Fall larch colors and storm clouds/North Cascades

Old Listener wrote:

GeorgianBay1939 wrote:

The proportion of nature to photography is always a challenge for me. I sometimes get into a "field guide" mode and seek to photograph the plant or animal or rock to display its unique, or ID features.

When you write a blog post, your words add depth and life to the photos.

I prefer photosites where the photog has taken the time to describe the contents and/or what "caught his/her eye". The context is often very instructive. I guess it is my background in teaching that biases me towards photography that I learn from and photographers who share their knowledge. Some finished products are often very engaging, but become more so when a context is shared.

Sometimes I get into a "photography" mode where I try to capture the colours, the light, the shadows etc from an artistic viewpoint. My best stuff, I think, happens when I end up displaying the scene in an artistic way.

You do better at creating in an artistic way than I do.

That is debatable, Bill. I would say exactly the same thing about your work.

You are, IMO, a master at that mutual symbiosis of art and science.

Thanks. For me, the subject matter is what interests me. If I perceive that a subject has beauty and interest, I'm trying to capture those elements in the photo. The flower or insect is supplying most of the art.

Bolding is mine. I think that all that we photogs contribute is to (re)present the art.  Please see Making Pictures .

Painters commented on the light in the west in the 1800s. I think our light adds to the beauty of nature in our photos.

It's hard to beat our autumnal late afternoon light illuminating a patch of cattails in a typical northern Ontario swamp:

I always worry about things going wrong in presentations. Wrong cable, power not available where I need it. Potential internet problems would add to my worries.

So I try stuff out in advance and have back-ups to most of the gear. In the last case I carried the whole presentation on a little USB flash drive . And I took my Mobile Internet Hub along which permits an internet connection in case the local WiFi wouldn't work. A variety of cables and extension cords too. I am finding that many libraries are still using analogue VGA projectors --- which results in crap on the screen. A 50" flat screen HDTV works fine.

I don't do nearly that much preparation. I concentrate on the worrying.

lol, I do both.

As a kid, I was an ardent fisherman and would read about walleye, pickerel, pike and muskies in Field & Stream. None of those fish in Mississippi and by the time I got to someplace where they were present, I had given up on fishing.

I was brought up in BC. Always trout on a fly. It wasn't until I ended up in Ontario that I started flinging hardware at Walleye and Pike.

No trout in Mississippi. Bluegills and largemouth bass were my targets. I lived on a farm with several ponds stocked with fish. I tied flies and make lures for my spincasting rig. Fishing was so easy then that it spoiled me. I haven't fished in decades.

Same here. I was spoiled by great fishing up in the "real" Northern Ontario. More fishers than fish where I live now.

I walked into our back yard today to look at a California poppy which had 7 flowers. As I stood there looking at the poppy flowers, I could hear a humming sound from a nearby coyote brush bush. Dozens and dozens of honey bees were visiting the (female) flowers. Not so many on another bush with male flowers. It made me think about the seasons in the low altitude SF Bay area vs. where Gary lives and where you live. We have some insects active right through the winter.

Wow. It is very quiet up here now. Some dragonflies, Whitefaced Meadowhawks on their last egg-laying.

I'm up to the Mt. Rainier photo galleries from our trip. I started a thread with a gallery from the Paradise area of the park. I think the white avalanche lilies are as spectacular as the subalpine mariposa lilies.

Beautiful work here.

Thanks for that comment. Perhaps you can get out our way some time. Let me know if you are thinking of a trip out here.

For about a 7 year (2000-2007) period I used drive my ancient AMC Eagles back and forth across the Continent.  A couple of trips a year with my two doggies.

Breakfast in Oregon Fog.

I really enjoyed the American SW and usually travelled off of the Interstates. I recall a comment attributed to J. Steinbeck in the "Travels with Charley" exhibit in the beautiful Steinbeck Center in Salinas .

Here is the quote :

I sought out U.S. 90 [actually, I-90], a wide gash of a super-highway, multiple-lane carrier of the nation's goods. Rocinante bucketed along. The minimum speed on this road was greater than any I had previously driven. I drove into a wind quartering in from my starboard bow and felt the buffeting, sometimes staggering blows of the gale I helped to make . . . . Instructions screamed at me from the road: "Do not stop! No stopping. Maintain speed." Trucks as long as freighters went roaring by, delivering a wind like the blow of a fist. These great roads are wonderful for moving goods but not for inspection of a countryside. You are bound to the wheel and your eyes to the car ahead and to the rear-view mirror for the car behind and the side mirror for the car or truck about to pass, and at the same time you must read all the signs for fear you may miss some instructions or orders. No roadside stands selling squash juice, no antique stores, no farm products or factory outlets. When we get these thruways across the whole country, as we will and must, it will be possible to drive from New York to California without seeing a single thing. [Emphasis added.]

I suspect that there is a lesson for photographers in the above.

Alas, my health ain't the greatest now so I think that my long range travel days are over.  So I'll have to satisfy myself vicariously by enjoying the photography that you and Gary are sharing with the rest of us.  Many thanks.

If, perchance, you expect to be around Georgian Bay, ON , please let me know.  I could point out a few nice places for you.

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some of our photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bill_lesley_photos/
http://naturelover.smugmug.com/