Moon over tree

Minimal landscape with moon up in the blue sky above tree

There is the theory of creative limitation saying that limiting yourself to a single mean of expression or technique – one instrument or style of playing in music, one technique of painting or one lens or technique in photography – can make you more creative and make you see things differently.  I have to be honest and say that I didn’t believe this to actually work, but  a couple of months ago I decided to try and use focal lenses that I don’t use so often. For me it means using tele lenses more and searching for scenes I usually ignore. I think this affected the way I see a frame and compose a shot, the way I search for subjects and points of interest in images. I’m pretty content with the results so I’m going to try and experiment further with different mindsets.

The photo that I chose to illustrate this article was taken with a 70-300 mm lens at 70mm. On one side the sun was setting and on the opposite side the moon was just rising above a tree. The terrain didn’t allow me to change my position too much and if I would have chosen a wider lens the moon would have only been a small dot in the frame. So I shot it just above a nearby tree with green branches and thought that less of the tree would make for a simple minimal and modern aesthetic.

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Rainy Autumn Days

Autumn Rain Detail in the Forest

There’s been some cold and rainy days where I live. Good for photography but really bad for the equipment and the photographer. The photo above was taken last year, on  a similar cold and rainy autumn day. The raindrops flying trough the air are visible in contrast to the dark forest, and the last leaves on the branch give a sense of a late autumn. Sometimes the atmosphere is in the little details. I love the autumn rain, but I do hope the weather gets better – I had to postpone a photo tour because of it.

This moody autumn detail is available for licensing at Stocksy.

Frozen Leaves in Late Autumn

Frozen Leaves in Late Autumn Morning

Sea of Calmness

I sometimes find interesting or out of the ordinary details in nature when I expect them the least. It’s the case with this photo of a small frog floating on a leaf in a pond. I was searching for new ways of getting further up a valley, didn’t have too much success so I decided to sit down and catch my breath for a couple of minutes, near a pond in the forest. I noticed that a little frog was doing the same thing resting on a fallen leaf, so I grabbed my tele lens and took a couple of photos.

I like this image, to me it evokes some kind of calmness, tranquility. This little guy is in the middle of the pond, yet floats around calm like nothing else exists. Sometimes when I’m stressed this image comes to my mind. Gotta keep calm, or the leaf might overturn. Great advice learned from nature, like so many other useful things.

I even have a print of this photo, and it works as a reminder to keep calm. If you like it enough to want to hang it on your wall, you can get it here