Fire Rings

December 4, 2021

Over the past 13 or so years I’ve had a mild fixation on fire rings. I’ve always been drawn to the way humans interact with and alter their environment, be it for survival (benevolent, maybe necessary, and well-intentioned regardless of location, or heeding Leave No Trace principles), recreation (may or may not be benevolent, most likely unnecessary, may or may not adhere to Leave No Trace principles), or vandalism (malicious, and wholly unnecessary), and fire rings are features in the landscape that can fit any of the three categories. I’ve mainly gravitated to those fire rings that are on public lands in dispersed camping designated areas, as opposed to those in campgrounds run either by the State or a private campground, I think really because they highlight some inner, or perhaps ancient or primal need, desire, or instinct we have for fire.

I don’t know if all of these photographs will end up as anything; sometimes it feels like it’s a bit of a one-trick pony: if you’ve seen one fire pit you’ve seen them all. But also, I’ve sometimes been surprised, and even a little dumfounded by where people have decided to make a fire. And, in the era of Covid, and having passed through two summers of increased use of our public lands, I’ve been disgusted and appalled by what and how much people have left behind in fire pits, either charred or even melted remnants of the fire there, or whole bags of unburned garbage. And in all of that, I feel like a whole body of work could materialize; I just need to spend some time looking at all the images I’ve made, and make even more. But for now, enjoy a few of my favorites I’ve made over the years.

Twin Falls, Day 2

April 22, 2019

I’ve been to all of these places before and photographed them all, but in many ways, though these places are familiar, it feels like I’m coming to these places for the first time (sorry if you’ve now got Foreigner stuck in your head). It’s been good to reacquaint myself with a landscape I fell in love with years ago.

I started the day by heading out to Thousand Springs, and got there before the sun rose and the moon set.

Moonset Over Thousand Springs, Idaho 2019

On my way back to town I spotted a couple Magpies building a nest in a tree. Magpies aren’t my favorite bird, but it was interesting to watch them build a new nest.

We spent some time at Niagara Springs where Tommy ran and jumped off all those rocks (pictures of that are coming soon). I made some photographs I quite like.

Picnic Area and Firepit, Niagara Springs State Park, Idaho 2019

We ended up going to a few other parks with playgrounds throughout the day so Tommy could play. I ended up photographing in parks more than I did at the places that drew me to this part of Idaho. I’m not complaining, mind you. I learned things about my creative process by visiting a variety of different places where the creative objectives are different.

We finished out the day with a quick visit to Twin Falls Hydroelectric Project. This now singular waterfall and its dammed twin comprise the two waterfalls for which the city of Twin Falls gets its name.

Fire Pit, Hyrum

August 29, 2018

Hyrum Reservoir

July 13, 2018

I’ve lived in Cache Valley for 10 years now, and I’ve never made an effort to go photograph Hyrum Reservoir. Until tonight. I feel like I’ve got a lot of images that have a lot of potential.

Here’s one I’m much more pleased with than I thought I’d be:

It was one of the last photographs I made of the evening, and I just happened to glance over as I walked past on my way back to my car.

SPE Southwest/West Tahoe CoLab

November 30, 2017

Back in college, I attended the National Society for Photographic Education conference in Newport, Rhode Island. I don't remember much about it, except that Frank Gohlke, one of my favorite photographers, was the Keynote Speaker, and that the portfolio reviews helped me grow a lot.

I have since attended a few other National and Regional (now Chapter) conferences, but until this last Chapter conference in Tahoe City, it had been 9 years since the National one in Denver since I had been to a conference. Even though I'm not in Academia at all, I started wanting to go to a conference last year. The National conference this year was in Orlando, and it would have been too expensive for me to go out, but I decided to just plan on going to the Chapter conference, wherever it was going to be held in the Fall. Once the details were announced for the Southwest Chapter and registration opened up several months before the conference was to be held, I was quick to register.

At that moment, it seemed like the dates for the conference were so far off. But the day finally came, and we three loaded up the car—well, Gina and I did; Tommy didn't do anything to help pack the car, the little freeloader—and headed out West. We planned on going as far as Elko, Nevada, which is about half way between Logan and Tahoe, to give our little guy a break from his car seat, since he doesn't like being contained for long periods of time (read: periods longer than 15 minutes). But, to his credit, he actually travelled really well both on the trip out and the return trip.

After a night of terrible sleep for all three of us in a Casino Hotel, due to the cigarette smoke that had permeated throughout the entire building, we hit the road again. We made a couple of pit stops, one of them at a rest stop in western-ish Nevada, where Tommy got to crawl and play in (and eat) the gravel:

Tommy playing in the gravel at a rest stop

We finally arrived at the Granlibakken Resort at around 3 on Friday. We checked in to our room and got settled in a bit, and then I went and made a few photographs of the Truckee River, and Lake Tahoe before the conference got underway.

William B. Layton Park, Lake Tahoe, California 2017

Harrell Fletcher was the main speaker at the conference, and he gave a great speech, covering all of the collaborative work that he's done throughout his career.

Saturday morning was full of short presentations by a number of artists, including one by a friend, Bryon Darby, who presented his New Farmers project, a collaborative body of work on contemporary farmers in Kansas.

That afternoon Gina, Tommy and I went out and played tourist, and I took advantage of the nice light and made a few photographs.

Commons Beach, Lake Tahoe, California 2017

As all the attendees were gathering together for dinner on Saturday evening, Gina, Tommy and I ran into Robert Dawson, one of my favorite photographers, and Ellen Manchester, Robert's wife, one of the photographers of the Rephotographic Survey. They invited us to sit with them, and I was a little giddy to sit with two photographers who have had such great influence on my work. We had a wonderful conversation, mostly about parenthood, and the joys of watching children grow and develop. Robert and Ellen have been working on a project involving children's education in Stockton, California, and another project on libraries around the U.S., and has expanded to libraries in Europe. They're both fantastic bodies of work.

Robert was the Honored Educator for the West Chapter, and he gave a wonderful presentation chronicling his many books he's published, as well as his latest work that he is doing, some of which is a collaboration with Ellen.

Being at the conference felt a lot rather like coming home, like I was with "my people." It felt so good to be amongst so many other passionate artists, and I'm looking forward to my next conference!

Work In Progress

June 29, 2016

I've been out quite a bit in the last month gathering photographs for these photo-mosaics I've gotten into making, and thought I'd share a few of the pieces I'm working on.

This first one has images made on three or four different occasions—once in the evening and twice in the morning just before and after sunrise.

Upper Bear River Recreation Area Parking Lot and Boat Launch

This next one has images made on five or six different occasions, at dusk, and at dawn and late afternoon.

This last one has photographs made on two different occasions, once at sunrise, and the other at sunset.

It's been a lot of fun conceptualizing, composing and then piecing together all the photographs that make up the larger piece. It's real time-consuming, both in the making of the photographs, and in the editing and arranging. I've got several hours already put into each of these photographs, and they're not even close to being something I'd say is a finished piece of artwork.

In a way, I feel as though I'm rebelling against the style I've worked in in the past 13 to 15 years, and it feels good to break from my "norm."

Motion

June 24, 2016

Four images of a wheat field while the sun sets with the camera panning in motion with a long exposure.

#challengeonnaturephotography

March 10, 2016

Last week, my friend and former photography professor, Darren Clark, nominated me to participate in a Facebook hashtag "campaign," #challengeonnaturephotography, where, for seven days, you post a nature or landscape photograph with that hashtag, and then nominate someone else to participate. As I've done so, I've had the opportunity to think back on my college education, and what I've been doing with myself photographically since then. Here are some lessons learned and thoughts I've had, in no particular order, over the past seven days (all the images I shared on Facebook are included at the end of this post):

I've lost the ability to really speak about photography as art. Not completely, but I've lost a lot of that ability. I want it back.
I need to come up with a new photographic project. Or two. Or five. No matter the quantity, I just need something to to keep me motivated. I guess setting some deadlines might help too.
When I decided not to pursue an M.F.A. after all, I lost focus (no pun intended) and motivation to just create art. I still photographed when I went on trips and went backpacking (sometimes), but I devolved into making photographs that were little more than just "pretty pictures of pretty places." They were, to me, a little empty. Not completely, because I never really photographed anything at any point in my photographic education or life afterwards that I didn't feel some emotional connection to, and felt a desire to express that connection through the photograph. But that's where any profundity in my photographs made in the last four or five years stops. Without an overarching purpose (see the previous point) behind my photographs, I feel there isn't lasting impact.
Since I did lose focus and motivation to create, I've felt like I'd turned my back on my education, and the friends that I made along the way. I felt like I betrayed them in some way. Within the last three or four weeks, I've felt the need to fix all of that. Participating in this hashtag thing has helped to light the fire of motivation.
I went out with Gina Saturday evening west of Logan specifically to photograph. In the long run, I'm not sure how successful the photographs all are, but getting out helped get the creative juices flowing again. And the outing revealed how out of practice I am with working a camera: I forgot to focus the lens on the first photograph I made!
Along with the loss of the ability to talk about my work, my eyes have lost some refinement in composing, and attention to areas of the photograph that need work (dodging, or burning, or overall color balance, or contrast). I also want that back. Probably more than the ability to talk.
I need to work on consistency—consistency in color balance, contrast in both black and white and color photographs—which I think has always been a problem for me.
I've always echoed the sentiment of Elliott Erwitt who said "The whole point of taking pictures is so you don't have to explain things in words." Early in my photographic education I felt in agreement with the statement that the more one felt they had to say about their art, the least successful it was. Now, I don't agree. I believe there is always some room to talk about the art one creates. Maybe a better way of thinking is that the image should be strong enough to stand on its own, and not require an explanation. Maybe that has been Erwitt's point all along, and I've just missed it...

Anyway, on with the images.

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

Boat Launch, Bear River, Benson, Utah, 2016 — Boat Launch, Bear River, Benson, Utah, 2016

Day 4:

Day 5:

Rye Crisp, Elephant Rock, City of Rocks, Idaho, 2010

Day 6:

Scott and Jon Photographing Thousand Springs, Idaho, 2004

Day 7:

Pond, Footpath, Memorial Park, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2007

departures

Once started as a blog to document my explorations and "departures" from my normal photographic stylings and wanderings, "Departures" now documents my explorations in the world I live in. No longer is "Departures" only about photographic and artistic endeavors, but about adventure, investigation, and even from time to time philosophic ramblings of a restless mind.

Latest

Featured

Oct 20, 2023

Restored Passion

Oct 20, 2023

Feb 25, 2023

What I’m listening to—Podcast edition, Vol. 1

Feb 25, 2023

Mar 4, 2022

Dream features

Mar 4, 2022

Dec 11, 2021

Tommy, The Photographer

Dec 11, 2021

Dec 4, 2021

Fire Rings

Dec 4, 2021

Departures Blog