This week and last week have been a lot of fun for me and my computer and my camera. Thought I would try to tell you of some of that fun – just for fun!

I am up here on this rather remote island – Drummond Island. It offers a fair amount of time to read,  ponder, and sleep.  Did you ever hear of mindful photography?  I never did until last week. Now, I’ve been reading and pondering it.

The book I’ve been reading describes it as a sort of a spooky zen thing – but I like a lot of their ideas: 

“Mindful photography is not about the one-upmanship or the desire to take the “best photo.” It’s a slower, more Zen style of photography. In regular photography we often become consumed with the idea of capturing the perfect shot. 

Mindful photography, on the other hand, is about being in the moment while also doing photography.  Studying, pondering, and creating an emotion with what is seen.  Then, without much  thought of photo excellence, snapping the moment to help recall that emotion in the future. The subject is not the focus of the photo, the emotion is the focus.

Oh, by-the-way, Mindful Photography can also improve mental health according to Jaime Kurtz (James Madison University).”

You know, I have many photos of clouds, of squirrels, of ducks, of deer, of tree bark, my horses, my cows, ……. None of them are great photos. They are photos that document the emotion that I was feeling or day-dreaming about at that moment.  Maybe I am a mindful photographer after all?  For example, this week, I was feeling and day-dreaming about the dominance among animals. I took photos of dominance happening.

I was watching several buzzards steal a fish from a Gull, then one dominating buzzard chasing the other buzzards away.  A dominate deer peeing to mark her territory, warning all other deer that the apple core I held in my hand was her’s alone.   Momma duck calling her babies to follow her away from me, that man on the bike. Clearly Momma was a dominate boss and each of the 10 babies fell right in line. Even Daddy duck fell in behind the family as Momma duck told him to do!  And, horses – Yes, herds of horses really have a dominate pecking order which every member respects.

I will share a few of my mindful photos with you in a moment – But first I will tell you of  an other thing I sometimes do with my photos.  I remove all images, keep the color – squish the colors around and make what I call abstract photography. To get started, I just stare at  a photo on my computer, let my mind dominate my hands by telling them what I want to see on the image. I go to PhotoShop and put it there – I think that is mindful photography too – I will show you some of them too

Poor photo – but it shows how buzzards are dominate – Fish stollen from gulls and only the dominate buzzard got to eat! – However, I just heard from my neighbor, Tom,  that the same thing  happened again – but with a different ending – the dominance has shifted – an Eagle, with talons extended, swooped down and stole the fish from everyone.

Poor photo – It is difficult to see the family that Momma Duck pulled together to move away from me on the bike – they are behind the Tamaracks.

Not a prize winning photo but it shows the dominate deer marking her territory and saying “That apple core he is holding is mine!”

Not a good photo of the owner behind the the board partition.  This horse, Adesse, rules the barn – no other horses in sight – the other four were in the open stall, waiting for Adesse to give up her position near the owner.

‘Tis beautiful. Due to a human interaction with nature, trillions of grasshoppers dominate this farm – Nothing but daisies grow here now – The grasshoppers eat all the green grass but not the daisies.

My mindful mind just had to play with the previous photo. It said, darken the sky, change it to keep the viewers eye on the page, and make it abstract?

My mind told my hands to do this

Oh my.   My mindful mind was still in control! They told my hands to do this too.

In this photo, the focus is on the emotion of my training success – not on creating a perfect horse photo. When I looked at this photo today,  the emotion of pride in training Perla to walk up on the box and stay there until I told her to leave came back to me years after this photo was taken. I relived the emotional joy of that moment from years ago.  Hey, Come to think of it, I was the animal that dominated Perla – Oh my.

As you swing thru life – I say, take a photo of your emotion – your feeling of the moment – then bring it back to life years later as you review your photo library.