Photography – Page 9 – Ripple Effects

Saturday Snapshot September 20: Ward’s Island

My ten-day trip to Toronto was not only about films. I brought along my camera and my ‘birding lens’, hoping to catch some birds in migration. Before I left, I read about the hotspots for birding on Ward’s Island, and printed some pages off the Internet.

Ward’s Island is just a 15-minute ferry ride south from the Toronto Harbourfront. As soon as I got off the boat, I realized I’d forgotten to bring along the birding pages. Why was I not surprised? No matter, without the guide sheets, I was in for a fresh exploration and a mental exercise in information retrieval. So much the better.

It turned out that the first week of September happened to be a little too early for bird migration. Temperature is also a factor. The day I visited the island, it was 30C (86F). But instead of birds, I did take some photos on that piece of tranquility a stone throw from the busy metropolis.

The Toronto skyline viewed from Ward’s Island:

The Boardwalk along the periphery of Lake Ontario:

House boat or was it boat house on the canal… serene and reclusive:

I’ve never been to Monet’s flower gardens at Giverny, but I can imagine it looking at the canal. Just like to name these photos the Monet Effects:

Ok, don’t rub it in. I appreciate the irony. But here’s the interesting thing: Look carefully and you’ll see the reflection is sharper than the subject, use ‘Chaos’ as the guiding light.

When I was just about given up on photographing birds, I sat down at the outdoor garden of The Island Café near the pier and had my breakfast. And what did I see? My very first sighting of Monarch Butterflies!

The Monarch 3

The Monarch, more than enough to compensate for my lack of bird sightings. A new burst of enthusiasm led me to retrace my steps along the canal to look more carefully for birds, but thanks to some overzealous fire ants successfully targeting my feet, I had to retreat after spending a fruitful four hours on Ward’s Island. A half day of total serenity.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

Photos in this post taken by Arti of Ripple Effects, September, 2014.
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Saturday Snapshot August 16: Serendipitous Supermoon

Again, it was pure serendipity. I was driving by a natural area on my way home last Sunday, August 10, when I just casually looked out my side window. The moon was mesmerizing. I did not have my camera with me, but I knew I needed to stop and capture the moment.

I parked my car along the road, got out and took these photos using my iPhone. I’m posting them just as they are, with no editing.

At 9:20 p.m.

9:21 p.m.

9:23 p.m.

Interesting, isn’t it? The sky seemed to have brightened as time passed.

Here’s the view as I turned around, the ‘opposite side’ of the evening sky:

Only after I got home and watched the news did I realize that was the Supermoon, the brightest celestial beauty we could see this summer. That night, the moon was up to 14 per cent bigger and 30 per cent brighter than a regular full moon.

And with this, I suddenly realized something … Serendipity is more likely to come to those who are uninformed. No wonder they say ignorance is bliss.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS.

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Saturday Snapshot August 9: Small is Beautiful

In my last Saturday Snapshot, I posted my serendipitous sighting of a Pelican. One of the largest flying birds, the Pelican has a wingspan of 9 feet, and some weigh close to 30 pounds. The Pelican can fly, amazing at 30 pounds; a butterfly can fly too, equally amazing at 0.5 gram, wingspan averaging 5 cm. I’d love to see the Monarch butterfly. They don’t come by here. Maybe I’ll be able to see some one day when I travel to the east coast. Aren’t they just as mind-boggling? Flying as many as 2,000 miles in migration with such a minuscule body? Where do they put their GPS? Something even smaller… What caught my attention are the two seeds like stars. How small and delicate they look compared to the dragonfly: Here’s another kind of small. Succulent, plump and colourful. Real food for the birds, imaginary treats for me. Don’t they look like round scoops of ice cream? And the small songbirds in the woods are my favourites. This House Wren is not adorned with bright colours, but a closer look at the different layers of down and feathers you can see the various shades of colours and pattern. And this juvenile looks charming to me: Yes, the Pelican is majestic, mesmerizing when it flies. But a tiny Yellow Warbler can make my day too. Looks like the feeling is mutual:

I don’t get to see a Pelican everyday, but these tiny creatures can tide me over till the next serendipity.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. Click Here to see what others have posted.

ALL PHOTOS iN THIS POST TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS.

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Saturday Snapshot July 26: Serendipity

It has always been one of my favourite words, serendipity. But now, I love it even more.

While birding in the woods a few days ago, I saw in the not too distant sky a huge bird slowly gliding. I remember two words conjured up in my mind: mythical, and mystical. I was trying to decide which one was more apt to describe my sighting. It looked like a crane or maybe a swan; my imagination at that instant had just gone haywire with excitement.

She (or he) glided gracefully, lowering and finally landing somewhere, disappearing from my view. With my stalking instinct automatically kicked into overdrive, I made a 400 m. dash and lo and behold, found a little stormwater pond behind a grassy berm, a pond I was not aware of before.

What I saw was magical. Swimming slowly on the serene water was this calm and solitary Pelican, a huge contrast to the exuberant paparazzo nearby, huffing and puffing behind the bushes:

I watched her quietly … preening:

Gulping down her lunch. She dipped her beak into the water and came up with her prey. I could see the shape of a fish in her large pouch; the next second it was gone, swallowed up whole:

After some time, she suddenly decided to take off. The following sequence was probably the most rewarding for any nature paparazzo:

I later found out that the American White Pelican is one of the largest birds in North America. Averaging about 16 pounds, but some grow to as large as 30 pounds. They are among the heaviest flying birds in the world. Their 9-foot wing span, snowy white body and contrasting black wing tip give them their majestic look and graceful flight in the sky. They are gregarious, hanging out in groups.

That’s why I love my serendipitous find even more, a solitary Pelican, quiet and serene, and not along the ocean shore, but right in my neck of the woods at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted. In addition, this is also a Weekend Reflections post. CLICK HERE to see other reflections.

All Photos on this post are taken by Arti of Ripple Effects, July, 2014.

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Saturday Snapshot July 12: Love Is In The Air

At first I thought, “how interesting, two dragonflies piggybacking.” Not until I got home and loaded my photos did I realize what sort of sequence I’d shot:

Definitely more affective than just practising for the Cirque du Soleil:

Love is in the air, can it be more obvious?

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

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Photos on this post taken by Arti of Ripple Effects, July 2014.
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Saturday Snapshot July 5: Mountain Bluebird

Six summers ago, I stayed in an isolated log home for a few weeks in Cochrane, Alberta. That was before I’d acquired my iPhone, Nikon, and birding interest. A few days ago I drove back there and revisited the place.

Funny how I was seeing everything from a birder’s POV this time. I brought my camera with me and purposely look for any flying objects, identified or not. I saw this flash of blue fly by, too fast for a focused picture:

Later the blue landed on a tree top. Here’s a slightly clearer view:

Not until I got home and uploaded the photos did I have the chance to find out what bird it was. With a snack in his beak, here’s looking at you, kid. The Mountain Bluebird:

Another view, astounding colour:

Alas, Nature has not endowed the female with as much colour, yet in my eyes, she is an equal beauty (a commenter explained this is a juvenile… an equal cutie):

A flash of blue, a place to land, a bug for snack, a good day.

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

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ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS, JUNE 30, 2014.
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If you had not visited Ripple Effects six years ago, here are some older posts on my log home experience:

Summer Indulgence (2008)

Nature Photography

From A Country Garden

Music In My iPod

AGO Exhibition: Terror And Beauty

The Art Gallery of Ontario, AGO, is a must-see whenever I visit Toronto. Not only because I’m a Frank Gehry fan who never gets tired of looking at the centre spiral staircase in there, but the exhibits are always intriguing and thought-provoking. Spent a few days in Toronto last week and this time, I was much gratified to view the current show at AGO: “Francis Bacon, Henry Moore: Terror and Beauty”.

Terror and Beauty, the motif resonates with the idea of Wabi-sabi. I’ve explored visually the notion of Wabi-sabi before. Two seemingly incompatible states juxtaposed against each other, beauty and sadness.

“You can’t be more horrific than life itself” says a quote from Francis Bacon on the AGO’s Artist page. The exhibits speak to that by extracting from the horrors of WWII and other forms of human sufferings and struggles depicted in the works of these two 20th century Irish/English artists who were contemporaries of each other.

The exhibit is a wealth of surrealist works from Bacon, and sculptures and drawings from Moore. But I was particularly captivated by the WWII items. While Moore is well-known for his abstract sculptures of the human body in larger than life poses, here’s a rare chance to see his more personal, wartime drawings.

Going home one evening in 1940, as he entered a London subway station, Moore discovered crowds of people sleeping on the platform to take shelter from an impending German air strike, the Blitz. He was taken aback by what he saw and his later drawing was a ghastly interpretation:

Photo Source: http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/moore-tube-shelter-perspective-n05709

That’s Moore’s view of the underground subway station used as impromptu bomb shelter. But what was it really like in those tube stations? That’s when I was totally captivated by the photos of the renowned photojournalist Bill Brandt displayed alongside Moore’s shelter drawings.

Rather than horrific depictions, I was utterly surprised by the actual photographs by Brandt, who acted as official war photographer. His noir and darkened perspective is haunting and yet, full of mystique and beauty.

What I saw was an opposite interpretation of the subway scene: rather than terror, I saw resilience. Indeed, the London populace came out in droves to seek shelter in the subway, a much safer haven than their own homes. What I saw in many of Brandt’s photographs was the strong sense of ‘life goes on’.

Two photographs in the exhibition will forever remain in my mind.

First is the Liverpool Street Underground Station Shelter during an air raid in November, 1940. The photograph shows a family sleeping soundly, bedding against the grooves in between the steel structures of the tunnel. But look more carefully, there’s even a bunk and blanket for a doll beside the child. They all look peaceful and calm.

For the archive in my mind, let me call this photo: “The Doll in the Subway”

The second picture by Brandt is in the Elephant and Castle London Underground Station Shelter. Here, people sleeping on the crowded platform while taking shelter from German air raids during the Blitz.

But look how they were dressed in. The mid-heel pump the woman in the foreground was wearing caught my attention. Looks like she was dressed for work. Blitz or no Blitz, after she woke in the morning, she had to go to work. Life as usual.

In my mental archive, this photo will now be entitled “The Mid-heel Pump”.

What more, after civilians had crowded into the subway stations against government’s advice, the officials had to respond with helpful measures by installing chemical toilets, first aid facilities, and providing drinks, while the people created their own entertainment. With all due respect to the victims of the Blitz, the resilience and adaptability of the Londoners are most inspiring.

After I stepped out of AGO, I wanted to go back in to take a more careful look at the exhibits again. But that was not feasible so I had to write this post from memory (no photos of the exhibits were allowed) and from some online digging. Glad to have found these two memorable images from the Imperial War Museum website. Thanks to AGO, these two historic photos will remain in my mental archive for a long, long time.

CLICK HERE to see 9 Incredible photos of the London Underground as Bomb Shelter.

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Related Posts on Ripple Effects:

The Frank Gehry designed Art Gallery of Ontario

Sketches of Frank Gehry (2005)

Art Gallery of Alberta

Saturday Snapshot May 31: After the Rain

Ever since I first read Annie Dillard, I’d wanted to see Puget Sound. But after all these years, I’ve been firmly rooted in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta. My neck of the woods is a boreal forest. So, I’m more at home with spruce trees than sandy beaches. Puget Sound will have to remain on my bucket list.

All through winter, spruce and pines are sustenance, the bulwark and shelter for birds and small creatures that stay behind, and me.

After two days of spring rain, I ventured out just when it broke clear slightly, and was mesmerized by the greens. From among the hardy spruce, the aspens burst out to embrace spring.

The tall, slender trunks, each a natural canvas

Colours and textures wrapped around

and moss as paints.

Nature’s artwork

Moss or fungus? No matter. Here’s life

Monet in Nature

And I couldn’t resist the capture, even though just a common sparrow, obscure, blocked by a branch:

Nature’s Artist at work in Annie Dillard’s Puget Sound as well as my Boreal Forest. Her descriptions are strikingly close to what I had experienced.

“I see a hundred insects moving across the air, rising and falling. Chipped notes of birdsong descend from the trees, tuneful and broken; the notes pile about me like leaves.”

Despite geographical distances and variance in environs, her words resonate:

“Time and space are in touch with the Absolute at base.”

– Annie Dillard, Holy The Firm

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLCIK HERE to see what others have posted.

Photos in this post taken by Arti of Ripple Effects

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Saturday Snapshot May 17: Franklin’s Gulls

I discovered a flock of Franklin’s Gulls a few weeks ago. Seeing the limited breeding area shown on the map, I consider myself privileged to be living right in this zone to welcome them.

Franklin's Gulls Map 1 — Source: South Dakota Birds and Birding

I heard the calls of gulls from afar, even before i saw them. I admit I wasn’t too excited. My initial thought was, ‘just another bunch of ordinary seagulls’. When I got closer, I saw a huge flock, close to a hundred of them.

Only after I’d uploaded my photos to my laptop did I realize these were not ‘ordinary gulls’ (for us I suppose are the more common Ring-billed Gulls). At first, I could not tell what they were. I had to look up the detailed descriptions to identify them.

They were Franklin’s Gulls, breeding adults. Their black head and white crescent eyes make them look like they’re hooded. They look almost cartoonish, comical, everyone full of character.

Franklin's Gulls
Below their dark hood is a white neck, their wings dark gray. The trailing edge of the wing is white, wing tip black with white spots. Slender and handsome:

See the beak of the gull on the upper left. In the light, it’s translucent orangey-red:

Beautiful wings looking from the top:

completely snow-white from underneath:

See Jonathan Livingston Seagull soar above the crowd, gliding in solitude:

After learning about the Franklin’s Gulls, I found I didn’t know much about the ‘ordinary gulls’ either… maybe nothing is ordinary in Nature.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS.

DO NOT COPY OR REBLOG

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Saturday Snapshot May 10: The Owl Family… Moonrise Haven

Here they are, all come out to enjoy the evening sun. In just a few weeks, the Owlets have grown so much they are about the size of their parents. How I tell them apart is by their still fluffy down. Here’s Owlie 1:

He likes to try out his new wings:

Oops, caught in the branches. Flapping and struggling to get untangled:

And Mama’s reaction to all the fluttering? Totally unruffled. She’s too busy posing for me:

Here’s the more quiet Owlie 2:

And where’s Papa? As always, watching from a distance on another tree, calm and cool. Here he is, hooting away. That’s the first time I actually hear an Owl hoot, rhythmic calls, music for Mama and kids, and me:

Who teaches their young to fly and land safely? Don’t look at Mama or Papa, they don’t lift a finger:

Who teaches them to play nice, and hug each other? That too, is instinct.

Ok, for Mothers Day, let’s have a photo. I’ll entitle this one “Moonrise Haven”, with thanks to Wes Anderson:

Ah… Natural parenting, so simple, almost effortless.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS, 2014.

DO NOT COPY OR REBLOG

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Previous Posts on the Owl Family (In Chronological Order):

The Great Horned Owl (March 2013)

Sign of Spring: Nesting (April 2013)

Spring Babies and Parenting Styles (May 2013)

The Hustle and Bustle of Spring (April 2014)

Within the Budding Grove (April 2014)

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Saturday Snapshot April 26: Within a Budding Grove

I just can’t resist. Having seen life bursting out in the spring forest, I’ve an urge to borrow Proust’s title here. But unlike Proust’s magnificent work, within the budding grove where I go birding, everything is stark literal, direct and visceral. No need for metaphors. Alive, chirping, calling, even confronting…

Robins stay here in the winter, but they keep quiet and hidden. Good to see energy recharged:

Or simply posturing. Here’s one Angry Bird:

In contrast, the Cedar Waxwings are more elegant, embracing the sun with poise and panache:

And there are other beautiful creatures with wings, in much simpler form but no less elegant:

The woods are lovely, but the main draw is the Owl Family. Again, another sighting of Papa amidst the budding grove, silently keeping watch…

over this trunk from a short distance, so not to draw attention to the nest I suppose:

Can you see them?

Here they are … a closer look. Two Owlets born shortly before Easter. Mom is in there, probably taking a much needed nap. This is a different pose from the one I posted on Easter Sunday:

What does this make you think of? For me… Mt Rushmore.

Within a budding grove, surprises abound.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS

DO NOT COPY OR REBLOG

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When Easter is the Spring

Quickening

Dead trees draw life
when the days expand and the sun
fulfills its promise, oft delayed
by the clutch of ice.

Clotted, gnarled, knotted twigs
on the trees sense sap and the death
of death. They stretch, begin
to puff green on the end.

We sing new songs
of a Life laid down for rebirth
when Easter is the Spring
and the branch is Christ.

— Mark A. Noll

Every new birth is a miracle. I saw two yesterday:

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And To All, A Happy Easter!

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