WAR OF THE WORLDS

DOWNTIME

DAY ONE

First day out of the nest for this little oriole.

MUD IN YOUR EYE

ROMEO

SWATS UP

ronpittspainted turtlegnatsswats upphotographgreenChrysemys pictareptilesfunny

INGLIS FALLS (graphite)

GOOSE LIGHT

SITTING PRETTY

WET PAINT

PHOTO FINISH

LAST LOOK

CHOMP

FOX

FROZEN

FIRST ALERT

GOT YOU ON MY WAVELENTGH

Flapanatomy

“There are no new ideas – only new ways of making them felt.” Audre Lorde

A male trumpeter swan and his mate were migrating north in late winter and chose to wait out a snowstorm on our pond. It was the first time we’d ever had swans.

I spent the entire day shooting and got some keeper images including this sequence of the male fanning his wings. At first, I was trying to decide which one to frame and then it dawned on me that I had a beautiful motion study. It reminded me of Muybridge’s studies from the late 1800s which I had often referenced in my work as an animator. But these swan shots were also stand alone, great images.

At first I arranged them side by side and had as many as six frames. Then the light bulb went off and I melded them into one.

Ever since then I’ve kept an eye out for “Muybridge moments.”

MISHKA

FIRST DAY OUT

MOOSE-A-LICIOUS

EASY BREEZY

PIGEONS

SAILING ON GOSSAMER WAVES OF LIGHT

SPRING

JIM

Wading the Willows

TANGLED

WINDSWEPT

Good news, bad news.

Bad:
- Frigid, frostbite-able, finger numbing, toe tingling, battery draining temperatures.
- Extreme, gusty winds, driving heavy snows, whiteout, blizzard blinding, impossible to focus conditions.
- Lugging thirty pounds of gear through knee deep, immobilizing piles of snow over uneven ground.
- Fumbling with too small controls in wet, over stuffed with “handwarmer” mittens.
- Fogged up viewfinder and glasses from miss-directed breathing escaping through a mouth condensation soaked balaclava.

Good:
All of the above, because there’s nothing like bad weather to make for a good shot.

The good, the bad, and the beautiful.

SNOWDRIFT

GLIDE