Mud Wrestlin'
This will be a very short entry. I have been out very little. It’s that time of year when the most fantastic sunsets happen during the work day, and it’s well past dark when the work is done. Oh, the pining I do from my window, nose pressed against the glass! I have to wash my windows daily… 😀
After I posted the last blog some friends and I went on our annual fall/winter hiking trip. Last year was a bit chilly, and one of us punched a coyote that snuggled up to the tent wall. This year we brought a trail camera in the hopes of catching some animals in their night activity, but the only activity we recorded was due to our own aging bladder capacity.
This year was much colder, and being tired of having a cold face and head while sleeping, I was pleased to bring along my new “war bonnet”… a down-filled helmet that is snug and cozy:
https://www.warbonnetoutdoors.com/product/custom-bad-weather-bonnet/
No affiliation of course, I just love the product. I slept better than usual, probably because it also muffles sounds.
The next day we went for a short hike, and I made a fine mess. David thought it would be fun to take a different route up the slope we were on.
“I don’t know,” says I, “it looks kind of marshy.” The plants were clearly water loving.
“It’s fine,” he says, and immediately gets a boot full of water, but being David he prances along as if nothing happened. I stumble behind him, and get a boot full too.
Blair retains his wits, says “No thanks!” and proceeds directly up the slope, keeping dry.
I lose my wits, following David who is walking like Legolas over the snow (Lord of the Rings reference, for all you fans). He’s also 50 lbs lighter than me, which I should have factored in. I mutter “How much worse can it get?”…and immediately plunge up to my waist in wet freezing cold mud. The Sarcastic Universe strikes instantly. I’m soaking, I’m stuck! David scrambles back to help pull me out, but the angle change makes me lose all leverage. So I winch myself out, slowly, inch by inch, soaking and muddying my arms and mitts in the process. Finally I get free, and I’m not only soaked, I’m caked in the finest mud I’ve ever seen. It was less like “goo” and more like dissolved powder. It got on everything, and stayed there. In case you can’t tell who the filthy one is 😁 I’m the one on the right:
We hiked a ways to dry off, but eventually my wet sloshing boots were too cold to bear, so headed back. There was a creek nearby and rather than bring all this dirt to camp, I waded into the stream to wash off. Coldest bath I ever took! Though I have to admit, after I got past the shock, that the water was warmer than the air, so my feet felt less like frozen lumps.
I got much of the mud off, but much more remained. I’d shake and rub my pants, and huge clouds would flow off me, carried away by the stream, but then I’d stand up and it would look the same as before. There was only so much of that I could take, and I had dry socks back at camp, so we cut the hike short. A couple days later, at home, it took a good hour to soak it all in the bathtub, and rinse it vigorously, before the water would run (mostly) clear.
So that was an adventure, but not much related to photography…
Back to that, there’s no theme here, just a few random shots.
I think what drew me to this next one, other than the obvious crow’s foot geometry, was how the snow embedded in the bark emphasized the textures, like grout on tiles:
For the next ones, I was trying out a new lens, a “50mm equivalent” with a very wide aperture. I got it for two reasons. First, to get technical for a bit, one of the drawbacks of the Olympus system is that, due to the small sensor size, the depth of field is magnified at an equivalent f-stop. A lens set to f/4 on the Olympus would be the same as f/8 on a full-frame Nikon. Most of the time this is a non-issue, or even a blessing, but it makes it harder to get shots like the next one, if you want to truly separate the foreground from the background. Hence the “nifty 50”, which can open to f/1.2 (instead of f/2.8 like my zoom). That f/1.2 is equivalent to f/2.4 on a full frame camera, but that’s still plenty shallow.
The other reason I got the lens is that “everyone says” using a fixed focal length lens helps you improve your photography. You are forced to move with your feet and think about everything because you can’t fix it by zooming.
I don’t know yet if what “everyone says” is true, because I haven’t been out enough, but it has been quite the learning curve. Figuring out when, and when not, to use a technique…it’s probably the kick in the pants I needed. I’m back to days where I come back with nothing, but it’s an enjoyable process.
All that said, and technical geekery aside, the next shot is what this lens is made for:
I was lucky to find the last area of grass lit by the setting sun, and I really like the soft arcs the grass makes, and how the repetition fades into the background.
Of course, there is a time and place for everything, and the next shot does not have, and does not require, any depth of field at all. I have to admit I’m a bit baffled why I like it. I mean, those colours are kind of hideous! But still:
You wouldn’t believe how much time I spent fussing over the next one…inching forward and back and to the side, just to try to line up all the elements exactly, from the amount of space the lamp “frames” give the building, or waiting for the lamp post to divide the cloud to…who can remember what else. That’s the fixed focal length at work. In the end, I guess I like the shapes and contrasts, but it’s not very compelling:
Then there’s this little grass, eking out a perilous existence. Opinions are divided on whether the rail lines travel left to right, or right to left…and if the latter, it doesn’t really work, because the lines pull you away from the subject:
Finally, my least favourite, I was taken in by the shadows and lines. I do like the textures, but it’s hard to tell what the subject is:
Really, there isn’t one. Plus I’ve been told it looks like “something else”…I won’t say what 🙃
And that is it for this month. Work is nuts, which is what is mostly keeping me away from this, but I’m grateful I have a good job in these very weird times. When I was a kid I used to look forward to 2020…surely we’d have flying cars, vacations on the Moon, and a broader level of general prosperity and opportunity. Now I’ll just be glad when it’s over, and we can go back to thinking about simpler things…like climate change! 😱😅
Take care, and stay safe!
