Postcards from the Creative Journey

1084 A Misty, Moisty Morning

Our host had a family emergency and had to leave a day early, so our last day of photography consisted of a rainy, foggy morning and was over by lunchtime.  Apparently misty, moisty mornings happen in the Atlantic Northeast just as well as the Pacific Northwest. With that weather we felt right back at home and headed out to photograph.

We drove to the Bubble Pond, the Jordan Pond and the Jordan Stream. Even though it sprinkled as we went out to photograph, we remembered our two rain rules, developed over decades of outdoor photography. The first rule is it almost never rains all the time at every place you want to photograph. The second rule is that there is no such thing as bad weather, there is only bad clothing. 

With good clothing and optimism, we made some nice images on our last morning photographing.

1083 Photography by Appointment Only

I’ve done photography by appointment before, but that was because we needed to coordinate our subject matter with the tide tables. That’s a completely natural thing to do and not a man made contrivance. In order to ascend to the peak of Cadillac Mountain, one must arrange an appointment time to keep the peak of the mountain free of tourist traffic jams. 

We took our time reaching the peak by moseying around the island to capture a few interesting items. The house was one of those interesting things. 

The top of the mountain is about 1500 feet above sea level gave us a pretty good views of the surrounding islands.

The interesting thing about fall leaves and light is that on an overcast day like today, the leaves photograph better. Harsh light washes out the color, flat light reduces the contrast and lets the leaf color shine through.

We have a half day of photography left on Monday and then we head back to base camp near Albany. I'm home on Wednesday afternoon and back to reality.

1082 A Pleasant Day for a Drive

Not much artistic, intellectual or sophisticated photography (not yet, at least), but we did get a chance to make some very nice photographs.

Our host took us on a well-planned drive around Desert Island showing us wonderful places and things to photograph. The plan has been to photograph early in the morning, break for lunch and rest and then go back out in late afternoon. 

I made this photo near sunset on the beach. I was facing away from the sunset. About a half dozen other photographers were also there, lined up in perfect formation so that each of them could make the same sunset photograph.

1082 Negotiating the Transition

The tough part about working on projects is that projects must end. The objective is met, the celebration is over, the lessons learned are remembered and then…

What’s next? The temptation is to rest on one’s laurels and wait for the muses to inspire. Waiting for the muses to find you is perilous. The muses will only find you if you are out working, not sitting at home on those laurels.

If you wish to continue working on projects, it is imperative that you have multiple projects underway simultaneously. That way, you can pick up a project that is already underway. Overlapping projects are the easiest way to keep on creating. The dead space between a completed project and starting the next project from scratch can wind up being a very long time. Having multiple projects in progress is a good way to keep productive.

1081 Strolling Through A Meadow on a Friday Afternoon

After a Friday lunch, we headed back out to stroll through meadow and woodland trails. Meadows here seem to indicate a swampy thick forest with either built up paths or duckboards to keep you out of the swamp. A pleasant walk,and we did find a few scenes worth memorializing.

We crashed and burned after Friday dinner and are having a great deal of trouble getting motivated for early Saturday morning photography. The intense creative space is catching up with us. 

1080 Arrrgh Matey! Marooned on a Desert Island

That would be Desert Island on the Coast of Maine which hosts Acadia National Park. Happily, we are staying near South Harbor, on what’s the “quiet side of the island.” We got up this morning at zero dark thirty to make sure we could get in place to photograph at the right place in time for the early morning light. 

After we ran out of the predawn and early dawn light, we headed over to Otter Cliffs and photographed until the light got a bit higher in the sky. 

All that and we’re finished by 9:30 AM. Now, we have to wait and watch the race between the afternoon sun and the afternoon overcast. Maybe there will be more images from today, maybe not. We'll just have to wait and see.

1079 The Indecisive Moment, First Published 11/13/2011

Indecision is the biggest killer of great photographs. I can think of nothing worse than being undecided about a photograph. The first decision every photographer must make is whether or not to commit to a particular scene. In the olden days of film photography (like, five years ago) there was a cost for film and an investment of time in the creation of a photograph. When I was doing large format photography, I took a long time to decide if I was committed enough to the scene to spend the time and money on developing the film and making a print. There was a whole lot of editing done before the shutter was pressed because there was an investment of time and money on the outcome. Prior to the exposure, you had to be committed to the photograph and the process.

A long time ago Portland Photographer Richard Brown made a comment about people taking 1/30 of a second to make a photograph and spent the rest of their life trying to explain the photograph. I think it’s much better to take the necessary time to figure out what the photograph will mean, how you will achieve that meaning and then decisively make the photograph.

1078 It’s a Catch Your Breath Day

We’ve been photographing for five days straight and it’s time to hold up for a bit and catch your breath. Today has been a day to take care of domestic chores, blog writing, just taking some time to rest from the explorations of the last few days and prepare for the next phase of the trip. The next phase starts tomorrow with an all day drive to Acadia National Park in Maine. Our route may not be the most direct, but we’re hoping it might be the most scenic. 

We’re expecting that once we get settled in Maine, the photographic pace will pick up considerably in order to meet the opportunities on the scenic coast of Maine.

In the meantime, here are a few images from the previous few days. I’m not sure if these images will ever be used beyond being included in the blog, but I like them right now and that’s good enough.

1077 “I’ve Got This”

This was the epitaph on the grave of a twenty-something young man. It’s one of those conflicting moments when humor and reality collide. I think it was Alfred Hitchcock who said that watching someone fall into an open manhole is comedy. Bringing the camera to the edge of the manhole and looking down is horror. So it is, with this epitaph.

Today’s destination was the Oakwood Cemetery in Troy, New York. We’re starting to push the vision in the right direction by emphasizing the foliage and roll of the land and making the statuary and markers fit into the composition rather than just making pictures of statuary. It seems to work a little bit better. The sad news is that we’re here just about a week or two ahead of when the leaves will be in full autumn color. At that point the synchronicity between the dying leaves and the statuary will make for some beautiful and thoughtful compositions.

1076 Another Day of the Dead

When you find a good location, you return to the location again. And maybe again if the place is good enough, big enough and doggone it,  really nice, then it’s worth returning. The Rural Albany Cemetery is all of those. Returning means learning and learning gives you an understanding of what is out there and what you might do to improve upon earlier attempts. 

After thinking about it the night before, we decided that the images of statuary we photographed on the first day were kind of plain, and limited in variety. How to improve the quality of the images we pursued was a big question.

 

We answered that question by changing the approach to the subject matter by changing the premise to photographing the Cemetery as landscape with whatever monuments and statuary we found as additional elements to the compositions. 

 

1075 Starting to Learn the Territory

Our local contact suggested that we check out local cemeteries. Why not? We stopped first at the Jewish Cemetery but only made a few images. 

We went on to the Rural Cemetery. We were told that many years ago, residents of Albany came out to visit family graves with a picnic lunch and enjoyed an afternoon in the country. The Cemetery is still a popular site for jogging, walking (both human and canine), and people visiting the final resting place of their loved ones. 

Add to the visitors, a couple of photographers who were entranced by the spaciousness of the place and the ornate gravestones. We found a place to make landscape photographs among the gravestones. A passing shower made us realize we had spent most of the afternoon photographing the landscape of a cemetery before we returned home. 

1074 It’s All About the Access

October 7

Access is the key to successful photography. As we found out yesterday, wandering around isn’t the best thing for creating photographs. Our host obtained access to a church, built in 1816 and still in use today. We drove a couple of hours to the church and spent the afternoon in photography. My previous experience photographing churches has been on the scale of basilicas to cathedrals. This church was much smaller, less ornamented and lacked the decorations I am used to in photographing Catholic Churches. 

It was a wonderful afternoon.