Photographs by Frank

24 March 2019

Sugaring

Filed under: Early Spring,Monadnock Region — Frank @ 6:15 PM

March is prime time if you are in the maple syrup business. The sap is flowing and folks are boiling more-or-less constantly.

This weekend a number of local sugar houses were open for “tours”. I put tours in quotes since most sugar houses are small structures and thus a “tour” consists of maybe eight or ten people at maximum standing in a circle around the evaporator.

Joan and I took a break from our regular activities this afternoon and visited two Antrim sugar houses.

I, of course, took my camera along.

Steam Rising

The Boil

Charlie Tending The Boil

What Fuels It All

Sap House Window

The Boil #2

Tending The Boil

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16 March 2019

The M’s of March

Filed under: Landscapes,March,Monadnock Region — Frank @ 12:30 PM

Most folks associate March with “Madness”. For me, March is associated with three other “M words”… Maple, Mud and Meeting. Maple as in maple sap/syrup. Mud as in mud season. Meeting as in Town Meeting. This past week we have had all three of these “M words”.

Yesterday afternoon, I went for a walk. At the end of our driveway, I had a choice… left and the mud of the “civilized” section of the road or right and the slush of the un-maintained section of our road. I opted for the slush.

Of course, I took my camera with me.

Stone Wall Detail #1

Birch Emerging from the Snow

Granite and Ice

Stone Wall Detail #2

Jane's Barn

Untitled

Living and Dead #1

Living and Dead #2

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11 March 2019

Oh Fig!

Filed under: Still Life — Frank @ 10:11 PM

Joan and her cousin Liz have a fig tree. In the warm weather it is planted (in its pot) outside in the flower bed by one corner of the house. It spends the winter in our basement.

The fig tree must be thinking that spring is coming since it has started sprouting leaves and figs. The other day Joan decided that it might be time to give it some light. Hence, it is now living just inside our front door. It may be there for some time since there is at least a foot of snow on the ground.

This afternoon, the soft directional window light attracted my eye and I decided to make a photograph of a small portion of the fig tree. I hung a black cloth behind the branch I selected and made a few exposures.

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9 March 2019

A Walk on the Lake, Part 2: Other Photos

Filed under: Uncategorized — Frank @ 7:05 PM

Of course, there were things other than bob houses to photograph during yesterday’s walk on the lake.

Here are a few of the things that caught my eye:

Drifted Snow

Red Chairs on Dock in Snow

Tracks in the Snow #1

Tracks in the Snow #2

Nominally White #1

Nominally White #2

Nominally White #3

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A Walk on the Lake, Part 1: Bob House Details

Filed under: architecture,Monadnock Region,Winter — Frank @ 7:00 PM

Yesterday afternoon was warm (just about freezing) and sunny, perfect for a walk on the lake. There are about half a dozen bob houses out on the lake (and a couple more on the shore by the boat ramp).

To my eye, the structures per se do not make particularly interesting photographs, particularly in the harsh late winter sun. However, there were many details that caught my eye.

Icicles #1

Icicles #2

Icicles #3

Stove Pipe #1

Stove Pipe #2

Stove Pipe #3

Stove Pipe #4

Untitled #1

Truth in Advertising?

Untitled #2

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5 March 2019

A Day on the Lake

Filed under: Landscapes,Monadnock Region,Winter — Frank @ 10:00 PM

Last Friday (1 March) , we spent most of the day on the lake… literally. The ice is about twenty inches thick.

We headed out before 11 AM and did not get back to the house until almost 4:30. We, there was a group of five of us, spent the day laying out guides and pulling a ground penetrating radar (GPR) apparatus across the ice in order to map the geology of the lake bottom. This was our second GPR session and a third is planned for this coming Thursday.

Of course, I carried my camera and made a few photographs while out and about.

Here they are:

GPR Rig In Action

Lake Shore (two frame pano)

Lake Shore

Lake Shore Detail

Untitled #1

Untitled #2

Untitled #3

Bob House #1

Bob House #2

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24 February 2019

Old Shells

Filed under: Still Life — Frank @ 12:59 PM

We have a basket containing artifacts brought back from Hawaii in the late 1800’s by some of Joan’s ancestors who were missionaries there. Among the contents of the basket are a number of large (4-6 inch) shells. A few of these made good subjects on a cold gray February afternoon.

Hawaii Shell #1

Hawaii Shell #2

Hawaii Shell #3

Hawaii Shell #4

Hawaii Shell #5

Hawaii Shell #6

Beware… photography talk head! I made these photographs using a single light source (at camera left) and a reflector (either a piece of white cardboard or a piece of cardboard covered with wrinkled aluminum foil… nothing fancy) to fill the shadows. The background was a piece of black seamless. However, in the end, I replaced the background with uniform black in PhotoShop. It is hard to keep light from spilling on to the background with a small tabletop “studio”. Thus the original background was various shades of gray and speckled with dust. Not the look I wanted.

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10 February 2019

Harsh February Light

Filed under: Landscapes,Monadnock Region,Winter — Frank @ 9:59 PM

In some ways we have had typical New Hampshire winter weather… periods of dull drab days and periods of bright, cloudless blue skies. What has not been typical are the multiple periods of warm weather. In the “old days” we would get a January thaw. These days we seem to get a thaw every few weeks.

The latest thaw was a couple of days in the middle of last week. The mud in the road was deep and spring-like. The road crew worked hard to keep it passable.

The last few days have been more typical of February, highs in the mid- to upper 20s F and lows in the low teens. The days have been bright and sunny… good for production by our new solar panels but challenging for photography. I have persisted none-the-less.

The first three photos were made in the last week, with a regular lens. The last six photos were made yesterday using a $20 “Holga lens” that I recently bought on an impulse. This 60 mm lens is all plastic and has a fixed aperture (f/8). Focusing is all manual and rather crude; there are small pictographs along the focus ring to indicate the distance. The resulting photos, all made in harsh February light, have “character”.

Church Detail (Salisbury, NH)

Bend in the Road

Stone Wall Detail

Barn Roof

Stone Wall

Birches and Stone Wall

Mill (Harrisville, NH)

Chesham Depot (long inactive)

Barn and Flag

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16 January 2019

The Profound, the Prosaic and Other Details

Filed under: architecture — Tags: details — Frank @ 12:00 PM

My friend Bill wanted to make my portrait. Why me, I have no idea! However, when it comes to such things, I know not to question another’s choices as there is no “right” or “wrong” in art.

Thus, we met yesterday for lunch at the Harrisville General Store before getting down to “work”. I arrived, at most, ten minutes before Bill. In that interval, I made these photographs, all within a hundred feet of the store’s front door.

After a bowl of wonderful soup, we headed to the house and got to work making portraits. I am very interested to see the result.

The Profound and the Prosaic

Mill Tower

Church Window

Barn Ladder

Barn Board

The first photograph in this series, reminded me of another photo of a black board I made almost ten years ago, see: Rule #47.

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8 January 2019

Images – Williamstown, MA

Filed under: architecture,Landscapes,Uncategorized — Frank @ 6:27 PM

Last Sunday morning (6 Jan 2019), we left the house shortly after seven in the morning and headed for Williamstown, MA; about a two hour drive. Joan was to attend a ukulele workshop organized by our friend, singer-songwriter, Bernice Lewis. I went along to see what I could find to photograph (I was not disappointed) and to attend the afternoon concert associated with the workshop. We also had an enjoyable visit and dinner with Jeff and Robin, friends from our Grand Canyon raft trip before heading home in the evening.

Williamstown is located in the most extreme northwest corner of Massachusetts (it abuts both New York and Vermont) and is the home of Williams College. Having spent a career in academia, I have visited more than my fair share of college towns. Walking around the campus/town for a few hours, I was struck by the complete merger of town and gown. To this casual observer the line between college and town here is virtually nonexistent. I spent about three hours wandering about the campus on a gray Sunday morning and found much to photograph.

The last photograph of this series is of a sculpture “Double L Eccentric Gyratory II” by George Rickey. The morning was quite calm and I did not notice any movement as I approached the piece and raised my camera to my eye. As I began to photograph the sculpture, I had one of those strange moments that sometimes occur as one goes about life. While I concentrated on the angles, the background and the edges of the frame a very slight breeze arose causing the sculpture began to move very slowly and subtly. It took my brain quite a few seconds to realize that this was a kinetic sculpture and that my mind was not out of whack!!