Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Picture Tuesday!

I can come to terms with the concept of my own mortality, but I am scared of thinking about yours

Hi everyone! No, Christie and I have not vanished, we have both come down with nasty colds, and the only thing going on outside of our respective daily responsibilities has been rest and sleep. I’m not going to let that stop me from my photo Tuesday though, I was adamant about that. I woke up early this morning to make sure and take a dose of daytime cold meds, and pack up some camera gear to take along with me to work. When the time came for me to take a lunchtime stroll around work to snap some pictures, I wasn’t so sure it was a wonderful idea as it was cold and breezy, as well as muddy. I sucked it up and went out anyways, I mean, it would have really defeated the purpose of having brought along gear to work right?

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So off into a large, muddy field out behind my work I went in search of any signs of spring. Not a green blade of grass anywhere. Seriously, everywhere I looked there was only brown crunched up vegetation and mud. No real colour of any sort to find. I trudged around with my camera out for what seemed like 10-15 minutes before I noticed that there were all kinds of things to take photos of around me, I just had to look. There were these shrunken berry looking things on the ends of some branches, and plenty of tall, dried out grasses for me to get creative with. It helped that the light just happened to be rather pleasant, and the sky a nice baby blue.

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I walked around and had some fun playing with depth of field, bokeh (that funky, pleasing blurry effect), and the textures of my surroundings that were emphasized by the natural sunlight. What began as a sniffling, cold walk around without much hope had quickly turned into something I was really very happy about, I just had to be a little flexible on what I was trying to capture. When I first set out I had the idea concreted in my head that I was going out there to find some magical shoot of green grass poking out of a muddy puddle, or a single bud on a branch beginning to open up, and instead of being totally discouraged when that idea didn’t pan out, I took in my surroundings and found something I had not thought of finding. It really is a good lesson, even with careful planning and well thought out shots, a photo session, whether an interior shot that is all setup, or an outside search for that perfect capture, it is always a good idea to keep yourself open and let a little bit of randomness enter that creative process.

Feelers

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Babe, they are amazing... and very familiar! All of Montreal looks like that now unfortunately. Near my bus stop at school there is this little patch of berries that somehow grew throughout the winter and are just now dying. The whole time I thought of how great you could make them look, bright red in the white snow... but after seeing that first pic I'm sure you could still make them look wonderful!

Hilary said...

These are really beautiful. Maybe you could tell us what f-stop etc. you used. I'd love that kind of info.

Ian said...

Sure thing Hilary, I will check the metadata as soon as I get in on these and update the info onto the pictures on my Flickr :D

Simones Kitchen said...

Ah... there you are!! I was wondering where you two had gone off too, but sick... that is not a pleasant thing. Hope you both feel better soon!

Great shots despite the not so green nature at this time of year. What I sometimes do during spring when I go in search of funky insects to shoot (I can't help it, I just like the creepy crawlies) I just find a spot, any spot, and then just try and stay there for a while. It's funny how after a few minutes or so, the place suddenly just comes alive with things you notice! It's like you wandering around and suddenly realizing there is plenty of stuff to shoot! Love the blue sky!! (it was raining here all day...:(

Coco Bean said...

Ha ha Junglefrog, yeah we are still here, a little worse for wear. I didn't think that anyone would notice that we were gone! Ian and I have been eatting packaged soup and take-out. (so gross but no one wants to cook)

When I was in art school I used to do the same thing and just sit down, look around, and draw all of the small things that no one would notice.
I hope that the skies clear for you soon! Thanks for the message.

Ian said...

Hi Hilary, checked out the metadata, and I feel silly as it is literally exactly as I thought it was, but I wanted to be 100% sure. I used the same settings on each..

Lens:60mm Micro Nikkor F 2.8
Iso: 100
Aperture: 3.2
Shutter: 1200
WB: Sunny
Exposure: -0.7
Color Mode IIIa
Saturation set to Enhanced