In landscape photography, my eye is drawn to quiet moments. I have found it is relatively unchallenging to make photographs of grand landscapes. One just has to wait for the right atmospheric conditions, which may require great patience and many trips to the same spot. But I enjoy the interaction with more subtle, intimate scenes, where the challenge is to find and interpret the feeling of the area. I want the viewer to feel the same feeling I had at that moment, which is why the making of the photograph must be entirely subliminal and intuitive.

 

One thing the viewer will find missing in these images is unrealistic and/or excessive use of digital post-processing tools, such as those found typically in images processed with Photoshop.  If some of the colors seem a little unrealistic it may be due to two things.  First, I don't saturate or enhance the colors other than to set the white and black points in an image.  That extends the dynamic range of what we see in the picture closer to that which was found in reality, but it also makes the colors seem more vivid.  Kind of like switching from Ektachrome to Velvia, for those who used to photograph with film.  

 

The other thing that may affect your perception of the colors is my misperception.  I am color blind, with a fairly significant red deficiency.  Pink looks gray to me, for example.  Purple looks blue.  I took a weekend course in Cibachrome printing once and labored over a picture of Half Dome all day.  That afternoon I proudly showed my finished 16x20 Cibachrome print to the instructor, John Senser, who was genuinely and visibly appalled.  I was mortified.  He looked at me incredulously, then back and the print and asked, "Who bled all over this photo?"  

 

I had no idea where the reds were in the image, and I could not tell that they were overdone.  Colors are easier to control with accuracy in digital images, so I don't think they're way off, but if something in the color images appears off in this or any other gallery on this site, it's probably due to my color blindness. (this is one reason why I tend toward black and white)

 

The images in this portfolio include several grand landscapes where we find awe and wonder, but mostly consists of more immediate and intimate scenes where I think we all find tranquility and peace.