real nightmare.

All of my dreams of late seem to be COVID-related, where my personal space is invaded or that once-familiar environments are seriously altered such that I can't find my way around.

The other week, in real life, I searched the LCBO Web site for non-alcoholic beer, as I'm planning a Brown Knowser video review for Dry January, of which I'm not taking part but feel I should see what alternatives are available for those who are.

On the LCBO site, there was a variety of various alcohol-free brews from which to choose and my eyes fell upon two: one from Ontario and one from the UK. According to the LCBO, there were plenty of the Ontario brew in stocks but only one bottle of the British one.

I figured that by the time I reached my local liquor store that UK bottle would be gone, so I decided to wait until the next day to grab the Ontario brewery cans.

That night, I dreamt that I went shopping in my LCBO and it turned into a nightmare.

First of all, the store had been completely redesigned and was more like an IKEA labyrinth than a typical LCBO. To add to the confusion, arrows on the floor would suddenly change direction and I was constantly finding myself walking in the wrong direction.

The store was crowded, with people squeezing between one another and making direct contact. And, to top it off, no one was wearing a mask and I could feel their moist breath in the air.

At one point, I screamed, "Put on a f*cking mask!" which silenced everyone.

One maskless person looked at me and said, "Sure, as soon as you do the same."

I put my hand to my face and realized that I wasn't wearing a mask, either. It was in the breast pocket of my coat, where I always keep one. I grabbed it and quickly put it on.

The other patrons reluctantly put their masks on but some were defiant, claiming that the damage was already done. If we were going to become infected, putting on a mask at this point wouldn't help.

I kept my mask on and searched for my beer, trying to keep my distance.

I searched the store, trying to find a non-alcoholic beer section, but had no luck. I approached one of the staff, who told me that there was no such section, that beer, regardless of its alcohol content (or lack thereof), was placed together on the shelves. I would just have to search for the label.

Now, anybody who knows me knows that I hate being in stores during this pandemic, especially in crowded stores. I try to get in and get out as quickly as possible. 

With the design of this nightmarish store, there were aisles upon aisles of beer, but I couldn't find the one I was looking for.

In real life, I would have seen the crowd when I first entered the store and said, "F*ck this sh*t," and walked out. But I continued to go through every shelf, even though my anxiety was through the roof.

I eventually awoke, never having found the beer.

The next morning, for real, I went to my local LCBO a half hour after it opened, and was relieved to find only two cars in the parking lot. Inside, I saw only a couple of shoppers. The employees outnumbered the patrons and everyone kept their distance.

I was able to quickly find the non-alcoholic beer section but the Ontario brew was completely sold out. Happily, though, there was plenty of that beer from the UK, so I grabbed a few bottles, plus a couple of cans of juicy, high-alcohol IPAs.

I left the store within five minutes, stress-free.

I'm not one who has vivid dreams with any kind of frequency—at least, not that I remember—but for more than six months, it seems like I have these pandemic-themed dreams every night. How about you? Are you having strange dreams?

Share them.

Monday, January 11, 2021

Virtual Pilgrimage

When DW first told me how much this was going to cost us, I balked.

"Thirty dollars a trek! I've never paid that much for an app."

The smartphone program, in question, is The Conqueror Virtual Challenges. The app tracks any distance that you cover—be it walking, running, cycling, swimming, rowing, or whatever. You can sync the app with your Fitbit, Garmin, or Apple watch, or with other fitness apps like Strava, Runkeeper, Map My Run, Fitbit, or you can even enter your distance manually.

The app is free to download. But to use it, to add a challenge—one of more than a dozen world treks—you pay for the route. DW wanted to walk the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail, which is more than 770 kilometres and runs from Saint-Paul-Pied-de-Port, in Southern France, crosses over the Pyrenees Mountains, and finishes in Santiago de Compostela, in northwestern Spain.

I wanted to complete the trek that runs the full length of the UK, starting in Lands End, in southwest England, and finishing in John O'Groats, at the top of Scotland. Not that I've ever really wanted to walk this 1,744-kilometre trail, but I have wanted to see more of the UK than I have so far.

We each bought both treks.

"It's still cheaper than signing up for a 10K run," said DW.

We began the Camino de Santiago trek first, measuring our daily distances on our fitness watches. DW would go for a walk around the block and has started jogging again. I have used our spin bike almost every day (I took a day off on Sunday) for most of my journey and have also added the number of steps that I take around the house to my end-of-day total. From last Tuesday until last night (Sunday), I have covered nearly 88 kilometres.

By Saturday evening, I had virtually reached the Spanish city of Pamplona. The app lets you see where you are from a street view, and I had just passed the Plaza de los Torros, the famous arena for the bullfights, and ended that day at the Plaza de Castillo, in the heart of this old city.

On Sunday, I had moved on, covering just under six kilometres and ending up at the small village of Ventosa. All of this day's journey had been achieved by walking a couple of kilometres along a nature trail and by wandering the house as I completed chores.

I was too tired to get on the bike last night.

DW and I have created a community—Bytown Blazers—and a couple of our friends have joined us. Seeing our friends gain on us or overtake us motivates us to keep moving.

(I'm way ahead of the pack, so far!)

In less than a week, I have accomplished more than 10 percent of my trek. As soon as DW and I complete the Camino de Santiago trek, we'll start off at Lands End for the next, much longer journey. I'm hoping to add outdoor cycling and kayaking to my method of covering the distance.

At the end of each journey, the makers of The Conqueror send us a medal that commemorates this journey. The cost of the two journeys and the shipping cost for the two medals is about $70, each. Still cheaper than a single organized race, as DW reminds me. And when we signed up, the creators of this app were offering a 20-percent discount, which made it even more worth it.

When we signed up, I told DW that I wasn't interested in the medal, that I don't need an award. As I see my progress and the street views of this virtual pilgrimage, I'm starting to change my mind about that.

As 2021 is also looking like a real trip isn't likely, I'd like some sort of memento that reminds me that I have virtually walked these famous trails.

If you use this app, look us up, and maybe we'll run into you.

Virtually, that is.

Friday, January 8, 2021

Don't Wait for the Perfect Sky

I used to say that I loved overcast skies when photographing the outdoors. The clouds are a great diffuser, eliminating unwanted, harsh shadows from your subjects. But what if the sky is the background of your subject or is, indeed, your actual subject?

There have been countless times that I have shot subjects to find that the sky is either blown out from harsh sunlight or, in the case of overcast skies, flat and lifeless.

In post-processing, I have used highlight recovery features in attempts to bring some definition to the sky. I have also pulled back on highlights to do the same thing. But rarely to I get the results that I've wanted.

On Monday, I wrote about how DW bought some new photo-editing apps: some, for herself, so that she could play with the competition to her company's software. But she also bought an app for me, for Christmas, to add to my arsenal of editing software.

In Monday's post, I showed the different results that I got from our various apps—Affinity Photo, Luminar AI, On1 Photo RAW 2021, and Corel PaintShop Pro (2016 and 2021)—and overall I found that I still liked PaintShop Pro the best, though I did like the preset filters and special effects of Luminar AI.

(For Wednesday's post of purple finches, however, I used Affinity, just to compare with PSP.)

For regular post-processing of my photos, I'll likely continue to use PSP. I'm most familiar with it, and as Monday's photos showed, I seemed to get some of my best results (as many of my Twitter friends attested).

As I continued to acquaint myself with Luminar AI, I found a feature that seems to solve some of my issues with blown out or flat skies, and while I won't rely on this cheat for the majority of my photos, it's a nice special-effects feature that can transform a photo.

When I want to manipulate a photo to create a particular mood, I have turned to Luminar's templates, such as sunsets, city lights, and nature, which can manipulate the amount of light, highlights, contrast, colour saturation and luminosity, and other aspects of the photo. From there, I will further tweak the settings, in the Edit mode, to suit my own preferences.

But there is a creative mode that really brings out the AI capabilities with this program, and I have used it when I've found that the sky in my photos is lacking. Luminar's AI lets you change the appearance of the sky and even add elements that aren't there. You can add the Milky Way. A bright-blue sky. A sunset.

You can enhance your sky with birds, balloons, fireworks, or planets. You can change an ordinary photo into one of fantasy and pure fiction.

In playing with these features, I used some recent photos that I shot during my holiday break. DW and I went to the ByWard Market on December 30, which was a grey, overcast day. To show you what the day actually looked like, here's the untouched photo, taken straight from RAW.

Playing with Luminar AI, I decided to add a dramatic sky that showed blue and individual clouds. Here's the result:

Standing below the totem pole that towers in front of the Ottawa School of Art, the sky was a blank canvas of pale grey, almost white. To it, I added a dramatic sunset sky.

And again, in front of the iconic Market building, there wasn't much of a sky until I played with the creative effects.


In the Jeanne d'Arc Court, I went a bit overboard, adding a dramatic sky and birds. Because my subject was some of the surreal artwork in this court, I thought I'd make a surreal sky. To me, this photo could be used as an album cover. Thoughts?

Finally, on last weekend's trek around the Fletcher Wildlife Gardens and the surrounding trails, I took a photo of the barn that lies along Prince of Wales Drive. It was in the distance and I could see it through some trees, along a path. Using my telephoto lens, I captured the image and told myself it was going to be a keeper.

I shot the photo as the sun was sinking toward the horizon, and my eye, through the camera's viewfinder, could pick up a bit of a yellow glow. But when I saw the RAW image, the light in the background was blown out. I decided to use Luminar AI with my post-processing, applying one of the sunset templates to bring back the warm glow that I had seen when I shot the photo.

It helped a bit, but not quite enough. What I saw through the viewfinder was not quite there. So I switched to the creative mode and added a sunset sky. To further bring out what I saw, I added just a touch of sunrays. In doing so, however, I had now placed the sun in the shot, through the trees, and I was certain the sun was just out of the frame when I shot it.

Oh well. The result is that the barn looks close to what I saw through the lens, though the sky is more exaggerated.

But one thing is certain: the photo is better than how it looked in its RAW format.

I've played with these features to see what Luminar AI can produce. And while I admit that some of the results are over-the-top, I will use them sparingly and, hopefully, in a way that doesn't take away from the basic essence of the photograph.

But having this tool in my box of photo-editing tricks, I know that I don't have to wait for the perfect sky to capture an image.

Happy Friday!

Thursday, January 7, 2021

Standstill

sedition (n)
    Conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against the authority of a state or monarch*

treason (n)
    The crime of betraying one's country, especially by attempting to kill the sovereign or overthrow the government*

insurrection (n)
    A violent uprising against an authority or government*

I haven't tuned into a live broadcast coming out of the United States since September 11, 2001. On that sunny day, I started my day like any other. I was in the office, just beginning my day, when DW called me. She was at home, on maternity leave with our first child, and she had been listening to CBC Radio. After initial reports that an airplane had crashed into one of the towers of the World Trade Center, in New York City, she switched on the news to get a clearer idea of what had happened, and then phoned me to let me know.

When I tried to search the information for more news, my Internet slowed down and I couldn't get anything, so I asked DW to turn up the volume on the television so that I could follow along.

At one point, DW told me that someone had captured the collision on video, only to say, "Oh my God, this is live! Another plane has flown into the other tower!"

I had her keep me on the phone and I related the news to my colleagues, who were sitting near me. A dark buzz of conversation washed over the entire office space. Like so many offices around the world, work came to a standstill as the horror unfolded.

Eventually, we were told to go home and hug our loved ones.

Yesterday, as I was working from home, I periodically checked Twitter for news about the US Congress tally of electoral college votes, mixed with the pro-Tr@mp rally that was happening outside the Capitol grounds. When I saw that the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, was about to speak, I tuned into a live PBS feed and listened as I continued to work.

As the proceedings were underway, I heard reports that the rally-goers were climbing the steps to the Capitol, where the security and police found themselves outnumbered. I started paying more attention to the reports and started to relay the news to DW, who shares our home office.

Photo source unknown, via Twitter.

Things escalated as Tr@mp supporters began breaking windows on the Capitol Building and forced their way inside. The Senate and House were evacuated, and I listened as PBS reporter, Lisa Desjardins, reported from inside. This is when my work was completely distracted, and I was drawn in to watch the live video footage and to various Twitter reports from various news outlets.

It almost felt like 9/11 all over again. I felt everything come to a standstill. This time, however, the terrorists were domestic and they weren't just looking to cause death and destruction, they were looking to obliterate the country's entire democracy.

Photo source unknown, via Twitter.

All at the encouragement of D@n@ld Tr@mp.

This is sedition. This is treason. This is an insurrection. For it to go unchallenged would be an utter failure.

The government of 2001 went after its enemies who were in a foreign country. With the change of leadership, it must go after its enemies on home soil.

The world continues to watch. So far, what we see is embarrassing.


* Oxford Dictionary, online

Tuesday, January 5, 2021

New Year

It's the only New Year's resolution that I've ever kept: more than 25 years ago, I resolved to never again make a New Year's resolution.

In January of 2020, I decided to participate in Dry January, where I would refrain from consuming alcohol for that month. It wasn't a resolution to reduce my alcohol consumption, which is not a problem. I simply wanted to take a break from it. In doing so, I managed to find some really good alcohol-free beer, so it was a win-win situation.

But my month-long abstinence from alcohol wasn't a resolution. And, as 2020 turned into the nightmare from which we still haven't quite awaken, my alcohol consumption actually increased as I began ordering my beer online and having it delivered to my doorstep. (Hey, I was making an effort to support the breweries and keep them afloat!)

I've been considering whether I should try Dry January, once again, this year, but I've been on the fence. On one hand, I've already done it. I have nothing to prove and I don't think I want to make it a ritual. I'll still look for alcohol-free beer and may review anything that I find worthy. But so far (by the time I've written this post, anyway), I haven't consumed any alcohol. I just haven't felt the desire, and two migraines in the first two days of the year have not helped.

While I haven't declared a resolution in decades, I still look at the new year as a time when I can make some changes which are, hopefully, for the better. Over the Christmas holidays, in which I traditionally eat more food, particularly foods that are bad for me, and I notice that my waistline seems to increase (or, more accurately, the belly above my waist expands—I haven't changed the waist size of my pants in more than a decade).

Beginning on December 30, DW and I have both decided that we would become active for at least 20 minutes a day. We had actually started doing this at the start of the pandemic lockdown, where we would go for walks every day. For me, though, as the summer dragged on and into fall, I didn't go out every day. Sometimes, weeks would go by where I wasn't active at all, and I could feel my health suffering.

DW, breaking in her new snowshoes.
Since the end of December, we've gotten out for photo walks, for walks through places like the Arboretum and the Fletcher Wildlife Gardens. With the recent snowfall, I've shovelled the driveway and we've broken out our new snowshoes. DW has waxed up her cross-country skis and hit the trails. I've spent time on our spin bike, which had been gathering dust in the corner of our bedroom.

It's not a resolution to become fit; rather, it was a conscious decision to become active again. It's returning to a norm that was all but forgotten. It was easy for me, during the pandemic, to hide away inside the house. But it seems that the tide may be slowly turning on COVID, and I want to return to the active person that I was.

When the snow is gone and the weather is warmer, I want to be able to jump on my bike or hop in my kayak. I want to be able to strap my camera bag on my back and go anywhere. And I don't want the winter to be filled with the inactivity that would make those activities harder.

It's not a resolution: it's a revival.

Monday, January 4, 2021

New Apps (For Me)

For years, I have been editing my digital photos with software that I have acquired through DW, who works for a company that makes this very software. Because she works for this company, she receives the latest and greatest versions of this software for free.

I knew I married her for a reason.

Because of my good fortune, this is the only software I have used to turn my basic photos into half-decent images. As I became more familiar with the software, I moved from shooting in JPEG format to shooting in RAW, and the quality of my output improved greatly.

Of course, I've also used photo-editing apps, such as Snapseed and Prisma, among others over the years, but I've only used these when editing photos from my smartphone or tablet, and rarely did I keep these edited photos after posting them on social media apps.

Last fall, DW began investigating some apps, as she usually does when she was comparing her company's product to the competition, and she decided to show a couple of them to me, out of curiosity. She wanted me to watch some of their demo videos and to give my impression.

I'm not one who likes to putter around and spend lots of time on computers. It's a great irony for me, working in a high-tech industry and using computers, when I really don't like to mess with them. Sure, I'm fine using a computer to write or use social media, but I don't like digging around with a computer to figure out how something works. I like programs to be easy to use and to be reliable.

It took me a few years to become comfortable using our existing photo-editing software, and when our latest version came out with a new look and feel, I was in panic mode until DW showed me a way of brining the app back to its classic appearance.

So when DW wanted me to look at different software, I was a bit reluctant. But she made me watch their demonstration videos before forming any opinions.

Of course, the videos showed amazing photos look even more amazing. Some even transformed a photo to look nothing like what you would have seen with the naked eye. Effects were added to change an image into a vision of fantasy.

After watching the videos, I told DW that I liked one feature from product A, another feature from product B. I said that product C seemed complicated but the results were stunning.

"I'm considering buying one of these apps," DW said. Last March, on my birthday, I used a gift card that was given to me to put towards a camera that DW had been eyeing. At the time, we made it clear that the camera would be hers but that I would be allowed to use it to make my Brown Knowser YouTube videos. And since she's had that camera, DW has renewed her long-dormant interest in photography.

A few weeks later, DW purchased two of the apps that we had looked at: Affinity Photo and On1 Photo RAW 2021. She liked the features of Affinity that were similar to or better than her company's product and the photo-organizing abilities of On1, and couldn't decide which she preferred, so she bought both.

Not being interested in learning new software, happy to be using the free version of PaintShop Pro 2021 (PSP), I let DW play with the new apps.

For Christmas, DW told me that she bought me a license for a newly released product, Luminar AI. We had seen the videos for this photo-editing app and I had commented that I liked some of the special-effects features more than the other apps, so she saved this program to give to me over the holidays.

We also have had versions of Corel After Shot Pro, which I used when it first came out but haven't used in years. So we now own five photo-editing programs and I think I'm overwhelmed.

The first program that I tried with a batch of new photos that were still on both my Nikon D7200 and D750 cameras was Luminar AI. After all, it was the program that DW gave to me for Christmas and was truly the only one that was mine.

One of the things that turns me off from a photo-editing program is how difficult it can be to open a file and start editing it. With PSP, you can click File, Open, and navigate to your photo or you can click the Manage tab, navigate to the folder that contains the photos that you want to edit, and pull them all in.

After Shot is much more convoluted and I would often have to call DW to the computer to show me how to start.

Luminar AI isn't as straightforward but it was easy enough to start working on a photo. A simple plus sign (+) at the top lets you edit a single image or open a folder and work on several at a time. You can manage a catalog of photos, use a variety of preset templates, much like filters in Instagram and Snapseed. Editing the photo is as simple as what I'm used to with PSP, though there are some features that I need to learn (but once I understand what they do, they're pretty straightforward).

Luminar AI also has some wild special effects in its Creative mode, and I played around with photos that were shot with overcast skies, changing the sky to show the Milky Way or add lightning to the clouds. There are so many creative effects and I'll start playing with them more over time.

But I have found that Luminar AI doesn't have the capability to create high-dynamic-range (HDR) photos from multiple files, though it does allow you to apply an HDR-like effect from a single photo (PSP does both).

I also find Luminar AI to be a bit slow, due to the AI requiring lots of memory to do its magic. And the preset macros tend to give a lot of punch to an image, which I then have to tone down if I want a more natural appearance.

I found On1 to be a bit more complicated in finding a starting point but as I became more familiar, it wasn't as difficult. Because I use my own method of organizing my photos, though, I did find saving my photos more involved, and I wasn't crazy about the overall results with my photos after editing them.

I'm sure that most of my problems were through user error, but it will ultimately come down to which program lets me edit the most quickly and gives me the image that I want.

I really liked the ease of the HDR rendering with Affinity, which gave me a better result than with PSP. But I did find that I had to work harder on a single file to make the image pop. Some photos came out looking rather flat, compared with other apps.

The following images were taken from a single RAW file. While editing, I did not look to the other images for comparison: I simply worked within each app until I got the photo to look as good as I could without overdoing it, though sometimes that didn't happen. Keep in mind that in the RAW photo file, the sky is totally blown out and the clouds do not appear in the sky nor in the reflection. Editing brought out the clouds.

See which one you like the best.

Affinity Photo
Luminar AI
On1 Photo RAW 2021

PaintShop Pro 2021

Which image do you like the best? When I first created these new photos, I shared them on Twitter, asking my peeps which photo they liked the best. Overall, most of the respondents chose the photo that was edited through Luminar AI.

I also went back to my photos of Horseshoe Bend, in Page, Arizona, which I had originally processed with the PSP app that we had in the spring of 2016. I layered five files, each shot at -2.0 EV, -1.0 EV, 0 EV, +1.0 EV, and +2.0 EV. Both Affinity and On1 could handle the five layers but Luminar AI could not, so I worked with the file that was shot at 0 EV and used some of the AI and preset effects to get an acceptable image. Have a look:

Affinity Photo, HDR (five files)
Luminar AI, single file (no HDR)
On1 Photo RAW 2021, HDR (five files)
PaintShop Pro (2016), HDR (five photos)

Overall, I like the HDR capabilities with Affinity. The images seem clearer than with PSP or On1. But I like the way that Luminar AI can make a photo pop, and the templates can do some amazing things with little effort.

But I still really like the ease of use with PSP and I don't plan to stop using it any time soon. Perhaps, as I become more proficient with the newer apps—it took me years to feel confident with PSP and I still have lots to learn—I'll settle on a single program. Or, I might use one app to get to one look, and then use another app to apply different effects.

I just hope that my photos in 2021 will shine.

Happy Monday!