By the time I get good at any house maintenance task,
I never need to do it again.
– Dad (who was moved pretty regularly for work)
Photography can seem sorta like that: By the time I figure out what will work, or what I want, I never get a chance to do it again. We’ve moved on. Or the birds have.
So it’s nice to have a few months in a place and a subject that doesn’t move away. Last week I got back to the Mill Avenue Bridges for a re-attack a little earlier with respect to sunset than the first time.
To get a deep-blue sky.
To get the sunset reflected in the water, as well as the bridge lights. Just ignore those nasty power lines.
To have a serendipitous opportunity to go for a close-to-symmetrical collage.
To learn yet again that my eye passes over lots of things I should see. Who put those . . . what, navigational aids? . . . smack dab in the middle of my photo? Well, technically I did since I’m responsible for everything in the frame, but what the heck were the river managers thinking? Safety or somesuch, I presume: certainly they weren’t thinking about this photo opportunity. After cropping out those annoying bits, I’ve lost half of the reflection.
To discover there’s another bridge: One that was obscured by the dark on my photo-shoot the week before.
To gratefully receive another bonus: In this case, a streak of fire from the serendipitous passage of a train from the light rail system.
Isabel – navigation aids are like trees. Sometimes you see the forest, but don’t see the trees right in front of you. Snipers rely on that to survive.
During a fire power demonstration in Gagetown many years ago, my army college class watched artillery bursts and CF-5 napalm strikes way down range from the safety of the bleachers about 1.5 km away from where the bombs were bursting.
When the demo was over, the commentator said, “Well that was all very interesting, but what you really have to worry about is a determined man with a rifle.” That’s when a sniper who had been lying in a small depression about 50 feet in front of the bleachers stood up in his camouflage suit and rifle.
You just showed the secret to critical success to “looking the other way” when everybody else is looking in one direction.
John – That’s both funny and not so funny.
I can see another calendar ! These are wonderful !
Barbara – Many thanks.
That first one is just FABulous, Isabel. The colours and light balance are just about perfect for my taste. (I love the velvety sky.)
Marion – 🙂 Many thanks. That velvety-sky effect doesn’t last for long. I told the Big Guy that next year we might have to camp out on the beach along the Salt River so I can just pop out to take a shot when the conditions *are* right.
I really like the second picture “very” much—the one with the red reflections in the water.
Good stuff.
Tom
Tom – Many thanks.
I kind of like the power lines – just think of them as an “historical landmark”
Alison – That’s a good way to reframe something I can’t get out of the frame anyway.