There’s such a different feel between the B&W version and the sepia version that I thought I’d post both and let you decide which you like better. I think the B&W feels more like a winter shot, the sepia like an old postcard or stereoscopic photo. What do you think?
Even in death, there can be beauty and, although I tend to enjoy color, black and white works well where there is texture.
For Cee’s Black and White Challenge: Close Ups.
For Cee’s challenge this week, all I did to this photo of the Cape May lighthouse on a silent and beautiful foggy morning was add the vignette. It was morning filled with magical shots and enveloping peace.
Fog
This dirt road is the road in and out for people, but each morning, the horses come in on it and each evening they go out the same way. We never tire of sitting on the porch of the cabin, watching them run by and observing the hijinks they sometimes pull. I softened this a bit to give it a dreamy air. The horses are dreaming of grass and wandering freely until morning. As for me? In this place, I’m always dreaming.
The orange Childcraft books we owned when I was a child (some volumes of which I still own) had several volumes of poetry. One of my favorite poems, then and now, was Alfred Noyes’ “The Highwayman” (the poem follows the photo.) The opening verse contains the line, “The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon stormy seas.” That phrase came to mind when I saw this photo that I took from a dark room at night. The abstract of the moon, naturally B&W, came about because my hands couldn’t hold the camera still when the shutter took so long to close. Fortunately, I liked the way it turned out and since Cee’s allowing us to choose our own theme for her Black and White Challenge this week, I offer it for your viewing pleasure!
The Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix is a marvelous place. Last year, it played host to the marvelous glass creations of Dale Chihuly and there’s still one installation at the entrance. But on its own, it’s home to a vast variety of cacti, flowers, and animals, such as this ground squirrel, beauties in their own, if very different, right.
Ground squirrels,as their name implies, live mostly on the ground. However, as we discovered while at the garden, they also climb trees! This little guy, however, was in his proper place on the ground, posing rather brazenly for this shot. It’s not much of a stretch to convert him to black and white, as he and the ground around him were all tan. Ground squirrels are related to marmots, groundhogs, chipmunks, and prairie dogs and are known for being able to stand on their hind legs for long stretches at a time. They’re also gregarious, which may explain this one’s lack of fear. Maybe he only wanted to say hello.
For views of Chihuly’s marvelous work as displayed at the Garden, click on any of these links:
Tantalizing Tuesday, Juxtaposition, Object, Day and Night, Hot and Cold, Boating in the Desert, Smooth, or Silhouette.
Nevil Shute’s post-apocalyptic novel “On the Beach” thankfully has nothing in common with this photo except for the location. This shell was found on Cape May, New Jersey and made the transition to monotone rather well, I think. Once again, black and white highlights all the details of the shell, while the shadow adds interest.
I’m still have no internet most of the time. I’ll be back in the groove next week.
While scrolling around my (recent) files for a photo, I came across this one and decided it was perfect for today’s Black and White Challenge. I like two things about it in particular. 1) It’s naturally B&W so, except for cropping and framing, it’s au natural and 2) the focus makes it unexpected. Of course, the next photo in my file is of the duck on focus, but today we’ll focus on the unexpected. 🙂 In this case, it gave me a very peaceful feeling.
P.S. Just realized that the Black and White Challenge has a theme…and this doesn’t fit it. So it’s just my black and white shot for the day. Guess staying up until 1:30 am to watch the end of a hockey game that went to almost the end of three overtimes made my brain a little slow. 🙂 But enjoy the photo just for itself and have a great day.
In the midst of the burgeoning of spring life, it’s difficult to remember the sere life of fall and winter. This life has its own beauty, however, a beauty easily translated into black and white from the earth tones that are all that is left. Here and there are found dried stalks, standing alone, refusing to go quietly into that white winter.
Such days of autumnal decline hold a strange mystery which adds to the gravity of all our moods.
~Charles Nodier, Smarra: & Trilby
Although I played around a bit with editing, the photo was black and white originally. Geometry never looked so good.
