#mddastudio

Here's an image that originally began its life as a 35mm transparency in the 1980's. It was digitized in the 1990's, and  transformed   yesterday, by the use of modern software programs, into an image with full extended tonality Ala the Zone System.

If you're not familiar with the Zone System of previsualizing the final outcome of an image's tonality, it was made popular in the 1940's through the black and white large format work of  Ansel Adams. Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

I hope you find this little informational tidbit helpful and that      you enjoy the photo as much as I enjoyed creating it and then recreating it for you. I do teach and mentor, groups or individuals      on the subject of photography so if you live in, or near, my area please feel free to connect with      me if you are interested in some instruction. I'm also available for remote teaching via email, phone and Skype.    

As a metaphor the ocean is by far a favorite. So are weddings. Life comes from the ocean, it's vastness is often used to describe the breadth and depth of one's affections and the moods that the ocean can evoke are nearly endless. Weddings are new beginnings filled with joy, excitement, possibility and anticipation for what may come from the union of mind, body and spirit.  Combined the two are a wonderful and complete metaphor for life itself.

How often do you contemplate your ocean of possibilities? Do you stop to pause often enough to enjoy the view and walk in the sands of time as a reminder of where you've been and the distance you've traveled? Perhaps a trip along the shores of your existence and experiences is warranted more often than you currently allow for. Isn't it time you took a vacation of mind, body and spirit and contemplate the breadth and depth of the marriage to the path and experiences life has presented you? Often looking back can give us the insight we seek to keep us moving forward.

Often it's the angle we choose to take, and what we focus on in life, that sets us apart from others. Dare to be different, take creative chances, and never let the spark of imagination that flamed your passion dim, regardless of how long ago that may have been. If you love what you do in life, you will love what you become, and so will others. This is your legacy.

In the world of photography Depth of Field, or DOF as it is commonly abbreviated, refers to the visual effect of a lens when selectively focused on a deep or shallow range in the field of view. The outcome depends upon several factors which include  the aperture or f stop that is selected, the focal length of the lens used, and how near or far the subject in sharpest focus is to the lens. The image in the accompanying example exhibits what is referred to as shallow depth of field as only the foreground  is in sharp focus.

This image is a fitting analogy for how we often view life. The lens we choose to look through determines what we see and how we see it. Some people wander through experience after experience using only a single lens through which to view those things around them and then set that lens they use on a very shallow depth of perception. Others are more variable in their outlook. They often will use a lens of greater depth of field in their equipment bag of emotional intelligence when they want more clarity and perception. At other times they just focus on things near to them when it serves their purpose and fits their selected perspective and narrative.

Most of us move through the world applying a variable set of optics and never give much thought to the reasons we select those we use. Then someone, or something, comes along and challenges our reason and purpose for the tools we apply and that forces us to think about the way we choose to walk through life. Photography has taught me a lot about the world at large and how I choose to perceive it. I never could have imagined when I began this journey of discovery just how much I would learn about myself and others simply by the career choice I've made to provide my life purpose and meaning.  

If you appreciate this image, along with the thoughts that accompany it, and wish to discover how to create thought provoking images to share with others, I can help. I teach and mentor, individuals, teams, and groups on the subject of photography and creative seeing beyond seeing. Whether you live locally or out of the area please feel free to connect to find out more. I offer instruction in person or remotely via email, phone and Skype. Isn't it time you took your passion for the art of living to a higher level?  

Take an old iPhone, a fifties era American car hood ornament, still attached to said car, apply a little AI app magic and what do you get? Regardless of what you get most agree that It's fun to play around with the possibilities using the current techniques and technology that are available to creatives these days. I know that purists in the arts often scoff at the use of such tools and processes as nothing more than cheating instead of  learning how to create in a traditional sense, but what traditional sense are they referring to?

Art and the tools to create it with have been changing ever since some dude accidentally brushed up against a rock outcropping with the burnt end of a stick and noticed that it made a dark mark on the lighter toned rock around it. Soon a whole cave culture arose as humans sat around telling stories and scratching out crude drawings depicting their prowess at everything from finding dinner to finding a mate. I'm sure at some point somebody who felt they knew art better than most decided the whole visual story telling was over when some wiseguy started adding crushed up berries and different shades of dirt to the mix and began applying color with a chewed up end of a stick to an otherwise nearly sacred monochrome craft. Cave walls and tombs would never be the same again

The truth is artistic creativity has been evolving since the very beginning of art as a thing and it wont stop at the point we've currently reached. Humans are meant to create, not just art, but the tools  which help others try their hands, and heart, at creativity too. Cameras weren't always cameras as we know them. Our modern camera came about when some guy on a bender in the desert woke up one afternoon to a vision of the world dancing across the light colored fabric covering the wall of his darkened tent. Then someone blew his epiphany by noticing a tiny hole directly opposite the vision and the crude but effective camera obscura was inadvertently invented.

Soon, in the timeline of human existence anyway, The Camera Obscura was all the rage. There were portable models invented which well heeled Europeans would haul out to scenic spots, climb in or strap on and while away the hours tracing the upside down world in. It was a shortcut to learning to draw from life. Is there any wonder the very first book of photography in 1844 by the English Scientist William Henry Fox Talbot was titled The Pencil of Nature? Michelangelo must have turned over in his grave.  

My point is this; regardless of the tools used or the techniques applied, creativity that is allowed to flourish along side advances in science  and technology, will make the world a more colorful, and hopefully, a better place with people exercising their ability to make stuff in order to inform, understand or simply to happily share with others.  So, how's that working out? So far so good.

An old broken down international fire truck parked off a dirt road in rural Oregon becomes the target of this photographer and roars to life once more in black and white. This image was captured with an iPhone, converted to black and white, then enhanced to bring out the subtle grays between the extremes of black and white. I love the challenge of achieving a full range of tonalities while using the medium of digital imaging to duplicate the look and feel of an image created in a darkroom. It's the simple things discovered, like this old fire engine, that renew my passion for the craft and art of photography which I discovered nearly five decades ago and I find my creativity roaring back to life once more.

What stirs your passion and brings your creativity roaring back to life? It's important that we each discover and nurture that spark of delight and wonder that causes us to think, dream and act in a positive and creative way. When we do we will find our feet firmly planted on the path to that inner Smile we so desperately seek.  

In the headlong pursuit of our goals and aspirations there will be times when we must put out fires. Some of these are of our own making while others are thrust upon us due to our position, relationship, or status. It's times like these when the best course of action is to step back and take a holistic view of the problem at hand.

Do we possess the right resources? Do we need help? Is there a better person to handle this conflagration we find our self facing or are we the one who must wade into the flames and most likely end up singed and sooty in the process? It's said that fire tempers steel. While this may be true it's also often apparent that being close to the heat can make that steel too hot to handle causing it to warp and even melt under the pressure.

It's best to take a thousand foot level view when preparing to face your rhetorical fires. The smoke you see, or have been told about, may simply be a candle testing the wind. The application of a few well placed drops of water may be all the dousing that's required when anything more would be an act of fanning the flames. Spare the air tankers unless their needed and avoid the damaging heat of drama and alarm. In the process you just may find that you can keep your Smile and share it too.

Once an icon standing on every corner, under the spreading canopy of old oak trees in the rural heartland, abused and beaten next to corner convenience stores and gas stations in inner cities, and alone under the stark glow of flickering street lamps in motel parking lots across America, it now sits empty, forlorn and forgotten by most. No one crosses its threshold these days.

The care and feeding of these sacred confessionals of communication, connecting nearly everyone to anyone in the world, demanded the Hail Mary of a pocket full of shiny shiny shekels, which dropped into their hungry bellies in a staccato metallic beat soon followed by a push pad ditty punched and played in hopes of giving or receiving news, a hymn rendered from the personal book of life.

No memes, emojis, or characters tapped out on an impossibly tiny screen, just a simple symphony of sound, delivered to an unseen entity, so close and believed in, yet so impossibly far away as to deny human touch. It was the song of songs sung through the sound of one's voice, shared from one end to the other. It was music to someone's ears, at times joyful and at others sad, but it was the way things were when we took time, and a quarter and dime, to phone home.