More High School Miscellany

The Spar

Love One Another

Aqua

Phases

Today’s showcase: a beginner’s poor stylistic choices. Up until now I’d been content to experiment and learn about things like proper exposure, how to use depth of field, pop-up flash no-no’s, how to focus, etc. But now, now I have some new discoveries to show you. Now I’m trying to break some boundaries, trying to get creative, to get artistic, to get deep into these photographic arts. It’s time for tilting horizons and zoom blur!

I’m going to spare both myself, and you, the several rolls of images like these. The sheer number of them makes me just a bit sad. I think I might have thought they were “cool”. And I’m pretty sure that their very existence could threaten the rise of my photography career. These images may be to my career, as a photographer, what an affair is to an aspiring politician’s career. So shhhhhhhhh. Keep them secret.

Fire With Flashlights

A little experimenting with the darkness, and bits of light, at the Westport jetty.

Grayson

Kene

San Fran Cisco

Took a trip. Went south. Took a plane. Had a camera. Stayed in the suburbs.

Two Cars For Your Garage

Aaardvarks

The Photographer

Silvery Silver Silverman

Some Bridge

This is California

Bird Walks Towards Sun

That Bridge Again

Ideals, Complimentary Colors, Birds, and Yes, the Beach

But not the same beach! No, this is a different beach. One which you can drive on if you’re so inclined. They call it Ocean Shores. I am against it, so I call it nothing. But at one point I thought it was the greatest thing ever to be able to drive on the beach. Especially when I was seeing the cool kids in their VW’s hanging out all day, looking like they had nothing, and therefore everything, going on. In fact my earliest driving experience was on this very beach. And I got pulled over. I was driving on the clam beds, very bad for the clams apparently. Also, I was incapable of reaching the accelerator on my own. My dad was taking care of that. He took the fall for me. Thanks dad.

Well, looks like I spent this day focusing my photographic energies on the aforementioned VW vehicle of the cool kids, some posts (is this my first conscious recognition of the dynamics of complimentary colors?), and some very exotic bird life. I hear that goose is from Canada! Whoa! Yeah! Birds can fly! WOOOOOOOOH!

All I Ever Wanted

Bird #1

Birds #2-33

I Love Color

And Again, The Beach

I wasn’t lying, I went to the beach a lot. This day, however, I’m actually impressed with the images I bring back. I think some days I’m in the right head space for image making, and all the other days it’s forced. This day I was there, in the right place, and didn’t do too badly for a beginner.

I’m going to keep it short today.

It’s so hard to do.

For me.

Ammophila breviligulata

Weather

Person!

Halved

Off Leash On Beach

Ah, the beach days. So growing up, I was close to the coast, and I spent a lot of time at the beach. Basically, anytime I was bored, or anyone was bored, we went to the beach. And often, my dog, Sydney, was  up for the ride when no one else was. She knew a few words, and, “Sydney, want to go to the beach?”, was definitely in her vocab. Once I had a camera as another willing travel companion, there was really never, ever, a reason to not go anywhere. But the beach was a comfortable and familiar destination, especially in winter when no one was there. It was a great place to walk a few miles and daydream, a no stress, no expectations destination for an occasionally wayward boy.

But that reminds me, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how difficult it is for me to get out of my normal life spaces. My studio, my house, my girlfriend’s house, all the familiar spaces I can be frequently found occupying. The exception to that comes when I travel, the familiar is gone, forcing me to put down my books, disconnect from the interwebs, and wander around in the present. Occasionally I find myself in the mood to wander around Seattle, my hometown, but it’s rare to find time and make the effort to be aimless in a place so familiar. The moment I take my camera outside, however, that changes.

Even if I don’t photograph, just having a camera with me puts me into some sort of weird super observer mode. I stare at things more, I stop here and there, see what’s going on, and think about it all. But I think about it in a visual thought kind of way, not a brain thought way. I don’t know if that makes sense to anyone but me, but it’s like intuition versus analysis. Or something. When I have a camera and I’m walking around, I’m just responding to everything intuitively and photographing it, accepting it as it is, and it allows me to engage with the world in a way which I normally don’t. Because usually, I’m stuck somewhere so deep inside my own head, being analytical, trying to change the world with private thoughts, that I can’t be bothered to pay attention to anyone or anything else. So maybe, in some fashion, photography grounds me to this earth at this moment. Maybe.

Also, I love my dog. And I miss her. Just to bring it all back around.

Sydney Gets Her Feet Wet

Brown Dog

Wave Sun Clouds