Gettng The Lens Close

I hung out with two other view camera photographers in the 80's, sharing many photo days together, each having our own view of the surroundings for pointing a lens. I tended to look for trees and rocks and water, old cabins or junk abandoned cars. Sometmes though I would get closer to the micro world when the light would make one object or another light up magically. Ed Vliek mastered shooting in very highly contrasty light, using it to create shapes in the sand dunes of Florence, Oregon. The shapes of the sand drifts in high contrast on bromide paper created wonderful abstract shapes.

One of the things that hindered my desire for getting in close to objects was because I only had cheap lenses for the view camera, soft lenses, which, at the time, made them less desirable as subjects. This leaf was one such object that caught my eye one fall. We had a female Maple tree in our front yard, where my two kids used as their adventure tree. One of the leaves had fallen and blown up to thef front porch, where it seemed appropriate for capturing an image. At the time I was using a Century Graflex 6cmx9cm view camera. Very nice camera. It captured this image.

Negative; Ilford HP-5 (rated 160) Developed; Pyro/Hydroxide

"Winter Leaf" Soon to be Palladium print