December

With the winter solstice, full moon, lunar eclipse last night, and a cold running through the office… no wonder I’m feeling under the weather today.  Sorry I didn’t get any photographs of the big event, but it was amazing to see none the less.  I hope you too woke up long enough to witness one of nature’s wonders last night.  I’m hoping we get some snowfall soon so I’m able to add to my winter images… it’s harder to find exciting material to photograph in the ‘brown’ of winter in Pennsylvania.  December has always been the hardest month for me to be inspired by the season… no ice, no water, always overcast, no contrasts… just shades of brown.

Yes, the mahonia are in bloom and some of the other winter bloomers are hoping for warmer days and sunshine.  But as a photographer, this is the time of year I find new trees, new forms and dances among the bare branches.  I add them to my mental database, watch and ponder the best conditions to capture their grace.  The only thing keeping me inside lately is the strong winds we’ve had almost every day this month.  But with the shortest day of the year now behind us, we have longer days, brighter light and maybe a little snow to look forward to for the rest of the winter.  December is restorative…  time to enjoy the quietness of this time of year and let the creative process slow and wander.  For it’s during these times we can more easily reflect and embrace what is truly important to each of us as human beings and as artists.

salt crystals

Winter has definitely had her grip on eastern Pennsylvania this month.  It’s been in the 20s every night and cloudy and below freezing every day with a howling wind.  And then last night we had our first snowfall… just enough to dust the ground and cause traffic nightmares, but too late for any chance of an evening shoot after work.  So I’m inside editing tonight and it’s a good thing since it has been almost two weeks since my last post.  This dusting has definitely excited me about getting some good snowfall, frost or ice for photography.  But I may have to wait until January or February at this point as the weather is forecast to be above freezing during the day for the next week or so.  Christmas lights just might have to do for the next week while the sun fully sets before I’m off from my day job.

So I came across the image above while editing… it’s from Death Valley this fall, near the salt flats after the sun came over the horizon and side-lit the salt crystals.  Not frost or snow… but another wonder of nature.

being a photographer

I am thinking tonight about how lucky we all are to have our sight.  Photographers use more than just their physical sight to “see” a photograph.  But tonight I am thinking about this because my father is having eye surgery Tuesday to correct a blown retina after cataract surgery.  A visual artist who may or may not get his full sight back.

It takes a lot of emotional courage to be an artist. Remembering this, I picked up a favorite book again tonight, Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking by David Bayles and Ted Orland, and found this quote to share… “In the ideal – that is to say, real – artist, fears not only continue to exist, they exist side by side with the desires that complement them, perhaps drive them, certainly feed them.  Naive passion, which promotes work done in ignorance of obstacles, becomes – with courage – informed passion, which promotes work done in full acceptance of those obstacles.”

The photo above is of aspen trees on the shore of Grant Lake in the Eastern Sierras. Clicking the thumbnail will bring up a larger image for closer viewing.

editing skills

I was going through my images from the trip west ranking them for processing and realized the best images are from when I was allowing myself to trust what I saw rather than trying to make an image of something I thought might be interesting.  I guess this is one of the lessons of editing, a task I rather dislike but am beginning to value.  I’ve certainly taken images and not known how to process them until later; I needed some additional digital darkroom skills. But I’ve come to realize that if I keep my mind open during the editing process, and take time to look at past images, patterns and concepts appear and sometimes I see something I couldn’t quite understand earlier.  What continues to surprise me is that I need some time away from the actual image making in the field to be able to really edit well.

The image of the cottonwood above is from Bishop, CA when I was scouting for petroglyphs before sunset.  But this tree and its pattern caught my attention and I’m glad I stopped to photograph it!  Be certain to click on the image above to view it larger.  This blog template does not allow very large thumbnails.

reflections

Reflections… a good metaphor for the writing I’ve been working on lately and for thinking about how photography fits into life!  I’ve been organizing images from my trip west and realized just how many panorama and reflection images I have.  But this has to be one of my favorite of the reflections… the Merced River in Yosemite National Park.  Enjoy!

Image capture with Nikon D700 camera and 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VRII AF-S Nikkor Zoomm Lens

fall colors

In preparations for my trip to Death Valley, I was playing with (learning the functions of) a rented 70-200mm lens so that I was not fumbling too much in the field with it.  I’ve been watching the transformation of the Rhus typhina colors near the underpass on route 320 and captured this abstract that represents more of what I saw than a fully focused image of this planting and cars.  I’ll be back in a couple of weeks and hope to have some beautiful images of the western part of our beautiful country to share!

milkweed

 

milkweed blowing in the wind

 

This past week has been an amazing transformation into fall color here in eastern Pennsylvania.  The colors are really starting to blaze… but there are still smaller miracles happening every day.  I found a beautiful field of milkweed blowing in the wind and later discovered the little milkweed bug (a true bug known as Oncopeltus fasciatus) and her offspring hiding in the shadows!

subtle autumn

Image taken with Nikon D700, 105mm lens at ISO 200, 2sec @ f/32

Sunday I spent much of the day scouting a little further from home for potential fall color spots in SE Pennsylvania.  But I am always amazed at what might be found just in my own backyard if I take the time to venture out a little further, look a little closer, and at the same time open myself up to possibilities.

I’ve admired this grove of wild sassafras in the Crum Woods for years, but I’ve never been able to capture what it is about them that I find so appealing.  I’ve always taken a frame of the whole tree in its fall coat.  But it’s the wildness and the twisted forms that really catch my imagination.  They aren’t quite at their peak yet.  But I realized today that the transition between summer and peak fall color is subtly beautiful.  Why do most photographers always seek out the “show” or “color peak” to photograph trees in autumn?  Perhaps because color has such a strong impact to images and our reactions to them.  And don’t get me wrong… I love these images too.  Fall color is a miracle to behold.  But I find myself lingering longer with images that don’t have such a color punch, but where the colors play a softer role in my contemplative process.

first signs

Yesterday I spent some time scouting some local sites to see how fall color is progressing.  Some of the first signs of autumn were evident in the native dogwoods and this lovely specimen was sitting on top of a hill at the Brandywine Battlefield in Chadds Ford, PA.  Many of our tulip poplars and oaks are dropping slightly yellow but mostly brown leaves and I’m thinking I may need to go north this year for some of the yellow displays.  But a few stressed sugar maples are keeping me hopeful that the reds will still show up around the end of October.

red in September

young seedhead of Magnolia grandiflora

This morning was a perfect morning for macro photography… not a hint of a breeze, a chill in the air with some morning fog and dew.  Just before sunrise I found this magnificent Magnolia grandiflora covered in cone-like structures.  These fruiting cones turn pink to red when they ripen and later this fall will split open to reveal the brilliant red seeds suspended on a fine silk-like thread.

Today they remind me of autumn’s renewal.  So many think of autumn as a time of decay, death and dormancy.  But autumn is also the time of spring hopeful and the renewal of life.