The Spark

33.365 90mm f8 1/640 ISO 200I only started what I'm calling my 365 project a month ago, but in truth I've been taking pictures of my son almost every day for two years.  His birth was the catalyst for connecting me to the camera, and it was the experience of practicing new ways of seeing him and of capturing my own parenting journey that made me want to stretch myself photographically.

I love taking pictures of Ezra, but after two years it had started to feel confining.  Committing to this project (and deciding that I wasn't going to turn this into a parenting blog) has been incredibly freeing in ways I hadn't foreseen.  I have given myself permission to turn the lens on the world apart from Ezra and it is making me feel alive in a beautifully unexpected way.

All this is to say I didn't expect to post Ezra here today.  But I tried a lot of different things with my camera yesterday and when I uploaded the pictures none of the ones I envisioned for this space were working.  Only then did I look through the captures of Ezra at our pre-nap playground romp.  So today I'll live by Rumi:  Let the beauty we love be what we do.

Just What the World Needs

32.365 120mm f5 1/125 ISO 400I know.  I know.  I hate shooting sunsets.  I mean really, is there anything new to say about how beautiful the sunset is?  But sometimes it's compelling enough to make me stop and try to outwit the cliche anyway. 

Lately I've been noticing this rhythm I'm finding as I shoot:  scanning the viewfinder, rattling off a few frames at a time, making adjustments in the exposure or the way I frame the picture.  And a lot of times the pictures feel okay but then one small shift happens and it changes everything.  The whole composition comes to life.  Sometimes it's some detail I see, and I take one step to the right, and then the hair on the back of my neck stands up because it suddenly just works. 

But sometimes it's complete serendipity, like a gift from the photo gods, as if raising my camera were a kind of prayer and they're responding.  That's how it felt when this flock of birds flew through my frame last night, so I just fired the shutter and said thank you.

November Valentine

31.365 18mm f4.0 1/4 ISO 800

Some days it feels like all I do is hurl myself as quickly as possible from one obligation to the next, but by virtue of some miracle traffic was light enough yesterday to give me ten extra minutes to set up this shot on my way home from work.  The city's main artery pulsed with a kinetic flow under a brooding purple sky.

It occurs to me now, one month into it, that this 365 project is becoming something of a love letter to Denver.  It's true, I'm still infatuated, even after living here for 15 years.  I love that, no matter where I've been, it always feels good to come home to here.

Speaking of where I've been, I finally (after one extravagent user error where I nuked all the photo editing I had done just as I finished the set) finished re-editing my pictures from Costa Rica.  A short album from last week's trip is here.

The Fog of Wednesday

30.365 22mm f8 1/320 ISO200I had every intention of driving straight to work and putting my nose to the grindstone.  Really, I did.  But as I drove down the hill from my house and saw the incredible frosty, foggy haze enveloping the city, my car just re-routed itself toward this scene.  The excitement must have been coming off me because as the guy in this photo walked up behind me he said, "that's going to be a cool picture."  And I couldn't help but gush as I looked through the viewfinder, "It looks so fucking cool!"

I told a friend at work about this amazing view and he said, "You're always in the right place at the right time."  And I realized three things: first, this is the reason to carry your camera with you at all times (even though it's a pain in the neck) and second, I really want to work downtown so I can walk or bike there.  But finally I realized that I have to believe there is no one right place.  This fabulous thing drew me to it but with an alert eye and an appreciative heart, photo worthy moments happen everywhere, all the time. 

But I'm really glad I got to appreciate this rare scene when it happened. 

Resistance is Futile

29.365 55mm f5.6 1/30 ISO 800

I raced out of my office yesterday afternoon, knowing that getting to my son's school on time would be a challenge because of the snow that blew in at mid-day.  I had resigned myself to begin making friends with my flash last night, since Daylight Standard Time has stolen my available light.  But as I jogged toward my parked car I noticed this detail of winter's first blast and I couldn't help but stop to rattle off three frames.

No one who has lived in Colorado for long would say that the snow that fell yesterday came early.  But somehow the season's first snow is still always a surprise.  I like how these last green leaves seem to be resisting the inevitable arrival of winter but in the end, like all of us, they must succumb.