Category: Fawna

chasing butterflies and blue skies

as a child i chased
butterflies with a net
now i chase images

Once caught, I never knew quite what to do with the butterflies. I looked at them under a microscope. I marveled at their color and delicate lightness. I ended up feeling uneasy that, as I studied them, they became less beautiful; battered and wounded. In the end I gave up catching butterflies in nets. Now, catching fleeting moments on a light sensitive surface, I find the opposite. The images become more beautiful as I study them; push the edges around; pull information from them; adjust the colors, tonality and contrast. Yet, I still don’t know what to do with my catches.

Yesterday, arriving at a favorite bluff, overlooking the great lake Michigan, I found and caught the following:

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It all seems so fragile

Beauty can be seen in all things, seeing and composing the beauty is what separates the snapshot from the photograph. — Matt Hardy

thursday morning she
flew into the window and
ann loved her alive

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a walk through the play ground

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continuing to learn the Ultima now with 90mm Apo-Rodagon and R8/DMR

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Leica M8, Visoflex III plus Cambo Ultima

“A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.” — Diane Arbus, Diane Arbus: A biography by Patricia Bosworth

access ability
pursuit of happiness
social justice. enigmas

For the last month I’ve been moving my office into my home. Remodeling a bathroom and building a custom version of the Cambo Ultima 35 from an Ultima 4×5 (seen below with M8 and Visoflex III; also able to mount R8/DMR, and 5D with a simple Really Right Stuff quick release). Since going digital I’ve missed the precision of the view camera camera movements to control framing, focus, etc. Now I have achieved the ultimate optical bench. Sweet.

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Below: three images made with M8 and 180mm Nikkor-W.

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…the creatures …each a gift …radiant energy

“The ground we walk on, the plants and creatures, the clouds above constantly dissolving into new formations — each gift of nature possessing its own radiant energy, bound together by cosmic harmony. …Light is my inspiration… …profoundly significant, it caresses the essential superlative curves and lines. …the energy upon which all life on this planet depends. …Today is the day!” — Ruth Bernhard

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Herring Gull

l1080046.jpgCanada Goose

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Awareness creates depth of experience.

“I thought I made a mistake once but it turned out it was a creative moment.” — Scott Fleming

Have you ever approached your lover, intending a kiss good bye, then felt a warm breeze flow from their face to your own? Not speaking of breath here; rather an in-the-moment-hyper-awareness of the 98.6 degree F, 37 degree C, body temperature slowly flowing from loved one toward self. I did. This morning. Lovely.

Happens all the time.
Appreciating it does not.
Then spring arrived.

—

difficult to hold

(click images for larger views) l1080012.jpgYellow-rumped Warbler (probably Myrtle type)

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Downy Woodpecker

l1080027.jpgYellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle type)

Push hard to get better

“Push hard to get better, become smarter, grow your devotion to the truth, fuel your commitment to beauty, refine your emotional intelligence, hone your dreams, negotiate with your shadow, cure your ignorance, shed your pettiness, heighten your drive to look for the best in people, and soften your heart—even as you always accept yourself for exactly who you are with all of your so-called imperfections.” so says my horoscope dude.

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