Man on the Edge of the forest

Man on the edge of the forest trough fog at sunset

I’ve always found interesting how different people see different things in a photo. Some look at the photo above and see a man walking out of a forest, some see the man entering the forest, a person with imagination could say that this is an apparition of a ghost in a surreal forest. A sad person could say that the man in the picture is walking sadly at sunset. An insecure person could say that it’s a photo of a man lost in the woods. A single image can be interpreted differently by different people.

The way we perceive reality differs, so our interpretation of art differs too. I think art is the interpretation of reality through the mind of the artist. But the result is also  subject to interpretation. So everybody takes from art what they need at a certain moment in time and space.

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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

 

Snow falling in forest

Snow flakes falling in winter forest

There’s something really special and serene about snow falling in complete silence. If the forest is also shrouded in fog, this makes for one of the most serene places I have ever been. When there is no wind and the forest is far enough from any human settlement, you can almost hear the snow falling.

I remember I walked trough the forest for a couple of hours taking foggy winter pics, and because my battery was getting low from the cold and night was approaching, I decided to turn back. Only then the snow started falling and I was mesmerized by the dreamy winter wonderland. I used a 35 mm lens and used a f6,3 aperture to have the group of of trees in the foreground in focus yet still have the snow flakes from the front and back blurry enough to make the whole setting more dreamy. I decided to make the white balance colder to better match what I saw that evening.

It’s one of my favorite winter photos. It brings together elements that I love: winter, fog, the forest, and has that “dreamyness” and atmosphere that I love to see in a photo.

It is available exclusively here: https://www.stocksy.com/836958 and managed to sparkle interest not only in winter, but all year round until now.

 

Tree under starry sky

Tree under starry sky with red moon rising and falling star

I love the peace and quiet of the night. While I’m out photographing at night it’s almost like a form of meditation. This has to do with the fact that night photography often requires really long exposure times, but I think it also has something to do with the fact that one can see our place between the stars and realize that we are part of a much bigger picture. This feeling is the most intense at night while gazing at the stars.

The photo above was taken on such a night of wandering on meadows and watching the stars and it has received a lot of attention trough the years, turning eyes and also selling a few prints. I think the reason for this is that it has a great subject – a strange looking tree in the foreground that almost seems to literally reach for the stars given it’s shape, but also because it captures another moment: the red moon rising. A lot of people asked if it is the sun or the moon that is visible. It’s actually the moon rising at midnight. If it were the sun, the whole scene would be too bright and the stars above would not be visible. I usually like horizontal prints, but this photo looks great as a print because the whole scene unfolds vertically: the darker area with the bright stars at the top of the photo, the middle blue part that is lighter and has fewer stars, and the bottom red part that has just a few visible stars. The exposure time was pretty short for a night photo – 46 seconds, so the stars won’t appear as light trails – I think I’ll make a post about star trails in the future as it is really interesting waiting for hours to see the final result. The night holds many mysteries. And even though night photography is difficult and takes time and patience – it is really worth it. I especially like the fact that I bring to light scenes that would otherwise remain hidden in the dark and would never be seen.

You can license this image here: https://www.stocksy.com/750368

Print available here: http://crated.com/art/266374/tree-under-starry-sky-by-photocosma?product=PO&size=14%7C10