Blog Archives
can’t sink me in sorrow
I’ve lived almost my whole life on the plains, within view of long horizons. Without them, I feel constrained.
Which I guess is why I took advantage of a piece of a horizon and stretched it out into a four-shot panorama. I felt better, too, when I was done and the photo was a little more horizon-y than the camera realized.
Gilbert’s Cove, Nova Scotia
photographed 7.27.2015
motors
I’ve been watching the place for a long time, waiting for the abandonment to hit the critical, photo-worthy point. And it’s nearly there…
The day I visited I noticed how those letters were cut from sheets of plywood. And then I realized that the wood grain is going in different directions on the letters and now I can’t un-see that part of it. (That’s a weird relic in my brain left over from when I was learning – unsuccessfully – to sew. Nice that I still remember to lay a pattern the same direction on the grain of the fabric and how hilarious that one thing still hangs around to influence random photographs.)
Slaton, Texas
photographed 8.7.2025
always leave traces in the leaves
I am not necessarily admitting anything, but one way to get something in focus on a manual lens – and this works best with a breeze so things are always moving in and out of the zone – is shoot in continuous mode while generally focused in the vague area you want to photograph. If you hold the shutter button down long enough, eventually something will wind up in focus and then later you can just delete 450 crap photos and get on with your damn life.
NOT THAT I DID THIS.
Posey, Texas
photographed 7.20.2025
it gets me every time
A monochrome of a sunflower field seems like the floral equivalent of a monochrome photo of a rainbow. So I did it.
You may not know that Texas is the third highest producer of sunflowers in the US. Also it takes about 16,000 sunflower seeds to plant one acre, which is interesting because that is roughly the same number as it takes to get through one baseball game.
it takes a lot to really disappear
Yes. So, there are sunflowers this summer. These aren’t the giant ones prized by backyard gardeners but a shoulder-high variety produced for “oilseed, birdseed, and occasional confectionary purposes.” And there are acres of them; the fields glow in late afternoon light. (And in early morning light too, I presume, but I’ve never been out there early enough in the day to verify.)
I was still wearing that delightful orthopedic boot, walking through dry and sandy soil while trying not to fall over, and (because why not!), trying to successfully focus a photo with a new manual-focus lens. Here’s what happened:
- I didn’t fall down.
- Although I did get about 13 cubic yards of dirt inside my boot.
- I was shockingly bad at the manual focus situation.
- But somehow managed to get a bee in focus in this image.
Go figure.
(Also, if my foot surgeon asks you if I walked in a field lately, the answer is, “No. Don’t be ridiculous.”)
title from lyrics by Matt Berninger – “Bonnet of Pins”
Posey, Texas
photographed 7.20.2025
One Day | One Image 