Various photographs from this spring!
Author Archives: natemetz
BLOOMS
I put off editing these photographs for several months because I wasn’t sure what direction to go in the post processing. I prefer to do very minimal cropping and lighting adjustments with some sharpening in the export. But, these flowers just didn’t have the right impact following my usual PP flow. I like the gloomy lighting of such a vibrant white flower, but out of the camera it lacked some shine. In Photoshop I was able to rescue these images with a black and white conversion. Instead of forcing a color image, I decided to follow the image and go monochromatic and BLOOM!
BEACH Greeting Cards
Since taking these photographs, I’ve been thinking about printing them on card stock for greeting cards. Living at the beach, it can be a challenge to have beach inspired (or even themed) products to sell that are not super literal: sea shells, umbrellas, flip flops, surf boards, sand castles, etc. When I came across this old wood, it felt beachy to me and the color blocking was already in place.
What do you think? Would you purchase a box set of blank greeting cards with 2 per image?
Towers Beach
A great local spot for sunsets is Towers Beach in Rehoboth. The parking lot opens up on a small strip of beach on the Rehoboth Bay that offers a large enough expanse that the sun almost sets over water. So many of my great sunset photographs were captured while living in Brooklyn in an apartment building that compensated for the cityscape and I could capture the setting sun on the horizon and not get blocked by many buildings. The flatness of sea level also really helps on the eastern shore! I’m glad to have found somewhere unobstructed that I can watch a good hour of changing light in the skies. It sure beats any hour of evening television.
© 2013 NATE METZ
In hindsight…
I don’t often post archive photos, but I thought it would be nice to share some of my favorite images of the holidays.
Hustle and Bustle © 2003 NATE METZ
A long shutter on the tree.
Snowy Woods © 2003 NATE METZ
When I got my first digital camera for Christmas in 2002, we got snow by January that I was able to capture these woods behind the house.
Red Valentino © 2004 NATE METZ
These red flowers on a Valentino gown in a Parisian window remind me of poinsettias.
December White Lilies © 2006 NATE METZ
Sometimes tropical flowers break up the winter blues!
The Center of my World in © 2007 NATE METZ
Manhattan by plane one winter night.
Snowy Pines with Blue © 2009
With my second digital camera, I had learned a few more skills and handled the WB better still.
Snowy Hollies © 2003
The state tree in a very uncharacteristic state.
RED X marks the holiday SPIRIT
Go search the skies, the landscapes, our inner minds for the markings and indications of something meaningful, answers, life and you shall be making a trek. Lifelong perhaps? You can be a wise man and you may also enjoy a nap in a manager surrounded by animals. I like to enjoy frankincense, myrrh, and gold myself!
But as we draw near the winter solstice, I want to share what the holiday means to me. It is the Christmas season, and that is the name of the national holiday that businesses close for whether you celebrate the Christian holiday or not. Christmas is about the winter solstice: the longest period of darkness (night) in the year. And on the next day, the promise of LIGHT returns and days become longer again. The holiday symbolically represents the return of life when the seasonal tides shift gears in the upswing yet again. It is about renewed hope and honoring the continuing cycle of life.
The color red is the color of the root charka. Red symbolizes life, vitality, strength and the physical plane. It also represents heat and fire. Our spiritual evolution (of the current earth walk) begins at the root charka when we are in utero. It is also the base of kundalini energy later if we develop spiritually in that way. It can be a very vibrant energy and certainly placed around us in the holiday season it is meant to counteract the cold winter, the long nights when mother nature lay dormant.
But where are my presents? Abstaining from gift-giving as a moral superiority and anti-capitalistic/anti-materialistic high road is laughable at best. Giving a gift, no matter how small, is the only way to receive. It is the law of attraction at it’s best. Give love, prosperity, hope, joy, and any multitude of blessings this holiday season. If that package comes in the form of a new coat, gadget, or otherwise, that’s fantastic! It is always best to give freely with the best of intentions. And this holiday season when nature gifts us with the return of more light, we too can give. Anyone speaking to the contrary has missed the reason for the season.
My take on the holiday is more abstract: red and crosses.
RED X © 2013 NATE METZ
SQUARES
If you’ve been following my blog, then you know I love catching life reflections and refractions on the wall. Then, watch them slide around, go out of focus, and disappear.
Here are some squares in the corner:
SQUARES © 2013 NATE METZ
The really fun part about these photographs is the rainbow of color across the images that came from the light refracting through glass. The original, out of camera file looked like white on beige almost. I always double check the white balance as one of my first steps in post processing. Doing so unlocked all the color present in the white light. I know it’s basic science of white light containing all the colors, but nifty none the less!
Here is the original photo for comparison:
End of the year POST UP
I opted out of doing any end of the year, top number, favorite and most memorable posts last year this time into the new year. After 7 months at that point, it didn’t jive with the blog and the work I had done. So, that means I’ll be doing a reflection post this year where I recap my blog, the best moments in my work over the past year expressing gratitude and reliving the highs and lows–NOT.
I have traveled into a desert of photography and according to my iCloud photo stream, I haven’t been on a walkabout for picture-taking since October! Details of my personal life do give some indication where the time and energy has been redirected. It’s all good things happening and part of my bigger quest to live a balanced and diversely rich lifestyle that incorporates my many interests.
Most recently, I learned crochet and last weekend I worked on this basket for my quartz crystals:
Now that we’ve traversed well around on a brief tangent, I’m going to tell you what that means for the photoblog! Many of you are aware of spring cleaning when we open the windows, shake the rugs, clear out the old and make room for newness. Otherwise, known as spring. Many of you are also aware of the American holiday, Thanksgiving when we make long lists of gratitude for our blessed lives. On my earth walk, though, now is the time I’m feeling the need to purge and unload. Almost in the dead of winter, I feel compelled to make room. When my intuition and inspiration speak to me so clearly I am much obliged to ignore social and cultural norms and follow my bliss because I know that’s what I must do for success, happiness, and prosperity.
Typically I keep a long running folder of photographs and then I slowly pick through them as I make blog posts. As I use photos and select options, I file them in a more long term folder. My system still has photographs from January 2013 that have yet to be sorted and posted. That is not to say that I don’t like the work or that it is technically inferior in any way. It is very important that you understand these photographs are not leftovers!
The next series of posts will be a blast of photographs: an end of the year POST UP. Enjoy!
Damn Good Advice: FIFTEEN
There is something honorable and humble about recognizing the origin of creativity as separate from the ego and conscious thoughts. I am surprised that Lois was able to draw this conclusion after so subtly establishing his own expertise in advertising. Most creative geniuses are masters of craft and worship their own greatness. The Great Idea does indeed exist independently of our 3D world and we are able to tap into the creative realms, channel the ideas, use our minds and hands to mold them into tangibles, and make art. It is quite mythical, yes, Lois, and magical I’d even say.
I also support the notion that creative people are more in touch with reality and are able to generate dialogues about any given subject. We are also more in tune with ourselves– our minds, hearts, and souls. We are a step ahead, prompting you to discuss and ponder. Great artists have a voice to guide a viewer through our work. Our function ahead of the curve is merely that, to show a way through and by. Art must be viewed. It is a spiritual experience to view art because it connects people, ideas, places, and more art to become something meta and great.
Creative Channel © 2013 NATE METZ
I am blessed and grateful for how I see and capture the world in photographs. I capture beauty in both pedestrian and worldly abstract botanicals and street life. It is with a great spirit of discovery that I share my camera lens with all of you. I spoke of it during my gallery talk at the Summer Streets opening reception. It is very rewarding to go on a walkabout with my camera, see beauty everywhere I go, and capture the fleeting moments of changing light and reflections. It is spiritually nourishing to know whatever I do capture will make beautiful photographs unexpected and enchanting.
My abstract and minimalist work is often retorted with the low blow that “I could do that…” But, you don’t and you haven’t. That’s the intrinsic value in my work. It’s what you pay for: the guide, the artist, a channel and medium to creativity that shows you the beautiful things that you don’t stop to ponder and enjoy. I show you just how much beauty surrounds us that you were previously too busy to enjoy. So pick up a copy of my book, browse my galleries, like me on Facebook and continue to immerse yourself in my findings. I love to show you what I see, how I see it, when I see it, begging you to ask why you see it. My creative abilities are a gift for us all and part of the spiritual chain that links us together in this blessed life.
Creative Channel © 2013 NATE METZ
PAIRINGS
The Rehoboth Art League is running a monthly series of pairings where members are invited to submit recent work to be displayed in the gallery with works from the collection. When I first heard about it, I glanced through the works and found nothing inspiring. About a week ago, I got an e-mail reminder saying that they were still taking applications for December, so I took another gander. This time two of the works stood out.
So, then I went through my framed work from the past 2 years and opened .jpgs on my computer along with the two images from the collection–about 12 total images on screen. I left it open for a couple hours while I worked on some crochet projects and paperwork. One by one I dropped out images and enlarged the remaining ones until I had my final selection.
Here is my proposal:
Corner Market and David © Ethel P. B. Leach – Oil on masonite
Parking for Candy Only 1 © 2012 NATE METZ – digital photograph
These two works come together as depictions of street life, titled appropriately to indicate the urban setting. However, it is their perspectives of the city that differ the greatest. Leach’s perspective is scenic of a corner at an intersection. Metz on the other hand is a macro work of still life. Although both highlight a study in forms where multiple rounded organic shapes in the foreground contrast against strikingly sharp, linear angles and planes in the backgrounds.
The tones differ as well. The feel of Leach’s painting is decidedly warm and friendly with subdued earthy tones and a brown-colored street. Metz’s photograph depicts a much starker street in the black and grey tonal blacktop aggregate. Metz’s street also has a much higher contrast in color with the bright candy floating across the surface to further differentiate the tonal variance.
The differences in feeling originate with the medium: Metz’s more modern work is a digital photograph and Leach captures a nostalgic moment in the traditional oil painting. The cooler emotional response to Parking for Candy Only could also be to the lack of human and canine pedestrians that are present on Corner Market and David.
Coming back to the perspectives of each, we can explore the points of view. In Leach, the reflections on the windows and the streets allow the viewer to examine different parts of the work. Also, the direction of each person’s face and canine gait allows us to ponder the various perspectives of the piece. Metz’s digital photographs, though, require three different frames to explore the various angles of the subjects. Each photograph allows the viewer to ponder a different perspective.