A sunset stopped by this past Monday while I was tucked away among the trees at Stafford Forge. The usual spots were occupied by human types, and the isthmus was flooded over by elevated lake levels. Short on time I buried myself in the trees along the lakeside.
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Sometimes a fleeting thought rises up through the dusty burned out barnyard that is my brain and implores me to do more portrait work. Then I quickly remember my own fears and the notion fades faster than a military barber buzzing out a high and tight. It is something I’d like to work on, but it’s going to take some real effort and some real discomfort. Not to mention some subjects willing to work through what’s sure to be lots of awkward everything—and lots of bad photos.
Thinking back to my Art Class Days when I cut my teeth doing pencil work, portraiture was the last world I entered. I wasn’t good at it. I didn’t want to be good at it. Eventually I broke down and gave it a go. My high school senior year concentration project wound up being drawn portraits of The Beatles. It was surely a challenge with plenty of pain points, but it wound up being a great period of personal and technical development. Were the pictures great? No. But they wound up being the best things I’ve ever drawn. (I’ve since abandoned drawing altogether. Essentially right after this project. Let’s hope this does not a pattern make.)
A decade and a half later, into photos now, I am thinking it is getting close to time I bring this broadening of horizons to my lens work. As with this shot, I imagine I’ll dabble more with myself as a subject. Admittedly this is hard in its own right because I am holding a camera to my face and hoping for the best compositionally. Spray and pray shutter action. It would be much better behind the lens with an actual subject. But hey, baby steps. Not only am I going to have to get comfortable with a new kind of subject—a human—I will also have to learn how to use artificial lighting. Being a landscape only guy this is completely foreign to me. But I won’t get nuts with flashes, strobes, etc. until I at least become serviceable in the craft and decide if it’s worth pursuing further.
So any friends want some new profile pics? No guarantees on quality.
Wild weather bore down on Surf City’s Sunset Park yesterday afternoon. I was fortunate enough to be out storm chasing with JC of Weather NJ fame, and we set up shop on a favorite Long Beach Island bay beach. With a dead west exposure over Barnegat Bay, winds were already ripping from the same direction, and a well defined shelf cloud was easily seen contrasted by the dark brooding cloud shadows behind it. Most striking, however, was the eerie green hue that illuminated the roiling bay water. It was an unnatural savage green, amped by full afternoon sun pouring in unfiltered from the south that was magnified as it bounced off the cumulonimbus cloud bottom. This, in effect, created lighting conditions that would be something akin to millions of pool table lights draped only feet over the bay. It was one heck of a sight. I’m sure my Snapchat followers could hear my excitement. (Not to mention a few expletives born of exuberance.)
No less than two minutes after popping off the photo above, the gust front made landfall, temperatures dropped 20 degrees within 10 seconds (no exaggeration), and the winds went from about 35 mph sustained to ~60 mph. Severe storm criteria is defined as 58 mph winds or greater, and we were certainly there. Of course, the lion’s share of thunder and lightning slipped just to our north, but man it was fun being out there. Talk about a charge of energy. Here’s a short film JC shot to give you a sense of the sandblasting wind. (That’s me standing out there trying to capture cellphone footage.)
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I made my way to Cedar Run Dock Road Sunday evening. While I wasn’t greeted with the exact sunset I was hoping for, I was welcomed with surefire signs of Spring. Ospreys perched on their platform; various seabirds I cannot identify—an ornithologist I am not—plucking out easy meals in the friendly confines of harbored tide pools; and sparks of green signaling the sedge grass’ return to life. A sight for sore eyes all after months enduring the Great Browning. From here on out conditions on the marsh should only get better. The sedge will grow and thrive, providing ample cover for productive marsh habitat simultaneously becoming more picturesque. Before long tall waving grasses colored in deep rich greens will fill our foreground and middle ground. Good times.
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Nouns, can we talk about how hard pictures have been to come by lately? I can’t buy a photograph and it’s weighing on me. Desperate to make something out of nothing, tonight I tried to work with the quality golden hour light pouring over my currently in bloom Japanese Maple. A staple of my front yard for years now, this is certainly the best tree my humble property has to offer. While it’s been wide angle sunset goodness I’ve been craving for weeks this is just going to have to hold me over. In the meantime the drought continues. Peaks and valleys. Peaks and valleys.
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Phragmites are an invasive species robbing valuable real estate from indigenous plant life due to the dense stands that’ll readily form and quickly grow. Efficiently conquering pristine lands like an imperialist in heat. To the uninitiated conquistador like me, they seemingly fit right in to the natural surroundings—adding almost picturesque sight lines that appear to fit right in to any naturally occurring coastal Mid-Atlantic landscape. It was only recently I learned they weren’t supposed to be here. But many of us aren’t supposed to be here, are we?
On just about any day that ends in ‘Y’ I certainly feel like a phragmites. A central Jersey transplant to Manahawkin, New Jersey, in the summer of ’93 I’ve always felt something of an outsider to the region. My insecure sense of being as coastal imposter only magnifies when I venture over to the nearby barrier island that is Long Beach Island. Here I’m twice removed; not just a Mainlander but a suburban sprawl transplant as well. You see no matter how hard I try, I’ll never climb the podium to gain acceptance as a True Local™. Sure I can wear flip-flops year round, pretend I’m clued into the the scene, all while living a few short miles from the beach, but I’ll never be one of The People. If only in my own mind.
But this is all our struggle, isn’t it? Just where to fit in?
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I made my way to Surf City Sunset Park last night with modest hopes of capturing a sunset. It’s been a while since I’ve produced some wide angle goodness, and I was eager to get off the schneid. Of course a low level maritime layer brought in a cloud deck to provide just enough blocking of the sun angle. It was a shame too, as the cold air was really firing the pastels on the high level cirrus clouds blocked out by the marine layer. Plans thwarted yet again.
After a few minutes hemming and hawing and with light fading fast, I opted to switch to the 35mm lens to try to make something out of nothing. From there any kind of skill went out the window in favor of unscientifically hoping for the best. Short on light I set my aperture wide open and dangled the camera body about an inch off the shoreline. From there I popped off a few shots hoping to get lucky and find something interesting waiting on my memory card. The result can be seen above. In hindsight I should have stopped down to f/2.8 and bumped my ISO to 400—maybe 640. This would have given me a bit more depth to my area of acceptable focus, and, coupled with the higher ISO, would have given me a bit more sharpness overall. Alas.
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This is the second time I’ve dipped into the well of anthropomorphizing flowers in a high key macro photograph. While two times does not a trend make, I have a pseudo third example if you take the time my mid-bloom maple conjured thoughts of dragons—to be fair it was Game of Thrones time. For me this is when a dearth of landscape photo opportunities start gobbling up weeks at a clip on the calendar. Itching for some lens time I get a bit desperate—I default to selective focus macros of everyday objects floating both in and about my house. From there it’s just pouring over the exposures in Lightroom trying to find the right frame to do something with.
In this case that something brought together a couple comfortable fall backs: black and white photography and Lord of the Rings. Today’s posted photo first caught my eye as I was processing yesterday’s Jane Magnolia pic. The wizard’s cap and flowing petals of this magnolia bud had just enough suggestion to get my attention. Upon closer inspection this morning the Gandalf connection struck immediately, and I could hear the why so serious? voice of Legolas Greenleaf warning his companions of an approaching Saruman. Of course moments later we are all treated to Gandalf’s triumphant return; cloaked in the garb of the White Wizard, bathed in white light having conquered the Balrog. Now back at the turn of the tide.
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Unwelcome cold has crashed the Mid-Atlantic early spring party and brought its unsociable below freezing friends with it. After a well above average March, with temperatures readily exceeding the 70s and 80s, winter has stormed back with a vengeance laying waste to my Jane Magnolia bush. It was only a week ago I wrote about how pumped I was to finally have my Magnolia back in full bloom after years in absentia. But after a week of morning lows in the 20s here we are back in the tundra with dead flowers in its wake. So much for getting my hopes up—thinking I’d make bunch of macro photos of its lovely purple blossoms this year. At this point I am just hoping today’s rain, sleet, and snow is it for winter 2016. Let’s get on to spring. Again.
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