The Art and Fun of Photography

Marching turtles on a creek near our home

     I enjoy taking photographs, but am by no means an artist at photography. Many of my photos are to preserve memories such as family events, large and small, and travel scenes and experiences. Many others serve as reference material for landscape painting. I have a great admiration for artistic photos, however, and sometimes wish I were more accomplished. Truly artful photography can be charming, brutally honest, breath-taking, and more.

A view of the creek

An extreme close-up of the creek and reflections

     A teen family member named Alex reminded us in December that artistic photography is a wonderful hobby and a rewarding pursuit. Visiting here in Coastal North Florida from inland southern California, Alex had no age peers during his visit but made the most of his time with us. Fortunately, he is passionate about photography--a wonderfully portable pursuit. When we asked what he would like to see or do in Jacksonville, he said--only partly joking--that he wanted to "find art". What a wonderful way to express his joy in finding interesting photo subjects and unique angles from which to make pictures!

     So, Alex took us all on several adventures to find art. My husband, Mark, showed him a nearby creek that he always enjoys on morning walks. I have used various views of this creek, viewed from a little bridge on an ordinary two-lane local road, in several paintings. It is just the sort of small treasure most people would pass by that inspires many of my scenes. Alex loved it and took a number of creative photos.

Just two of the many branches of the Treaty Oak

Alex meeting us at the south end of the Main Street Bridge

     Then we visited a truly amazing live oak tree, called the Treaty Oak (yelp has some photos), which stands in its own little urban park in Jacksonville. All of us had a great time there, and then Alex expressed an interest in one of the major bridges over the mighty St. Johns River. We dropped him off on the north end, and he walked over the bridge taking a number of photos on the way.

     I wish I could show you some of Alex's photos, but I do not have any. A few of my snapshots, though not "art", will show you the local locations we enjoyed together while on Alex's quest.

Question of the day:  What non-touristy spots would you show Alex near your home?

North Florida's Natural Beauty

     Recently, my friend Dee and I brought our cameras for some time exploring  my immediate neighborhood and a roadside creek view a couple miles up the road. We both appreciate the natural beauty in coastal North Florida and often share tips about places to see and photograph water birds, hawks, eagles, or other wildlife. Dee had borrowed a camera from a friend to see whether she would like that brand and that particular zoom lens for herself. I just used my usual humble camera, but we both captured some good shots. Now, I will consider which of my photos might make or be a part of a future painting.

     The egret haunts a retention pond just a few houses away from our home. The grey skies and soft winter light made for subtle scenes at the creek.

     

 Question of the day: Do you take time to look around you daily?

Jacksonville Beach Painting Progress--Focus on Sky and Sea

It has finally been possible to get back to the Jacksonville Beach scene I began painting a few weeks ago, a small piece in a panoramic format, 6" X 12". Sky and sea were my main interest in this little study, which I worked to keep quick and minimal. Although the piece is not finished, I wanted to show you its present form. The birds are just quick-sketched in with white and grey tones and need some adjustment. There will be a few other refinements in the clouds, beach sand, and waves, but the basics are all here.

As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, working more quickly was a goal for this piece. I work slowly and include a great deal of detail in my larger paintings--perhaps too much at times. The point of this exercise was to help me fight a tendency to be too fussy and instead to take a breezy, minimal approach, intentionally working in shorter sessions.

The palette is very simple: ultramarine blue, cerulean blue, paynes grey, cad red light, a touch of burnt umber (a warm brown), and titanium white. The top photo shows the entire piece; the other is a detail shot. This has been a satisfying study, and I am looking forward to more exercises in a breezier style in the future as well as to planning some larger paintings in my more typical style.

Question of the day: Are you trying something at least a little new and different this summer?

Still Here

I am sorry for my absence from writing and visiting blogs for the last couple of weeks. It has been an extremely busy time--mostly in a good way.

I hope to have a more extensive new post ready for you soon, but wanted to say hello in the meantime. The photo shows a view of our beloved St. John's River, this time from the wide lawn of a Victorian home whose owners hosted one of Mark's Master Gardener events a couple of weeks ago. It is a lovely, characteristically Jacksonville, Florida view. Life is definitely too short for painting all the beauty in our area!

Details of New Painting and More About the Painting Process

The Lyons Club Park Boardwalk painting got off to a decent start in terms of composition, but some other aspects of the process were unsatisfactory at first and required revision. For those of you interested in the painting process, that is the topic today. The photos are close-up detail shots of the new painting I showed you last time as well as a photo of the entire piece.

As I mentioned last post, I shifted the viewpoint a bit from the reference photo, but you could see that I retained the basic elements of the scene without radical change. I raised the horizon line, which often seems to land in the horizontal center of my photos, because a painting should (almost) never be cut in half by a major element or line. I made small, grey-tone sketches of several possible compositions to consider and gridded over them horizontally and vertically into thirds (resulting in nine smaller rectangles). I try to place my focal point near the intersection of two of these lines, which is pleasing to the eye (these are sometimes called "sweet spots"). In this piece, I regard the center of interest as the area in the upper left third where a single tree stands and the boardwalk comes to a point and makes a sharp turn to follow the river bank. That is such a compelling angle that the viewer's eye is inevitably led there. But I include a path over to the right and then visual paths up, down, and around so that the viewer's eye will naturally move through the entire composition and find other areas of visual interest as well.

I thought I had chosen a perfect palette for this painting, but needed to change it along the way. I use a limited palette for each work, meaning a selection of certain tube colors which will blend well to create the entire range of color variations for the scene. Even though the viewer may not notice the use of a limited palette, the result is more pleasing and harmonious than using many randomly chosen colors would be. The palette I choose varies with the subject, weather, and season. This painting has no tube green at all; greens are blended from blues and yellows, and modified with red, purple and grey. After one change, the final palette consisted of cerulean blue, cobalt blue, paynes grey, dioxizine purple, cadmium yellow light, yellow ochre, cadmium red light, buff, and white. Although the photo is almost entirely in greens and blues, I wanted a livelier scene and added shades of purple in the water. Then, I used burnt sienna (a favorite color) to add a range of tones in the marsh grasses. This was a mistake, in my opinion. The burnt sienna did not blend well with the blues and purples I had used, so I put it back in the drawer and experimented with other shades for the grass. Some of our North Florida marsh areas include a sort of brownish burgundy grass that seemed likely to fit in, so I worked that into various spots in the grass along with some buff and greenish blends. This particular burgundy is a blend of cad red light, paynes grey, and a little purple (used with care--the purple is strong).

This painting came together a bit more quickly than sometimes (I am a sloooow painter). If you have any other questions about the painting process, please feel free to ask either in a comment or to email me (see profile for address). I enjoy sharing "shop talk" with interested readers.

Question of the day: What aspects of the painting process (if any) are of interest to you?

New Painting--Lyons Club Park Boardwalk on the St. Johns River

Join me on a spring walk in Lyons Club Park along the St. Johns River in Jacksonville, Florida. This new painting is nearly finished, but rather than waiting to post it, I decided to show it to you today. The revisions I still plan to make are so minor that the differences are unlikely to be noticeable in a blog photo. The piece is a 16" X 20" acrylic painting on gallery wrapped canvas, so can be hung without a frame. The scene wraps around the painted edges.

Today, I am showing you the painting and one of the reference photos I used. Next post, I will include some close-up photos of details in the painting and more information about the painting process.

You can see that I departed from the reference photo in terms of the viewpoint, the palette (colors), and some other details. The painting's viewpoint is a bit further away at a higher point along the walk by the marshy river bank.

Among the Jacksonville area's many lovely parks and preserves, Lyons Club Park is a well-kept jewel. Birds sing along wooded trails, and fish and other water creatures are abundant. We saw a number of people fishing along the bank while others paddled up to shore in canoes and kayaks. The water currents are varied and interesting as the St. Johns River runs straight north (unusual in the Northern Hemisphere) just before it turns east to flow to the ocean. We are on the east bank of the river looking north. The Trout River flows in from the west (out of sight from this view), and both rivers rise and fall with the ocean tides. So, the water is almost always in motion--sometimes lazy and sometimes powerfully choppy. Ripples and waves can run in nearly any direction, changing throughout the day, and sometimes swirling in eddies caused by the confluence of outgoing rivers meeting an incoming tide. It's a perfect place for a refreshing and renewing walk.

Question of the Day: Does your area treasure and preserve its natural habitats and beauty?

Savoring--Completed Landscape Painting--"A Sunday Afternoon in May"

"A Sunday Afternoon in May" has proven to be a satisfying project. Last post, I showed you some aspects of the planning process, beginning with the reference photo, which is posted again here so that you can see the ways in which I have changed the original scene to create an effective composition for a landscape painting. The St. Johns River actually flows behind the bushes in the photo, but was not visible from that point of view. However, I wanted to use the point of view in the photo because of the lovely patterns the foreground shadows made--as well as the interesting verticals of the tree trunks.

Rather than go on about the painting process from last post's sketches through to completion, I will just let you join me in this delightful park-like spot on a private school campus in Jacksonville, Florida. I built the bench just for you.

Question of the day: Wouldn't it be fascinating to time-travel to scenes painted by the Old Masters and compare the actual location to their interpretation of it?

Growing--Nice Display of My Paintings in a Shop

The owner of Trends Home Decor in Jacksonville, Florida, has honored my work with an attractive grouping in a prime location in her shop. She likes the way these five pieces look in a grouping, and I am surprised myself by how impressive they look the way she has arranged them :>). Somehow my work looks more like real art displayed in her shop than it does at home (at least in my view). Sometimes we don't give ourselves enough credit for our own work and can benefit from the respect others give it. I think that is true at times no matter what kind of work we do.

A previous post recounted the serendipity that led to this unexpected opportunity to display paintings for sale and described Trends in more detail. I would highly recommend Lori Taylor's fine shop and the lovely, affordable art, home furnishings and home accessories she offers. If you are in the North Florida area, stop in to see for yourself. Trends Home Decor is located at 3919 Hendricks Avenue just south of Emerson in the San Marco area of Jacksonville, Florida. Note: If the paintings above are difficult to see, just click on a photo to enlarge it.

Question of the day: When have you had an experience that provided a welcome, different perspective on your work, your life, or yourself?

Exploring--A St. John's River Park in Jacksonville, Florida

I hope you enjoy seeing scenery in and around Jacksonville, Florida, because this post has more :>). Since both our super sons and their wonderful wives were busy on Mother's Day, Mark and I enjoyed a quiet afternoon. The weather was so spectacular, clear and pleasantly warm with a light breeze, that we decided to take a walk in a park we had seen only briefly before when we were house-hunting seven years ago. The Lyons Club Park (that's the way the map spells it), lies on the western edge of a point of land along the St. John's River just before this north-flowing river makes its last winding turn east to empty into the Atlantic Ocean several miles from the park. After a delightful walk, we took a peek at a second lovely park, a preserve area just across the main road on the north edge of the point. Always on the lookout for "paintable" scenes, I took some photos as we walked in Lyons Club Park. One shows typical vegetation along one of the well-kept paths. Another looks back at the way we had come, a park boardwalk along the marshy river bank. The third shows the industrial port views across the river at this point, an interesting contrast to the parks and preserves that line some of the river bank, the lucky riverfront homes, and to the city skyscrapers and urban river walk downtown. We continue to be grateful that we chose Jacksonville for our home in this semi-retirement phase of life (and beyond, we hope). The variety of wetlands, wooded areas, beaches, and extensive preserve lands--the varied habitats and ecosystems are amazing. What a super home for a landscape and seascape painter! Exploring and discovering new areas of natural beauty are an important part of creative living for us.

Question of the day: What are the best natural features of your area?

Savoring--Contrasts in Jacksonville Harbor, Nature & Commerce

Following up on the previous post, I have two more photos to show you from our dinner cruise on Jacksonville's beautiful, wide St. John's River. At one point, three dolphins greeted us, playing all around the boat as we enjoyed their company. I wish I had a better picture of them. Although I did my best to capture an image, snapping away as they circled and leapt, many of my photos are of ripples where there had been dolphins a second before. Oh well, with or without boast-worthy pictures, I will not forget the experience. We were awed and privileged to be near these sleek, intelligent animals. They seemed to be riding the rising tide of the salt water sweeping into the river, a twice-daily flow that enriches the variety of marine life we see in the river. Even where we dock our sailboat, about 14 miles from the mouth of this mighty river, the water is brackish enough to support many salt water creatures from small crabs to those gentle giant sea mammals, manatees.

The other photo is a contrast to the rich marine life in the river and shows a ship in port--just one glimpse of the heavy shipping Jacksonville's active port supports. The graceful bridge in the background is called the Dames Point Bridge--one of our favorites among the many river crossings. Reviewing my photos from that evening, I realized again how much I enjoy living in this area. I love the varied natural habitats and extensive nature preserves in our forests, meadows, salt marshes, and ocean coastal areas. However, I am also a city kid through and through. Growing up just north of industrial Muskegon, Michigan, on the shore of Lake Michigan, I loved to watch the activity at the commercial docks. Once the St. Lawrence Seaway opened the lake to international shipping, the loading and unloading of ships, the transfer of goods to trucks and trains, and other dockside activities increased exponentially. Yet, there too, we were near gorgeous natural habitats and preserves and enjoyed the best of both worlds, in my view.

Question of the day: No particular question comes to mind--just the thought that we are very fortunate in our home area and all the places we have lived. I hope you find beauty and fascination all around, as well.

Exploring--A New Perspective on Our City, Jacksonville, FL

These views of Jacksonville, FL, are taken from a boat on our mighty St. Johns River. I think our city looks amazing from many angles, and particularly enjoyed seeing it from the deck of a power yacht this past week. One of our friends, William Gardner, had made the winning bid at a charity auction for a dinner cruise for 25 people aboard the yacht belonging to one of our local business owners. The experience felt quite "upper crusty", well out of our usual league, with a bartender, and a caterer who produced astonishingly elegant food in the small, but well-equipped galley . However, we were among wonderful people--some of them friends and some of them fascinating new acquaintances to enjoy conversing with. The whole experience seemed quite magical and refreshed me for the rest of the week.

In a way, seeing the city from a fresh perspective feels like a metaphor (loosely speaking) for what I need as a blog writer. I am feeling the need for a new point of view lately and am trying to take a mental "cruise on the river" to see if I can find a fresh approach to the blog. It's not a matter of being unhappy with the kinds of posts I have been writing, just a matter of needing a boost to keep my own interest in it alive. On Wednesday, the blog was one year old, and the anniversary is making me reflective, it seems. Lately, I have posted less often--sometimes because of other commitments, but sometimes simply because I had trouble deciding on a post topic or getting motivated to write. I try for general interest entries on the overall theme of creative living, but find myself rejecting ideas that seem too ordinary. Yet, there have been times when an entry that seemed a bit dull to me struck a chord with some of you. Your creative comments and insights revealed deeper levels of meaning that had not occurred to me.

So, maybe the new direction I need is to be less perfectionistic and more conversational with posts. I know I need to post more frequently to keep readers interested. No promises though--I've aimed to start a better post schedule several times in the last few months and then failed to come through for you. However, my original goal of posting at least every five days or so is a good one and should be achievable. That would make for at least six posts per month--I would like to get back to that. Do any of the rest of you who blog have trouble staying with it at times?

Question of the day: Do you have suggestions for me regarding blog topics you have liked or ways to stay on a blogging schedule?

Exciting Opportunity--New Venue for Painting Sales

This 22" X 28" acrylic painting on gallery wrap canvas, called Textures by the Creek is now for sale in a lovely, classy shop called Trends Home Decor. I am thrilled with this new opportunity and will show more pieces there in the near future.

Through a happy serendipity, just at the time that I had been investigating possible outlets for my work, we attended an art reception at Trends. Our friends, a florist and a musician, were participating in the event--the florist having opened a satellite location in one portion of the shop. When we walked in, William, the florist, introduced me to the owner as a painter. She immediately asked if I "already had someone representing" me. I was momentarily stunned because that sounded like a question for a bigger name artist than me. However, I tried to act cool and said, "Not at the moment."

Well, no need to make this a long involved story--I browsed the shop that day with a careful eye to the art pieces, home accessories, and furniture sold there, the presentation, the clientele, and other factors that mattered if I worked with the shop. It seemed that my work would fit well there, being compatible, yet not exactly like, other pieces, and being in a similar price range. The atmosphere is classy, yet relaxed and welcoming. The owner, Lori Taylor, is a savvy retailer, but also a personable, caring colleague to the consignors whose works make up part of her inventory. She is a fine artist herself, with some lovely, interesting mixed media pieces displayed in her shop.

When I made an appointment to show her some of my work, she was very enthusiastic about working together. Her terms are simple and fair. So instead of taking a complex contract home to study and think about as I had planned, I decided on the spot to leave the largest piece for her usual 90 days. The only reason I don't have more pieces there yet is that I need to decide how to price them in order to make a satisfactory amount after her commission without ending up with too high a price--a new and interesting marketing puzzle for me to solve. I am very excited about this new venture and hope that if you live near Jacksonville, FL or visit here sometime, you will stop in at Trends Home Decor. 3919 Hendricks Avenue.

Question of the day: Isn't it interesting that sometimes we have to struggle and sweat to advance toward our goals, and then, once in a while, a sudden serendipity opens a new door?