HINT: If you want to understand this vignette, then you must *click the photograph to enlarge it.
We are having a “Staycation” and working on the Mountain in preparation for our move.
What are your plans for the summer?
*NOTE: Actual odds of anyone clicking the photo are 1 : 150 Why is that? 😉
New creative writing photo prompt from: Rochelle Wisoff-Fields – addicted to purple
Under the Friday Fictioneers -photo prompt flash fiction (in 100 words)
(For photo credit please click Beth Carter’s photo!)
Searching the streets looking for just the right one, surveying his trophies, musing, “How easy it used to be.” She walked the gutter, her back to him, thumb out. He pulled alongside. Before he could ask she slid over the car door and into the seat in a fluid movement.
Smiling, joking, laughter, he shy, she bold. They drove on for a while, neither cared where they might end up; each knew their destination would be secluded.
Noticing his photographs she quipped, “Old girl friends?”
He replied, “You might say that.”
Smiling, they thought, “This’s gonna’ be easy.”
~~~~
NOTE: This was a walk on the wild side for me. I took one look at the photo and there I was.
Are you shocked?
I was!
My first year of teaching I integrated a lesson on Monet to include not only art, but writing, language arts, science and math. We studied plant structure from the roots up, and I loved it that the next time we painted still life, Ricardo drew a cutaway view allowing the observer to see what was going on below the ground!
Kadesha, I will admit, had me quite confused when she wrote about her picture one day. She had written a paragraph and kept repeating one of the lines over and over throughout her work. It was purely by accident that week, that I discovered her mother sang gospel songs at home to practice for the church choir. It was a light bulb moment for me! This knowledge allowed me to break her paragraph down into verses and there it was… a beautiful song about Monet and his gardens complete with a refrain!
My students surprised me by excelling in all areas of the lessons presented. We drew still life, and discussed Monet’s use of small dots of paint, that when viewed from a distance, came together to reveal the picture. Each time we read, painted or drew, we wrote about it. At the end of the lessons I picked the best examples from each student to depict their hard work, which culminated in a published book. Copies were sent home with each child, and all this was done FREE OF CHARGE!
One of my favorite pieces was done by Miss Chavez. She had drawn a picture of herself on Monet’s bridge, and there, looking down into the water, was her reflection among the water lilies. I loved how she phrased the use of dabs of color into her own words in this excerpt:
“Monet used little color dots to make his pictures, and you have to stand backer to see the picture.” Miss Chavez, Grade 1
That year, we all came away with a better understanding of color, light and reflection, and learned so much more along the way.
And, I am partial to reflections in images to this day.
Chihuly Glass Exhibit, Cheekwood Estate, TN
PLEASE, DO CLICK ON THE PHOTO FOR A CLEARER IMAGE. 😉
Yesterday I foolishly risked life and limb on an icy two lane bridge to get a few photographs of a swampy river nearby. I pass over this bridge when I go into downtown Madison and always wish I had time to stop and take photos. (Or wish I had remembered my camera!) However, when I got home I found that I was pretty much disappointed in the photos I took. I suppose it was all the whizzing cars going by at 3:30 PM, and then there was the slippery slush and ice … and well, that’s just not conducive to good photography now is it?
And yet, there was one that I found quite interesting when I changed the perspective and did some cropping. No, it isn’t that the photo editing that makes the picture any better, but it was how the changed perspective made the colors and textures pop when I did so.
Have a look…
Here is the original photograph with a bit of camera shake (Recall those whizzing cars!)
And now the crops and changed perspectives
Simply flipping it changed the perspective and brought out the reflected blues from the sky.
Turning it on end allows the eye to focus on the tree line and its mirrored reflection. Which led me to this crop…
And then this close up.
I really love those blues!
Seems there is a lesson here that might be applied to better photos in the future. And although I have done this before, it was this stunning photo entitled Chinatown, New York, by Matthew Goddard-Jones, found on the National Geographic site that got me to revisit the idea:
Now this is a beauty! It gives me something to aspire to and will get me back out there looking for better shots to work with.
How do you handle a bad photo? Do you choose to hit delete or play with it to find some hidden interest?
