KJ's Blog

Fort Steele is now a tourist set up but the old gold rush trail used to go right through here and it was a trailhead for the outfitters and guides.

My pinhole photograph, At the Docks, was selected to be in the group exhibition. The Richmond Arts Coalition is marking Canada’s 150th by presenting ArtRich 2017, the second juried exhibition for local artists at the Richmond Art Gallery. I also won the People's Choice Award!

Another fun Steveston Photowalk at Steveston dock. Join us on our next Steveston Photowalk!

I went on a photo trip with my awesome photographer friend Francis Dorsemaine and his photography group to Westminster Abbey in Mission, BC to take some more images with my Fuji GFX 50S. 

You can buy this photo journal (as well as all the previous travel books!) at Kerri-Jo's Blurb store.

I attended a couple shows on Sunday at the springVancouver Fashion Week  to see Marilyn Wilson get honoured as Ambassador Extraordainaire for her coverage and support of Vancouver Fashion Week for the past 20 shows over the last decade. 

I was nicely surprised to see the following e-mail with three honourable mentions and six nominations in seven different categories at the International Color Awards!

Christmas Special!

One of the fun things about photography is the community around it. I had the chance to meet up with a couple amazing photographers, Bryce Evans and Chris Collacott:

Show jumping and equestrianism in Turkmenistan has taken a giant leap towards getting ready for the 2017 Asian Games. Four horse and rider teams will be selected to participate in the games out of the ten selected for the team by the Turkmen Atlary (Department of Horse Breeding).

Turkmen djigits of the national equestrian games group “Galkynysh” performed their circus vaulting during the opening of the VIIIth International Equine Conference and Exhibition. he horses are Akhal-Tekes from the President's stables.

The Turkmen Atlary State Horse Association held their fourth annual horse marathon (60 km) during the Turkmen Horse Holiday at the National Equestrian Sport Center. Twenty-five horses and riders took part in the marathon. 

Emma's grade six class each picked a country to discover and research in a World Expo project. Emma picked Turkmenistan. 

I have entered this competition for the last three years, since I became a professional photographer, and have received at least one nomination every year. It is very encouraging to participate in a huge international competition and have my images selected by these accomplished judges! 

Professional photographer Kerri-Jo Stewart of Canada was presented with the 9th Annual International Color Awards  THIRD PLACE and Honor of Distinction in the category of Sports at a prestigious Nomination & Winners Photoshow.

Professional photographer Kerri-Jo Stewart of Canada was presented with the 9th Annual International Color Awards top Honorable Mention in the category of Silhouette at a prestigious Nomination & Winners Photoshow.

Emma made us get up to attend a joint Easter Sunrise Service at Garry Point this morning. A bit cold and drizzly but all around we could appreciate the beauty of nature and spring and the flowers seemed to glow in the darkness. It was a peaceful service and a sea lion kept poking his head up every time we sang! 

The  semi-final results of the L'Oreal Colour Trophy are in and our team made it!

One thing I missed out on when becoming a professional photographer is doing an apprenticeship. A huge amount of knowledge can be acquired from working with experienced professional photographers.

Vancouver Pacific Wave Synchronized Swimming Club competing at the National Stream Provincials:

I'm on the Canadian Team!

Here is the December edition of Culinaire Magazine. Check out page 25, that's the blurb about my win in their writing contest. I wrote a story about food and wine and paragliding in Argentina. That story is included in the book, "Flavour Argentina ".

Travel with Kerri-Jo through Argentina. Fly from Buenos Aires to Salta and drive down to Tucumán through some amazing high altitude countryside eating local cuisine and drinking wine while partaking on various adventures! Nine local recipes included.

Steveston Photowalks had a meetup at Bloedel Conservatory. I had fun playing with a few different lenses. 

Here are some vineyard as well as in-camera movement images from a Naramata orchard:

Culinaire Magazine advertised a writing contest for a landscape photography workshop by Scott Forsyth hosted by Kettle Valley Winery. I won!

Delta Photo Club had a meetup at Fraser Downs Racetrack. 

The winning photographs are being displayed at the Aberdeen Shopping Centre in Richmond from Oct 6-31, 2015. Make sure to check them out!! There is quite some talent. First and second place winners were awarded to photographers from China and are really pushing our idea of what is a great portrait as well as having very strong aesthetics. 

I had four images in the curated Photographie exhibition at the Anvil Center in New Westminster.

The Professional Photographers of Canada British Columbia had their 2015 salon this past weekend. 

I had the highest scoring images with three merit images and one excellence.

The latest photojournal from Argamak Publishing by Kerri-Jo Stewart about this year's Turkmen Horse Holiday celebrating the Turkmen Horse in Turkmenistan. A week of festivities and equine celebrations, including a trade fair, endurance racing, jumping, circus acts and of course horse racing. Turkmen culture is intertwined with their horses that are now bred worldwide and known as Akhal-Tekes.

Kerri-Jo is the Master Photographers International Fine Art Photographer of the Year. She also won seven Best in Class awards:

Best in Class: Album in the MPIO image salon:

These are my images that won Best in Class in the Master Photographers International image salon. (Note: I won the most number of class awards as well as the Fine Art Photographer of the Year!)

See all five images receiving Awards of Distinction under the Commercial Category of Master Photographers International's International Image Salon 2015:

I attended the CAPA PhotoExpo this past weekend and was inspired by Andrea Sirois' moving landscapes images. Here are my first few tries. Although I wasn't able to copy her technique I had fun trying and will continue to develop this look.

A big part of our summer is swimming with the Kigoos Summer Swim Club!
Here are some images from the Icebreaker (our home meet):

I have been nominated for Photographer of the Year for both Commercial and Fine Art in the Master Photographers International's International Image Salon 2015! Here are my images receiving a Prestige Award!

The Richmond provincial group of Vancouver Pacific Wave synchronized swimming team is our local synchronized swimming club. They did very well this year at the Provincial Championships in Kamloops. 

During the opening President Berdimuhamedov  praised the Galkynysh equestrian group's successes around the world. They won the grand prize at the 16th International Circus Festival in Italy as well as a gold medal at an international competition in Moscow in 2014. "The Galkynysh group of national equestrian games significantly contributes to promoting the world glory and prestige of Ahalteke horses that is our national glory and developing the art of horse breeding."

Following the endurance race was the show jumping exhibition at the indoor jumping stadium, National Akhalteke Horse Complex. The Presidential Stables as well as the Ministries of Defence and Internal Affairs sponsor riders. The twelve top jumpers in Turkmenistan were part of the competition.

The Turkmen Atlary, the State Horse Breeding Ministry of Turkmenistan, has organized an annual endurance race for four years as part of their national Turkmen Horse Day. The 60 km endurance race was held at the permanent endurance course at the International Equestrian Complex in Gokdere. This year 33 Akhal-Teke horses participated representing riders from all provinces as well as the Presidential Stables, the Ministry of Defense and Internal Affairs.

I am still thinking about the portraits in the recent PPOC salon so I am going to put some thoughts down:

Awarded one each of Excellence, Merit, Accepted and Not Accepted:

I have been juried in as an active member of the Federation of Canadian Artists! 

Our Steveston Photowalks meetup at the Reifel Bird Sanctuary:

The three images I entered in the Moscow Photo Awards all received an Honorable Mention:

All four of my images were nominated in the Black and White Spider Awards. Only one of them was originally for black and white (Tension Lines) and the others I converted just for the competition. I was curious more than anything. But now I will do some more images in Black and White for the image specifically and experiment in that area.

Day of the Horse 2014. Check out the preview:

We went for a walk through the Reifel Bird Sanctuary and of course I took my camera. I used my 80-400mm lens but with the kids I think the 50mm would have been better. Even if you just walk along the paths you will see lots of birds, like these shorebirds and an amazing amount of ducks.

The 3d annual Vancouver International Photography Festival is being held this weekend and today I was presented with the CAPA (Canadian Association of the Photographic Arts) Gold Medal as well as the OEC Best of Show Award for my image, Identity:

I really liked my previous skytrain photos so I did the same thing again. I go to the front and put my camera right against the glass and hold my breath. My BW photo "Tension Lines" of the bridge going over the Fraser River received a Merit at PPOC nationals. I also like my tunnel pics where I shoot long exposures (50mm, f4 at about 1 second).

These are my entries for the PPOC-BC Salon 2014:

The BC Endurance Championships took place on September 13 on the Telemark Nordic Trails in Kelowna. Murray Mackenzie put on a great ride and it was so fun to be a part of it all!!

Nat Geo Your Shot  came out from DC and did their third meetup in Vancouver!
(After New York and San Francisco, next Denver and then Sao Paulo.)

Levente Mady (who has played on Canada's national team and at the Olympic Games, World Championships and World University Games) gave some water polo instruction over the summer and will be coaching a youth water polo program at Watermania on Tuesday and Thursdays at 3:15pm starting in October. 

Thanks to Dionysios of Van City Free Capture Meetups for setting up a group photography tour of the Orpheum:

We visited the Vancouver Art Gallery and explored the experience of art. Both Douglas Coupland's "everywhere is anywhere is anything is everything" and Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller's "Lost in the Memory Palace" are great exploratory exhibitions.

This past weekend I was fortunate to attend a photography workshop put on by the iconic Greg Gorman through Vancouver Photo Workshops. I want to take photographs that reflect the personality within the image, which of course is what Greg does best. There were great photographers in the class and we had very good models.

Nikon and Beau Photo sponsored a shoot at the Canadians vs Tri-City baseball game at Nat Bailey Stadium. They brought out a series of super cool lenses to use, including the 200 f2.0 (my favourite!), 200-400mm, 400mm F2.8 and 600mm f4.0. I had great fun using the 600mm!!

Vernard LuvnGrace Goud, TraceBlackwater & New Image College Present the OFFICIAL EARLY **ArtRAVE: THE ARTPOP BALL TOUR** MEET AND GREET VIP PARTY ** with LADY STARLIGHT (GAGA BFF/TOUR DJ):

Image Explorations was amazing again! I had a great time of course but the real benefit was being able to attend classes with Thom Rouse. Thom's artistic inspiration and knowledge have brought me to the next level as an artist.

Kerry Gibson's third fundraising event for Hycroft's elevator. Kerry has successfully raised enough for the first part of the elevator project, and funds are still needed to bring people to the third floor.

I was quite excited about a fashion launch taking place at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Douglas Coupland's artwork was a great backdrop for the modern European/Russian fashion styles of Garment Global:

Taiwan Tourism Bureau hosted an opening ceremony for Cycling Taiwan. Taipei 101 spokesman Michael Liu (劉家豪) spoke with about the things not to miss in Taipei for business people, even if you're there for a short time make sure to check out this list:

Randi Winter brought me out to Vernard LuvnGrace & Adam Hurstfield's rescheduled make up event at the fancy Xi Shi Lounge at the Shangri-La. Since Lady Gaga's concert was postponed so was Vernard's big event, **The Official LADY GAGA INTERIM RESCHEDULE Afterparty/Party**. But of course Vernard wouldn't let everyone down so they got together and quickly whipped up a great party to make up for it! 

The 2014 International Akhal-Teke Horse Association (IATHA) Special Conference took place in Beijing in May. As this is the Year of the Horse, the China Horse Industry Association concurrently put on a China Horse Cultural Festival. The Akhal-Teke horse of Turkmenistan is symbolic in China as they are recognized as the Emperor's horse and known as the magical Ferghana horse. The theme for the conference was "Peace, Heritage and Dream".

The opening of the Exhibition for the Turkmen Horse Holiday was held on April 24th at the Exhibition Palace in Ashgabat. The ceremony opened with a letter from President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov greeting the exhibitors as well as the participants of the 6th Turkmen Racehorse and World Horse Breeding Art International Scientific Conference.

Shannon Falls is on the way to Whistler Village where we are staying at Bear Lodge for the weekend.

The 4th meeting of the International Akhalteke Horse Breeding Association was held at the Yyldyz Hotel.

The opening ceremony of the library of the Turkmen Atlary State Association:

Here are some photos from the jumping competition took place at the International Equestrian Sports Complex in Ashgabat. The horses went two rounds, the first at 110cm and then 120cm.

The Akhal-Teke horse delegation mostly stayed at the Ashgabat Hotel. It's a nice hotel just above the Stadium and beside Bagt Kosgi (the Wedding Palace). 

Here are some fun shots of me playing with the Fuji X100S during my flights to and from Ashgabat. Nothing like playing with a camera when you're stuck in a seat for hours!

A few people braved the rain and went out on a photo walk in Vancouver (better saturation in the rain anyways!). 

These are my entries for the PPOC Salon 2014:

Fallen Angel & Lost in a Love Story in Photohaus Gallery's EROS, February 2014 (Vancouver, BC, Canada)

Opening Reception for the Visual Narrative: March 14th, Mpls Photo Center

Congratulations! Your photograph in General category is qualified to the Final judgment stage.

My image of the marching soldiers in Turkmenistan has been selected to be exhibited in Susan Burnstine's exhibition, The Visual Narrative at the Mpls Photo Center in Minneapolis! 

the Golden Stallion wins at HIPA 

Here is the certificate for being selected as an individual member of the National Photographic Team of Canada for the 2013 World Photographic Cup: 

Tons of snow today in Steveston! I thought it would be a great time to get photos of Cuba, our cat, playing in the snow. 

I took Katie Huisman's Portraiture course through Vancouver Photo Workshops. Katie is amazing with how she looks at images and how much she sees. I've learned tons on what to look for in both posing and post production of a variety of types of shoots, including business and corporate, actor and fashion.

Cavalia comes again to Vancouver with Cavalia Odysseo. The scenery highlights some amazing landscapes, joining humans and horses in their voyage of discovery as they travel around the world:

Hijab 1 & 2 in Photohaus Gallery's Socialconciousness Exhibition curated by Katie Huisman:

I am doing Dogs of Steveston to get out and photograph every week and just enjoy our great area, Steveston. It's a fun project inspired in part by Humans of New York:

Bill Buchannon and his Clydesdales are a legacy in Vancouver. He has been breeding and showing them at the PNE for over 50 years.

Christopher Pike arranged a Super Shoot, Philippines Shoot for a Cause, as a fundraiser Philippines Typhoon survivors through the Red Cross. Everyone donated time and some money and the event raised over $2,000.

Delta Photo Club met on Granville Street instead of holding their regular group meeting. We all had fun with night street photography and the rain added some great colour reflections to all the lights.

An Afternoon of Fashion, Champagne and Opera benefiting the Breast Cancer Society was hosted by Cynthia Pace and Randi Winter at the Hycroft Mansion, home of the Vancouver University Women's Club.

I was going to a fashion show in support of breast cancer and I decided it would be more fun to shoot it than just sit and watch:

Here's my latest photojournal from the Turkmen Horse Day this year. You can order directly from Blurb as an 8x10 inch book or contact me for one of the nine 11x13 inch limited hardcover editions with special paper, signed and numbered.

‘Out of Blue’ was selected and awarded CAPA Gold medal in VIPF 2013 Photo Contest:

Kerri-Jo's Portfolio: People

A visit to Grouse Mountain to see the Raptors:

A group of us got together on Sunday morning for a fun shoot at Britannia Shipyard:

I went to two of Syx Langemann's lectures. In the One-Light Demonstration Syx went logically through the effects of direct on-camera flash to off camera and then adding reflectors. His "Once I Was a Camera" lecture was a teaser for his course and inspiration from his personal projects.

Here is the article about feeding to reduce your horse's coat color from fading for Equine Wellness Magazine:

Here is Kerri-Jo's winning image from the Super Shoot at Image Explorations:

Here are some photos I took during the Arthur Meyerson workshop atVancouver Photo Workshops. The theme was "the color moment":

Kerri-Jo won the PPOC BC Top Editorial Image (Osman Tajizadeh of Kalalai, Golestan, Iran):

Kerri-Jo won the PPOC BC Best First Entry of 2013 (Turkman Sunrise):

Kerri-Jo won the PPOC BC Top Press Image (Off to War):

My photo of Osman Tajizadeh of Kalalai (Golestan, Iran) is on the cover of the Richmond News today! And the article is some of my story about the images that won the PPOC BC Photographer of the Year award!!

In this photojournal special edition some of the special guests invited to the Turkmen Horse Celebrations talk about their experiences ... and of course Kerri-Jo's comments about her amazing experiences during the celebrations along with some gorgeous photos!

Kerri-Jo is the PPOC BC Photographer of the Year!

There are two days left and Rae-Anne needs your support for her documentary film, Sable Island, The Beauty of the Free!

We had a great time at the Mane Event Expo in Chilliwack! There were great trainers as well as an awesome show:

Visit Kerri-Jo Stewart at the Mane Event Chilliwack 2012, October 19th – 21st at the Argamak Photography booth. She will have an artwork display and you can check out her books, including Shooting Gold:

Kerri-Jo is recognized as an expert in Equine photography by the Professional Photographers of Canada!

This trip was my third to Turkmenistan and the second time I was lucky enough to celebrate their "Day of the Horse", the holiday of the Turkmen racer. The Turkmen Atlary were our gracious hosts and showed off their amazing horses in many different competitions, including halter contests, jumping, endurance and of course horse racing.

Caspian horses are cute little riding horses that are becoming popular mounts for children. Even though they are small (9-12hh) they are referred to as horses as they are more similar in phenotype (how they look) to horses than ponies. They are reported to be a versatile, hardy and intelligent horse that is biddable and willing to work with people.

Forage is a staple in any horse’s diet, and the best sources are natural grasses and hay. But if your horse has special needs, here are 8 alternatives for consideration.

Although free feeding is considered best for horses, it is not always beneficial (or easy to do) in captive situations.

My photo of the Highland pony was bought for the cover of December's issue of Top Flight magazine (Russia).

Turkmenistan celebrated the 20th year of Independence this year on October 27th. It was an amazing parade with beautiful choreography. First the military paraded through the square, then the horses and then the various groups. You really have to check out how they set it up with background flags and all the colours!

Talk about the trip of a lifetime! This small but so historical country overflows with culture and hospitality. Turkmenistan is absolutely amazing and a must visit, especially for horse lovers. Their beautiful Akhal-Teke horse is intertwined throughout their history and remains an important part of their society. They celebrate them on the last Sunday in April, which is their "Day of the Horse", the holiday of the Turkmen racer.

Watch for my stories about Cavalia in the Horse Canada and Equine Wellness magazines!

The horses go from right off the truck into the ring to give a short performance for media. Sylvia Zerbini gently lets them express themselves and play while asking them for a performance.

Fairland is a great performer full of infectious enthusiasm with the horses. She stated that Roman Riding used to be known as the Polish Post. In Poland it became imperative to have a faster mail delivery system so they dropped the mail cart and put all the mail on the horses. Then the driver stood on the back of the horses for a speedy delivery system.

I was lucky enough to be invited to the arrival of Cavalia in Vancouver and had the great privilege of meeting the handlers and the horses first hand. Normand stated that he had this crazy idea to put 50 horses in a show together with almost 100 performers. Cavalia is now famous for the variety of performances with riders, aerialists, acrobats, dancers and musicians but most of all for the relationship between these people and the horses.

Many of us have had to deal with soaking a horse’s hay, whether  because of an airway sensitivity or allergy, or for nutritional reasons.  And we can relate to the “joys” of handling soaked flakes in sub-zero  temperatures (though with new equipment such as the Haydrator, this is  getting easier). Now that there are more advanced ways of soaking and  steaming hay, it means a greater investment on your part – so does it  matter what method you use?

It seems that there is a broad spectrum of plants that have anti-nematodal / anthelmintic activities. The trick is in getting the correct amounts and most effective combination. This is an experiment for me, I'm not recommending it to any one else!

Ponies aren’t horses. That means they can’t be fed the same way you would feed your horses. The obvious difference is in their smaller size, but ponies also tend to have more efficient metabolisms because they are designed to get maximum nutrition out of sparse coarse forage. They developed into tougher and more efficient keepers than most horses, and are adapted to conditions with harsher climates. 

I think this is a great idea!! A perfect way to feed grass all year with hydroponics:

Equinome: The identification of a gene variant in Thoroughbred racehorses that is predictive of genetic potential for an athletic phenotype.

The authors are of the opinion that the bit can be a welfare and safety problem for both horse and horseman. Equestrian organisations that currently mandate use of the bit for competitions are urged to review their rules. 

Your horses are affected by transport and need time to recover fully following transportation. They also have increased susceptibility to disease in the 24 hours following transportation. Also, they are less stressed and less likely to get sick if their heads are not tied during transportation.
Included is a summary of shipping fever (pleuropneumonia).

Hess et al. (1) conducted an interesting supplementation trial on horses during an endurance race with an international group*. They found that electrolytes with high Sodium and without Potassium, combined with a higher Calcium feed were advantageous to the horses and potentially decreases pull rates. 

The dietary cation-anion difference (DCAD) of a feed can be used to characterize large animal diets. DCAD (also known as DCAB or dietary cation-anion balance) of the diet is a major determinant of blood SID as the strong ions enter the blood from the digestive tract (Riond 2000)... DCAD affects systemic acid-base balance because it defines the overall net cation to anion content of the feed. 

Neilsen and Spooner of Michigan State did a post hoc study of research looking at changes in bone as a result of either nutrition or exercise. The interest in decreasing skeletal injury in horses is of course of great practical importance to horse owners and trainers. They found that it is exercise that causes improvements in bone throughout the literature.

Here is an abstract of research from Northern Arizona University finding that stallions were faster than both mares and geldings. Looking at the results for Thoroughbred, the stallions were lengths ahead of the mares at the 1600m (or less) races and there was twice as much difference between them at races over 1600m.

Massage therapy (MT) is an accepted and used primary treatment option for DOMS. However, MT lacks validity as a medical modality because its effects have yet to be scientifically established.

The type of feed the horse eats is what determines what fuel is available for the horse to use during exercise. So it is important to figure out the optimal diet for your horses. Although there has been research showing the benefits of fat supplementation over feeding grain in equine diets, many people still prefer to add grain to the diet thinking it is better for their horses. This paper is one of the more recent showing that fat supplemented horses used less glucose during endurance exercise than the horses whose diet was supplemented with sweet feed. That means that that their limited glycogen stores are used up faster than when they are fed the higher fat diet. So, it is the horses fed higher fat without the grain whose energy systems will benefit in endurance exercise. And on top of what to feed for best performance is that the traditional high grain diet may be a root cause of many problems, including laminitis, obesity, diabetes and tying up.

Daily variation in the measured blood constituents identified in this study was due to either feeding or dehydration. All values were within physiological limits, showing that any circadian rhythm evident in this study was within clinical reference ranges, with the exception of [TCO2]. Ninety percent of the horses had a [TCO2] above 35.0 mmol/L at some point during the study and 70% of the horses had a [TCO2] above 36.0 mmol/L and may have received a positive TCO2 test result in the Ontario racing industry.

The purpose of the research described in this thesis is to investigate effects of feeding and daily variation of equine blood parameters on plasma acid-base status. Therefore, the presented physiological information should improve our basic knowledge of the daily changes in plasma acid-base status and set the stage for further research on acid-base status in horses.

Track racing relies heavily on the horse’s anaerobic metabolism to produce the speeds necessary to win. One widely accepted theory is that a major limiting factor to high intensity exercise is the production of lactic acid in the muscles. This paper examines the way lactate is produced and utilised in the horse. It outlines how lactate affects the horse during exercise and describes metabolic changes occurring with high intensity exercise.