Shadow of a Mountain

Jim Anderson Photo

...in my youthful imagination, his life and the life of the mountain became as one...whose influence holds me captive still today...His life is a part of my heritage...a part of my two son's heritage...and is a part of the mountain's heritage. He, after all, was not just a frail old man, but a man with a story and a history connected by a mountain...
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In the 1950’s and early 1960’s, I was fortunate to grow up in the Mayberry-like community of Wister, Oklahoma just a few miles down the road from Poteau. The memories of those years spent in that southeastern Oklahoma community instilled within me a sense of personal values that still resonates with me today.

That part of the state carries with it a unique flavor of terrain where broad wooded valleys are accented with prairie fields and pine covered hills. The most dominant of those hills is Cavanal…a 2000 foot escarpment that spreads its broad shoulders across the western edge of the county. According to local legend, it is known as the world’s highest hill being listed as 1999 feet high…one foot short of being actually classified as a true mountain.  Whether it actually is the highest hill in the world is open for conjecture, but the legend of that mountain carries with it a sense of identity and home.

It is within the shadow of that mountain, where my family planted roots…four generations on both sides were born, lived, and many are now buried within sight of its peak. It is where I first began to dream visions of grand adventures sparked by stories of fox dens and bear dens across its flanks my grandfather told me about.  Stories about his youth chronicled with faded photographs from the turn of an old Victorian century toward the promise of new 20^th century.  There were stories of French and Spanish explorers along with Native Indian cultures that owned that land long before it was settled...and stories of strange and wonderful things that happened on the mountain. The word 'Cavanal' is derived from the french word for 'Cave' and indeed legend has it that Indians in the area would report rumbling noises from inside some of the caves found on its flanks.

Robert Star Bridgman - my great-grandfather
Circa 1910

Robert Lee Bridgman was his name…everyone called him ’Bob’. His father Robert Star Bridgman, my great-grandfather, established one of the first proprietorships in Poteau having moved his family there around 1895 using a borrowed wagon. As a youth Robert Star stood witness to the Civil War…just young enough to have stayed out of it, and over the years established and ran several businesses including a cotton gin, hardware store, and a newspaper…eventually evolving into a furniture and home décor business that still operates to this day…well over 100 years later…still owned and operated by family members. My grandfather followed his footsteps and continued in the family business tradition for many years.

A dapper and youthful Bob on the right
circa 1915

I remember my grandfather mostly as a frail and gentle older man…during WWI he ended up in France and was injured by poison gas that wrecked his lungs causing him great distress for the rest of life. Pictures of his youth before those war years show a strong and vibrant young man…rather dapper in appearance.

Robert (Bob) on left with friends
Circa 1915

I can only once remember him ever raising his voice in anger…seems I knocked a picture off the wall because I did not listen to him when he told me to settle down…my grandmother was more mad at him for raising his voice than at me.

He often would place us grandkids inside a large cardboard box…close it up…then spin us around, shaking the box every which way…to our great delight…and I was fascinated when he removed his teeth and placed them in a glass of water…he could almost make his chin touch his nose after doing so. I still remember watching him sit in his back room listening to a small Philco radio that seemed to take 5 or 10 minutes to warm up enough so it would work.  If not the radio, then he would open the news paper and read through it finishing the crossword puzzle before putting it down.  He would often walk the half mile or so to town instead of drive, until that became too difficult. He was not highly educated, but had a great intellect and even served as a local representative for the Democratic party during Roosevelt's run for office. His politics were simple...do what was right for the country, for the people, and for your family...and apply christian values to all three.

Goldie...on the left, was severely burned and
died shortly after this picture was taken
 Circa 1905

But…what I remember most about him was his integrity…an integrity that was strengthened by his Christian values.  Quiet and gentle by nature, he possessed a strong sense of self…slow to anger…always thoughtful…always ready to help. Yet he carried with him a longing to remember and forget a tragic day when he was just a small boy..a day when his little sister Goldie died in a fire. I never really knew much about what happened back then, but you could still see the event lingering in his eyes if you looked closely enough.  Although he was right handed, his hand writing carried a strong slant backward...from what I understand this often indicates that something profound must have happened in his past...Maybe it was Goldie...

There were times when a family would come into his place of business…the kids needing shoes and something to wear to school. Often, they would have little resources to pay for such things, but my grandfather and grandmother would make sure those kids had what they needed…the dad had a new pair of overalls and work boots, and mom a new calico dress.

They would place the bill in the books as an IOU…and tell them to not worry about it for now. More often than not, a week or two later on a Sunday afternoon after church, my grandmother would hear some knocking at the backdoor…that same family would be standing there holding a sack of tomatoes or some corn on the cob, maybe a basket of eggs…and hand them to her as payment for the clothes.  The next day…paid in full…would be written in the ledger.

That life style of generosity was returned to them in the same measure some years later. After a devastating flood, that all but wiped out Wister, their place of business was all but ruined.  With no insurance to deal with it, recovery would be long and difficult. A few days later as we were helping to clean up, some mail actually arrived…in the stack was a bill from one of their long time suppliers in Fort Smith. The look on my grandmother’s face told the whole story. Realizing they had no funds to pay for that bill and the newly purchased stock was mud caked and ruined, she opened the bill…across the face was written…paid in full. Their supplier recognized the situation and in a level of generosity not often seen today, wrote off their bill as a gesture of good will.

Robert (Bob)
Enter backdoor of his home
circa 1940

It was stories such as these…some I witnessed…many more I heard about… that formed in my mind who I was as part of this family. My grandfather’s stories about his boyhood playing on the heights of Cavanal Mountain still linger in my memories. In my youthful imagination, his life and the life of the mountain became as one, and although I long ago moved away from that environment…its influence holds me captive still today. I am often haunted by melancholy desires to return to the days of my youth…to the heights of that mountain…and revisit again the simplicity that was life in those days. I often wish I could travel back in time and visit my grandfather during his youth...to see for myself the formative years that so influenced his life...that with direct connections through time influenced mine as well.

As my grandfather grew older…his damaged lungs took a terrible toll on his health and his once sharp and insightful mind faded into confusion.  Often he would suffer through difficult nights unable to breathe, gasping for air. I remember my grandmother late one evening as she knelt beside her bed for her nightly prayers…asking God to not allow my grandfather to die suffering from the lack of breath.  She was afraid she would not be able to cope with watching that happen to him, and she did not want to see him suffer that way. In his final days…her prayer was answered…his kidneys failed…and the doctor said he would not feel a thing and would quietly go off to sleep.  He breathed his last breath in the early winter of 1973…with the comfort of family surrounding him.

When I think of my grandfather, I think of home...when I think of home...the memory of his life fills those thoughts...and as those memories play out in my mind,  I think of that mountain…it was a mountain made of earth and stone with a history and a life as large as its broad shoulders. It's almost like the strength of that mountain carried my grandfather through the years...yet, as frail as he was…I've grown to understand that it was the man…made of integrity and honor…who was the larger of the two.

Keith

First Light...Last Light...make big first and lasting impressions

My favorite times to photograph happens just before sunup and right at sundown...that last few moments between twilight and daylight...daytime and evening.  The first light of day generates some of the best moments because there can often be so many kinds of conditions that exist at that time...morning haze, fog, clear skies, clean air, subtle and bold textures in the sky.  The window of opportunity normally only lasts for a few minutes and in that few minutes so many things can happen.  Blink, and you can miss the best moment.

One time a few years back I had arrived before sunrise at one of my favorite locations on the Tallgrass Prairie in Oklahoma.  There was a thick layer of low lying clouds that obscured the horizon and the sunrise appeared like it was going to be a non-event.  I made the trek into the prairie through the tall grasses to a rocky outcropping.  By the time I arrived my pant legs and boots were soaked thru by the heavy dew.  The sky was all but grayed out and I really didn't think the morning shoot would materialize.  

Just at sunup time, I began to notice some indistinct glowing in the obscuring cloudy cover where the sun should be appearing.  Instinctively I lowered my tripod  and framed some coneflowers to line up with where the sun might appear.  Within  a minute or so, the sun burned thru the cover and set the hazy fog aglow and the disc of the sun popped thru...I fired off a couple quick shots...made a quick adjustment and fired off one more, then just as quickly, the sun faded and the moment was gone.  My morning shoot was pretty well over in that few seconds of opportunity.  If I had not been there, I would have missed capturing one of my favorite prairie moments.

First light doesn't always mean the actual first light of day.  In this particular case, first light was that moment when the light first appeared in high enough quality that I could use it photographically.  It is that transitional light that often becomes the first usable light.  First usable light provides a unique blend of spontaneity and power that flows thru time...and your capture if it is that single best moment of that timeline.

The same applies to the last light of the day.  Many of the same situations exist during that time.  Many years ago when I was stationed in Oregon, I made a trip over to Crater Lake National Park.  I spent the whole day there...the only camera I had at the time was one of those 110 pocket cameras...and yes, the pictures I took were predictably not very good.  Late that evening as I was driving out, I encountered one of the most amazing sunsets I've ever seen.  The sky was lit up with every color imaginable, and the sharp ridges of the surrounding mountains and valleys were filled with blue light accented by reds and oranges...but alas, I had used up my allotment of film and simply watched in awe not being able to capture a truly magical moment.  (Shortly after that day I purchased my first SLR 35mm camera) .  But during that sunset, there came one moment in its timeline when the brilliance of what was there exploded...yet like an explosion, it lasted but a few brief seconds and was gone.

Last light of the day often is not associated directly with a sunset...but how the light of the sunset affects the things behind and around you.  As amazing as they are...sunsets are often very cliche-ish as just about every combination of them that can be imaged has already been photographed thousands of times.  Many times, I will turn around and look the other way to see what the light of the sunset is doing around me.  That warm glow will often fill the landscape with vibrant amazing light that adds character and subtle beauty to ordinary things.  It's just a matter of planning and anticipation.

To make big first and lasting impressions with your photography, use all the magic that is at your disposal during those magical times of the day called first and last light.

Keith

"...you know what i'm say'n"

There are times when people cross our paths and affect us way more than a simple chance meeting would otherwise dictate.  Oddly enough, some of the most profound impacts are caused by the least likely of individuals. A little over a year ago one such person came into our lives that dramatically changed our perspective on homelessness and addiction. His story evolved through a special friendship that warmed our hearts and challenged our emotions far greater than what either I or my wife Kris fully understood at the beginning.  His was a life of hardship that found hope yet a life that was tormented by the demons of addiction.

One Saturday morning on the downtown square in Bowling Green, KY, I met Greg, a large middle aged African American man about 6’4” and pushing 250+ lbs with massive hands and rough exterior to match his rough demeanor.  I was there to monitor a photography class field trip.  Having arrived early, few people were there except for a couple of individuals sitting on the park benches.

While I waited for the student photographers to arrive I spent some time taking some test photo’s of the park area when after a few minutes I heard someone yell…”hey you…you with the camera…come here!”

I looked up and saw that Greg, who I had never met until that moment, was calling to me…”come here…I need to talk to you…”

Greg was a large intimidating man, and I was a bit uncertain about approaching him, but something inside of me said…” it’s okay…go talk to him”.

As uncertain as I was, I approached Greg with a smile and a handshake, his massive hands all but crushing my office softened hands, asking him how I could help him.  His first question was very direct and caught me off guard, “You ever take pictures of homeless people?”

“Well…as a matter of fact I have,” I responded with a rather uncertain flavor as to why he would ask such a thing.

“You ought to take my picture…I’m homeless…you know what I’m say’n…there’s a lot of us homeless folks down here and nobody even pays us no mind…you know what I’m say’n…somebody ought to tell our story…we need some help…you know what I’m say’n.”

 That was the beginning of our friendship that developed over the next several months.  My wife oddly enough was searching for just such an opportunity, but did not want to do it for the wrong reasons.  She spent months praying about it asking God for guidance in her desire to interact with the homeless population in our community.  Unknown by me, she had asked God for a sign…something definite…something concrete that affirmed not only her desire, but her obedience to do what she felt she was being called to do.  When I told her about meeting Greg, it was like one of those God moments where all the uncertainty vanished, and her calling was affirmed with power and strength.  When she told me about her prayer…wow…what can I say, it was truly an amazing revelation.

Over the next few weeks she and Greg, who was sleeping in a storage shed at the time, sat on the park bench downtown while I or another person watched from afar,  and talked about his life…he even brought other homeless people to the park so she could speak to them. Occasionally I’d run into Greg myself and have a talk with him.  Through each interview a picture began to develop…a pattern of abuse, addiction, abandonment, and bad choices, all leading to the plight they were in.  Each story was different but followed a similar pattern…Greg described it best…”Chaos…utter chaos”.

Greg spoke of all the hurt in his life…about losing his daughter to drugs a few years previous, about his addictions and the consequences it produced.  Most of all he wanted to help others by telling his story.  You could see the searching in his eyes, the pain, the sense of despair and longing to reconnect with the world.  His past held him down, yet he wanted to use those experiences not only so others might benefit, but that others, like ourselves, would understand the other side of life we so often neglect and shy away from.  Our preconceived ideas about homelessness were shattered by his story.  Our hearts broke when he spoke about his own brokenness.

After a number of interviews with him, Kris began to share with Greg about the love of Christ, about a love that transcends any that we as mere men can comprehend.  She spoke about forgiveness and told Greg that none of us are worthy of such love, yet in God’s eyes, it matters not about our past, only our understanding of what our future can be when he enters into our lives.  She spoke of how Christ, came into this world to accept our penalty…to die for us so that we could live, and how he defeated Satan’s desires by doing so and rising again.  She spoke of letting go of the old life, and asking Christ to enter into our hearts to transform who we are…it’s a matter of faith…and that it is a free gift offered to all people.

On that day, Greg sat silent for a long time on that park bench, head bowed.  Kris said nothing and allowed the Holy Spirit to work on his heart. After several minutes, he raised his head, tears streaming down his broad face and said he wanted that…he wanted to know that it was real. He wanted that peace but didn’t know how.  Kris said, “I know how…” and prayed with him the sinner’s prayer that he repeated in his deep staccato voice.

A peace fell over this rough man’s face…this man who had lived in chaos all of his life, who had fought cancer and addictions, and who had suffered tragedy and pain countless times. Giant tears streamed down his face, a strong giant of a man who in the presence of my meek and tender wife, broke down all conventions and let his life change.  The Holy Spirit worked a miracle that day…there are still amazing miracles in this world. 

A few days later he asked us about getting baptized, and so Kris spoke with our pastor about doing so and he was delighted.  August 28, 2011 was the day and he was as nervous as a mouse…he said, “whatever possessed you two to think I’d want to stand up front of 600 or 700 people and do this…” We laughed and reassured him it would be fine.

When he stepped into the baptismal he towered over our pastor, who is no small person himself standing over six feet tall and played college level football.  You could see the power in Greg’s face as he began to comprehend what was about to happen.  After a brief few words from Pastor Jason, Greg knelt and was placed under the water…then his feet came up and he lost his balance almost pulling Pastor Jason in with him…but, he managed to right himself with Jason’s help…and when he stood up, something happened that I’ve never seen happen before.  Almost the entire congregation stood and cheered.  The noise was the loudest noise I’ve ever heard in a church building much less during a baptism.  It was truly an amazing moment and Greg seemed all but overwhelmed by the power of that moment.

In time with the help of others, we were able to get him out of that storage building and into a small apartment.  For several months he continued to go to church, began volunteering at Hope House, a job he loved, and spent time at the park where we’d run into him and have some great visits. And…in time…Satan began his attacks. 

Forty something years of abuse still held deep in his life, and he struggled with the addictions that held him captive. These were struggles that most of us simply cannot comprehend for he was pierced deeply with their sharp hooks and the effort required to remove them often proved more painful than the affects of the addiction itself.  Several times he lamented about how he hated what he had become, that we didn’t understand the grip that it had.  He was right…we didn't understand...even though we intellectually understood what he was talking about we had no idea the power of those addictions and the pull it had on his life.  In spite of his conversion, in spite of his changed life, slowly, those things that had held him captive for so long began to reattach their sharp hooks to his life.

Several times he begged us to help him…we tried, but society simply has little tolerance for someone with Greg’s background, and opportunities that should have existed for him to receive the counseling that he needed simply did not materialize.  Kris and I are not trained to deal with those things, but we tried to help him…we tried…but just didn’t know enough about how to get him that help.  Over the next several months his life began to spiral downward again, and there were times he would call us in tears because of what was happening.  He stopped going to church…stopped volunteering at Hope House.  We tried to maintain contact with him, tried to encourage him...but he cut us off from his life and we were forced to back away.  Several times we tried to reconnect, I spent one evening watching an NBA playoff game with him…others tried to help too…but he remained distant.

Most of the summer passed without much of a word from Greg, then he made contact again...that lead to us inviting him back to church and he accepted...he seemed genuinely relieved at having done so.  That Sunday morning we called to re-affirm our pickup time...no answer.  We drove over there anyway and found Greg recovering from a multi-day binge.  He was in no shape to walk down the stairs much less go anywhere.  We were disappointed...he seemed ashamed...asked us to pray for him again...and we did, then left him.

That afternoon, Kris received a call from Greg…he was sounding different…not at all like the Greg we had come to know. He made no sense in his ramblings…he asked us to pray for him again…we did…he called several times…and seemed disconnected with reality.  We decided to give him some space realizing that his old demon alcohol was again attacking him and in that state of mind most anything we would do or say would fall on deaf ears and even worse, a broken heart.

Two days passed when Kris received a troubling phone call from one of our other homeless friends…she said Greg had died.  We scrambled to confirm what we had heard and after contacting a friend of mine who had connections with the local hospital…we discovered the rumors were true.

I can’t tell you just how we both felt…maybe you can imagine, maybe not, but our insides wrenched with every kind of emotion…It seemed all too unreal, it couldn't possibly be true...yet it was very real.  Our friend, our special friend was gone...August 20, 2012...three days before his first spiritual birthday, God called him home.  

Kris felt drawn to return to his apartment…she discovered the door was open and she stepped in.  On his small lamp table was our picture, several devotional books we and others had given to him, the picture of his daughter, and his first communion cup.  On the floor was a binder with an Alcoholics Anonymous label across the front.  She opened it and read through some of the pages.  Inside page after page of testaments, from others who he had encountered along his struggles, that carried voices from the past.  They had come to know Greg the way we had.  They saw in him the same goodness we knew was there…a goodness that had been straggled because of addiction.  Kris left everything where it was and returned home.  Both of us seemed to stare into the void not wanting to believe what had happened...questioning what we did or could have done to have prevented this.

Greg had received medical help as EMT's administered to him early on that Monday morning...he was taken to the ER...then sent to a local addiction help service...who from the best I can gather basically sent him home later that morning...I don't know all the facts...where he died...alone.

…..I tell this story only because I can see more clearly now how God brought Greg into our lives.  In spite of his condition, we saw a change in him…we experienced the joy in his heart when he first turned his life over to Christ.  We saw him struggle, bounce back…struggle again.  He opened our eyes to another world that we only knew superficially…a world that is ugly, a world that traps people in a bondage that most of us can never really comprehend.  Through him we saw how life choices can have far reaching affects on others…how the absence of a strong father figure in someone’s life can lead to confusion of what it means to be a man of honor and courage…how abuse from an early age can alter a child’s vision of who they are…what their vision of truth is…a truth that is too often distorted and drowned in a bottle or fogged over by drugs.

Even though Greg found hope in Christ and that hope can conquer all things...the addiction he had was so strong, that without help he struggled to turn away from the things that ultimately destroyed his life.  Kris and I have great confidence that Greg's conversion was genuine...we saw the tears flowing down his face...experienced the joy in his eyes...that sense of peace that he showed even for those few short months...we cling to the understanding that God's timing is perfect and in spite of Greg's troubled past, God saw something in him that he knew would benefit others.  We feel honored to have been a part of that plan and know that he no longer is tormented by that addiction...that only peace and unrelenting joy is his where he resides now.

Homelessness is not pretty…simply handing out a meal or two once or twice a year, although a nice and warm gesture, often serves more to make the person doing it feel good than it actually helps those in need.  Getting involved in this kind of ministry is not about feeling good…Stepping in to help requires a commitment that often leads to pain and sorrow…sorrow that can stab straight to your core. 

I could care less about politics and even less about politicians whose praise of such things are used to buy votes or gain an artificial advantage in the polls.  If our politicians really cared, they would walk a mile or two or ten in the worn out shoes of a homeless person, feel the cold of a biting winter night…or feel the fear and anguish of someone addicted to alcohol and no where to turn…to give their hearts to a cause where the return is no real reward at all. To follow this kind of call is to follow what Christ spoke of….a life unfettered by personal gain or economics or any of the valueless things we are bombarded with daily from our society.  Most of all, it means to give of yourself from your heart at the risk of having that heart broken.

Homeless people are real people with lives of feeling...with histories of value...with fears and pain and trials that most of us cannot comprehend.  They often give up on themselves because society gives up on them.

Greg was my friend who died largely because our society shunned such people as himself. I’m not ashamed to say so…

”...do you know what I’m say’n?”

Keith

Strategic vs Tactical - A Photographic Process

The lack of a strategic and/or tactical plan in your photography can often lead to disappointing results.  Some years ago I made my first serious attempt at photographing Oklahoma’s Tallgrass Prairie.  How difficult could that be…it’s a beautiful location…lot’s of photo ops…great place to spend a day.  Thusly equipped, I arrived an hour or so after sunup and began photographing this wonderful landscape.  That evening after I downloaded all the day’s images I began to realize that I had made a serious mistake…all of my images basically looked the same…few of them actually captured the essence of this amazing location…they were…well, snapshots, and not very good ones at that.

As I pondered on what happened I began to realize my mistake.  My strategic approach to photographing this location was flawed…I had no strategy…and my tactical battle plan, or lack thereof, failed as a result.  What I failed to do was to understand what my opponent was in this adventure.  My lack of planning all but wasted a great opportunity.

The point I’m trying to make here is that I have learned over the years that great photographs don’t always just happen regardless of the location.  It takes planning and preparation.  When I made that adventure on the prairie, I just assumed the location by itself would provide those great photographic moments.  Granted, indeed there were some spectacular opportunities…it’s just that my timing was wrong…the light was wrong…I didn’t think thru the photographic process…and I didn’t visualize what I wanted to accomplish. I simply had relied too much on random chance and that randomness just did not work on that day.

Consistently great scenic or nature photography does require an element of strategy and effective tactical application.  On subsequent attempts to photograph Oklahoma’s prairie, I used this approach and the results improved significantly.  I studied the life history of the prairie…when do the spring flowers bloom, where do the buffalo herds spend most of their time, where are the best vantage points…some of the answers required spending time in the field…hiking across the rolling landscape…arriving way early and staying way late.

Before long, I was able to develop a more effective strategic approach to photographing this amazing landscape.  But, it required more than that…it required being able to identify specific photographic techniques to capture the essence of what is there.  Simply standing on the side of the gravel road and firing off a few snapshots won’t work.  I would use binoculars or even my large telephoto lens to locate specific locations at a distance, then hike over to them and physically check them out.  That’s how I found ‘Coneflower Hill’…a wonderfull knoll with a rocky outcropping on top whose western flanks were covered in acres of coneflowers and various other prairie blooms.

I found a location deep inside the preserve that few if any people ever visit that is characterized by a rocky canyon arroyo covered in spring blooms.  I’ve spent an entire afternoon in that arroyo on several trips.  It’s also a great location to greet the first light of day.  The idea here is to find locations that have a measured potential, then plan your approach to take advantage of that potential.  It may require getting up at 4:00am to be on location an hour or so before daylight to capture the subtle nature of the predawn light.  It may require waiting for a stormy day to take advantage of cloud formations and dramatic lighting.  As always, great scenic photographs depend on great dramatic light…what’s hard is timing your arrival to correspond with that great light.  On a place like the Tallgrass Prairie, it’s important to have specific locations identified to take advantage of those great moments of light.  That’s where the strategic application of tactical photographic skills comes into play.

Strategic vs Tactical…both are critical to successfully photographing great scenic locations.

Solving Visual Problems - Don't be Afraid to Let Go...

I learned some years ago, that one of the most important concepts about what makes a great a photograph is applying the idea of simplicity to your compositions.  Simplicity simply means that all the structural elements in the photograph are there for a reason, and there is nothing there that distracts from your story.  It does not necessarily mean that the image lacks for complex details...it just means that when someone looks at the image, they know exactly what the photographer was trying to do.

One of the hardest things a photographer has to learn when refining their craft is to not be afraid to let go. What I mean by this is that often we find ourselves so captivated by the whole of a particular scene or object, that we fail to recognize its most important elements.  When that happens, we also can fail to capture the essence of the moment.  Letting go means to look at your composition with a critical eye and to visually render the scene down to its most important elements...then concentrate on those.

Letting go in photography sometimes means we must toss aside preconceived notions, and look at the problem from a fresh perspective...after all...that is what we as photographers do...we solve visual problems.  This applies to every kind of photography whether it be nature and landscape, to architecture and portrait photography.  The problem we face is how do we capture what is really important.  Solving that problem often becomes a challenge because we tend to handicap ourselves by wanting to hold on to the parts of the moment that really don't add anything to the effectiveness of the photograph.

If we begin to look at the problem creatively, we will begin to recognize that something entirely different is what caught our attention...focusing on those defining elements is what helps us solve the problem of capturing the moments identity.

So don't be afraid to let go of part of the visual elements in your photographic attempts...most of the time those simplified compositions are the most effective and eye catching.

Keith

Hitting the Wall…A Thru the Lens look at Life

Homeless woman's hands

Back in the early 1990’s, while still in my relatively young 40’s, for some crazy reason I thought I needed to get involved in competing in Triathlons.  Seemed like a good idea at the time and indeed there was a measure of fun and accomplishment associated with it…it was also a lot of hard work.  Compete is hardly the correct word to use in my case…simply to finish was accomplishment enough for me and to do that required a lot of training in three athletic disciplines…swimming, bicycling, and running.  The running part I knew better than the other two as up until then, I had been involved in running activities off and on since junior high school …bicycling I took up somewhat later in life…well after college and well into my 30’s, mostly for recreation, but found it enjoyable and valuable as a fitness tool.  Swimming on the other hand I knew would be the most difficult activity to deal with.  Oh…I could swim pretty well having been a lifeguard back in my college days, but I was never a competitive swimmer and had to learn how to train for that event the hard way through trial and error…plus…half way into an open water one kilometer swim you can’t simply stop and pull off the road…so I had to place a major emphasis on that training aspect to avoid voiding my warranty by drowning.  Turns out, I really enjoyed swimming as a fitness sport more than the other two and continue doing so even today.

There was one particular race…actually it was a team event, where we had a swimmer, biker, and runner…I did the bike…where I learned what it meant to ‘hit the wall’.  The bike portion of the race was 60+ miles on a hilly course…5 laps around a 12 mile loop, plus an out and back connecting portion from the staging area to the course loop that added 2 or 3 extra miles.  

Seems I came down with a bad case of bronchitis a few days before the event that really took the wind out of my sails.  I managed to make the race and did ok for the first 50 miles or so averaging around 20mph…then…wham!  I hit the wall hard…nothing left in the tank physically, even less desire to continue…and I still had about 15 more miles to go.  That was the longest and hardest 15 miles I’ve ever endured on a bike in my life.  My average speed dropped from around 20 to below 15 and it was all I could do to finish.  Each hill climb became a test of wills…me against gravity…and gravity won most of the time. The main reason for the wall slamming me in the face the way it did was caused by a number of factors…over-training and lack of rest, which broke me down physically and so I got sick…and lack of proper hydration and fuel replacement during the race.  Although I finished my portion of the race…it was not pretty…but, I did finish…I didn’t quit even though I felt like it.  The one thing that kept me going was the encouraging words of others who lined the course..and when I climbed that last hill, to hear the cheers of the fans and friends helped to push me over the top.

Oh well…the point I want to make has nothing to do really with triathlons, but about hitting the wall and how it relates to life.  Sooner or later we all face circumstances that push us to the limit of our endurance…emotional, and in many cases even physical.  Many times, self inflicted wounds push us to that limit, but other times circumstances beyond our control just catch up with us.  Those are often the more difficult ones to deal with…you just feel disconnected and frustrated because of that lack of control.  The people I’ve admired the most over the years are the ones I’ve known who have endured through very trying and difficult circumstances.  None of us know for sure how we will react to adversity until we actually face that circumstance. Bravado spoken from the confines of a cushioned life carries little weight…yet humble perseverance when times are tough, speak loudly to those who witness it.  It’s been said, it’s not how many times you get knocked down that matters…it how many times you get back up that counts.  Facing hardship is a part of life…how you face it depends on your character.

My wife Kris and I have spent a lot of time talking to homeless people in our community…often providing donated blankets during the colder months to those who need them.  We’ve seen where self-inflicted or even worse, family inflicted wounds have all but destroyed some of them…they for the most part have given up and turn to alcohol and/or drugs. You can see it in their eyes.  Many are victims of circumstances.  Even so, we have also seen a great deal of resilience in many of them.  Even under difficult circumstances, they have retained their sense of humor and dignity.  Many of them keep hitting the wall over and over… continually getting knocked down…but more importantly, they get up again and again and carry on.  I’ve learned a lot about character and facing difficulties by simply listening to these people.  They amaze me with their stories.  Not so oddly, the one thing they crave most is to be touched…to shake someone’s hand…to receive and give back a hug…have someone acknowledge that their life has meaning and they are still relevant and important...not just in God’s eyes, but in our eyes.

Most of us have never really known what it’s like to hit the wall in real life…to run out of options…to have nothing left in the tank.  Taking the time to listen to someone who truly has…well, it can’t help but make me wonder how I would react if I truly found myself in that circumstance.  My meaningless ordeal of hitting the wall during that race was nothing more than a bad case of planning and fatigue...I knew all I had to do was stop, and it would all end.  Not so, for many of these homeless people...they can't just stop and expect it all to go away.

The winter season is not all that far away and I challenge you who read this to step away from your comfort zone for a while...talk to someone who may be down and out...homeless or otherwise.  Reach out your hand...offer a hug...give them a blanket or a meal...but most of all, give them part of yourself, because that is what they need as much as anything else...It is amazing how a simple act of kindness will lift the spirits of someone whose spirit may have hit the wall...doing so will not only help to carry them a little further, you just may discover that your own spirit is lifted as well.

Keith

Use the Vertical to Accent the Horizontal...

The ever constant Oklahoma wind flowed across the prairie like invisible waves...waves made apparent by the undulations of the tall grasses as they rolled in time with the tune of the wind.  I love first light on the prairie...it's a magical time that takes much longer than it might seem to materialize...and at the same time lasts but a fleeting moment and is gone before you realize its gone.  Photographing the prairie I've discovered, is far more difficult to accomplish than one might think.  How do you capture it's grandeur...the big sky and openness in a single shot?

The prairie by its nature is relatively flat and rolls across the landscape in undulating patterns that create, under the right conditions, shadows and textures...but those shadows and textures are for the most part isolated low to the ground and tend to blend with each other.  What one experiences visually while standing on a high knoll during first light is far from what is easily captured in a photograph.  Visually we can detect the subtle variations in the landscape and can feel the bigness of the sky as it arches above us.  A photograph can only capture a pseudo likeness of what is there.

One technique that I use to capture the essence of the prairie is to use the vertical to accent the horizontal.  What I mean by this is that by isolating something against the sky vertically, you enhance what is trapped below the horizontal line.  There are numerous ways to do this...one of the most common is to use clouds...especially those white fluffy summer clouds.

Clouds add depth to a flat sky...they also cast shadows across the landscape and add interest to what might otherwise be a bland composition.  Combine this with breaking the horizontal line with something vertical in the foreground composition and not only do you bring depth, but you bring life to the image.

The idea of using the vertical to accent the horizontal works in all kinds of situations...not just big sky open prairies.  Whenever you have a wide field of view by adding something on the horizon to break it up, you are taking advantage of the accent flavor.  

Turning you camera to a vertical orientation is another way to use this technique.  Knowing when to use a vertical orientation vs horizontal is a matter of personal taste really, but some subjects tend to work more effectively as a photograph in the vertical.  The idea in most cases is to isolate the subject against the sky or some other background.

One note...the horizon doesn't always have to be...the horizon.  Take the prairie for instance...being characterized by a rolling landscape you can use those rolls to you advantage by isolating your subject against a background with careful selection of angle and composition...much like the image at the top of the page.  Your horizon in essence becomes one of the rolls.

Using the vertical to accent the horizontal may seem like an ordinary approach to photography...even so, by making a conscious effort to visualize how the vertical can enhance a horizontal landscape...you will add another level of learning to your ability to see photographically.

Keith

Isolate What is Important

Several years ago as my youngest son was playing little league baseball, I watched him struggle game after game to hit the ball.  I could take him to batting cages and he would knock the cover off the ball...but in a game, he'd strike out time after time or he would barely make contact with the ball and get thrown out at first.  I just couldn't quite figure out why he had the ability to hit in the batting cages...even when the balls were being thrown all over the strike zone...but he could not seem to do so in a game.  It wasn't until sometime later that I began to realize what he was doing.  When he was in the batting cage, he would focus in on what was important...the ball...but in a game, he had a tendency to focus in on the field and not the ball...and so he would never watch the ball into the bat and swing wildly hoping to make contact.

Oddly enough, I see beginning photographers do the same kind of thing...they tend to see the field, but fail to focus on what is truly important...consequently, way to often they strike out in their photographs.  Successful photography includes many aspects, finding what is important and concentrating on it is one of the most important.  I've said it, and heard it said by others many times...your job as a photographer is to find order in the midst of the chaos....in other words...isolate what is important and simplify your composition.

Occasionally I'll run across a photograph that really catches my attention.  What usually does the trick is how the photographer was able to do just that, focus in the most important part of the composition.  Often, I'll find myself looking at the wrong part of the scene and attempting to capture something that just isn't there...just isn't working for some reason.  When that happens, if I change my focus...look more tightly at my surroundings, I will just as often discover the elements that were catching my attention to begin with, and an entirely new composition materializes.

So don't be afraid to tighten your focus...narrow the field of view and see the individual elements that make up the composition...concentrate on those and you just might begin to see the world from entirely new perspective...and when that happens, your photography will grow another step in the right direction.

Keith

Photographing what I see vs Creating what I visualize

One of the most challenging things that beginning photographers must overcome is to understand the camera’s reaction to light...Too often they see something they want to photograph…point their camera at the scene and fire away letting the camera make all the decisions…as a result, the results don’t always match what they experienced emotionally.  The impact of the moment just isn’t there in their images.  It becomes one of those…’Well, you had to be there..’ moments.

There are a number of reasons this happens, the most important one being that most average photographers believe the camera simply captures what they see the way they see it.  In reality, the camera doesn’t do that.  What they don’t understand is that the exposure controls built into the camera can’t distinguish between a blank white sheet and a blazing sunset.  It doesn’t’ know what it is looking at…it simply reads the intensity of the light that is filtering into its exposure sensors.

What the camera does is this:  Based on the light values it reads, it wants to take an average of those values and set an exposure that falls in the middle between the upper and lower end of the exposure values that would work for a given lighting situation.

So how does knowing this help me as a photographer?  This is where the visualization part comes into play.  I want to avoid getting too technical here for fear of frustrating and confusing those who may not grasp all the photographic nomenclature…so, let me describe a circumstance to illustrate what I am talking about.

Take for instance a beautiful Kentucky morning with pastel colors arching across the horizon and layers of fog hovering down in the valley…something like this shot.

 What you have here is a situation where the sky is very bright, yet the landscape and fog tends to remain somewhat dark.  Understanding how the camera will react to this kind of lighting situation is important to understanding how to capture it.  The idea here is not so much to capture what you see visually, but to capture what you are experiencing emotionally.    Most DSLR digital cameras can utilize at least three types of exposure metering:  Wide-Area Evaluative, Center Weighted, and Spot metering.  Let me briefly explain each of these.

Wide-Area Evaluative is designed to evaluate the lighting situation across the whole spectrum of available light in the scene…in other words it looks at pretty much the entire scene to evaluate the light intensity.  It is very effective in most situations.

Center Weighted does almost the same thing as WA Evaluative, except it places a higher value to the light it registers in the center area of the scene.

Spot Metering looks specifically at the light it registers in that center circle or square in the middle of your view finder…and ignores the rest of the scene. 

Remembering that the camera wants to move the exposure value to the center of the scale…what happens when you use Spot Metering and meter off the lower part of the sky?  Think about this for a moment.  If what you are seeing visually is lighter than a middle tone value, then the cameras metering will cause the exposure to slightly darken the image…in essence bringing that portion of the scene it is metering toward the middle of the scale…something like this:…  

  

Notice that the sky is a shade darker than the previous image because the previous image more closely resembles the actual visual brightness in the sky which was shifted toward the lighter end of the scale. 

If the sky at that point is darker than a middle tone value…then the camera brings the exposure value toward the middle…lightening the sky.  Something like this where the first image shows a dark sky and the second image shows the sky more toward the middle value.

If it was already near the middle value it would remain at the same value.

Put another way, if the sky is light…the camera wants to darken it…if the sky is dark…it will want to lighten it.  Both visual values are pushed toward the middle. Same thing applies to Center Weighted…the only difference is that the camera is looking at a wider spectrum of the scene to gather its light values.

When using Wide-Area Evaluative…any large dark area or light area will often skew the exposure setting and you might end up with skewed results.

This example is a simplified illustration of how the camera sees light.  So, how can you use this to your advantage?  It requires the ability to visualize the scene from the camera’s perspective…not so much what you are seeing visually.  Understanding how the camera will react to the light, you can then begin to think about how you want the image to look, and use the natural inclination of the camera to capture the light in a more moody and emotional way.

Let’s expand on this just a bit.  All DSLR digital cameras will have a function called Exposure Compensation…usually designated with EV or AV initials next to a button with a +/- inscribed on it…like the one you see below on the upper right toward the middle. 

If you look at the viewer on the back you will also see a scale on it with a 0 in the middle and expanding out with …+1…+2 to the right and -2…-1… on the left…like this;

-2…-1…0…+1…+2

When you press the +/- AV button, this scale is highlighted and using the finger wheel or control wheel on the back you move the cursor left or right to line up with the corresponding values on the scale.

This is one of the most useful and important functions on the camera.  The only button I use more often than this one is the shutter release button.  What it does is allows you to tell the camera to compensate up or down the exposure scale a certain amount above or below what it wants to automatically do.

Let’s take the same illustration we used previously.  Pretend the sky was a rather dark and moody reddish orange color and really captured your imagination.  Just looking at the sky, you realize that its color value on the scale falls below the neutral middle value.  If you allow the camera to do what it wants to do…what will happen?

Remember…it wants to move the exposure toward the middle…so that dark and moody sky will more than likely become a lighter shade than what you want it to be…often effectively changing the dynamics of the visual impression.  To get around that, you can tell the camera via the +/- compensation to keep the sky darker by dialing in a minus value…how much depends on just how far you want it to go…something between a -1/3 of a stop to a full -1 stop…by shooting a series of shots using different values you can bracket the images and then chose the best one later.

This is a very powerful function…and can be used to assign a color value to a particular portion of a scene by creatively using the various metering methods and experimenting.  After a while, it will become second nature to you and you will find yourself compensating before you fire the first shot…because now, you are beginning to visualize how the camera sees light…and using its capabilities to capture the scene, the way you want it to appear…not what the camera gives you…nor necessarily how it appears visually.

Okay...the point is to get you to thinking in terms of visualizing your image before you take it by understanding how the camera is going to react to the light and using that reaction to your advantage.

Keith

What is Your Photographic Attitude?

I went out one day recently to photograph whatever I could find…my heart just was not in it…as a result my images reflected that attitude…they had no purpose…no energy…no life.  Over the last few years, as I write about photography in whatever form it takes as a storyline, one thing I’ve come to realize is that photography…inspired photography…relies as much on attitude as it does all the other aspects of the art form.

That opens up a thought…do great photographic moments generate a great photographic attitude…or does a great photographic attitude allow you find those great photographic moments?  When I reflect back on those times when it just wasn’t working for me and evaluate the situation…well, most of those times were generated because my heart just wasn’t in the moment…for whatever reason.

Dewitt Jones, a National Geographic photographer and motivational speaker, once said something to this effect:  Too often we take the wrong approach to finding great moments…we tend to take the ‘I’ll believe it when I see it’ approach…when in reality we should be taking the ‘I see it, because I already believe it’, approach to photography.

What he meant by this is that when we believe that great things will greet us on any given photographic journey, then we will begin to see them…we will find those moments that nature offers up to us no matter how subtle…we can look beyond the obvious and find inspiring beauty in all things.  We simply must believe that they will be there…then...we will find them.  If we approach the art form from a hopeful attitude that something might be worth photographing...we prevent ourselves from opening our minds and our eyes to the subtle things that nature presents to us.

That concept is as important as understanding all the technical and compositional elements of photography.  If we are unable to see, or more importantly fail to look for, the opportunities that are there…then it really doesn’t matter how well versed we are in our technical prowess…we’ll never capture those moments because we are blind to them…our attitudes effectively place shutters over our creative vision and we simply overlook what is there.

So…what is your photographic attitude?  Think about it…believe amazing moments will be there…you’ll be surprised by what you might discover.

Keith

Visual Sounds of Summer

There are country sounds, feelings, and aromas that only summer can generate…farmers working their fields, hay being cut, and that warm breeze that makes the trees shake with life...and experiencing its warm embrace while sitting under a shade…I love sitting on the front porch listening to and feeling the spray from a summer rain shower…oh those summer rain showers that fill the air with their moisture laden aroma.  It’s a great time of year for photographers as well.

In Kentucky, the evening sky can be amazingly bold with subtle differentiations between layers where the lowering sun slowly filters through each and redefines their structure with pastel lights.  Mornings carry their unique flavor as well…often clear and fresh, yet with enough character to fill the landscape with golden light…throw in some fog and you have a great mix of mood and drama.

Capturing these images is as much a process of capturing what you feel as it is a technical application.  Understanding how the camera sees light…how it reacts to light…is key to generating those technically great character and mood images, but expressing the mood of the moment involves understanding yourself and how you react to light as well as understanding what generates an emotional response in someone else.  It’s more than pointing the camera at a scene and letting it make all the decisions...it’s understanding why the camera made the exposure decision it wanted to make, and visualizing how you actually want the image to look…then compensating to achieve that goal.

A mistake many beginning photographers make is, believing they have to capture a scene exactly the way it appears to them visually.  Sometimes that may be exactly what you need or want to do…but, the trick is understanding that you do not have to accept what the camera automatically gives you…which in many cases is not the way we saw the scene visually.  The camera, properly used, is capable of imparting drama and emotion even when photographing an area with subpar light…it is capable of making subtle-light bold…bold-light subtle…and great light amazing.

The visual scene is only part of the image generation process…what separates those great emotionally responsive images from ordinary snap shots is having the ability to look beyond the obvious and photograph from the heart…not the eye.

Summer can be a wonderful time to practice this as the light variations are so wide during the day that opportunities abound for those willing to get up early enough to capture them and willing enough to find those potential locations where the light will flood the senses with its magic….then looking beyond that…not simply accepting the average exposure values the camera gives you…but branching out and seeing the scene not from the eye, but from an emotional point of view…then ask yourself one varied but important question; why do I want to capture this scene…what is here that captures my imagination and why is it important to me at this moment…then photograph the elements that play on those emotions.  How to accomplish the technical aspects of it comes with practice…shooting the visual sounds of summer, or any season, with emotion...comes from the heart.