My favorite shots of all time

This series of images, a series I call "Between Tides," was created back in 2009. I spent a lot of time walking along Oregon beaches, photographing rocks on the bluffs. I then chopped up the pictures, re-combined them, blended them, and turned them into these images. I have more than 50 of them!

Why do I like them? They are primitive-looking, colorful, graphic, strange, mysterious, and bold. They represent my time spent simply walking and looking. They represent my ability to make something out of seemingly nothing. And they are nothing like I have seen anywhere else. And I've seen a lot! They are uniquely mine.

I have a number of them up on Fine Art America. Have they ever sold? No. Should I remove them? No. Eventually someone will like them as much as I do. And if not, then they're still there for me to admire!

Hmmmm... These would look good printed on metal. At the very least, I should have some printed to hang in my own home.

Again, I consider these my favorite photos. And of the hundreds of thousands of pictures I've created, these still, from 2009, stand out for me.

Thanks for looking.

©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 walk on the beach

Chris and I headed up to the north end of the island to walk on the beach. Very cool location with lots of driftwood, rocks, barnacles, and a huge stump that had washed ashore.

Walking around the "root" end of the stump, there were all these nooks and crannies where rocks had lodged. Whether the rocks were there as a result of storm and wave action, or had been nudged in place by various artistic souls as they walked past, I can't say for sure.

What I CAN say is that it looked great! We were there around noon on a sunny day, so the lighting was less than ideal. One small part of the rock-encrusted stump was in shade, however, so that's the section I concentrated on.

Both of these are cellphone shots, and they look surprisingly good to me.

Next time? I set out on an overcast day, armed with tripod and reflector, and see what else I can do here.

Chris added a few more rocks to the mix before we left.

©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. Thank you!

Faces on the beach

The first thing I need to say is that none of these was altered in Photoshop to create the faces — all were "as found" on the beach. It's weird. Some days you'll find no faces at all and on others, well, seems like you're being watched all the time. I particularly like the look and feel of the last photo, an angry raptor of some sort, complete with a highlight in the eye created by dried seaweed. Fun stuff, no?

©Carol Leigh, who is comfortable photographing faces in nature, but terrified of taking pictures of actual human beings...

Rock Study #72

Went for a walk on the beach this morning, photographed some rocks, and came up with this ... number 72 in a continuing series. ©Carol Leigh

The Collection Collection: Limpets and Rocks

My studio doesn't seem to be getting any tidier, but I'm having fun photographing what I'm uncovering. (And I haven't even gotten to that box yet that contains the half-pheasant, miscellaneous feathers, more shells, etc.) Add to that about 50 old keys, miscellaneous round things that I think are to hold clock faces, that bag o' letters I was telling you about earlier, a jar of metal numbers, and oh, so much more. ©Carol Leigh