The Warmth of Fall Trees 


There is a rare space in
late fall when the  red and amber leaves have fallen.  Their colors are warm,
inviting a  walk as they make that comforting soft crunching sound under foot. 
The  hidden colors of the red oak’s bark becomes visible as the youngsters of 
the woods hold onto their bright tan leaves.  I imagine they are  comforting to
each by enhancing each other’s life, with no thought of  time passing or judging
the variety of colors created with such freedom  of imagination.  They remind me
to practice the beauty of their wisdom:  holding on and letting go are practices
based upon  readiness.
This is part of the Gallery Exhibit that will open May 1st at the Rivers Edge Conference Center in Rocky River.

I've created notes about 14 classic photographs which willl be exhibited May 1 - July 31 at the River's Edge Conference Center in Rocky River.

This is titled Silencio.  Sycamore trees prefer to make their lifelong home beside a stream or river.  In the late fall and winter when the leaves have fallen, the white branches of the sycamore light up.  It's as if someone flipped a switch and the white bark of the twisting sycamore stands out from the surrounding oak and maple, whose bark is dark and grey.
Route 715 in eastern Ohio is a short route, rarely traveled, with plenty of places to pull off.  Considerable time and patience and conversation with the trees reveal their best side. The rarely traveled road contribute greatly to slowing down and walking around the trees and then walking back from the trees, to determine whether to use a normal 50mm or 35mm lens, or steps way back on the road and use a telephoto--70-200mm.   n this classic photograph we can see beyond the twisting white sycamore tree branches to a few colorful branches that have held on  The grey sky was avoided when I created the photograph, but the effect of the sky is to create a soft diffused dome of light.  Many times the soft and gentle effect of a grey sky is just what my heart needs.  "Be soft and gentle to yourself.  Slow down."  Give yourself the gift of Silencio.

As I am now 66, these words of Gary Snyder are comforting and challenge me to reach inside and take hold of the courage within, to be the person am born to be. What do you think?


 
he human community,  when healthy,  is like an ancient forest.   The little ones are in  the shade and shelter of  the big ones,  even rooted in their lost old bodies. All ages and all together  growing and dying…But let there be really old trees who can give up all sense of propriety and begin
 throwing their limbs out in extravagant gestures,
 dance like poses…. holding themselves available to whatever the world
and the weather might propose…They are like the Chinese Immortals,
to have lived that long  is to have permission  to be eccentric…To be the poets and painters among trees, laughing, ragged, and fearless.They make me almost  look forward to old age.
                  Gary Snyder

In a playful burst of energy,  I just spun the wheel on the back of my camera to see quickly what I had taken so far, and I saw how the duck weed in this little pond, was slowly moving clockwise, as a result of a little trickle of water from the rocks.  I wondered how slow I could get the shutter speed with every polarizer filter on, the ISO down to 50, the f stop at 22.  .... about 30 seconds, that was it, on a bright day. 
So in my next visit to MidWest Camera I learned about a variable neutral density filter--variable in that it began with 2 stops darker and by clicks went down to 8 stops darker.  Genius was the name of the filter.  Expensive.  But I went back and here is a 3 minute exposure of the duck weed. 

I thought I'd be clever and use the variable neutral density filter at High Banks in the Fall and see what occurred.
Blur occurred.  or....  BBBBBBBBBLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURRRRRRRRRRRRR

So I went to focus stacking.  I created 32 images rapidly.  And then put them together. Not as fascinating as the swirl in the pond, from a tiny trickle of water.....   

 Swirls like galaxies are found in all kinds of places on the crust of the Earth, in clouds, in sandstone--the record of the swirls from millions of years ago. 

If you'd like to subscribe to my blog, look to the lower right hand corner where you'll see in orange RSS feed, click on that, and then click subscribe.  I hope you will.

Next time, the question is, How do you put 32 images together as one?  Or, What is focus stacking?  Or, How to make a curving fern that is in focus at one end but not the other, in focus from end to end? 
'nuff said.

John

“When
I Am Among Trees”
A
Witness of Classic Photography
 By
John Holliger


The persimmon and witch hazel trees were
planted before I was born.  By my
early teens I had been going along with my Dad as he “took a walk around the
yard” after a day’s work, as Mom prepared supper. 



The persimmon tree was rarely known or even
joyfully eaten in our parts.  The
witch hazel was twisted back and around so much that I’d given up following one
branch bending back upon itself and through the loops of her siblings. 



The story I love to tell the most about our
“walk around the yard,” is about the family of rabbits who didn’t move when we
approached them under the white peach tree.  They looked up and some fell over, too
dizzy to move.  The others took a
few steps and collapsed.  They were
drunk from the old, fallen white
peaches.


Years later after my Dad had died with a
broken heart, following the death of my twenty one year old sister, I learned
how his “walk around the yard” (1/2 acre) began.  Having already struggled to recover
from polio as a young man, there were days when my Dad would wake up, lost in
his own interior dark wood.  When
  my mother saw this she handed my Dad something that slowly brought him back to
  us:  the Wayside Gardens
catalog.  And he would pour over
the pages looking for exotic trees that had a chance to survive in northern
Ohio.  Then came the days of
anticipation and reading again about the trees that were on their way to
him.   And so began his
contented “walk around the yard,” touching and gazing with great care and
affection each tree, their branches and leaves and fruit. 
I imagine him becoming one with them, and they with him. 



These lines by Mary Oliver described my
dad’s “walk around the yard.” 



“When I am among the trees,
especially the
willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me,
and daily.”


“…the trees stir in their leaves
and call
out, "Stay awhile."
The light flows from their branches.

And they call
again, "It's simple," they say,
"and you too have come
into the world to
do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine."   



   When I Am Among the Trees" by Mary Oliver, from
Thirst. © Beacon Press, 2006.


My dad was a photographer
of tiny, fragile biologies like mosses and lichens, something that suited a
quiet, gentle spirit.  He joined a
botanical society of university professors who took yearly hikes among the
trees.  He brought back exceptional
photographs in the l940’s and l950’s 
of the beauty of the tiny lives that lived under the protection of the
trees, who were always filled with
light.


Years later when I found
myself lost in my own interior dark wood, I too walked among the trees, the only
plant species that lived upright like me. 
I carried my cameras as an outward explanation for walking among my
brothers, but now no longer with my Dad. 



Then one day I saw him,
hiking a narrow ridge at the top of  the Cataloochee in the Smokey
  Mountains.  “Cataloochee” is a
Cherokee word meaning, “those who walk upright.” I could see clearly between each tree at
the top of a narrow ridge, and between them, my Dad, a Cataloochee, one who
walks upright.


On one of these hikes when
I was lost in my interior darkness, the Loving Mystery who embraces and gently
holds all things, stopped me in my tracks.  I was given this sense of Presence all
around me.  The Light of my
Cataloochee brothers was vivid and vibrating, as if each were a silently singing
tuning fork.  What I heard was the
soft singing of leaves. 



I can get lost and stuck in
trying to change what cannot be changed. 
But when I “walk around the yard,” the trees call out, "Stay awhile." 
The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, "It's
simple," they say,
"and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go
easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine."   



Not long ago I read in one of Wendell Berry’s
essays about a man in Kentucky.  He
drove his F150 truck into the woods after work.  He got out and sat on the open tailgate
for a long time.  The trees for him
as well, were filled with Light. 
But one day he drove into the woods and came to a road closed sign. 


Getting out and peering down the road, he was
stunned by what he saw. The entire
mountain of trees that had filled him with Light… was gone,
removed by a coal company. 
The owner lived thousands of miles away, never having seen what he had
  ordered removed with his simple signature.


If I knew where the man lived in Kentucky, I
would go to his home where his F150 sits. 
I’d knock on the door with my thermos of hot coffee, and together we
would weep.


 

I was video taping a presentation with live music.  To my surprise when I arrived I saw this hugely intense glare of sunlight
on the wall that was to be the background.  So I rotated my body 90 degrees, and then the lens 90 degrees.  I eliminated
the glaring wall, but now I had a sideways video. 
But to rotate can be easy; open the video in Photoshop CS6, go to image, and rotate image; or use Windows Movie Maker, upload all the video, allow the program to adjust the resolution of the video; when that's done, go to "home" and rotating
icons will appear.  Click the one you want and all it done.
Good luck. 

26 degrees with a brisk wind, 7:30am makes for frozen fingers very quickly.  But oh what a beautiful scene of mist rising from a little river running beside route 715 in Warsaw, Ohio, swishing blue waters and clear, smooth reflective waters of golden sun.
David Whyte's words come to mind, "...whatever does not make you alive, is too small for you."