photography

Collaboration, Creativity and KIN Fables

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fog-spiritsFog spirit, © Seb McKinnon with original photography by Karen McRae

I’m quite excited to present some amazing work by Montreal artist Seb McKinnon, starting with the little collaboration above. To create this image Seb worked by shape-shifting three of my photographs together until he conjured up an ethereal fog spirit in the landscape.

When I asked him to describe his creative process these are a few of the words he sent me, “As an illustrator, I’ve developed a personal technique that relies heavily on creating chaos in order to find my subject. In other words, I mess up the canvas in a very subconscious way with digital tools, a very intuitive process, quick actions, quick responses…”

I think this technique is illustrated very nicely when one travels through the collection of artwork on Seb’s blog, which I have had the pleasure of following for the past few years.

Back to the little fog spirit. It is part of much bigger story; Seb is no ordinary illustrator.

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KIN Mask Concepts © Seb McKinnon

He, and his brother, filmmaker Ben McKinnon, have been working together on a gorgeous trilogy of short films called KIN Fables which bring together Seb’s extraordinary artistic vision, Ben’s outstanding cinematography, and a myriad of other talented collaborators. Even the haunting music score (Clann) that runs through the eight minute film was composed by Seb.

I hope you take a few minutes to experience the magic of the first film, KIN, which has already won some cinematography awards and was recently featured as a Vimeo staff pick. You won’t be disappointed!


To help support the making of the next two films, Salvage and Requiem, the McKinnon brothers have a Kickstarter campaign on the go until the end of March. You can visit their Kickstarter page here to learn more about the trilogy, and to see some of Seb’s inspired artwork made just for KIN Fables and contributors to the project.

I’m honoured, too, to have been invited to collaborate artistically! I’ll be making some photographs to support the multimedia aspect of the project, which, along with photography, includes a graphic novel, a full length music album, and paintings and illustrations.

You can watch the Kickstarter video below to find out more about this inspiring project, and you’ll “meet” the McKinnon brothers too! This where the power of community and collaboration come together and make things happen.

Places to go ~

Website: www.kinfables.com
Kickstarter: KIN Fables Kickstarter
Production: Five Knights Production
Facebook: KIN Fables

Kin Fables in the Media ~

The Concordion: KIN fables: ‘a musical, visual journey into fable’
The Main (Montreal): KIN, A Journey into Modern Fable

knight&girlKnight & Girl © Seb McKinnon

Road Stories

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A winter sky and roadside grasses. The sky actually looked just like this, with rainbow colours shimmering at the edges of the clouds. The little bird flew right into the frame just as I pressed the shutter.

[Photographs made while riding in a moving car.]

© Karen McRae, 2014

Trichoto(me)

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TrichotomyThe little foot paths in our minds, firm and grooved from gentle barefoot pacing.

[An in-camera triple exposure layered with another photograph]
© Karen McRae, 2014

World Wildlife Day

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Rock-Iguana1Since today is the first(!) official World Wildlife Day I thought I would post some photographs of an at-risk species I was introduced to on my trip to the Bahamas. These are Bahamian Rock Iguanas that live on many of the small islands in the Exuma Cays. These iguanas are on the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) Red List as a threatened species. On some islands there are a number of factors putting them at risk such as poaching and other (introduced) animals including cats, dogs and feral pigs (more about the pigs later!), but I was particularly interested in the impact of ecotourism (since I was there as a tourist myself) and the fact that they are often fed by people visiting the islands.

As our boat pulled up to the sandy beach one could see many iguanas sitting there on the sand, and oddly they didn’t move away when our small group stepped out of the boat and walked to the shore. These wild reptiles are now quite familiar with human intrusion and have little fear. They were waiting for food. As honoured as I felt to be walking among these beautiful creatures their lack of fear left me kind of unsettled.

If you want to delve further into the complicated relationship between tourism and conservation here is a paper evaluating just that: Effects of ecotourism on endangered northern Bahamian Rock Iguanas (Cyclura cyclura)
– Hines, K. 2011. Herpetological Conservation and Biology Vol 6, No. 2:250–259]

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And here are some interesting facts about the Northern Bahamian rock iguana from the Bahamas National Trust website:

  • Rock iguanas used to be eaten by early inhabitants of The Bahamas. Today it is illegal to harm or capture a Rock iguana.
  • The Andros Rock iguana is the largest iguana in The Bahamas and can attain a length of nearly five to six feet.
  • The most threatened Bahamian iguanas are the San Salvador iguanas.
  • The serrated ridge along the spine of the Rock iguana radiates excess heat from the iguana’s body. In territorial displays this ridge makes the iguana appear larger to its adversaries.
  • Iguanas are equipped with breakable tails which cleave off neatly when seized by a hand or a predator.A new tail begins to regenerate immediately.
  • Rock iguanas can live for up to forty years!

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© Karen McRae, 2014

Ragged February Flowers

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FebruaryFlowers5After a bit of warmer weather a few days ago, I noticed some of the tiny seed heads from last year had managed to make their way up through the snow for some air. I think it will be a while before any more of them show their ragged little heads; we are back to winter and that snow is still thick over the earth. I like seeing how they change over the seasons so I took a few photographs this morning as we shivered together in the wind. Happily, they are still filled with little seeds of hope.

© Karen McRae, 2014

Night Light

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NightLight3Sometimes when I feel like my work or ideas are getting monotonous I try to think of my camera as a sort of sketchbook and think of ways I might capture ‘sketches’ of the landscape rather than more ‘representative’ photographs. I’ll try using double exposures, long exposures and/or maybe camera movement to get a different sort of feel happening.

NightLight2These are a few images from a snowy winter evening when I went out to just play. No expectations or specific ideas – in my mind I was simply sketching the night and following my intuition as I experimented. I made setting adjustments as the camera gave me feedback. At times I used flash to capture the snowflakes and elements in the foreground along with exposures lasting several seconds, and at times also moving the camera to see what might happen.

NightLight4In the first image you can see that I was moving my camera up and down which created light trails from a light source on the other side of the woods. A strange image but there is something about it that I find oddly appealing. Perhaps it reinforces the idea that a camera is a tool with endless possibilities and every so often I need to be reminded of this.

I wasn’t initially planning on posting these as they seemed to be more about process than result – technically they are quite noisy – but I sort of like the soft-focused, grainy look of them and in the end they really are sketches of a snowy winter night.

© Karen McRae, 2014

The Shape of Winter, Elsewhere

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SandbarRipples5 In this version of winter you cast off your boots and bulky layers and place your feet directly on the warm sand. Sand that you have gratefully borrowed for just a week. And you can’t stop looking at those marine blues of the sea and the graceful patterns the water makes. You want them etched in your mind forever. Damn, we live in a gorgeous world.

A counterpoint to the previous post, I guess. I’ve been away – feet in the sand, head in the clouds blue sky.

[Near and far views of the shifting landscape of Exuma, Bahamas. Sigh.]

© Karen McRae, 2014