More Lessons on Nature Photography

In the last edition I said something to the effect that nature photography was mostly a matter of where you stand. That’s true as a prerequisite, but for one thing it can be very difficult and require high level hiking and survival skills to get to the right spot. And of course there is more to it than that. Like for anything, you have to be able to see and then it helps to have some kind of vision. It’s not easy.

The above painting is the first image I remember seeing that made me change the way I saw the natural world. The artist sees light and communicates it with incredible style. The violent white splotches capture the beauty of dappled light better than anything I ever could have imagined. I’ve been trying to capture the spirit of that photo ever since. There have been others since. The artists of, and similar to, the Hudson River School had an even greater influence on my nature photography. Of course a camera can’t capture the same look as paint on canvas, but you can learn to see light and composition the way the artist was seeing it and from there apply it to your own work.

This is a Hopewell mound just up the road from where I live. I’m curious what you think about it? I pass this mound all the time. Although the mound building cultures were as significant as any major human culture in history, and more so than most, very little is known about them and even less evidence of their existence remains. Part of the problem is that what does remain does not look spectacular. Mounds are just piles of dirt with plants growing on them. A picture of a mound looks like a picture of a small hill. But it is not just a small hill and a photograph of a mound should not look like a photograph of a small hill. To remedy that I have begun taking portraits of mounds. A good portrait should show more about the subject than merely what it looks like. I think that’s what the great 19th century landscape painters did. They made portraits of the land. They didn’t just paint pictures of it.

Anyway, here’s the takeaway. Look at a lot of art and find some that speaks to you. Then put some thought into the meaning of what you’re looking at and consider what you’ve learned from all the art you’ve looked at. The results should at least be interesting.

I’ll probably have more to say about nature photography going forward. I’m curious what you think.