Thursday, February 24, 2011

winter time and the living's easy


Water has the ability to transform the ordinary into something magical. Snow, ice, or in this case, fog, draped the trees in a little bit of mystery, reducing their color and details and emphasizing their forms.

I still contend that human beings were not designed to manage as many details as we do. That if you consider all of human history, it's only the last few decades in which we've been bombarded with the sheer volume of information we now attempt to process. Perhaps that's why for myself at least, I find simple images in nature so soothing. It's a relief. Quiets the mind. And adding a unifying layer of fog or snow (as I am looking out upon this morning) to an already lovely subject just makes it more simple and serene. That's my theory, and I'm sticking to it.


I pass by these tree trunks every week or two when I walk down to the water's edge. Also the little creek I posted on the page with the my new images on my site. There are also several other foggy morning images.


This final image is one of several I've dug out of my archives, and remixed. Again, the effect I am creating is one that emphasizes the beauty of form by removing color and by amping up the contrast.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Tiny Bubbles...



(Now try and get THAT song out of your head.)

There are wonderful images to be created out in cold, rainy, dreary weather. But sometimes, I just can't get myself to get out in it. (Maybe because I'm calling it dreary? I actually do like the changing weather here.)

Anyway, this week I played indoors with a pan of bubbles, altering the light, the background colors, the angles. The results highlight the forms and shapes in a way that I really enjoy. Hope you do, too. You can see them all at karen ussery latest.