Somewhere among the flowers is a sneaky, flower-eating squirrel. Use your keen powers of observation to find him! 
I stood and watched this little beasty eat about 10 of these flowers. He would chew through the stalk, eat the back of the flower, then move on! I didn’t know that squirrels liked flowers so much!
Style: a particular, distinctive, or characteristic mode or form of construction or execution in any art or work
As I continue to organize and import images, I am starting to get an overall feeling for my style. Now, that said, I don’t know if my style would be recognizable to anyone else where they to see several groups of images side by side. I don’t think that it would be possible given only a few images; however, given a significant body of work, one might be able to tell.
I’ve noticed that 95% of my shots are taken vertically. I just love that format. I prefer small subjects and huge wide open spaces, like water or clouds. It is rare, with the exception of macros, that I will fill the frame. I just love to blow this photographic ‘rule’ out of the water!
I love contrast and bold color, but when I see an image that is well suited for B&W, then that’s the only way to go! As for subjects, well, they are all over the map, but seem to lean towards nature, although, since the Next Step workshop, I am detecting a great swing towards the inclusion of people.
Now that I have a significant number of images cataloged, it is fun to look around and see what I’ve been doing. I don’t go out to specifically follow my style. Heck, I just discovered my style today!
Have you ever reviewed your body of work and come up with an idea of your style?
I’m back from Dallas … back among the trees. I’m happy to be home. Although I had a great time with Richard and enjoyed his hospitality immensely, I can happily say that I’m glad to be back in Charlotte. I don’t miss Dallas at all.
From the moment that I got my rental car and left the airport, I had the feeling that I had made the right choice in leaving Dallas. No regrets. Seeing the concrete jungle, the lack of trees, the overwhelming number of businesses along the sides of the highways, and the ever present noise from traffic made me happy at the lifestyle change that we made.
Now, safely at home and within a couple of hours of The Blue Ridge Parkway, 4 hours from Seabrook Island, and a few scant miles from acres upon acres of natural greenery, I am home again.
To be sure, Dallas is not without its qualities. It’s a great place to work and become successful. There is great job diversity; however, when the top thing to see is the where JFK was shot at number 1 and the Galleria Mall at number 2, I needed a bit more nature!
I’m glad to be back.
About the pictures: These pictures represent my feelings about my old state and my new state. The first is a shot of I-35E going into downtown Dallas. I took this picture on Thursday after I left the airport. As you can see, nothing but buildings and cars. This is a typical look for Dallas along its highways all around the city and surrounding areas. There are very few trees in the Dallas area and they are, for the most part, very short.
The other picture a North Carolina shot from a park near my house. It represents the beauty, color, and life that I see in NC that I was so desperately missing in Dallas.
The other day when I was at the Dallas Arboretum. I was speaking to a man whose daughter was there having her picture taken for her Quinceano celebration. He asked me if I was a professional. I told him no. He asked what I took pictures of. I told him, life. He asked if I had a card, so I gave him one. The card has my byline on it: Life. Stop and take a look! He said that he really liked that. I had already taken a couple of pictures of his daughter and told him that I’d be happy to e-mail them to him. I hope that he contacts me and asks for them.
As we stood talking, there were some people on the other side of the water fountain. They were having a good time posing in front of the fountain and taking pictures of each other. Naturally, I had to capture this very special moment.
After I walked off, I started thinking about how great I felt to share these important moments with my fellow human beings. Sure, I don’t know them and may not ever see them again, but at least I had the privilege of meeting them and sharing this brief moment of joy with them. I had the privilege of making a connection, no matter how short the time. I’m sure that I could have sat there and chatted with him for the next hour or so … I’ve done it before, but I was with Richard and didn’t want to keep him waiting. I can be quite a chatterbox with whomever I meet. If they are willing to talk, then it’s not problem for me!!!
In the end, I just basked in the glow of being outside, having a good time, talking to people, and using my camera to record all of the beauty around me. It was a great day!
I rarely watch television. I find little content worth my investment of time. However, today as I waited for Richard to get ready to go, I watched The Discovery Channel. I don’t know the name of the show, but it was about improvements in sniper weapons. They now have a gun and bullet combination that can take out a ‘target’ at 2,500 yards, over 1.5 miles!!! Mind you, they never said anything about what was on the receiving end, moreover, who was on the receiving end. They only talked of soft targets, velocity, and accuracy.
There was a man who spoke, with obvious pride, that he created a new bullet that would maintain supersonic speeds over the entire distance and still have enough power to destroy the target.
I was seriously down thinking about all of the effort that we put into becoming more efficient in violence and death. I couldn’t wait to turn off the TV and get away.
So, when Richard was ready, we went to the Dallas Arboretum to take pictures of flowers. I needed some beauty!
I was, however, not prepared for the type of beauty that I would find, but I’m glad that I did. The Dallas Arboretum is a very popular place for weddings. Today was no exception. From what we heard, there were 11 weddings scheduled for today alone! Also, there were a number of Quinceanos (15 years) shoots. Quinceanos is a big celebration in the Catholic Hispanic community, similar to a sweet 16 party, but it occurs at age 15. It’s a really big deal and people spend tens of thousands of dollars on this very special day.
I saw so many beautiful young ladies today. It did my heart good to see life! I couldn’t resist. I lapsed back to my Next Step ‘mode’ and couldn’t resist asking could I take pictures of certain people. My first person was this absolutely beautiful young lady whose dress caught my eye. Beautiful. She looked at her parent for permission and they happily obliged and asked that if I had a shop/studio, that I put her picture in the window!
Later, I saw a very pregnant lady walking through the gardens displaying her beautifully distended belly. It just struck me as beautiful, natural, and nothing that she should hide.
After watching that horrid program, this was just the shot in the arm that I needed.
This weekend, I’m in Dallas, TX, which is where I used to live. I’m here to help a friend of mine, Richard, who has a great interest in photography, but is getting somewhat lost in all of the details with shutter speed, aperture, depth of field, yadda, yadda, yadda. So, I flew to Dallas (and boy are my arms tired!) to spend the weekend with him in a sort of boot camp.
We started with a discussion about depth of field and apertures, etc. I had him the backyard shooting pictures of water bottles lined up in a row to demonstrate DOF, then pictures of me posing in front of a tree, with a trunk sticking up out of my head and having him move me around to eliminate or totally blur that trunk.
Today, we talked about shutter speeds, etc. We also took time out to go shooting at Joe Pool Lake today and White Rock lake yesterday. Tomorrow, we’re headed to the Dallas Arboretum to do some macros, etc. Sunday, looks like we are going to the Fort Worth Botanic Garden and Japanese Gardens.
He’s learning a lot quickly! We also talked about composition, etc. today. So things are going well! I guess that this is the start of my teaching/workshop wish, except this time I am holding a sign: Will work for food and accommodations.
“I know that ya’ll go to a special school”
“You need to go out into the deep water.”
“Put your finger near the duck; they don’t bite”
“Hey! I keep moving this way, but ya’ll keep coming near me. Go the other way!”
Some of the words that this slightly frustrated fisherman was saying to the kids who disturbed his quiet fishing spot. When Richard, my friend, and I arrived at this location, I asked this gentleman if I could take a few pictures of him fishing. He was very nice and said, “sure”. I took a few pictures and we chatted with him for a while. He’d already caught a couple of catfish and was going for more.
Suddenly, 4 kids and their mother came into the area. The kids were fascinated with the ducks and the ducklings and decided to camp out next to this fisherman. After the thrill of the ducks wore off, it was time to have a splashing good time in the water, right next to where he was fishing. They laughed, giggled, splashed, threw rocks, and were generally … well, acting like children. It was a joy for me to see, but this guy, though not really angry, was not filled with joy as I was at watching them.
It was a funny sight to see because he tried every way that he knew how to express his displeasure, but in a very kind way, but the kids and the mom just weren’t getting it or didn’t care.
Finally, after a number of funny situations, the kids and the mother left. I tried to get the mom to let me take her picture, but she was a bit camera shy. The kids, however, were not and she didn’t seem to mind that I took their pictures.
Oh well, sometimes the fish win … with a little help!
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