Two of my favorite actors; Michael Cera (I still think of him as George Michael!) and Jay Baruchel at the opening of Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist at Ryoerson Theatre as part of 2008 Toronto International Film festival.
They were too close so I shot these with my trusty 5D Canon EF100 lens. I still have a couple of weeks to try the Sony A700 and the crazy Zeiss 135 lens and am having a lot of fun with it so far.

La Princesse made her way into Liverpool city center yesterday. I’ve never seen crowds like it even with FA Cup homecomings. Water Street, Castle Street and I imagine Dale Street were full. I bet The Strand was too and the surrounding areas. Insane amount of people. I’m surprised they managed to get La Princesse through. What a sight though. The water canons were impressive and I hear everyone got soaked. She moved up Church Street to where the band stand used to be and fought with a digger. Afterwards she headed up to the Adelphi and on to Concourse Tower where she spent the night.

I think the most amazing part was how it changed my perception of it, and I reckon every ones. You here that a giant spider is going to stomp around town and it sounds terrifying. You see it on the side of the building and its a bit ominous. It wakes up and reaches out to people, gets scared by fire and goes back to sleep. The next day it really wakes up and goes for a walk. It looks so scary because its huge! However, by the next day you see it covered in snow and you see the 50,000 people turn out to greet it. Its not a huge scary spider. Everyone is there to cheer it on. By the end of the day it goes up the building and sleeps. The music is never there to scare you and so it sets the tone of wonder. Its amazing just how they’ve made it seem real. I know its on a truck but you don’t see the truck. You see this giant spider, who is a little scared of its surroundings, wandering the city. Amazing.

 
For me, a camera has been one of the most empowering tools for seeking the divine I’ve ever had at my disposal. Becoming a professional photographer has been transformative in a way that prevents me from ever going back to my previous way of seeing. I’m uncomfortable though, with flippantly saying things like, “I love my job� because that sounds a bit pretentious to me, and as if I think I’ve got something over someone else. A person truly in love doesn’t necessarily need to shout the fact to the world, love speaks most fluently when it doesn’t require words for expression. Which I suppose is an odd thing for a girl like me to be writing.

Prior to every photo shoot I’ve done since I started this vocation, I’ve said a prayer that’s a little corny and I’m somewhat embarrassed to reveal, but is in fact my mission statement. “Please God, help me to seek you in the faces I photograph today, and reveal you through the images I make�. This, very simply put, has been my mantra. So I say it out loud before I even think to pick up my camera.

Approaching anything with the attitude of seeking the divine is what’s empowering. It means looking for the good in every situation and the light in every person. That’s an amazing and awe-inspiring job description to proceed with! I wish I could say that I approach all aspects of my life in the way I do with camera, but I still struggle with this. The camera is trying to teach me not to simply observe “what is�, but rather experience the ever present goodness that is the essence of all things.

I strive for the things I share in this journal to be honest and open, but in a somewhat vague manner so as to possibly resonate with another reading or viewing. Today’s entry is different. It’s personal and profound to me alone. The images shown are a couple from a large body of work that I believe may be my best to date. Not necessarily in technical merit, but more in reaching the primary objective I’ve had since I started this work. I observed and revealed more clearly than perhaps ever before, the face of the divine in the faces I photographed. And something significant happened to me as result.

Without going into all the synchronistic details leading up to this session, I knew when I first met this couple and photographed their pregnancy that our paths were fated to intersect as they did. Their love story is incredible–not in a fairy tale kind of way, but in a “walk through the fire and come out the other side raw, exposed and healedâ€� miraculous way. Together they embody appreciation for life and love the likes of which I’ve rarely witnessed.

On the morning of their scheduled newborn shoot I began with my usual prayer but for some reason unconsciously altered it a bit. The new prayer went like this: Dear God, I look forward to seeing you today in the faces I photograph, and revealing you in the images I make. This rather subtle change of words represented a radical shift in my thinking. I wasn’t hoping to see the divine, I was expecting it. And what we expect to find is always what we ultimately experience. It was easy for me to anticipate good on this morning having previously met the extraordinary couple, but after I finished the shoot I realized that if I truly believe that God exists in every living thing I shouldn’t be *hoping* to see this ever, I should be *expecting* to see it. Therein lies the profound change I experienced as a result of photographing these three beautiful “angels�.

Thank you, Greg, Shannon and Cassidy for restoring in me an expectation of the divine that I’ve somehow lost touch with. I will never forget what we shared and experienced together on Cassidy’s sixth day of life. It was heavenly.

~Cynthia