Today's photos:
This was one of those days when I was so into the walk, I spent more time on the trail than I had intended. Those who are familiar with Friedrich Park will know that the set of trails I covered today are more than a bit physically demanding.
Those who know me, know I'm not one to pass up a good challenge. In case anyone is wondering, I am very experienced on hill country trails and have good upper body strength, so as long as I can get a firm footing under the forearm crutches, I can manage the terrain. The biggest challenge is the gravel they put down to mark the trail and limit erosion. It has a tendency to roll out from under a crutch tip about the time I put my full weight on it.
I hope today's photos show that the relatively difficult level of the trail (ADA level 4) was worth the effort. The Fern Del Trail may be beyond my limit from what I have read about it, but I will at least give it a try next week.
I have done black and white film based photography ever since I was given my first camera over fifty years ago. I have also done color photography, but black and white will always be my first love. Unfortunately, since switching to digital about five years ago, I have done very little greyscale.
There is a different mental process for digital versus film that I think favors color technique. There is also a different visual process when taking photos for color versus black and white. I have done assignments where I have been shooting in both black and white and in color film, switching from one camera to the other, but I have never been quite satisfied with the results on those occasions.
The emphasis in color photography is on the psychology of color. A photograph that is predominantly bright primary colors will not only have a different look than one with pastels or earth tones, it will have a different feeling for the viewer and a different interpretation.
On the other hand, a black and white photograph is a higher level of abstraction than a color photo. In black and white the emphasis is on shape, line, form, texture, lighting; the basic visual elements of the black and white photograph.
Some subjects are better suited to color because the color provides a fundamental and necessary component of the interpretation. Other subjects lend themselves to black and white because the color is either secondary to the interpretation, or in many cases, distracts from the desired interpretation.
All but two of the photos I have posted on this blog thus far have been color. Following are a series of photos I took in the San Antonio River headwaters woods in Olmos Basin in 2004. They were originally taken on film and later scanned to digital. Notice how texture and line predominate in these images, elements that may have been visually suppressed and gone unnoticed if they had been color images:
Today's photos:
Friedrich Park is the premiere wilderness park in San Antonio. The Hill Country land was donated to the City to be used specifically for the preservation of native species. The regulations for use of the park are the strictest of any in the San Antonio Parks and Recreation system and are rigorously enforced.
Today's photos are intended to be a visual metaphor of the experience of the walk along the trails as one walks along under the beautiful, dense tree canopy and past the exposed hill country limestone.
Sunday morning I began taking photos to use on the two blog pages I am creating specifically about the San Antonio River trailheads and the river channel restoration process. I was concentrating on wider angle photos, but could not pass up the opportunity to get a few more photos of the river's wildlife.
So, here are a few more photos from the Mission Reach:
