Trains, Planes, and Automobiles

My plans are made to go see my daughter and the grandbabies, and also to meet her new significant other. I’ve chosen the method of travel that seems the most sane in this world – train. I can go round trip on the train for what it would cost me in gas to go a little more than one way and I get pretty good gas milage. The only way I’m flying these days is if the trip is too far to do any other way.

I started out loving flying. I saw the ocean from the air before I ever saw it on the ground. In fact, the first time I did see the ocean on the ground I wondered where the white fluffy things that sat on the water (clouds) were. I remember nothing but enjoyment when we flew back from Korea, 33 hours in the air, my poor parents. I do remember feeling a little miffed because everyone told me we were going to stop in Hawaii and the only thing I saw in Hawaii was the inside of a windowless room where all us children were herded while our parents went through customs. I loved flying when I took a bus to Boston and then discovered I could fly back for just a little more money. Sixteen hours on a bus plus 2 hours in the New York terminal vs. an hour and a half in the air. It was heaven. It was pure decadence. When my first husband and I moved to New Hampshire we flew back home regularly. I’d bring my camera and fight for the window seat, taking lots of non-descript cloud photos through scratched plane windows.

Perhaps it was the time the plane hit turbulence, the seat belt sign stayed on for the entire trip, and I needed to visit the restroom in the worst way. Maybe it was all those small planes that I flew in when I worked the northeast installing and teaching software. I especially remember the one into Pittsburg where the seats looked like school cafeteria seats bolted to the floor and we bounced and rolled like never before. Maybe it was Air Florida hitting the 14th street bridge. Somewhere along the way flying got a little scary.

I went through a period of being afraid to fly and that slowly mutated into just not liking it but doing it anyway. I came to acceptance that when it is your time to go, it’s your time to go and quit being afraid of crashing.

Now there is a whole new fear, getting stuck on a plane for hours while it waits to take off. I’m not so afraid of getting stuck in a terminal. I’m pretty resourceful and I always have my camera with me so the idea of getting stuck somewhere interesting sounds kind of fun. But getting stuck on a plane for hours on end, stuffed into a tiny seat, with the bathrooms slowly becoming unusable, sounds slightly terrifying. And it is so much more inconvenient these days. I can’t check my camera and laptop because they might get stolen but they’re bulky and dangerously close to the carry on limits. I end up only carrying one camera and stuffing it into the laptop carrier with my purse and now I’ve got so much delicate electronics rubbing against each other that I’m afraid to put it in the overhead bin. Not to mention trying to take off my shoes, keep an eye on the laptop, the other eye on the camera, and get through the metal detector.

The train – it sounds so civilized…

Patience (or not)

“I never know in advance what I will photograph, ... I go out into the world and hope I will come across something that imperatively interests me. I am addicted to the found object. I have no doubt that I will continue to make photographs till my last breath.”

Ansel Adams


A lot of patrons remark that I must have a lot of patience. Actually I don’t or at least I don’t think I do. I search out the wild places because of a spiritual hunger that needs the peace and tranquility they offer. Any photograph I get is an extra gift. I don’t generally lie in wait for a specific shot. I walk and look and wait for beauty to reveal herself. When I am out taking photographs I will raise the camera to my eye a hundred times without pressing the shutter. If I like what I see however, I enter a different mode. I will take 30 shots in the space of 10 minutes or less trying to get that perfect representation of what I see before me. Unlike what some say, the camera can and does lie. It darkens the darks and washes out the lights. Sometimes the camera, most frustratingly, tells the truth. Our eyes compensate, turn the pole straight even though it is leaning when it becomes two dimensional. Our eyes miss the piece of trash in the foreground, until it shows itself in the photograph. It’s not just the art of seeing that makes a good photograph. It is the art of seeing and anticipating the way the camera sees.

Sometimes I just stop though, and breathe in the air, feel the solitude.

Photography Invitational and More on Canvas

I am looking very forward to the Photography Invitational at the Mount Dora Center for the Arts. They will be displaying four of my photographs. They even put “Morning in the Glades” on the postcard advertising the event. I was there today dropping off work and got to see some of the other work that will also be displayed. Some very nice quality work and well worth the trip to see it. Please stop by if you can. I will be at the opening which is on April 11 from 6 – 8 PM. This is the same time and in the same area as the Mount Dora Art Walk. If you cannot make the opening the exhibit will be up until May 9.

On another note - Another attack on photographs printed on canvas and it’s coming from photographers themselves. It’s come to my attention that some photographers are having their canvas gallery wrap prints made in China very cheaply. I will be the first to admit that I don’t do my own gallery wraps. Trust me, you don’t want me to, it’s not a quality product if I do it. I can eyeball a print inside a mat to see that it is straight but I can’t get my gallery wraps straight or neat. I’ve also tried several suppliers to do gallery wraps for me until I found my current one. They just weren’t right either. Too tight and the canvas cracks, too loose and it looks sloppy. The coating put on the canvas is important as well. Canvas gallery wraps do not have the benefit of UV resistant glass to protect them from the elements. The wrong or improperly applied coating will cause the photograph to fade prematurely. The bottom line is that quality is very important on a canvas gallery wrap.

If you buy from me I can guarantee that my canvas gallery wraps, and all my work, is done to the highest quality possible and done in the US. If you buy from somebody else and the price seems quite low, please check and make sure you are getting a quality product. If you’re looking for a canvas gallery wrap made in China – Wal-Mart sells them.

Check out the new picture of me. A friend and I photographed a wedding this past weekend and he took this very nice photograph.