An old burn barrel in my backyard - a standard 45 gallon drum, the kind you see everywhere. I mention this to establish scale; it isn't an old soup can.

One week into spring, winter continues. -25°C last night and a dusting of snow. A couple cm of snow the night before. Icicles hang from my eavestroughs. It is pleasant enough during the days that the "gophers', ie. ground squirrels, are all out and about, and that means the migrating hawks and eagles have a food source, but I wonder how disruptive this unseasonable weather will be for passerines - birds that depend on insects or seeds. This is a hint that I will be posting some new wildlife shots, starting in two or three days.

Today, all I have to offer is a barrel. It belongs in my broad category, Photography Of Ordinary Things, or What To Do Around The House When You're Snowed In. It's a way of staying sharp and keeping the creative juices flowing so that when a great photo comes along, you won't miss a beat. Meanwhile, there is a certain satisfaction that comes from making something out of... almost nothing.

Photographed in Val Marie, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2023 James R. Page - all rights reserved.

Tags:   burn barrel 45 gallon drum metal rust rusty snow snowy snowed in snowed under late winter March too much snow ordinary things staying sharp challenge pano crop panorama backyard wintry cold simplicity white something from nothing prairie Val Marie SK Saskatchewan Canada copyrighted James R. Page 2023

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I'll end the current small set of square shots with an exterior view of one of our local grain elevators. And of course there is a story behind it...

Winter can be a challenge, even for the experienced. I had my car checked out last fall, including the battery. "It's fine," the mechanic reported. It wasn't fine, and I'll have a new mechanic next time around. When my battery died in the extreme cold snap of late December, I pulled it, brought it inside to warm up, and used a slow charger to infuse some temporary life into it. That wasn't so difficult. But it left me marooned for a few days in a tiny prairie village in the middle of nowhere, ie. where I live.

And one afternoon the light was fantastic: rich and warm despite the air temperature, which was well below zero. I grabbed my camera and a lens, and went for a walk. Shooting this and that, I wasn't inspired and wasn't getting anything worthwhile, so I invented a new rule: every ten steps I had to stop and shoot at least one photo.

I hated myself for that, but I had to smile. It was an imposition that forced me to look long and hard at my surroundings. As I circled the elevator, this was one of the shots I made. Not bad. I enjoy coyotes or pronghorn or macro shots of ice - or anything from the natural world - more, but as an exercise I think this accomplished its goal. At the very least it kept the visual engine chugging away instead of going dormant. "Creative muscles" need to be flexed, whether they belong to a pianist practicing scales, a dancer stretching, or a photographer looking at the light.

Photographed in Val Marie, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2021 James R. Page - all rights reserved.

Tags:   building grain elevator square winter light abstract abstraction siding light shadow warm cool red blue colour contrast color contrast exercise learning to see structure photography of ordinary things Val Marie Saskatchewan Canada copyrighted James R. Page

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Today I'm starting a new set: square crop, random material, and - here's the key - spontaneous. None of these were planned. They all emerged from unpromising situations, and there is a story behind each of them. Of course there is!

The image "Scrap Yard" was a case of making something out of nothing. My car was in the shop for new tires and maintenance. They were not organized - the needed parts and the tires were in a warehouse across town - and they told me it would be "a while". This turned out to be hours, and because they wasted most of my day, they will never see me again.

But the time wasn't a total waste. I had my camera, and a brand new Nikon 500mm f/5.6 lens - just that one lens, as I usually bring it along on trips to town for random wildlife sightings (which are frequent because I live in an isolated location). Okay. A walkabout. One lens, and a long telephoto at that; this would be challenging.

I was in the industrial wasteland of Swift Current - every city this size has one. Not pretty, not charming, but necessary. There were scrap yards, recycling yards, sorting yards, piles of junk behind dilapidated fences, and I wished for a wide angle view. 500mm is awfully long. Snippets and slices of the scene were the only possibility. DOF was appallingly shallow. And this is not really the stuff I enjoy photographing. I had to go into full abstract mode, change my thinking, forget about subject matter, just look at shapes, textures, lines, colours. From the first hour... nothing... but then my seeing improved, and I ended up with two or three shots that I like. A good exercise. And a great lens, although I would not recommend it for scrap yard photography under most circumstances...

Photographed in Swift Current, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2021 James R. Page - all rights reserved.

Tags:   scrap junk abstract abstraction square industrial debris disposal urban city pipe metal red blue yellow testing, testing new lens Nikon 500mm exercise imagination something from nothing Swift Current SK Saskatchewan Canada copyrighted James R. Page

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