Twilight Branches, Image # TR-8330
Hey folks, long time no post eh?
Things have been a bit slow this spring on many fronts for me, suffering from both photo and writers block. I know the way to kick it is just to “do something” – anything – but it is sometimes a real drag on motivation as well. However, I couldn’t let April slip by with only one post! :-)
I have had a recent surge in print orders (always a good thing), and it is interesting how they come in surges. I can have very little activity on the photo business front for awhile, and then all of the sudden – BAM! I am slammed with orders. (not a complaint! 
). The down time did allow me to finally get to a section of my website I have been wanting to finish for some time. That is my frameless print section. (more…)
NOAA sky cover forecast - socked in gray!
I was anxious last night because I wanted to get up early today and head up to Lake Huron to hopefully do some long shutter speed blurs at the shoreline during twilight. However, the weather forecast didn’t look like it was going to cooperate with my intentions. One of my favorite tools for checking the weather is the NOAA Graphical Forecast. I like this particular forecast tool because it offers a lot of different overlays to show you what the conditions are going to be like, in addition to temperature, rain, etc. I like using it to check forecasted sky cover to see if a morning twilight might have a chance of some nice colors.
While I haven’t learned the secret formula yet for colors, I have learned that if it shows solid gray across the state, your chances are pretty much ZERO. Even a bit of rain wouldn’t bother me if the tool showed it moving past quickly and clearing the sky before dawn. Still, it was worth checking early this morning to see if things changed overnight. (more…)
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Clinton River in snow, image #WI-9552
I shall be snowy, no, wait, I will be warm, no, maybe some ice, no, bitter cold, no, how about some rain? We have been on a roller coaster ride in our temperatures here for months. This is turning into the craziest winter in my recent memory. I have only had to shovel twice since November (not that I am complaining on that part).
This snowy scene was just last Sunday with snow we basically received that day. The day before, we had nothing. I had a couple of hours to do an evening hike in the woods. This river is about a 10-15 minute walk from my house. The woods were beautifully covered in snow.
Yesterday, it was 55 deg F – and all gone. Michigan’s Winter is having an identity crisis. How many personalities have we yet to see? Blink and you might just miss something. I must say I am somewhat liking the unpredictability, instead of day in and day out of cold weather.
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Tangerine Tango Sky, Denali National Park, Alaska
For a few years now, I have been casually following Pantone’s Color of the Year. These colors are the trends Pantone’s color experts see in the markets of design, art, and fashion combined with an outlook of where the world and society are headed the upcoming year. Since nature doesn’t really follow the trends of the year, I always found it an interesting exercise if I could find images of mine that resembled the color that is being placed on a pedestal at the time.
The Color of the Year for 2012 is Tangerine Tango, Pantone #17-1463. It is a “spirited reddish-orange” to signify the desire for bold steps in moving forward. No doubt there is some relation to world economic times and the anxiousness to see things pick up. Times yearning for encouraging signs.
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Yellow Aspens and Alaskan hillsides, Cantwell, Alaska
The new year has found me keeping to myself inside for these first couple of weeks, doing some reading, playing some games, and not a lot of new photography to contribute. It has me sometimes perusing some of my archives in search of trying something new, something different, something to inspire me. I suppose I have entered 2012 taking a breather before charging ahead.
Selective coloring on images really hasn’t been my cup of tea in the digital age, and it certainly isn’t anything new and adventurous. I actually enjoyed doing this in the “old days” with a set of Marshall’s Oils and a black and white print. Since then, I have read people call it irritating and trite. For some, I tend to agree. The black and white kid photo with a red strawberry, the urban street scene with a neon sign, or any number of things that have been done ad nauseam.
The labels and stigmas that we put on things seem to demotivate people from actually trying something that actually might work. Thou shalt be damned if you actually enjoy it. Then if you do cross that line, you are left with wondering if people are going to judge it solely because you have wandered into this forbidden territory. Well, let it be known I have wandered.
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