I’ll keep this one short and sweet…so all that madness I’ve been blabbering on about the past few posts about this Far Meadow business? Well, the whole purpose of that trip was to photograph a new A-Frame cabin as well as their ‘Glamping’ facilities. Well, those pics have finally been published! Below is a gallery of those images.
Enjoy. Book. Go. Trust me.
“Our backyard is the National Forest,” she says. Their back-yard…IS THE NATIONAL FOREST!
That part of this whole thing didn’t really hit me until I walked across the gate into the meadow and saw the sign that said, “Property Line – Entering National Forest.”
Literally…I grabbed an iced tea, walked across a mini field of wildflowers that took all of 16 seconds, and there it is – the property border, and the beginning of…the National Forest.
Anyone that knows me has heard me say more than once that if and when I finally do own a home, it needs to be small, low maintenance, and quaint, but I do have a requirement – a lot of natural land around me…and if someone asked to pick two places in California to do that in, they’d be Big Sur and Yosemite. Well, this couple have worked tirelessly to make that happen. That is literally their life. In the time I’ve been here, they haven’t stopped working on this three-year work in progress, the third cabin, and I mean real physical labor – building, carpentry, plumbing, cooking, painting, staining, you name it – all in an effort to have it ready for the tenants, and never once complaining about it, I would imagine because they realize that this life is beautiful. In most cases, a hint of envy might take me over, but for some reason, in this case, it didn’t. Instead, I foudn it encouraging as all hell to know that this is not just a thing of fantasy, this is a very real possibility as a result of work and do. They just do. They don’t complain about it. They just do it – and for the most part, with smiles on their faces.
In any case, here I am, entering my final night of this little pseudo-adventure, and I sit, by candlelight, yet again, writing this communique (sorry, had to do it…), reflecting a bit on the last few days. It takes getting away from everything you’re used to, your monotonous, almost formulaic robotic way of life, to understand and put everything into perspective…life truly is good. Experiences are what remind you of that. Yes, bad shit has happened, and bad shit will happen, that’s just a part of it, but so does good shit. Overall, when you take the initiative to try to pay attention to the life that is around you and the life you’re living, rather than just numbly let it guide you and pass right by you, every single one of those moments that you live in, those moments you truly live in, you realize are good moments. This moment, right here, right now, is beautiful. And the more of those beautiful ones that you pay attention to and accumulate, you can store in your memory for those times when you need them…you can draw on them and remember that there are many incredible moments, come and gone, and, most important (and hardest) to remember, will come again.
So some of the moments that I will continue to draw on for days, weeks, months to come come from these final days here at Far Meadow. Today, while the light was directly above and not quite optimal shooting conditions for property photography, let alone any photography, the owner decided to take me to some ‘amazing pools and waterfalls’ close to the property, so we hopped in the truck and headed on down a grizzly sierra road. We twisted and turned through pine trees and dirt roads and came upon a trailhead that led us through manzanitas and beautiful moss-covered pine groves that soon opened up into a creek, that led into a pool, that led into a wider creek, that led into a bigger pool, that led into…well, you get the picture…
The combination of fresh-flowing alpine water cascading across the warm sun-beaten rocks, snaking it’s way from one natural pool to another, provided for some of the most perfect swimming hole conditions I perhaps have ever encountered (it’s still tough to completely beat Havasu Falls…). The color of the water danced from forest green to platinum to gold, depending on which angle you looked at it, and whatever surroundings that the light was bouncing upon it from. This is where the Eye-Fi came in super handy, for every direction you turned your head provided another frame. Here’s a few of them.
I was so inspired that on the drive back, I instinctively tapped into my inner Van Gogh with this shot (in actuality, it was all an accident stemming from having the camera unintentionally in shutter priority mode rather than the intended aperture priority…but hey, turned out to be one of my favorite images, so, well, yup!):
Silliness aside, we got back in time to snap the final round of shots needed for the rental, and proceeded to make and devour our final meal together in Far Meadow…sausages, artichokes, and soup, all cooked upon that same open fire pit flame. We laughed about the look on the store clerk’s face when they went to buy a wood burning stove on a 109 degree day (for clarification, it was a cabin installation for the winter months…), we conversed on everything from the difference between photography and art to the major differences in compost toilets (don’t ask…), then grabbed a nightcap glass of white wine, walked out into the meadow, and turned our heads upwards for a final time, soaking in the milky way, a couple of shooting stars, and a few more laughs…
…just more of those ‘moments’ to bank away…
— For Part 1 of this Far Meadow Photo Adventure, click here! and for Part 2 of this Far Meadow photo adventure, click here! and find me on Google Plus, where I’m most active on a daily basis or on Twitter @wasimofnazareth for my mobile mayhem (aka: pretty pictures taken by iPhone).
So had a house I had to shoot this week for Airbnb. It was actually the second of two units on a property I shot before, but I hadn’t seen the second unit as it was occupied that first time. Anyway, not important…so after I was done shooting the interior, I figured, no one was here, I was going to take advantage of the moment and just kind of chill for a minute. When you’re standing on a deck with nothing in front of you but a gorgeous canyon that opens up to the Pacific Ocean (see image at bottom of this post), it’s hard not to force yourself to take a break and soak it in. So as I sat down and took a few gulps of my warm ice tea that had been sitting the car since I showed up, I saw this ridiculously quaint and charming little candle holder with a pile of little rocks alongside it, being draped PERFECTLY by a grapevine. And when I mean, perfectly, it’s as if it was staged. For some reason, my imagination took me to the Mediterranean coast, perhaps Spain, maybe Italy, I don’t know, but my wanderlust got the best of me and I started snapping a few shots of it as if I was actually on that coast. (more…)
So was a pretty good last few days. Did the whole Scott Kelby’s “Shoot Like A Pro” workshop/seminar here in Los Angeles on Friday, and I’ve got two thoughts:
One, he’s the MAN! I learn more from a one day session with him than I can on my own in months. He simplifies things so much to the point where you start asking yourself, why the hell did I ever think that was complicated to begin with? I had a great experience at his Photoshop seminar last Winter, was hoping for the same with this one, and I got it.
Two, WHY DIDN’T THE METRO RAIL EXIST WHEN I LIVED IN LOS ANGELES!???? Damn…parked my car in Culver City, made it down to the Convention Center in 20 minutes on the train, and just as easy on the way out. No traffic, no rush hour, no gas, no driving, no cell phone ticket, no 20 dollar parking, no hassle. Frickin’ insane. Right in my stomping grounds…L.A. almost felt like a (gasp!) real city! (more…)
TWICE IN ONE WEEK! This is crazy exciting for me on the inside…so earlier in the week one of my favorite photography podcasts picked one of my images to critique. That was my oak tree image that I was using to bring attention to the non-native borer that is threatening to rid california of all of its oaks. It was featured on the April 1 episode of the Digital Photo Experience podcast and that blew my mind.
Well, earlier today, I was sitting here editing photos for work, listening to another of my favorite photography podcasts, this one is the April 5 episode of Frederick Van Johnson’s ‘This Week In Photo,’ and all of a sudden, at about the 51:04 mark, I hear my name (butchered, but they gave it a good effort) when they announce their first ever photo critique on the show. They picked my image ‘a slice of yosemite layer cake,’ and they dug it. They had professional photographer guests Jeffrey Totaro & “Fro Knows Photo” Jared Polin all give their thoughts, and it was all positive. Frederick went so far as to say that he could see the image printed large and framed on a wall with a nice light. I mean, I can’t think of a higher compliment.
I know it may sound like I’m boasting or whatever, but I’m not. I’m just genuinely hyped. Please understand, this is the first time in my life that I’m doing something that I actually feel I’m supposed to be doing. Like everything I’ve done before has been leading me to that thing that just feels right and it’s starting to come together that way, and at age (almost) 36, that’s pretty damn exciting for me. While the next steps once, very recently, felt ridiculously daunting, they’re all of a sudden starting to feel exciting and encouraging instead.
It’s always been an ultimate goal to help people that need it and be able to lend my skills to try to help make things even a little bit better than they are for those in unfortunate situations and regions and areas in life, and I feel that I’m getting closer to a point where that can become a reality. Using the skills I’ve honed over the past 15 years – video, writing, publishing, and photography – and somehow bringing it all together into something that actually makes some sort of a difference. I don’t know exactly where and what this is going to lead me, but for the first time in perhaps, well, ever, I feel like at least a path, albeit a rocky one, is being laid out in front of me. So long as I don’t think about it too much and just keep paying attention to doing what I feel is right in the moment – right now – perhaps, perhaps, the rest will sort itself out.
There I go thinking about it too much again. Ah hell.
So I’m kind of hyped. The new episode of one of my favorite photography podcasts was released today, and every week they choose a few photo posts from their Google Plus community and talk about and critique the photos. This week, they chose one of mine, the second time that’s happened, and I couldn’t be happier about which one…it’s the oak tree from the earlier post about Malibu Creek State Park and the borer that’s threatening California’s oaks. Any attention I can bring to that I’m happy about…it would be an incredible tragedy if we lose those iconic oaks.
Anyhow, check out the podcast, it’s called Digital Photo Experience (http://dpexperience.com) and it’s hosted by two extremely well-respected names in the photography industry, Rick Sammon and Juan Pons. If you download it, I highly recommend listening to it all, it’s the April 1 episode, but if you just want to skip to the photo critiques, they start with mine at the 1:02:45 mark.
So after all that, they didn’t even remember to have us present our projects…but that didn’t stop me from moving with it. Not because I felt I needed to prove anything but because I truly want to do what I can to help out the park system. Budget woes are apparent all over, but that’s driving the passion of the volunteers, myself included, to make sure people are aware of the parks and these public spaces. They’re frickin’ insanely beautiful and they’ve basically saved my sanity and I know that anyone that shows up will feel the same. It just does that. So I created a Google Plus page for the Malibu Creek State Park Docent program, started posting to it, and plan on getting it going. So if anyone’s reading this and is on Google Plus, add us to your circles. If you’re not on Google Plus, well, you should be…just sayin’. (more…)
It’s strange how my life has turned into a series of photo taking and processing. Sure, not getting paid for all of it, so can’t really call myself a true professional, but all of my income is coming from this stuff, which is actually kind of…eh…neat. For the first time in my life, I’m actually feeling like I’m doing something I’m supposed to be doing. 36 hot damn years old and now I’m figuring this out?
Anyway, woke up with the intention of spending all day today working on editing the Megan Racing videos and processing those photographs so I can get a paycheck before rent-time creeps up in a hurry, but remembered that my docent project is due tomorrow at the final interpretation I’m required to go to as a new Malibu Creek State Park docent. (more…)
