Made with Canon 5D Mark III with 50 mm f/1.8 lens
Today is
Day Three
of my personal thirty day challenge to photograph the same subject every day for 30 days. One way to do the challenge would be to take a single image each day for 30 days. But I chose to make several images each day and then to pick my favorite image of those I make each day. This gives me the fun of trying several different ways to photograph the tree each day. And I get to play around with lots of different techniques.
The image at the top of this post is my chosen photo today. I made a number of in-camera multiple exposures of the river birch tree this morning but this image is a single photo of the tree. I converted it to toned B&W and layered it with a texture photo using Adobe Photoshop exclusion mode. I then decreased the highlights and lowered the center of the tone curve in Lightroom.
Creativity is sacred, and it is not sacred. What we make matters enormously, and it doesn’t matter at all. We toil alone, and we are accompanied by spirits. We are terrified, and we are brave. Art is a crushing chore and a wonderful privilege. Only when we are at our most playful can divinity finally get serious with us. Make space for all these paradoxes to be equally true inside your soul, and I promise—you can make anything. So please calm down now and get back to work, okay? The treasures that are hidden inside you are hoping you will say yes.
― Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
I’ve been playing with this texture layering method on photos of plants and trees a lot lately. The first time I made an image like this I just playing around trying to figure out a way to show the beauty and grace of a scene that I had noticed and photographed. The color photo did not do the scene justice so I just kept playing around until something clicked and I thought, “Yes! That begins to show what I felt when I saw that scene.” Like many techniques that I’ve learned over the years I’m probably over-using it right now. That seems to be the way I roll. I learn how to do something new with my photographs and I use it and use it and use it, even when it probably isn’t the best technique for the image.
Eventually I come back to a more nuanced approach, and what I learned stays with me and influences my work without over-powering it.
Perfect Timing
This 30 day challenge that I set out for myself is perfectly timed for where I’m at in my life right now. I’m not able to get out and do a lot of walking because of foot pain that gets significantly worse when I try to take my regular walks. So my photographic reach and possible subjects are limited to my house and yard.
By making several images of the tree each day I have several new images to work on each day which brings me joy.
Give your mind a job to do, or else it will find a job to do, and you might not like the job it invents.
― Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
What creative activity brings you joy? Are you making time for it in your life regularly?
May you walk in beauty.
Yesterday’s pick for the 30 day challenge
Multiple exposure in toned B&W
Multiple exposure
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