widening rings… – Page 7 – nature photography and blog of Harsi S. Parker

The Last Unicorn?

Well… it just might be… if we can believe what a shadow has to say. *GRIN*

Harsi / June 25, 2011 / mammals

Teaching an Old Fly New Tricks

Most children have a bug period, and I never grew out of mine.

Edward O. Wilson

** Extra-special bonus points for the first person to tell me how it’s done! **

Harsi / June 24, 2011 / arthropods, photography, quotations / 7 Comments

The sun has been BLAZING lately. I try my best to find creative ways to work with this element when it comes to photography. I’m including a few images that I took of the setting sun shining through a mosaic of Laurel Sumac (Malosma laurina) leaves. The effect in-person turned out to be much more spectacular than I was able to capture with these images. As long as I had them open in Photoshop though, I decided to play around a bit. Has anyone else ever experimented with the “Invert” command? It inverts the colors in any image, producing an end product that is similar to the way a film negative might appear. In most instances, I find the effect to be too harsh and obviously computer-generated looking. However, with a select group of scenery images and also with many abstract shots, it can produce some unique outcomes that I actually like. Click on the original photos below to see their color inverted. When I saw how these turned out, my thoughts immediately turned to batik — a wax-dyeing technique. Hmmm…. maybe that’s just me?

Anyone still having cool weather where they are?

Harsi / June 23, 2011 / artwork, plants / 3 Comments

15 Minute Art: The First Week

Boy, time just seems to be flying by lately! I thought I should probably post a brief update about my fledgling experiment to create a bit of artwork everyday.

:15 Minute Art, week 1

So, here’s a recap. Day #1 was the squirrel sketch I already posted.

On Day #2, I found an old drawing tool — a plastic template for drawing common geometric shapes (emblazoned with the catchy name “The Geometer”!). I thought it might be interesting to create a wildlife image entirely from this preset selection of ovals, triangles, squares and whatnot. Not sure if it translates or not, but the finished drawing is supposed to be a juvenile Great Horned Owl among some Eucalyptus’ leaves and flowers… in a very abstract way, of course.

Then, on Day #3, I totally forgot to do anything. Yup! That’s how crazy my head has been lately… three days in and I just completely spaced out. (In my defense, my husband returned home from Australia early that morning, then we went to a late breakfast, then I went out with my sisters-in-law to pick out bridesmaid dresses, then I came home, changed, and went back out again to have dinner with some relatives at my parent’s house. So… by the time I got home and finished putting up this blog post, I think my brain had just about had it for the day.)

Day #4 was a simple feather. I probably like this one the best.

Days #5 and #6 had a botanical theme. First a grape leaf and a few vines. Then, some lupine leaves, stems and flowers.

Finally, today, I decided to just let my mind wander for #7. Perhaps not the best idea! This started out as a stink bug (Family:Pentatomidae), but mutated into some sort of insect ghost rising up from a small collection vial. Hah! Don’t ask me!! It certainly wasn’t what I set out to draw… it just sort of happened along the way.

The same friend who inspired this project in the first place asked me the other day how it was “going”. I wasn’t really sure what to say. Truthfully, it hasn’t felt like as much fun as I had hoped it might be. It’s felt a bit more like homework than play. After sitting for awhile and thinking about why that might be, I’ve got a few thoughts. First, I’m still really hung up on making something GOOD. (I put the word in all caps so that it feels as weighty here on the page as it does in my head.) The adult in me simply hasn’t stepped aside yet and let the kid come out to really let loose and explore. Embarrassingly, I even found myself cheating a little bit… A couple times, if I started a drawing and didn’t like where it was headed, I’d quickly turn to a fresh page and say — “OK, the fifteen minutes actually starts… NOW!” I know there was no rule against doing that per se, but it goes against the notion of just accepting whatever comes in the moment and going with it. Also, I think it would have been better to start with a medium that is less constricting than a ballpoint pen. Charcoal? Watercolors? Oils? Clay? Finger paints? I’m not sure yet… but something with color and something that lets me get a little messy and go a bit more crazy if I want.

I have to keep reminding myself that the purpose of all of this was to reconnect with my childhood self. Fewer hang-ups. Fewer preconceived expectations. More joy. Much much more joy. I figure if I can just get to that place, the GOOD stuff will follow. I’ll share another update in a week or so….

Harsi / June 22, 2011 / artwork / 6 Comments

Spotted Again

You might remember the last fawn sighting I posted about… Since then, I’ve had several opportunities to see them around my place, but often when my camera was not at hand.

A few days ago, while driving home, we saw a mother and her youngster on the side of the road and stopped to let them cross. I was so engrossed in watching that I didn’t think to try and take a few photos until they were almost out-of-view. I love the backdrop of field and trees, but the fawn itself is little more than a brown pair of ears visible above the grass line….

Today, I headed out for a very brief walk as the sun was setting. It was unpleasantly warm and I was immediately distracted by the unwanted attention of various “bitey flies”. (Yup, that’s my highly scientific term for any number of fly species that make their living extracting blood from the local mammals… including myself, sadly.) Perhaps if I had been less distracted, I would have noticed the big dark eyes staring at me from a short distance away and approached more slowly. I stopped in my tracks and even backed up a few feet… sometimes this is enough to put our resident deer at ease and they will just go back to what they were doing. But the mother deer munching on Toyon in front of me had two fawns with her and I think she thought better of sticking around. They started to disappear into the dense brush. I simply watched them go. Despite my desire to take wonderful photos, I try never to chase after animals. I have no desire to alarm or frighten them — even if it means that I miss the shot. After a few minutes, I wandered past the area they had been and looked up into the foliage on the hill rising before me. At first I didn’t see anything, but I heard a bit of crashing as one of the fawn dashed to keep up with its mother. I managed to take a few images, though the second fawn never came back into view…

As I was taking the above photo, the flies began to descend on me in the most merciless of ways. I already felt a bit wilted from the heat and I hadn’t even walked up the hill yet. Still, when you can come home with memories like these, it’s hard not to smile.

Harsi / June 21, 2011 / mammals

Simple Thoughts

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about…

…SKY

and

…WATER.

They both draw me in…

Shifting expanses of color.

Vastness beyond comprehension.

A place to become lost.

A place to find things.

Harsi / June 20, 2011 / skies, travel, water / 2 Comments

Hello Again, Old Friend!

In the still gray hours of early afternoon, I walked with a new friend up the fire road behind our cabin today. I mentioned that two years ago I had the pleasure of photographing a blooming Plummer’s Mariposa Lily (Calochortus plummerae) right near where we stood. Despite my best efforts, I hadn’t managed to find anything in the same spot last year, and even as I said all this, I was scanning for signs of the obscure plant. No luck!

That might have been the end of it, but on our return trip past the same little stretch I turned to point out something of interest and (lucky me!) found myself staring directly at one! A single flower washed in shades of pink and yellow, atop a spindly stem lacking any leaves. The Plummer’s Mariposa Lily is endemic to California and it is classified as endangered or rare by many sources.

This is an attractive flower when viewed from the side…

…but the real magic happens when you peer into its center!

Our long walk produced many wonderful sightings and lots (and lots!) of great conversation about the local plants and wildlife. But, I think for both of us, this encounter stood out as special. I am so excited to walk back up tomorrow and take a few more pics. And the day after that… and, well…. probably the day after that too!

Harsi / June 19, 2011 / flowers, plants

The Tiger and The Coyote

One of the definite highlights of my trip to El Dorado Regional Park a couple weeks ago was a beautiful Western Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio rutulus) which repeatedly landed on a close-by patch of Monardella sp. (commonly referred to as Coyote Mint) and then stayed there like someone was paying it to do so. For me and my fellow arthropod enthusiast (Chris), this was like hitting the jackpot.

These butterflies are impressively large, but in my experience, they have a frustrating habit of flying around in large circles, then landing just long enough for you to lock in your camera settings and get them framed nicely. Then, you go to press the shutter and find that there’s no butterfly in the viewfinder anymore. Where did it go?! you mutter to yourself… You look around, spy it landing on another flower a little ways off, and the process starts all over again.

But… not this particular butterfly. It seemed quite smitten with this one small grouping of flowers and though it often flitted away for a few seconds, it reliably came back to the same spot over and over again, giving us both ample opportunity to get many photos in a row and even play around a bit with our viewing angle and composition. It was heavenly!!!

As is so often the case when I sit down to closely examine my nature images, I discover things that would be very difficult (or impossible) to discern in the field. As I began preparing the photos for this post, I was definitely working under the presumption that I had only photographed a single butterfly. Somehow, the repeated act of it returning to the exact same group of flowers just made me (and I’m guessing Chris too) presume that it was the same swallowtail each time. Apparently… not so!! If you look closely at the images, you can see that there are several notches on the edge of the upper wing of the first butterfly (probably caused by a close call with a hungry bird?) that are not found on the butterfly in the remaining images. Also, if you check out the side-by-side comparison shot I put together below, you can see the subtle differences in the markings themselves.

I am indebted to Chris for his help in providing me with an ID for the lovely purple flowers. Also, he has put up a wonderful post of his own about our day together at El Dorado — check it out!

If you missed my previous posts about my trip to El Dorado, you can read them here and here.

Harsi / June 18, 2011 / arthropods, flowers, plants / 4 Comments

I Miss The Owls

For 5 out of the 7 years we have been here, a Great Horned Owl (Bubo virginianus) pair have nested and raised their chicks within very close proximity to our cabin. My experiences observing the little owlets, from their early days in the nest until long after they have fledged, have been priceless. This happens to be one of the years that they have nested somewhere further afield and I find myself missing them quite a lot. Not just the joy of seeing and photographing them, but most especially hearing the parents hooting back and forth to each other and the juveniles’ plaintive begging calls. As you can see in the above photo, the young bird’s first feathers are much lighter in color than those of adults… but, the eyes are certainly just as yellow!

[Oh, and for anyone that’s interested, this was one of the original photos I started with when doing the digital artwork for the post “Bubo in Black-and-White” — 3rd image on the page.]

Harsi / June 17, 2011 / birds / 2 Comments

Squirrel Squiggle

Last month, I wrote about my desire to create more artwork and also about some of the hurdles I expected to encounter. I was thinking that though it has been more than a little difficult at times, I’ve been so proud of myself for sticking with my “one blog post per day” plan. So, today, I’ve decided to try something similar and have challenged myself to create one new piece of artwork per day. Knowing that this will feel uncomfortable at first, and also knowing my tendency to get “stuck” when I don’t know WHAT to create or I don’t think it’s going well, I’ve decided to set down a couple rules:

#1 – The artwork must not be computer generated. (This is an arbitrary decision, but lately I’ve been wanting to spend more time away from the computer and just do something with my own two hands.)

#2 – Consistency over quality. (One new thing every day… no excuses!)

#3 – Spend no more than 15 minutes creating.

Now, don’t get me a wrong… I don’t expect anything stellar to come from such minimal effort. I won’t have much time to really think about what I’m doing, make it look nice, or perfect any concepts. But, then, that’s sort of the point. A very good friend of mine sent me a link to this short video which pretty much summed up the troubles I’ve been having. [If you’re not up for watching the video, the basic message is to STOP getting hung-up on all the things that can distract and discourage you from creating art and just DO IT!] My hope in putting strict limitations on myself — odd as it sounds — is actually to make this a more freeing and playful experience than it might be otherwise. After all, it’s only 15 minutes a day and there’s no pressure to create anything super-impressive. I want the artistic process itself to become an inherent daily part of my existence — and I want that more than I want to create one or two awe-inspiring things. After only about a month of continuous writing for this blog, I am already finding it’s getting easier and more intuitive. I have high hopes that I might have equal success with this new experiment.

Gosh, with all this build-up, my little daily doodle of a Gray Squirrel might be kind of a let down…

*grin*

(I hope not.)

Harsi / June 16, 2011 / artwork / 6 Comments