Spring 2011

The natural world holds great fascination for me. Viewed through the lens I am often amazed at the captured snapshot of time and place, illumination and weather that come together forming the image of the photograph. Here is a collection of my images created during the last of winter / beginning of spring 2011. Remember to double click on an image to enlarge. Hope you enjoy…

"Nature gives to every time and season some beauties of its own; and from morning to night, as from the cradle to the grave, is but a succession of changes so gentle and easy that we scarcely mark their progress." - Charles Dickens

The winter snow cover leaving the landscape is part of the natural world theme at this latitude in the Inland Pacific NW. Pictured here is the Columbia River Valley, near Chelan Falls. The image captured on an overcast day carries the mood of the weather over this historic river valley.

Often this time of year the late winter / early spring storms push off the Pacific Ocean, over the Cascade Mountain Range and deliver more layers of snow into the high country as seen here with a March snowstorm just breaking over the Kettle River Range.

Another look into the Kettle River range this time between Sherman Peak and Snow Peak we see the transitions of the northern hemisphere seasons at work on a micro scale. Spring conditions in the valleys / winter conditions in the mountains.

A couple of weeks later there is a clear change approaching as the snowlines retreat upslope to the higher elevations as the spring thaw encompasses the lowerlands. Tis a fine time of year in the Okanogan Highlands.

Leaving the mountain landscapes but continuing on with images from this transition period of the early seasons of 2011:
I always enjoy the opportunity to photograph Snoqualmie Falls but to do so when the winter snow melt is in full flow is a powerful experience.  Had been about a year since I last visited this 268 ft (82 m) waterfall on the Snoqualmie River. Snoqualmie is also the name of the People, who have lived for centuries in the Snoqualmie Valley in western Washington. The falls are central to their cultural beliefs, and spirituality. This area is a traditional burial site, and it is the belief of the Snoqualmie People that the falls are “the place where First Woman and First Man were created by Moon the Transformer” and “where prayers were carried up to the Creator by great mists that rise from the powerful flow.”During a beach walk on Bainbridge Island, Puget Sound, chanced upon this driftwood composition. It fit the lens just right...

This session will close with one of the images from this spring I'm rather fond of ~ an aspen grove in the Kettle River Valley near Curlew, WA.

"Keep close to Nature's heart ... and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean." - John Muir



Nautical Art - part 1

I am a sailor. Having been born on the biggest island of the U.S. eastern seaboard seems to have deposited a certain amount of 'salt' in my blood. While I have lived in the dry areas of Texas, Colorado, & Arizona there was always an underlying call to the water. To quote a favorite character, "There is nothing, absolutely nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats." And that is the point of focus with the visual journey forthcoming - a passion for all things nautical.
















"The Adventuress" above, is image #1 in this series. It was nothing short of delightful to cross paths with the 136 foot, gaff rigged, schooner Adventuress as she ghosted across Haro Straits between the western shores of Canada & the U.S.A. Built in 1913, and recently restored, she is listed as a National Historic Landmark (see link below).









The photograph above; "Trawler", image #2, has been in my collection many years. Taken in 1999, on a foggy day, during a late September cruise through British Columbia's Desolation Sound, it has ghosted back & forth through both my basement darkroom and my digital darkroom. I was never satisfied with the results, until recently that is. This, the final edition of the rendering process of this photo, has finally captured the image my eye 'saw' on the misty day of the photograph. This may be the longest period of time I have had an image on the drafting table. And in the end - I really enjoy the results. See link below for Desolation Sound.











Image #3 entitled "Pilothouse" is a photographed created in 2001. Anchored in a cove off the norwest shore of Matia Island in the Pacific NW San Juan Islands this home-built, wooden classic caught my eye as the afternoon summer sun settled over Sucia Island (in the background). It's one of those shots I wish I knew who the owner is so I could give him or her a copy. See link below for Matia Island State Park.






There are times when the world is yours...
When a single breath fills your existence. A time when the whisper of wavelets curling on a clean, gravel shoal is your sound track. I love those moments and so does the subject on this beach on the west side of Clark Island in the San Juan Island group. Photo #4, above, is titled "Beach Time".


Photograph #5 is titled after the name of the sailing vessel, "Grace". Owned and piloted by my dear friend Marjean, the SV Grace is a 1965 Islander seen here motorsailing her way across the Strait of Georgia north of Nanamio B.C. I recall that when this photo came out of the can I danced around delighted in how that magical light had been captured on film. Now having undergone scanning and a very light rendering there is an even greater feel of the mysteries of crossing a large body of water on a small boat.






"Into the Mists" above, rendered photograph #6 is another of those rare shots that happen if you are in the right place at the right time and ready to engage a camera. This vessel was crossing my path as I solo sailed across the sometimes notorious Strait of Juan de Fuca. As we came close to crossing the skipper of this boat turned parallel to my course and soon vanished into the mists. With nearly 20 miles of open water in front of us not to mention a busy shipping traffic lane, I wondered if he was lost, or disoriented. Not once did I hear a fog horn from this vessel.







A visual break from the vessels, this landscape, above, on the southern point of Clark Island with Lummi Island in looming dark in the background and Mount Baker and the Cascade Range in the left quarter of the photo. Represents a classic San Juan Island view. It is #7 of this series.


I'll close this series with a piece entitled "Gull in Flight". A photograph taken from the deck of a good friend's custom pilothouse motorsailor Chak Chak. On an early spring cruise several years ago.

So ends the first series of Nautical Art on the Firewater Images site. Hope you enjoyed the show and will check in later for more.
Foster

The sailing vessel Adventuress:
http://www.soundexp.org/index.php?page=history

Desolation Sound B.C. Canada:
http://www.google.com/archivesearch?sourceid=navclient&rlz=1T4ADBF_enUS245US245&q=desolation+sound&um=1&ie=UTF-8&scoring=t&ei=G-bKScO5IYKOsQPq9NmgCg&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&resnum=10&ct=title
Matia Island State Park:
http://www.stateparks.com/matia_island.html

Clark Island State Park:
http://www.stateparks.com/clark_island.html

Strait of Georgia:
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/230264/Strait-of-Georgia

Beach series...

Lets go to the beach... Based entirely on latitude
'beach time' for different people means different things. In the Pacific Northwest it isn't always "fun in the sun" at the beach. We have off-season days, rainy days, and bad-tide days. There is time at the beach like the adjacent photo of yours truly bundled up for an April beach walk, silhouette self portrait. But in my opinion a bad day at the beach is still better than a good day at work. Here's a few for your visual treat...

Pacific Beach, girls playing in the early season surf. This photograph conveys the feeling to me of the hearty Pacific Northwest people who will venture out into the elements even when the temperatures are 'less than ideal'. I love that 'endless' Pacific Ocean stretching into the beyond.
Of course the title for this photo is "Beach Girls"...
Sand & Water, there is no more of an ancient composition than a combination of water and land. Based on historical record our forebears , wandering the wide world, held no less a fascination for the intersection of land & water than we do today.


"Steep Beach" off the Oregon Coast is a representative photograph of the amazing relationship between water and land that exists in the Pacific Northwest

"Beach Walkers" What can I say? I love the rendition of this photograph. The concept here is to find a relationship between light, image, rendition and composition that affects a watercolor painting. To do this with a camera, darkroom and eyeball is certainly a challenge which I hope I've come close to accomplishing here.

"Sand & Shell"; often the smallest of details make the most interesting of visual stories. You can almost picture in your mind the last, foamy wavelet pulling back across this shell and sculpting the sand in it's passage.