Coast Redwood Tree bark, Roosevelt Grove, Humbolt Redwoods State Park, California
I am still sorting through images I like from our trip out to Northern California. This particular shot was made on the last day. We made one last stop in Humbolt Redwoods State Park hoping for some foggy areas. I was still searching for ideas on ways to convey the enormous size of these trees aside from including people in the shot. I found this little scene where initially I was just attracted to the gorgeous bark on the two large trees on either end. I started out just making close up images of the bark, somewhat abstract.
With a little change in camera position, I also was able to include a smaller tree in between them. The problem I faced was the sun was already quite bright out, and the background was getting quite full of bright spots. I did a 5 exposure blend with this image to be able to capture the entire range, and then cropped the really bright areas off the top. I like the contrast, detail, and color of the bark, it really highlights why these trees are called “Redwoods.” I thought the wider format also emphasized the width of the larger trees. It is still hard to get a feel for exactly how big these trunks are, but at least you know they are big relative to the smaller one! :-)
Read MoreAs mentioned in my previous post, one of the main sites we wanted to visit during our visit were the popular California Coast Redwoods. Of course, the Redwoods are not in one area, they are spread out along the northern California coastline where the climate is perfect for them to thrive. We selected a spot near the middle of the various parks to reduce travel time to each one. Ultimately we ended up just visiting two of the primary ones, Humbolt Redwoods State Park and Redwoods National Park. There are some other parks further north towards the Oregon border, but we simply ran out of time to venture that far.
Coast Redwood old growth forest, Rockefeller Forest, Humbolt Redwood State Park, California
Redwoods themselves are an interesting species of tree. Aside from their great size and height, their bark can be up to a foot thick (305 cm). This makes them very resistant to insects, as well as fires. Their biggest threats appear to be damage due to other falling trees, and climate change. Climate is the main reason they are now limited to this isolated region of the north California and Oregon coastlines, reaching only about 40-50 miles inland. Due to their extreme height (up to 380 feet / 115 m), they actually span three different climate zones, from the shady, moist forest floor, to the stem in between, to the sunny, windy, and drier canopy. Another interesting fact I learned is that the larger trees can release up to 500 gallons of water into the air per day. No doubt an important contribution to the climate of the entire region.
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Textured Tulip from my yard
I spent some time photographing this morning pretty close to home, about as close as I can get actually – our front yard. My wife Lisa has done an amazing job with flowers around our house, and I often take advantage of having a lot of great subjects around. Today I photographed one of our tulips that has not opened yet. I was immediately drawn towards the tear drop shape formed by the petals, and knew I wanted this to be a focal point in the photograph.
Identifying what you are drawn to up front can help a lot when you are forming your composition, and also focus your post-processing. It helps guide your entire decision making process on how to approach your subject, and how to ultimately represent it.
The color of the tulip was pretty vibrant pink, an overpowering pink actually. Color can quickly become a rock concert when you are only after a light ballad. The color quickly became a dominant feature of the photograph, giving less emphasis to the small shape I was attracted to. That color needed to be tamed!
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Deer in messy woods
The woods behind my house are quite chaotic. There are all sorts of vines, twigs, fallen limbs, and probably the center of the world’s collection on thorny plants. I have often wondered why I don’t see the deer with a thousand scratches on their sides. They obviously have mastered navigation through this mess.
Now as a photographer, striving to create simplicity in my work, I look at this and think – what a mess! What am I going to do with this? I find myself quite challenged to make some type of simple, harmonious image of this place. Just walking through it can be quite an effort, let alone composing some type of organized photograph from it.
It is interesting to think about the reaction of the human mind to clutter versus harmony. We are naturally attracted to visual stimuli that seems to be in balance. Conversely, clutter tends to lead to visual tension and stress. Then again, many people see simplicity and harmony in a Jackson Pollock painting! With that, it chaos really in the eye of the beholder? These woods actually resemble many of Pollock’s works.
All sorts of questions, not many answers, but they are fun to think about. I thought this image communicated the environment pretty well. While not an image that I would hang on my wall, it still reminds me of this day when I was just sitting after a fresh rain watching a herd of about 8 deer navigate effortlessly through these woods. Sometimes maybe that is enough.
Read More“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” - Leonardo da Vinci
Perhaps you have read this quote before, I certainly have. It is one of those quotes that states so much more than the simple words that it is composed of. I don’t think about the literal aspects of this much, but in practice, it is something we all do with every image, every time in the field and afterwards. I was recently reminded of it in reading Guy Tal’s new ebook on Creative Processing Techniques.
Abandoned resort in Bonaire
With photography, the process of abandonment can be brought about by a number of influences and has a number of different stages. When you think about it, it can happen during capture, during editing, during post processing, or even in the act of storage. Each one of those stages brings about different reasons why abandonment might happen at that particular point. A photograph is faced with a lot of different obstacles to overcome before reaching its way out to the world, or not at all.
This process of nurturing a photograph along came to mind for me upon thinking about this quote again. It can be like what I described in my last post where you are trying to find suitable subjects to fit into a puzzle. The process of searching in the field is much like nurturing it to become something more tangible. We make conscious decisions to work a subject further, or to move on to something new. Abandonment in the field may be a creative choice, or one plagued by outside circumstances like time, opportunity, or state of mind.
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