A charcoal sky

For the first few months of spring I decided to go out and try and capture the mood of the season. Unfortunately that mood had been predominately one of cold, sleet and steely grey skys. And while this wasn't idea for exploring or taking holidays it was perfect for capturing moody dramatic pictures of the sky.

Under this chrome dome branches from the trees spread capillary like over clouds and man made monuments alike. In the background the building sat like black sentries. It was a beautiful and apocalyptic world to explore with my camera.

As I wandered I took my time to sketch shade and light, capture contours, branches and leaves. In other words I changed the world with my camera and with it drew a charcoal sky.

Standing in Lunar's light

The moon has always been a potent mystic symbol, in Buddhism it is the throne upon which Tara sits, in Hinduism it is the jewel on Shiva's brow, in Christianity it is a symbol of chastity and to the greek pagan it was the goddess selene who was all seeing and all wise and an enemy of strife.

I've always felt the pull of the moon, a strange energy that made me want to run wild and dance and celebrate under its glowing light. It was for this reason that I set out last night to capture this feeling, this energy through the lense of my camera. As last night was not only a supermoon but also the night of a lunar eclipse.

I followed its etheral light through trees, across roads, under street lamps and into abandoned parks all to capture its intense glory. The world through my camera went from blue to black to yellow to orange to gold. And still I could only capture a fraction of its glory, this moon and its light.

Maybe I'll always be drawn back to the young man I was, standing outside surrounded by the beauty of nature on a cold crisp autumn night, being bathed in Lunar's light.

The sky in the lakeside

I decided to focus on my abstract reflection work again this week, as the last few posts I had done had mostly focused on travel or realistic subject matters. I had noticed on my way into work that I passed a particularly beautiful lake with some lovely reflections.

Setting out with my camera I decided to focus on creating a series of dreamy images of the sky. I've felt in the past that looking up into the sky gives the impression of gazing into some great ocean through which a vessel could glide across a great blue silent sea.

This was what I wanted to create by that lakeside, the dream that instead of standing looking at a lake you might be gazing at another world, one where the horizon and the water's edge blur and becomes instead a never ending sky of water and wind.

Ballons take flight

While I did in fact promise myself I would write a second part to a beginners photographers guide. Its taking longer to write then expected so in the mean time Balloons!!!

I had been travelling back with a friend from a day out in Bath. It had been a magically day and as our train pulled into Bristol it became even more magically. For that day Bristol had been home to a ballon festival and as our train pulling into the station we followed a magical trail that ran across the sky.

A trail of balloons that soared majestically above the city of Bristol, we stood entranced on the platform, desperately taking pictures. Trying to capture the wonder of this floating beauty. It was a moment of transient bliss that meant that maybe for an instant our souls could take flight and our imagination could rise out into the deep blues and ride upon an untamed sky.

To fly toward a secret sky

“This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.”  - Rumi

For me the sky, birds and clouds have in later life taken on a religious bent to them. Whether it be their slow sailing passage across a clear sky, or a savage journey across a grey and stormy horizon. The moment of clouds and birds across the dome above us has in time brought out me a deep and religious awe in me.

The sky reminds me of my own smallness in the divine scheme of things, it brings a peace to my mind and allows me to to gaze enraptured at the objects that sail across it. I imagine that we like the birds and clouds that float across it are guided to fly towards God and his or her servants on a sometimes peaceful, sometimes fraught journey. Guided to one day fly towards Love across a divine and secret sky.

And the sky wept colour

I had been getting a bit bored with the photography I had been doing and had really started getting the urge to push myself. We all get there as artists, feeling stuck in a rut and wanted to push ourselves artistically but not really being sure how to do that.

A walk down to the sea near where I live really helped with that. What started off as an exploration of the rubble strewn beach slowly an inevitably became a study of a sky that began to weep with colour.

The fact that the area was fairly industrial certainly as the street lamps and electrical pylons that ran over head criss crossed the sky, accentuating the strange and vivid shapes that the clouds formed overhead.

I stayed until the sun went down, until finally all the colour had been wept from the sky and the stars finally emerged. And I left happy and truly inspired.

Industrial revolution

After having moved to a less then salubrious area of Cardiff, I discovered to my delight that I was right round the corner from an industrial estate. I had made a mental note to explore it and so as the sun was setting I made my way to the grounds and began to explore.

I discovered damaged gates, rusting metal, barbed wires and electrical cables and all around it the surge of nature, an unruly tide threatening to swallow everything in its path in its quest to reclaim the land that man had taken from it.

It is these places that I love the most. Forgotten, decaying and being slowly retaken by the greenery that begins its eventable creep inwards.

It also offers fantastic opportunities for photographers, filled as it is with details, wonderful colours and dramatic shadows against the sky and it shows that for a photographer anything, even something that can be as ugly as an industry estate can be remade into something that is colourful and beautiful.

Perfect blue buildings

Asleep in perfect blue buildings,
Beside the green apple sea,
Gonna get me a little oblivion, baby,
Try to keep myself away from me
- Counting Crows

Looking upwards in any city and you might find yourself wondering if you've accidentally become lost in some alien world. Glass spires and concrete walls might rise to the sky, surrounding you on either sides.

Or you might find yourself dazzled by the flashes of the sun, glinting off the sides of an otherworldly temples to capitalism and profit. You might find statues carved in dedication to legions of inquiring minds, gods or angels.

And above all of this a dome of perfect blue, like a glass wall designed to protect you from a great, azure sea.

These designs are our mark upon the world, our attempt to create true beauty in it, a way for us to impose our idea order upon the world, or perhaps a way to protect ourselves from the impermanence of it?

In any case it pays to look up once in a while and dream of buildings lost in a blue sky.