Telling Stories.

“It is interesting being a shooter. The pictures you make are like a connect-the-dots game that becomes the line of your life, as real and vibrant as the lines on your face and hands. We tell stories with our pictures. In turn, our pictures tell our story—what we did, and how well or poorly we did it, and, very significantly, if we stuck with it.” Joe McNally in “Sketching Light: An Illustrated Tour of the Possibilities of Flash”  

Most people who know Digitalmontana Photography are on my email list.  At the bottom of every list image is a quote by a famous photographer, Henri Cartier-Bresson, considered the father of photo-journalistic photography.  The quote says, “Photographers deal in things which are continually vanishing and when they have vanished there is no contrivance on earth which can make them come back again.”.  In essence when we shoot we are capture a slice of an unfolding story.

When I take the time to go through my library of images I see more than the images in front of me.  I remember and re-live the stories behind them and  I am certain that I am not alone in that respect.  Each image triggers a flood of memories and emotions associated with that tiny slice of time.  Call me biased if you will, but that’s why it is so important to record these events, to capture our stories to be passed on to others, whether it be family or friends.  It is so important to record those moments and places which are special to us, to be able to look back, see where we’ve been, how far we’ve come, how much we’ve changed; how much life has happened to us! When we’re gone, the pictures will remain. They will tell the future our story…who we were and about our lives. Your heirs will thank you.

Several days ago I posted about the search for Snowy Owls and how we did not find them.  Recently I returned to that area with new information about their location and did find them.  Not the typical bird found in our area, some experts think the Snowy Owl has been pushed further south due to lack of food or the severe weather conditions in the Arctic.

 For the Oglala Lakota Indians, the Snowy Owl represents the North and the north wind and were admired and respected by the tribe; in fact, warriors that excelled in combat wore a cap of owl feathers to symbolize their bravery.

It was a privilege to find and photograph these beautiful birds which are the color of winter.

Snowy Owl

Snowy Owl peeks over a drift of snow

Snowy Owls

Outdoor Theater - Best Seats in the House

Snowy Owl

A lone Snowy Owl in front of a beautiful mountain backdrop in Northwest Montana

 

 

Assignment: Backlighting

The most recent self-assignment subject was backlighting.  This type of lighting illuminates the subject from behind and can be used very effectively for translucent objects or silhouettes.  In this photo I used a strobe flash with a spot grid and aimed it at glass beads I purchased at a local bead shop.  I used a 100mm macro lens at F 32:

 

different colored glass beads in a line

Some Are A Little Different

Mindful

“And becoming mindful is an art.  Before you can make good photographs with natural and available light, you have to know what’s there.  It means noticing the small details of color and qualities of light.  Every location has beautiful light, colors, and context, but not everyone sees them.”  Visual Poetry by Chris Orwig

Iris

Iris

Wet Iris

Water droplets like jewels on an Iris petal

 

In Search of Snowy Owls…

Despite the Snowy Owls being elusive, Saturday was a good day. We were able to get out of town and into nature AND take a few pictures. Our day started about 8:45 AM and we got back to town around 5 PM and drove nearly 200 miles looking for these spectacular birds. Our turn-around point was the National Bison Range where I go several times a year, however this time there were few animals to shoot, but the scenery was spectacular!

Mission Mountains as seen from the National Bison Range

Mission Mountains

One of the great surprises was the picture of the little Sparrowhawk or Kestrel, a type of Falcon.  The background colors were spectacular!
Sparrowhawk or Kestrel

Taking a break

This tree caught my eye as we drove along an irrigation ditch near Pablo Reservoir searching for the Snowy Owls.  The shape was intriguing and I thought perhaps I could extract it for a composite element, but as it turns out the image stands alone on its own merits.  At least that’s what I think.
Winter Tree

Winter Tree stands next to the Pablo Irrigation ditch.

This is a slightly different angle on the same tree with more of the irrigation ditch in the background.
Tree stands next to the irrigation ditch

Pablo Tree stands next to the empty irrigation ditch.

Updating

One of the curses of professional photographers is the continual need to update and try to keep up with the quickly changing technological landscape. This goes for blogs as well as equipment, software and social networking. It has gotten to be quite insane with all the choices a photographer NEEDS to be successful or to just keep up. The treadmill we are on never stops. With that said I would like to say to stay tuned for upcoming changes…both here and on my website. We (my technical adviser: Christian Dorr) and I have updated our hosting service and in the future hope to install a storefront for selling Digitalmontana Photography art and images.

In just a few short weeks I will be attending another MPPA convention in Billings and am in the process of selecting images for this year’s competition. The selection process is always a PITA, but I have excellent mentors advising me. Onward, through the fog!!

Seven Silent Sentinals