Thursday evening I found myself in Brattleboro with some time on my hands.
The only camera I had with me was my digitally “enhanced” camera obscura. Thus, this is what I used to make photographs; all were made within a couple of hundred feet of the Vermont Center for Photography’s front door. (The last two photos were conceived as a diptych.)
Yes, you read that correctly… this post is about onions, well really photographs of onions!
A couple of days ago Joan harvested all of the onions from the garden. They are sitting on a tray in our breezeway drying.
Yesterday, I borrowed a couple of them to use as models. I spent an enjoyable few hours (split between yesterday afternoon and this morning) playing with the lighting and making photographs.
This is the fourth year*, I have picked an “Adams Dozen”… that is, twelve of my favorite photos for the year.
The process seemed more difficult this year that it was in years past. I “exposed” 16,914 frames in 2015**. On my first pass through, I ended up with nearly eighty candidates for this years “Adams Dozen”.
Here is my final selection:
* See this post for the first year’s selection and for a more detailed explanation; see this post for last year’s selection.
** This is maybe a bit more than the recent past. My LightRoom catalog says I exposed 12,832 frames in 2014 and 11,735 frames in 2013.
This afternoon was middle-of-summer hot and sticky. I headed to the cool of the basement to make a photograph that has been rattling around my skull since about February.
The subject of this photo is the only piece of nine cords of firewood that we did not burn this winter. When I came across this piece of wood, I placed it on the mantel instead of in the stove.
Truly a fine piece of New Hampshire firewood!
A few years ago (before I retired), I bought a book titled Book + Art. Handcrafting Artists’ Books by Dorothy Simpson Krause. At the time I read through it but I did not find the time to experiment. Now, I have the time… so I have been experimenting!
My proximate motivation, was the series of “Autumnal Abstracts” I made this fall. I was interested in finding a way to display a set of images from this series and a small book seemed like a good solution.
My first usable book (Photo A1, below) began with two small photos printed on a half sheet of regular inkjet photo paper which was then folded in half. This makes for a final a page size of 4.25″ x 5.5″. Three of these folded sheets were then sewn into a card stock cover.
This construction is very nontraditional…the open ends of the folded sheets are placed at the crease of the cover and sewn in place. More usually, the creases of the pages are place into the crease on the cover for sewing. However, the “odd” construction worked pretty well and I did not need double sided inkjet photo paper. One small snag with this construction is that the book is very stiff… it does not lay open by itself. (This is why there is not a photo of the inside!)
I was so pleased with the result that I made seven more copies for an edition of eight!
After my “success” with the Autumnal Abstract series, I decided to try a similar but larger book (see photo A7) with photos from my “Flow” project. The construction is the same as above but I used 11″ x 17″ sheet of paper; again printing two images per sheet. This results in an 8.5″ x 11″ page when folded in half. For a cover, I used a very nontraditional material… a sheet of thin “craft foam” from one of the chain stores.
Emboldened and wanting to experiment further, I switched back to the Autumnal Abstract series.
The next version (Photos A2 and A3) of was a more traditional construction. I made, using traditional methods, a small booklet (4.5″ x 6″) out of bristol board and I glued photos on to the pages.
In looking though my stash of photo paper, I found that I actually had a package of double-sided paper. It is not high quality paper but it sufficed for another experiment. I printed two photos on each side of a half sheet of this paper and trimmed them so that the pages were 5.25″ square when folded in half, Three of these folios were stacked together for the final book. I added a card stock cover and bound them all together with a traditional pamphlet stitch. The result (Photos A4 and A5) is a very traditional looking booklet.
About this time, I visited Zephyr Designs, an art supply store over in Brattleborough, Vermont. I came back home with a number of sheets of decorative paper with which to continue my experiments!
Photo A6 shows one result. The construction is similar to the second version described above except that I again”went square” (6″ x 6″) and the cover is made from a piece of heavy and woody paper rather than simple card stock.
Long thin (i.e. panoramic) photos are often difficult to display traditionally (i.e. matted and framed). In thinking about this “problem”, I decided that an accordion book might be the solution… so I experiments some more!
I won’t bore you with all of the failed experiments. Suffice to say that most photo papers have coatings that crack when folded and that a number of the resin coated papers contort into all sorts of interesting shapes when glued to more traditional papers! (Plastic coated papers don’t react to moisture the same way as regular papers do.)
My first successful attempts at accordion books involved printing on regular watercolor paper (a half sheet that measures about 7″ x 20″) and adding decorative paper covers to the end panels. (see Photos A and B below; these are showing up at the end of the series for some reason…. #%@$ computers!)
This was a good start, but not every photo looks good with the muted contrast one gets when printing on “plain” watercolor paper. So I continued my search for an ink jet paper that would work in this context. I also was interested in completely covering the back of the print (i.e. not just adding covers) with decorative paper.
I think that I have got all of the problems solved! The remainder of the photos below show the front and back of five different accordion books (measuring about 5.75″ x 16″) that I have made over the past few days.
Last week, Joan “won” an auction for a 40″ loom.
It was donated to the Grapevine (a social service agency located in Antrim) and included in their recent fund-raising auction. Thus, a good cause was supported.
She picked up the disassembled loom on Sunday afternoon and by midnight that evening we had it assembled even sans manual. Not bad for two people had never really examined a loom up close before.
On Wednesday, we were finally able to make the short trip to Harrisville Designs, one of our local purveyors of all things “fiber”. Joan needed to get some “stuff” necessary to use a loom but that was not among “stuff” that came with the loom. (As you can see, I am up on all the technical jargon associated with weaving.)
My presence on this excursion was not essential. However, I decided to accompany Joan on her trip for a number of reasons…
1) To get out of the house during this stretch of miserable weather.
2) To, hopefully, keep the expenses associated with the “stuff” to be acquired as low as possible. This, of course, leaves more cash available for photography stuff tools!
3) To have a chance to photograph interesting “stuff”!
The citizens of New Hampshire take their politics seriously… even in the mid-term elections. This is probably because we really hew to the idea that all politics are local!
There are road side signs every where as candidates work on their “name recognition”. In some places one passes a lonely singleton in some one’s yard or along an isolated stretch of road. In other places there are great masses of signs concentrated in a small area. The first photo (below) shows the lineup of signs by our local market in Antrim.
Since we do not watch television (or listen to commercial radio) I can only imagine the onslaught of political advertising that viewers/listeners are enduring. Clearly, from the sign at one nearby fire station, the barrage has been too much for at least one individual!
“Our Town”… Peterborough, NH.
Joan went to see a concert in Peterborough late yesterday afternoon. We intended to head to another concert in Brattleboro, VT in the evening. Rather than Joan having to drive back home to pick me up after the first concert, I figured that I would find enough to entertain myself while she was listening to Lithuanian music. Thus, I went along with her to Peterborough.
The first concert began at 4. After dropping Joan off, I headed to the Toadstool’s, the bookstore. Three books and $15 later (I shopped the bargain bin!), I was off with my reading material, to Harlow’s Pub for a beer. By the time I finished my beer, it was good and dark, raining lightly and foggy… perfect conditions for some photography!
Thus, with camera in hand, I made a couple of circuits around downtown Peterborough. By 6:10 we were in the car headed towards Brattleboro.
I was surprised to see male Autumn Meadowhawks around the yard on the weekend (2 and 3 November) since we had some cold nights (temperature in the low twenties Fahrenheit) last week. I only saw one or two individuals at a time but they were still flying strong.
On Sunday (3 Nov) Joan was raking leaves when she disturbed a very cold and torpid red-backed salamander nestled among the leaves. As I moved him from the spot where we found him, he became a bit more active. I grabbed the camera which was rigged for odes and made a couple of exposures. I then headed back into the house for the macro lens… all for naught, as he was gone from the rock where I had placed him by the time I got back. I searched the area in vain for some minutes but he was not to be found.
Tuesday evening (no… make that late afternoon, as sunset is about 4;30 these days), I headed down to the lake in hopes of a nice sunset to photograph. I was rewarded with less than five minutes of nice pink colored clouds but this was enough to make a nice photograph.
Today (Wednesday, 6 Nov) I headed up Pack Monadnock for some more raptor watching. I arrived just before noon and stayed until about 3:30. We saw a number of raptors including two golden eagles, but none were close enough to photograph. (Henry’s full report is here). I did, however, make a few photographs of smaller birds which alit briefly nearby.
There is another week and a half of the raptor watch season remaining, so hopefully I still have time to get a “portfolio quality” photo… if not, there is always next year!
In my view, Autumn can be divided into three sub-seasons. Early, when the bright deep red of the swamp maples appears. Middle, when the reds, oranges and yellows of the upland maples and birch dominate. And finally, late, when the yellow-browns of the oak and beech appear.
Late autumn is now in full swing around here!
I have, in my minds eye, a photograph of the rising moon just above the local horizon with an “interesting” foreground bathed in the warm light of the setting sun. I know that this is somewhat of a visual cliche, but I want to make my own version.
In order to do this successfully, one needs to understand that on the day of the full moon, the sun sets at roughly the same time as the moon rises. On each succeeding day thereafter, progressing towards the next new moon, the moon rises a bit later relative to the sun setting. Conversely, on the days preceding the full moon the moon rises before the sun sets.
In September, I made it out to (unsuccessfully) photograph the moon rise the day after full moon.
Late Friday afternoon (i.e. on the day of the October full moon), I pointed the truck towards the Peterson WMA in Dublin to see if I could make a photo of the rising full moon. The road (NH 137) passes this large wetland on its west side so there are expansive views to the east. I was hoping that the ridge on the west side of the road was not too high so that the foreground would not be in shadow when the full moon made its appearance over the ridge to the east.
Alas, this was not to be… a day or two before the moon is full would work better… I know this. Next month!
On my way to Dublin, I made a side trip to one of my favorite spots (in Marlborough) for viewing Mount Monadnock. The first two photos shown below were made there.
The third and fourth photos were made as I waited for the moon to make its appearance over the ridge at Peterson WMA. The third photo (made at 5:15 PM) gives a hint of the disappointment to come… the sun light has already disappeared from most of the foreground and sunset was still forty five minutes away. Moonrise was about ten minutes before sunset.
The fourth photo was made at 5:56 PM (four minutes before sunset) and there was no moon in sight yet… uggh! The moon, when it finally appeared roughly twenty minutes later, rose just to the left of the trees at the far right of third photo. By then, it was too dark for an effective photo. Maybe next month in a different place and a day or two before the full moon!
The last four photos were made on Sunday. The skies were a perfect combination of bright blue and crisp clouds for making landscapes. The clouds made for rapidly changing light on the landscape so one makes lots of exposures and spends considerable time waiting for “good light”.
The first two of these photos were made at the wetland were Craig Rd., Reed Carr Rd. and Old Pound Rd. meet; a couple of miles from the house. The last two were made at the “upper” beaver swamp a short walk behind the house.
All of these photos show the oak and beech dominated late autumn foliage. The drab gray of November is soon to be upon us. Making interesting landscapes between now and the first snows will be a challenge!
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