It’s all lines and light.
That’s what I see. Curved lines, straight lines. Diagonal, vertical, horizontal. How best to frame the lines? That’s the only question I have to answer.
And then there’s the light. Light highlights lines, creates shapes or forms. Soft light, hard light.
It’s all lines and light.
I can’t tell you how many times this mantra has popped into my head this month. It started in Singapore, the whisper about lines and light. And almost every time I pick up a camera to take an image since then that’s all I think, all I see. The lines and the light.
Maybe it’s because it’s been a crazy month. Away more than home. No time to stop and think, no time to breathe. Instead of deep contemplation, I experience the world. I do. I photograph.
And I boil it down to the essentials: lines and light. That’s all we really have to work with.
This is an interesting Photo-Heart Connection for me this month. I literally could have chosen almost any photograph I’ve taken, because this mantra was in my head for most of them. Getting home from our Spring Break trip to the California Redwoods yesterday afternoon, I didn’t even know how to begin approaching the Photo-Heart Connection for March. I have been working my way through piles of laundry, trying to transfer photographs, and getting ready for a very busy week following a very busy month. But this morning, I woke up with my “It’s all lines and light” mantra in my head and I knew that was it. My Photo-Heart Connection this month is about cutting it down to the essentials. In my photographs, in my life. That’s what has to happen sometimes. Sometimes there are periods of intense doing to feed the thinking that will come later. Right now I’m focused on lines and light. I’ll look back and pull the meaning out of that later, when I’m not so busy. I always do.
This month’s photograph, by the way, is from the Botanic Gardens in Singapore. From the Orchid Gardens, actually. I was more interested in the fantastic lines and light in these leaves than the unique, colorful flowers blooming everywhere.
How about you? Where have you found your Photo-Heart Connection this month? Share it with us.