Tim Grey’s Blog

I was sitting on my couch reading, trying to ignore the uncomfortable heat. It was about 9pm, the sun had just set, and the sky was turning an incredible pink, but somehow I wasn’t inspired to go outside. I think the head had stifled me and convinced me that staying in one place was the best way to cool down.

Suddenly, the trees started screaming out, announcing the arrival of a front through the intense motion of their branches. I went outside, and was overwhelmed by the sound of the wind, the pelting of debris from the trees, and the dramatic drop in temperature. I settled into the hammock to enjoy the quick onset of a break from the heat, when I realized what a fool I was to not have my camera with me. I rushed inside, grabbed my camera, and started wandering around the backyard looking for interesting subjects.

The light was fading quickly, so there really wasn’t much to photograph. But it didn’t matter. I was enjoying the experience both in terms of the sudden excitement in terms of weather and the sense of chasing a subject photographically. The trees and just about everything else around was suddenly blurry on account of the motion caused by the wind. The temperature plummeted quickly by nearly 20 degrees Fahrenheit in the span of less than five minutes. The heat wave was over, not overnight, not over hours, but over minutes.

While this most certainly didn’t need to be a photographic experience, it became one. And while the photos I obtained certainly weren’t great or even all that useful, the act of taking pictures while nature was having a mood swing made the experience all that much more enjoyable.

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 4th, 2009 at 8:35 pm and is filed under Philosophical, Photography. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site. Your comments will appear immediately, but I reserve the right to delete innapropriate comments.