WATER

How many ways can we photograph water? Oh, there are so many variations. Next time you see water, ask yourself, "What can I do with this, other than the obvious? 

When I detach myself from the label "water," it frees me up to see beyond water. So, what is there to photograph, beyond "water?" I look for lines, colors, shapes, and forms. If I feel something or get a sensation from simply being around water, I strive to translate it into something we call a photograph.

I don't aim to document what I see and make it the best documentation possible. The best photography is found where technical know-how and creative aesthetics meet. 

With that introduction, let me share a few images and share what ideas, thoughts, or feelings went into creating them. 

The thought of a duck, when compared to a peacock, leaves me with little excitement, unless that duck is surrounded by a canvas of colorful abstract shapes. 

Feelings are not easy to translate, but certainly not impossible. This is where the technical and creative sides of photography come in. 

Years ago, I stood in front of a powerful waterfall in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, Ouzel Falls. The water was gushing down toward the creek it created. It was rumbling so loud I felt the ground vibrate beneath me! Here is how the waterfall looked.

 

As loud and powerful as the waterfall was, I felt a sense of peace and tranquility as the soft, wet mist landed on my face. I wanted to translate that feeling, that sensation. So, I slowly and calmly walked around the huge boulders in front of me, hoping to get up close to the bottom of Ouzel Falls. It was there that I saw my translation--peace and tranquility. A combination of composition (the aesthetic side) and a slow shutter speed of 1/6 of a second (the technical side) is what it took for me to translate my senses that day.

In the middle of a field workshop at a botanical garden, I asked my students to follow me to a series of pond water fountains with an orange wall as a backdrop. I taught them how to experiment with different shutter speeds and to take advantage of the continuous shooting setting to take several bursts (images) within seconds. I like this image I created during that workshop, taken at a shutter speed of 1/2000 of a second. It gave me a great, colorful abstract. It also has the look of a transparent sculpture.

I was hiking on a mountain trail in Colorado during autumn. That's the season aspens show off their gold colors. As I looked for aspens, I looked down at the trail and noticed a sprinkling of gold on the ground. Wow! The gold nuggets I found were nothing other than reflections along the stream on the trail from the aspens above. What a pleasant surprise. When I take a hike, I make it a point to stop periodically and look behind me, as well as look at the ground to make sure I am not missing out on the not-so-obvious. I'm glad I looked down at that moment. My title for this image: "Trail of Gold."

On another trail in Colorado, in the fall, I came across this scene. It was surreal, like magic! I love reflections, but these were magical. A line of golden aspens cloned themselves, upside down, in the lake before me. I loved the mirror image. The lake was low, creating horizontal lines in between the reflections.

One of my favorite lakes in Rocky Mountain National Park is Sprague Lake. I was there when the lake was partly frozen. It gave me a really cool abstract design of shapes and color. The red/orange colors you see are nothing other than late-autumn dead leaves floating along the ice sheet edges.   

It had rained the day before this next hike. There were several hikers on the trail that day. I noticed them as they hopped in between and around the small puddles created by the rainfall the day before. 

It was on my way back from the hike that I noticed nature's art in one of those small puddles. It was like someone had painted an abstract inside an irregular canvas. As I set up my tripod to begin my art project, a few hikers stopped, curious as to what I was photographing. I pointed to what I saw in this particular puddle. One of them said, "I would not have seen that if you hadn't pointed it out."

I asked several hikers what they thought had created those awesome colors. At first glance, it looked like a parking lot oil spill. One hiker theorized that it was maybe the natural oils from the trees that made their way to the ground after yesterday's rainfall. Lesson? You can find a great shot, right at your feet.  

I started doing this years ago, out of curiosity. I have photographed a reflection in the water, knowing that I am going to show or display it upside down. The look simulates Impressionism or Surrealism, depending on the subject and what I do with my shutter speeds.

Here is one example. It is a reflection of trees in the spring. I photographed their reflection, knowing that I was going to display them "upside down." It looks very surreal. It looks like trees, but why are they distorted? The Godfather of Surrealism, Salvador Dalí, loved to distort objects and animals.

Give yourself an assignment. Search for water, in any form, and see what you can do with it. Take the labels off and look for color, form, shapes, and design. You will be surprised with your results. 

The best photography is found where technical know-how and creative aesthetics meet.

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