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“One of the reasons there are so many terms for conditions of ice is that the mariners observing it were often trapped in it, and had nothing to do except look at it.” ― Alec Wilkinson As winter transitioned into spring and the light coating of snow melted on the lakes, rivers and ponds in the area, some very interesting effects emerged, that I had not previously noticed. Perhaps it’s due to the… Read More
“When you see a fish you don’t think of its scales, do you? You think of its speed, its floating, flashing body seen through the water. Well, I’ve tried to express just that. If I made fins and eyes and scales, I would arrest its movement, give a pattern or shape of reality. I want just the flash of its spirits.” ― Constantin Brancusi I could not believe the colours on the… Read More
“Sense how Even the smooth stones ache With stories of their own In the shuddering light of day.” ― Scott Hastie Emerging from their icy bondage, two stones, or is it three, rest upon their captor, as ice water flows over them. What’s the story of these stones? They sit alone, apart from others. Where did they come from? The pure ice they rest in fills a narrow but deep, steep walled,… Read More
“Let us simmer over our incalculable cauldron, our enthralling confusion, our hotchpotch of impulses, our perpetual miracle – for the soul throws up wonders every second. Movement and change are the essence of our being; rigidity is death; conformity is death; let us say what comes into our heads, repeat ourselves, contradict ourselves, fling out the wildest nonsense, and follow the most fantastic fancies without caring what the world does or thinks… Read More
“One must know the so-called ‘lesson of a downpour.’ A man, caught in a sudden rain en route, dashes along the road not to get wet or drenched. Once one takes it for granted that in rain he naturally gets wet, he can be in a tranquil frame of mind even when soaked to the skin. This lesson applies to everything. ” – Yamamoto Tsunetomo Above is a photo from the past… Read More
“By March, the worst of the winter would be over. The snow would thaw, the rivers begin to run and the world would wake into itself again. ― Neil Gaiman Bubbles, trapped in ice, glow beneath the icy waters of the spring thaw, like a wraith, lit by some inner glow. Mid-February this year brings an early and rapid thaw. Cold water flows with life over frozen creeks, softening the shapes trapped below, beckoning… Read More
“How strange that the nature of life is change, yet the nature of human beings is to resist change. And how ironic that the difficult times we fear might ruin us are the very ones that can break us open and help us blossom into who we were meant to be.” ― Elizabeth Lesser I was considering numerous titles for this images. There is a lot happening here. I was considering “Transitions”,… Read More
“Ice contains no future, just the past, sealed away. As if they’re alive, everything in the world is sealed up inside, clear and distinct. Ice can preserve all kinds of things that way- cleanly, clearly. That’s the essence of ice, the role it plays.” ― Haruki Murakami, Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman A temporary reprieve from the cold of winter, hinting at a more prolonged thaw and the promise of spring ahead. Ice… Read More
“The magical way the wintertime warms you up is through its frozen beauties!” ― Mehmet Murat Ildan Yesterday, was a spectacular day! Here we are in mid February and the temperatures hit 12° C. The light was glorious and the outdoors beckoned me. So, with camera bag in hand, I set out to enjoy the day and see what it would reveal to me. Since the temperatures last week were around -30°… Read More
“We gaze continually at the world and it grows dull in our perceptions. Yet seen from another’s vantage point, as if new, it may still take the breath away.” ― Alan Moore Winter wears on, some days are bright and clear and others dark and dreary. Yet, through it all, nature lives on and builds crystal sculptures on frames of wood, grass, and stone. At the right time of day, the sun… Read More
“…I hear the sounds of melting snow outside my window every night and with the first faint scent of spring, I remember life exists…” ― John Geddes It’s mid-February and our first significant snow has fallen and begun to melt within a few short days. Beneath the thinning blanket of ice and snow, water writhes, flows, and drips, only to be frozen briefly by the chill of night and released once more by… Read More
Elegant in it’s simplicity? Apparently, someone had been throwing rocks onto the ice, hoping for a breakthrough? I returned a few days later to find dozens of rocks littering the ice surface. It turns out that the frost pushed them from an adjacent cliff and the rolled across the ice, coming to rest some distance from their source. Things are not always as they seem. Perhaps this situation is a combination of… Read More
The photo title says it all. An image of a pine tree reflected in an ice puddle on the trail. Here we are, early February and much of the scant snowfall we’ve had has melted off, running into creeks or pooling in icy puddles. The light this day was wonderful and lit the pines up with a soft glow. It was this ‘glow’ that attracted me to look closely at the puddle and… Read More
“Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purpose through him.” ~Carl Gustav Jung I am inspired by the art and writings of other creatives. That’s one of my reasons for blogging, connection to a larger community, people who see,… Read More
The title is a bit misleading, as the water is not frozen. I took the word frequencies from the delicate ripples in the water and the effect they had on the reflection. The image is actually inverted and I was debating leaving it that way. However, the composition I was envisioning is better communicated this way. You can see a little hint of the shoreline, still coated in ice and snow. The… Read More
A challenging composition. Part of the ‘trick’ to capturing the motion of water is to create a time exposure based on the speed of the water and the light available. I tend to do most of these earlier in the day, or late afternoon, when the sun is soft and indirect. Last week I found myself, mid-day, looking at these wonderful scenes of water rushing past icy shores and trying to figure… Read More
This was an interesting phenomenon. With a change in temperature, the ice sheets had shifted and the water at this point of the river seemed to have to decide whether to go over the ice or under it. Most of the water went under the ice and seemed to pull at the surface water. The effect, which I tried to capture here, was a vortex of water which rotated on the surface… Read More
Above is another photo of the winter waters of Duffins Creek, north of Pickering , Ontario. It seems the creek had frozen solid to the bottom recently, as water was flowing over the ice in many places. This scene caught my attention as the sun revealed interesting aqua tones in the ice beneath the surface. The ice had tilted slightly, causing a bit of an ebb, or backflow, and created this wave… Read More
I have to admit that I have been to these falls many times over the past few years, but never in winter. The falls are the result of a dam being build to keep and introduced species of trout from migrating too far upstream and eating the eggs of the native brown trout. I’ve posted a few photos of this dam in the past. The winter scene is beautiful, especially in the right… Read More
On a particularly nice day in mid-January, I went for a much needed hike along the Seaton Trail, south of Whitevale, Ontario, with my son. The day was an opportunity to enjoy the outdoors and make some photos. The creek was partially frozen over and full of wonderful detail in hues of blue and green. Above is a view of the typical scenery showing ice coverage and flow. The plants are all… Read More
Never the same twice Wonderful patterns in the ice Beautiful randomness of nature Just add water Nikon D300 Tamron 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200 mm 1/320 sec, f/9.0, ISO 250 For more images like this, please visit my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/EdLehming or my website http://www.edlehming.com
Many years ago, just north of Pickering, Ontario, was a flourishing hamlet called Altona. There was a school, a couple of churches, a hotel and many beautiful farms, as well as a mill. In the 70’s the lands were expropriated by the Canadian government to build an airport. Well, the airport seems to have become a distant memory and the lands sat, essentially abandoned. The mill, and several other historical buildings, along Altona… Read More
Winter can be such a thing of wonderment. The photo above was made in December of 2014 while on a trip to A Place for The Arts, an artist cooperative in Bancroft, which I am a member of. The drive was generally uneventful, with the occasional blowing snow and a few drifts over the road. There had been a slight warming the day before and a quick cooling down which created a… Read More
While winter has been slow to arrive in southern Ontario this year (we’re in fog and rain right now), that was not the case last year. The image above was made last winter on Ahmik Lake, near Parry Sound, Ontario. It had snowed gently most of the night, partially obscuring the tracks of others and was quite cold, but the day quickly brightened up. At the top left of this image is… Read More
A switch today from my mono posts of late and a look back to a winter past, in abstract. The above is a view through the edge of the forest at Fraser lake Camp, near Bancroft. There was a bit of fog in the air and frost on the branches. The whole scene had a dreamy feel to it. Since the vertical elements were present, I decided to try a vertical pan to… Read More
This year’s final post is a reflection on a winter past. As I noted throughout the fall, it has been a particularly mild year and we had no significant snow or cold weather till a few days ago, and even that was fairly insignificant. Two years ago, we got hammered with an ice storm that buried us in a combination of wet snow and ice. This mixture quickly froze into solid ice and… Read More
Two years ago, southern Ontario, Quebec, and much of the north-eastern United States was hit hard with an exceptional ice storm. In its wake, the storm left hundreds of thousands without power and a literal wonderland of ice and sub-zero temperatures that lasted for days. This storm was an exception in many ways. One of these was that the ice, which normally melts off shortly after the storm remained intact and stayed… Read More
This morning, the pond at Goodwood Conservation Area had no snow on it (it was -10 C). The pond was covered with these branched holes. I’ve looked them up and seen several theories as to what causes them. Most attribute it to a hole forming under the snow as it melts, which creates the branches or conduits. As the snow melts and the ice reforms, it fills in with darker, harder ice…. Read More
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