The fourth day of "The Year of the Owl Pellett"

Here in Cayce, SC it was fifty seven degrees at 8:00 am, a heavy fog, and just the right morning for a photographer to stroll about on his/her morning constitution. Most photographers will tell you that the real fun of the business is in actually taking pictures. Well, I agree! But we still have to justify our existence somehow, and that is why we to have figure out ways to sell this stuff. But, this morning was devoted to what we like to do best.

I love to shoot (photograph) in the fog. That way you can't see my mistakes. Fog does two things for me. First, it isolates specific micro images within a macro scene. The smaller becomes more apparent. Everything is condensed in the mind's eye because we cannot see that far to get the overriding and sometimes cluttered view. Second, and I love my fellow man but, I love the absence of my fellow man more. It's Sunday morning and the rif-raf are either preparing for or going to church and not on "My river walk".

The Cayce "Riverwalk" is a five mile walking path of concrete and raised wooden boardwalk along the Saluda and Congaree Rivers which runs between Cayce and Columbia South Carolina. There is another two and half mile walk on the Columbia side of the Broad River which joins the Saluda just above Cayce and forms the Congaree. Look at a map, it's easier to see than explain. Suffice to say the walks are in ancient floodplains and as such offer numerous opportunities to study and photograph nature. I do about three miles each day always with my camera. I learned long ago to take the camera everywhere I go. About the time I don't have it, the killer shot magically materializes. It's simply Murphy's Law. BUT, remember Skip's law says that Murphy was an optimist! So I always carry the camera.

The total of the two legged critters this morning were two lady and one male jogger over a two hour period of about three miles. Sweet! It's interesting that not only does the fog concentrate the photo images in my mind but also tends to concentrate my thought about everything else. You know the meaning of life and other esoteric stuff like that. But thirty seconds later I come back to my senses. There are a number of cobwebs along the walk which are just different. I am going to have to Google to look for the type of spider which makes such an elaborate weave.

Accompanied only by the shrill, shrill, shrill call of a banded kingfisher somewhere in the murk above the river, my mind drifts to the things which must be done to the blog, the website, and the planning of sales campaigns. Then I am saved! My eye catches the branch of a sycamore tree over the river, in the fog with it's leaves gone, but fruit still attached. Now I must concentrate my thoughts on composure, angle, light, and elimination on unwanted clutter. The "Work" part of my business is put off for another but different creative moment.

Photography is an art! Want to start an argument? That statement will do just that. But I view it this way. My mind's eye saw the tree branch, composed the image (the art part), and the camera (the technical part, tool or brush) froze that 250Th of a second of natural history forever. Simple!