I have photographed large-scale landscape features (like the one above) at the Black Place out in northwest New Mexico dozens of times and posted blog entries about many of them. You can read them here, here, here, and here.
This time, on a visit at the end of December last year with my photographer friend, Alan, I chose to pay more attention to shapes and textures on a smaller scale. Thus, this post mostly contains interesting textures I found within an area about a half-mile square. To me they are intrinsically fascinating and beautiful, and I don't even know how to describe them, so I'm just going to show them with minimal comment.
Many of the images might legitimately be considered "abstract" because I intentionally excluded indicators of scale or context/environment.
In addition, I have converted some images to black-and-white, and in some cases I include both versions; you can decide which you like better. For example,
So here we go. Let's start with some of the larger scale features with texture:
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As the sun was setting behind the mesa on the south side of the valley, the light became effectively Blue Hour, and I got very interested in the zaftig features as in the images below:
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Chasing the light, I began to move away from the base of the mesa and back into direct, low-angle Golden Hour sunlight still shining on the north side of the valley, focusing primarily on the texture mix of small rocks (points) and water courses (lines) on the ground. For these, I generally prefer the color versions.
I came across a whole field of rocks with orange lichens on them . . .
. . . and one rock with only the pale blue-green lichens:
Then a huge open space with thousands of rocks of all sizes:
Eventually, even on the north side of the valley, the sun was again disappearing behind the mesa . . .
. . . and suddenly it was Blue Hour again! Notice how the right side of the image below is Blue Hour light, the left side is still in Golden Hour (just barely), and the center section (water course) is a mix of both.
Near the base of the northside hills were interesting flows of Mancos shale . . . essentially dried mud. In Blue Hour light the textures worked well both in color and monochrome:
Then it was time to hike back to the car and head for home (a two-hour drive away).
If you would like to see these images (and more) in a larger format, please visit my photography website, Todos Juntos Photography, by clicking here!
Cheers, -- LWO
