Surrender

January 30, 2005

I'm not quite happy about not having a very productive day, but at least I did get a little bit accomplished.

Although the sun was out in full force, I just didn't feel like getting into a car today and so I just stayed parked at home.

But as the day went on, I grabbed a chair from the kitchen table and set it out on the front porch and read for a while. There was not a cloud in the sky and since there was no wind I was quite warm in my black fleece, sans jacket.

The book was about photography, and yes, I should be studying since I did pay my hundred bucks to take the LSAT in just under 2 weeks.... but I just could not engage in more "trial questions."

So I sat in the sun and read for a while, until of course I got distracted by the sunlight. I think it took maybe 10 minutes and I started looking around, because I could actually hear the sunshine.

Ok, ok, so it wasn't the sunshine, but what I did hear was the sound of winter surrendering.

It's about freaking time, I've just about had it with sub zero mornings and getting into my car in the evening after a high of 15 degrees.

Want to know what I heard?

I heard the sound of surrender, one part of nature giving in to another.

Almost all of the foot of snow that was on my roof had disappeared and now all that was left was the ice and icicles dangling from the front gutter.

Water was pouring down some of the icicles, dripping off others, and every once in a while, one would break off and crash to the snow below.

I can't tell you how great that sounded, so I decided to try doing the picture thing. What follows is a progression, from ok, to better to what I think is the best, and it illustrates how a bit of technology and a little light on the subject can change the whole landscape.

Whenever something like this comes up, I grab the olympus to see if a "quickie" will fit the bill.

I took 7 different shots and then came into the house to check them out but was not really happy with any of them.

You can see the ice, but the drops are not so clear.

I was a little disappointed with the images so I decided to go ahead and haul out the big gun and waded through the snow in my tennies to fire off another 20 shots or so.

We're getting there, and in this cropped image, the drops are pretty clear.

Again, I went back to my book in the sun for a while, but before I could engage in the second chapter, I decided to take a couple of quotes I had just read and add them to my web pages.

When I finally walked back out to retrieve the kitchen chair it dawned on me that the sun was setting and that the magic hour light I talk about just might be hitting the drops.

Twenty more, and there you have it.

I like this one, really like it.

Kind of amazing isn't it? Three photos, taken from essentially the same spot, two of which are from the same camera and lens, yet one of them is imbedded with so much detail and life.

World famous photographer Galen Rowell's (recently killed in a plane crash) preface in the book I was reading was about the difference between "direct representation" of a scene and having a "visionary image that communicates the intentionality of the artist's experience."

Now I don't claim to be a visionary, or even that good of a photographer, but I can point out to folks that if they take the time to look, and look again, they might just see something that was there all the while, waiting for just the right light.

And that my friends, was intentional.