Creek – Page 4 – Decaseconds

Double feature: Frozen Stream

2012-Nov-29 emceehammrLeave a comment

On the same European adventure to the alpine village of Obergurgl in Tyrol, Austria, I was out for a walk when I captured this shot of a creek running near the village in the process of freezing over. The ice is interesting to look at but the semi-abandoned outbuilding on the bank. It doesn’t appear to be in active service, as evidenced by the partially ajar door, nor is there an obvious way to get down to the entrance, though perhaps without the snow and ice there’s path down the cliff face or maybe even some sort of connection to a cave in the cliff. One can only guess at what function this building does or once did serve.

An Atavistic Collection

2012-Nov-052012-Nov-07 adohertyhLeave a comment

This weekend, I finally conquered a serious challenge: organizing my ancient photo collection. As I went through it, I found some photographs from almost a decade ago. Unfortunately, they weren’t taken with a DSLR, but I’m presenting them here as a taste of compositions, colors, and places that aren’t otherwise found on Decaseconds that frequently. With no further ado:

This is the creek, behind my childhood home, where I spent countless hours building castles, bridges, and walls from sticks and stones. The water comes from the top of nearby Mt. Riga, and is icy cold through most of the year. Somehow, we still managed to handle swimming in it during the summer.

This picture shows the Long Walk of Trinity College in Hartford, CT. This is the oldest part of the school, built when the campus moved to its current location in 1863. This particular day at the end of November was the first snow of the year. Everyone is just a bit surprised, the leaves are still on the trees, and the snow seems wetter than at any other time.

This photograph was taken at the top of Mt. Monadnock in New Hampshire. Though the top of the mountain is barren but for a few shrubs, it turns out that this isn’t because of being above the tree line. Over the course of centuries, the mountain was repeatedly burned, both to make room for livestock and because wolves were living in its caves. Now, just a handful of berry bushes and grasses crust the smooth, ancient stone of the mountain. Some have called it, “the Most Hiked Mountain in America.”

Finally, I have a picture from Key West, Florida. The sunsets and the enormous thunderheads there make for some lovely pictures, but my favorite detail is at the horizon: the poles supporting power lines, alone in the water, bringing electricity from key to key.

Rain and Roots

2012-Sep-262012-Sep-20 adohertyhLeave a comment

Little pockets of calm exist all over Berkeley’s hustling campus, but Strawberry Creek on a rainy day is a particularly superlative example. The leaves and water take on this lovely green that perfectly offsets the red needles from the Redwoods above. Against this palette, the textures of the mud and roots are all the more striking.

Sunset by the Banks

2012-Sep-212014-May-12 adohertyh2 Comments

Walking through the forest with family on Christmas day always has a special crispness to it. The roads are deserted, the days are short, the trees are bare. If the weather is chilly, the whole experienced is sharpened with red noses and warm drinks afterwards. That was the experience on the day I took this photograph.

Kami’s Rock

2012-Sep-102012-Sep-09 adohertyh1 Comment

An enormous, moss-covered stone mediates the meeting between pathway and stream, deep within the Nitobe Memorial Gardens at the University of British Columbia. Though the calm pond and the massive entrance have given a broader idea of the Gardens’ feel, I really like the calmer, more compact corners. These little areas seem like the perfect place for a kami to live.

House on the creek

2012-Jun-192012-Jun-19 emceehammrLeave a comment

North Berkeley has some of the most picturesque homes in all of Berkeley, like this one perched above one of the many creeks criss-crossing Berkeley. Like this one they are rarely as fancy or as large as the homes you find up in the hills but somehow they seem more like they’re actually someone’s home.

Learned Trees

2012-Jun-15 adohertyhLeave a comment

Today’s shot is one of my earlier attempts at HDR; I really like the composition of dark, absolute trees against the dappled sunlight, but with the benefit of time… Well, there are a variety of changes I’d have made in both the shot I took and the post-processing that followed. Reflecting on my past can be quite the learning experience–I’d like to think I’m more critical of my own work than anyone else’s.

Almost Like Summer Camp

2012-May-28 adohertyhLeave a comment

There’s something about a (relatively) simple wooden bridge over a wee creek that shouts, “SUMMER!” Given that today is the “unofficial first day of summer” (pools open today in much of the country, etc.), it seemed appropriate to feature something so summer-centric.

Antique Creek

2012-Apr-03 adohertyh1 Comment

The environment changes so completely when it rains that I can’t help but run out with my camera in the moments between storms. Today’s photograph is another from UC Berkeley’s Strawberry Creek on a particularly drizzly day. The contrast between nature and the manicured stone walls works out quite nicely when everything is wet and glistening.

Ingrained

2012-Mar-31 adohertyhLeave a comment

This little stream was running by the trail not far from where Brendan took yesterday’s photo. At first, I felt distressed to see that tires had been dumped into the stream, but further inspection made it obvious that they’d been washed there in heavy rain years ago. There was a certain relief in seeing them encrusted in moss and being (at least partially) reclaimed.

The contrast between the blacks/greys of the tires/rocks and the array of greens in the moss, ferns, and trees worked out really nicely for highlighting the contrast between the “static” parts of the image and the encroaching life.

Tunnel

2012-Mar-022012-Feb-28 emceehammrLeave a comment

Not all of Berkeley’s water ways are quite so picturesque as my previous post. I think this picture really captures the essence of Berkeley: a mixture of urban and natural elements. The contrast of the graffiti and cement tunnel with the overgrown ivy and the creek, just outside the Berkeley Faculty club, really sums this up.

Shimmering Creek

2012-Feb-292012-Feb-28 emceehammrLeave a comment

There are some truly spectacular spots on UC Berkeley’s campus including this spot just outside Stephens hall, a quiet place beside a babbling brook to escape from all of the undergrads shuffling between classes. I took this shot around sun down and captured this shot which makes it look like the creek is on fire.

Sunset Creek Grass

2011-Dec-272013-Jun-12 adohertyh3 Comments

On Christmas day, I had a chance to walk through a forest preserve outside Chicago. The sun was setting as I stopped by the side of this creek, and I loved the way it lit up the stalks.

It’s also refreshing to have proper clouds in my photographs; there are so few well-defined clouds in California that the sky can look a bit boring. That’s rarely the case in the midwest.

Strawberry Creek

2011-Dec-212011-Dec-30 emceehammr1 Comment

Getting any sort of reasonable image of Strawberry Creek has been difficult recently with the recent environmental calamity, but even with all of the activity, pontoons and petrochemicals it was still possible to capture this long-ish exposure image of one of the forks of the creek as it runs through UC’s campus.