January Chills
Welcome back! Once again this will be short, mostly woodland scenes in the depth of winter. For some reason this year I’ve had a lot more trouble adapting to the cold. My feet and fingers seem to complain more quickly. Granted it’s been quite cold, hitting -25 and -30 regularly, so I guess I should expect it by now!
Most days I was able to get out the sky was heavily overcast, but luckily on a few days the light leaked through and gave some nice contrast and relief, like on this pale afternoon:
I’m a bit torn about whether the arrangement has balance, but the left side pines are lighter and lacey, while the distant pine on the right feels heavier and dominant, forming a suitable counterweight. At least, that’s my take.
A similar scene taken on a different day, and later towards sunset, emphasizes the relief on the snow when it falls among the small bushes:
While the sun was out, I managed to capture a couple more intimate vignettes, simple shapes for my simple mind 😄
The last one above was a bit tricky, and I’m not sure it works. I used a very shallow dept of field to emphasize the simple shapes of the pits around each tree, and the line of the deer trail behind the trees. However, my eye at least heads for the middle tree first, finds out it’s out of focus, and then wanders around wondering where to go, until it settles on the two front trees. I’m not sure that effect is beneficial, maybe it doesn’t matter.
On a day without any sun at all, and a fresh snowfall, I found this scene. I confess it’s my favourite, and I like the etched effect of the snow on the trees:
Finally, on a completely different day, I was driving around on some of the gravel roads about an hour north of the city. The sky was overcast and I decided nothing would come of the sunset, so I began driving home. Luckily, I glanced in my rear-view mirror and was shocked to see a hint of colour. I turned around, and began to race back to one of the lakes to get a clearer view. It was a good test of my new car on snow-covered gravel roads 😉 I managed to make it back to the lake just in time before the colour faded from the sky:
Maybe it’s the memory of my bare fingers in the wind, but there is something absolutely frigid about that scene to me, with the sun fading as if to say “I bid you adieu and leave you to the North Wind…good night!”
And that is all for this month. Hope you are all keeping well and warm 😊
Cheers!
