University Avenue, with it’s boulevard of apple trees slices through Toronto’s Hospital District. It is a ribbon of colour bound by bleak institutional architecture. But miracles happen here every day. That’s what I love about this picture. The way the colour explodes out of the darkness like hope rising from despair.
My obligations as a lawyer have kept my camera in its bag for far too long. But an adjournment allowed an unexpected shooting opportunity. Walking up University Avenue between Sick Children’s and Toronto General Hospitals I found these trees breaking out of the shadows.
It was unclear to me how I should capture the scene. Traffic was busy and the sidewalk was a stream of scrubs, suits and patients. After a couple of tests I decided to use a photo impressionistic approach by photographing the trees “in the round.”
I love the way in the round technique deconstructs a complex scene into its essential elements in an impressionistic way.
This picture is composed of about 20 images photographed “in the round” technique; meaning I walked around the tree to the extent possible taking pictures from different positions. The images were merged using an opacity blend which deconstructs the scene reducing it to its essential elements.
This picture was well recieved on Flickr where it received over 40,000 views on the first day thanks to its selection for Explore. That makes 21 Explore images for me in the past 2 years.
Sometimes you just know how a picture is going to turn out; sometimes the joy is in the surprise. This image is a perfect example.
I saw this scene while walking through the cactus garden at the Phoenician Hotel in Scottsdale . What caught my attention was the repetition in the receding saguaro and the strong vertical elements. Creating depth in an impressionistic images has been a challenge for me.
To create the photo impressionistic effect I used the high-speed montage approach I am developing. I shot a burst at 60 fps while panning, The images were then brought together in Photoshop using an opacity blend. I could have created the same effect using a dark neutral density filter and a slow shutter speed but composition would have been an issue for me. The high-speed montage approach is more suited for photo impressionism on the fly.
The result was better than I had hoped. The vertical elements created a texture I had not seen in the viewfinder adding to the scene’s depth.
Flickr selected this image for its Explore page yesterday; about 9,500 views in 24 hours. Thanks to the curator at Flickr who championed this image.
Trees have always been an important subject in art. For me they bring to mind the power of an Emily Carr or the drama of Ansel Adams. They are grounded. They reach for the sky. A natural subject for impressionist photography.
When I started experimenting with in the round photography I first turned to trees. Visually trees are roughly symmetrical which lends themselves to the technique because fundamentally in the round photography relies on pixel averaging. When similarly placed pixels are roughly the same it is more likely that a strong image will emerge after the opacity blend. As a result the trunk is a natural anchor for the image. The leaves feather towards the sky. The background details wash away leaving the subject alone in the frame.
The genesis of this series was an unexpected opportunity. Early on a gloomy Saturday I set up on the South apex of Queen’s Park Cres to photograph the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. As the light improved I noticed the trees behind me, along the street edge, had started to turn colour and with the road closed for the marathon it was possible to photograph around the trees.
What I love about these photographs is the way the technique captures the form and colour of the trees while just hinting at the detail. Trees have always been an important subject in art. For me they bring to mind the power of an Emily Carr or the drama of Ansel Adams. They are grounded. They reach for the sky. A natural subject for impressionist photography and one I keep coming back to.
The other thing I love about this technique is the way the foregrounds seem to twist, circle or band. The result is always unexpected. I can pre-visualize the tree itself but the foreground is always a surprise.
These in the round impressionistic photographs have been well received on Flickr. Four of them appeared on Flickr’s Explore page. One generated 22,000 views in a single day. That is a stark contrast to the way my photo impressionism was received a couple of years ago when I often receive comments asking if I had a neurodegenerative disease or hadn’t learned to use auto focus.
I am coming to understand this about photo impressionism: there is no one size fits all technique. You have to open your imagination and pre visualize the effect before pushing the shutter. You have to experiment. You have to push your boundaries.
Photo impressionism has many faces. The soft focus approach is popular but I have never really given it a chance preferring to concentrate on multiple exposure and slow shutter images. A recent trip to New York changed that for me.
The first technical challenge was understanding how to override the Nikon 1 V3’s powerful automated tools. The solution: use a DX lens and manual focus mode for better aperture and focus control. The buttery rich bokeh is a function of a large aperture setting.
To a great extent I think this approach works because of the bokeh. At night the images become dream like. Colours that formerly defined background elements move to the forefront. Often they seem to dance. Look at the view of the World Trade Center below.
The built form of the World Trade Center seems to melt into a pillar of light. For me it has become a lighthouse of hope, and strength overlooking the street below. I was excited to learn this morning that the curators of Flickr’s Explore page had added it to today’s list.
I am coming to understand this about photo impressionism: there is no one size fits all technique. You have to open your imagination and pre visualize the effect before pushing the shutter. You have to experiment. You have to push your boundaries. I love it!
My exploration of photo impressionism started with dragon boats and I keep coming back. Is it the power, the visual rhythms, habit? I just don’t know. But the resulting images never fail to please.
The photograph below is composed of about 30 images brought together using an opacity blend and recently appeared on Flickr’s Explore page. It was taken at Toronto’s International Dragon Boat Festival on Toronto Island.
I spent Canada Day exploring Ripley’s Aquarium and a new camera; Nikon’s mirrorless N1 V3.
Ripley’s Aquarium is a visual buffet; well laid out exhibits and exotic subjects. It has a wonderful collection of sharks and stingrays. But for me the Jellyfish Room was the highlight. Where else can you spend a few moments with these ghostly aliens. The image below is from that visit.
Although this shot is not typical for my genre I really love it. I think it captures the delicateness and movement of the jellyfish while maintaining the alien quality I experienced. So you can imagine my excitement this morning to find that Flickr Explore had chosen it for today’s page. This is my 5th image chosen for Explore in the past 12 months.
Thanks to the curator who championed my picture.
almost alien, a jelly fish pulses through the tank at Ripley’s Aquarium in Toronto
For those who keep track of these things, being selected for Explore resulted in just over 10,000 views in one day.
I have been using Flickr for a couple of years to test photo impressionistic ideas. From my experience the Flickr community is more engaged than the other photographic communities I have tried. That is important to me when I am trying something new.
So you can imagine my excitement this morning when I discovered Flickr’s Explore editors had selected my latest in the round experiment for their feature page. The exposure from that means dozens of new followers, many interesting points of view and a bit more acceptance for photo impressionism as a genre.
Thanks to the curator who championed my image.
Update
For what it is worth, looking back at the views on this image and the others I have had featured on Explore, you can expect about 8,500 views over 3 days on average if you are lucky enough to be selected. For all of my photo impressionism images fetured on Explore see https://www.flickr.com/photos/photo-impressionism/sets/72157638979727914/
