After a two-month hiatus, I am finally back to giving attention to the blog. We passed through a tough stretch. First there was my daughter’s wedding and the company that came to town to help celebrate. Then came the holiday season, which I could have managed if I hadn’t gotten sick. I was down and out for three straight weeks with the flu. After the holidays passed it still took several weeks to regain my strength, but I was also behind in my regular job. So, I’ve been busy up until now. This has been a two month stretch in which I haven’t gotten out to use my camera. Friday, it was relatively warm for a January day along the Wasatch Front. The air was clear and it seemed I would have a decent sunset. With only about 1½ hours to work with, I decided to take a short hike on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail 10 minutes from my house. I didn’t have a specific destination in mind or a particular photo I wanted to make. I simply wanted to be out on the hillside again, walking a trail with camera in hand. While I was sick, I occupied a lot of my time by watching YouTube videos on photography. There is a lot of free material to access, and some of it is quite good. I’ve particularly enjoyed binge watching Thomas Heaton, a bloke from the north of England. I’ve also watched Nick Page, Ben Horne, and most recently Mads Peter Iversen. I’ve learned a lot and I’m eager to be out practicing the craft. Some of the technique I’m learning will require the investment in a few new toys. My shopping is on hold until I have a few more shoots in the next couple months. I drained my business account for a reason I’ll explain in the next little while. There is plenty for me to do in the meantime, and so I’ll share with you where I am now, what I hope to work on this year, and where my focus in photography is going.
From watching three years’ worth of YouTube uploads by Thomas Heaton, I’ve learned there is a tremendous amount of effort that goes into creating a good composition. I’ve known for many years that great photography requires exceptional light, strong composition, and a compelling subject. I can get away with only two of these elements if that’s all I have available, but when one is missing it puts greater pressure on the other two. If I were to rate the elements in order of importance, I would place composition first, great light next, and lastly a strong subject. I’ve seen many wonderful images consisting mainly of composition and good light. Thomas Heaton puts a lot of effort into finding and creating a strong composition. I’ve often been distracted by dynamic light and get so excited that I attempt to make light the subject and assume it has compositional powers. While it is possible to create great composition with light, it usually is most successful when there is subject involved. So, with my limited time on Friday evening, I struck out upon the trail in search of composition. I was confident the light would take care of itself to some extent and I was hopeful to find a decent subject. To reiterate, I wanted to work on composition.
I wandered off trail, up the slope and down the slope, bushwhacked through scrub oak, and in and around various hillside landscapes. As the sun sank lower in the sky, I realized I had to find my composition soon. Without the dynamic sunset light, I would most certainly come home empty handed. Finding or making a good composition is hard, harder than one would think. In retrospect, I should have started my hike sooner, found my composition, and then waited for the light to happen. With the good light fading, I had to force the composition. The best setting I could find was a collection of dried grass and flowers on a southwest facing slope. The backlit flowers looked warm and bright. The grass bent into the photo enhancing the leading lines of the clumps of dried flowers. The setting sun made a nice focal point above the mountains on the other side of Utah Lake. These images are not stunning and I don’t think they’ll qualify for printing. But as an exercise, it was a lovely evening and a good workout. It’s a step in training my eye find composition in a chaotic world. The forecast calls for more storms this weekend. It’s been a relatively warm winter for us and that certainly makes for a more pleasant experience with camera in hand.
