LANDSCAPE, SEASCAPE, CITYSCAPE, URBAN LANDSCAPE

I’m calling this BLOG entry in the photography series simply “LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHY” because I consider all images of out-of-door spaces to be pictures of the land. All of the outdoor space on earth, including the sea and cities and sky, are subjects for landscape photography. Ansel Adams and Eliot Porter are two of the artists who have given us great landscape images of places in North America.

Before the digital revolution, photographers had to leave mountains and trees where they were; and if a cloud got in the way, they had to wait until it passed or moved to another part of the sky. Whenever I begin to think like a self-righteous purist and insist that only what the camera sees can be a legitimate photograph, I remember that there was a time when critics considered color photographs, of all things, to be “not art.” What sense does that make? A pattern was established at the very beginning of the age of photography when the only kinds of images that those early photographers could make were black and white. They manipulated “reality.” When I’m enjoying myself playing around with Photoshop, I am reminded that there should be no limitations whatsoever on art... except perhaps art designed to do damage. There's the rub. Who is to decide?

I bring to my landscape photography the attitude that Thoreau brought to his experience with nature . He wrote in his journal, “This is June, the month of grass and leaves... Already the aspens are trembling again, and a new summer is offered me. I feel a little fluttered in my thoughts, as if I might be too late. Each season is but an infinitesimal point. It no sooner comes than it is gone... We are conversant with only one point of contact at a time, from which we receive a prompting and impulse and instantly pass to a new season or point of contact. A year is made up of a series and number of sensations and thoughts which have their language in nature. Now I am ice, now I am sorrel. Each experience reduces itself to a mood of the mind.”

I go out with my camera, day and night, knowing that each time is an “infinitesimal point.” What I see will not exist again exactly as it is today. Failing to photograph San Diego with storm clouds above it on a rare blustery day is to miss an opportunity altogether; so whenever it looks to me as if thunderheads are approaching the city, I grab my cameras and tripod and rush past Point Loma to a high spot near Cabrillo Monument and the lighthouse.

Landscape photographs should be seen larger, so you should click on the following pictures to see them properly.SAN DIEGO FROM CABRILLO NATIONAL MONUMENTHOMAGE TO HENRI CARTIER-BRESSONPOTOMAC RIVER, ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIAHIGH CLOUDS EAST OF SAN DIEGOAFRICAN CORAL TREES, SAN DIEGO EMBARCADEROPOINT LOMA LIGHTHOUSE, CABRILLO MONUMENTHOTEL DEL CORONADOSAN DIEGO FISHING FLEET, LATE NIGHTPACIFIC SUNSETSAN DIEGO FROM CORONADO, LATE EVENINGSAN DIEGO FROM CORONADO, EARLY EVENINGBIRDROCK, SAN DIEGOSAN DIEGO COUNTY SHORECHINA SEA BETWEEN JAPAN AND HONG KONGFISHING FLEET, SAN DIEGO BAYSALTON SEAFROM INTERSTATE FIVE, THE COAST RANGE SOUTH OF SAN FRANCISCOTHE SUTTER BUTTES IN THE NORTHERN SACRAMENTO VALLEYANZA-BORREGO DESERTNAPA VALLEYEAST SAN DIEGO COUNTYMIAMISAN DIEGO AT DAWNSALTON SEASALTON SEATEJON PASSBALBOA PARK, EDGE OF MORLEY FIELDOLD LIGHTHOUSE AT CABRILLO MONUMENTST. FRANCIS YACHT CLUB, SAN FRANCISCOMISSION BAYSPRECKLES ORGAN PAVILLION, BALBOA PARKPHOTOGRAPHER AND MODEL AT THE SALTON SEAFORT ROSECRANS NATIONAL CEMETERY