Daily bit of creativity, #003

With this daily “creativity” thing I’ve (perhaps foolishly) started, I was poking around a bunch of cellphone photos, pictures I took of Peggy’s Cove Lighthouse in Nova Scotia last year. I’d tweaked this picture a lot in-camera, so now it was time to bring it into Photoshop on the desktop and see what else I could do.

This is what I made this morning. I also (again, perhaps foolishly) uploaded it to Fine Art America because hey, why not? I like this picture (today). But I can see how some (or most) people might not. I mean, what the heck are those boxes in the sky? And what about those red thingies in the lower right?

I believe that artists have to make work to please themselves. If someone else likes it, well, then BONUS!

So that’s my daily bit of creativity for today. Hope you enjoyed seeing it.

©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

A couple of boats . . .

A couple of boats in the Nova Scotia fog. Lovely.

©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

Yellow boat

This pretty yellow boat was side-tied to a dock in Nova Scotia and proved to be rather difficult to shoot.

All my angles just didn't work and when they did work, my lens wasn't quite wide enough. Exasperated, but determined, I filled my frame with 2/3 boat and 1/3 water.

I didn't like the shot at first, but the more I look at it, the more it appeals to me. Why?

Well, the color's good. It's a solid yellow that's striking.

And then there's the strip of green all around the edge, which sets the boat apart from the water and also adds a touch of interest.

The dark water, too, helps set off the light, bright color of the boat.

And then what really appeals to me is the composition, how I opted for a vertical format, have the pointy end pointing up, how at first glance the photo appears to be simply of a bold shape, and then you see that it's a boat.

The composition is clean, simple, strong. Just like the Nova Scotia boat.

©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

Buoys and boathouses . . .

A few overviews of what we stumbled upon wandering around Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia on a sunny morning.

©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

More boats . . .

I've shown and captioned these on Facebook, but thought I'd also put them here, just for the record.

Our first morning in Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia, and Chris and I are in just the right spot to see the "Harbour Mist" enter the harbour to offload mackerel, mackerel destined to be lobster bait.

Then toward the end of our trip, in deep fog heading toward Cape Forchu Lighthouose in Yarmouth, cool stuff loomed out of the mist -- big piles of lobster traps and, just up the road, fishing boats.

CJ spotted this "Lady Carol" buoy behind a stack of lobster traps and called me over to shoot it. Just up the road, I found the boat it belonged to. And Chris was heard muttering, "That's no lady, that's my wife!"

 ©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

Cartoonlike cuteness . . .

Just a quick little cellphone shot of a dory moored off the town of Shelburne, Nova Scotia. These boats are just too cute!

©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.

Suspiciously familiar . . .

Nova Scotia is a nautical place. It's not considered part of "The Maritimes" for nothing. Luckily, I'm a "maritime" kinda gal. Navy brat, coastal affiliations with California, Oregon, and Washington. And I live on an island.

So Nova Scotia looks suspiciously like "home." Even our latitudes are the same. Halifax is at 48 degrees, 38 minutes. Whidbey Island is at 48 degrees, 35 minutes. You do the math.

Other than driving kilometers, temperatures read in Celsius, and that glorious red maple leaf flag, I hesitate to say, IT WAS JUST LIKE HOME.

Well, not exactly, but pretty darned close. So close I could talk about Dungeness crab season to a lobster fisherman, both of us then realizing that our crabbing/lobster seasons begin and end around the same times.

What's particularly cool about Nova Scotia is that there's so much charm packed into a relatively small space. And, as you find in coastal Maine, there are lots of little peninsulas to drive up and down and around, never knowing what sort of weather you'll encounter, what boats might be out and about, and what the light will be doing.

So you're constantly surprised. What? No boats here at all? What? It's pouring down rain! What? It's sunny? What? It's hot and humid? In September? You gotta be kidding.

We had it all. Fog, sun, heat, coolness, rain, boring light, and wonderful light. Never did wear the two sweaters I brought. Wish I'd packed shorts. Or at least a short-sleeved shirt.

So here's my first glimpse of Nova Scotia. Lots of harbor harbour exploration, lots of boats, lots of sunshine. Lots of fun.

And you know what I regret? When renting the car, filling out the forms, I wish I'd said to the agent, "And you all drive on the left side of the road, right?" Just to see his expression.

Technical stuff: For this trip I brought two Canon camera bodies, one with a cropped sensor, the other full-frame. I brought a 24-85mm lens for the full-frame body and a 70-200mm "L" lens for the cropped sensor body. Never did use the fast 50mm lens I brought, nor the 12mm extension tube.

 ©Carol Leigh
All text, photographs, and other media are ©Copyright Carol Leigh (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from Carol Leigh.