Kangaroo Paw & Crow

I've always loved taking photos. In fact, when I was pondering this yesterday, I remembered living across the street from a shopping center that had a photo developing shop. They knew me well and they had one-hour service. I would be in the store often, eager to view my photos, ripping the package open right away. I even remembered a little house type structure in the same shopping center--a one person booth--where you would drive up, drop off your roll of film for processing, take your ticket, and come back in a few days.

I was late in buying my first digital camera. I believe it was 2007. This morning as I look through many nature related photos to post, I decided I would have to come back to that group later because I found many to choose from. I kept remembering others I had taken that are in different folders. It becomes a challenge to organize the photos. I liked keeping them the way they would come back from a developer, by the date they were taken, rather than sorting them into similar categories. But I do occasionally make copies of a batch that I'd like to post and then create a new folder.

One day I'd like to take a photography course, but for now, I think I'll just keep snapping away and trying to practice good composition skills that I try to learn through looking at photography books for ideas and observing the work of my fellow photographers here.

It's wonderful to see something: A person, the sky, a creature--anything that begs to be recorded at that moment in time in the form of a photograph. Yes, sometimes words are the best medium. So many choices for expression and that's another thing I love--the possibilities, choices and especially combining the different mediums.

For today, I choose two from the same day: A crow in flight and a closeup of a kangaroo paw plant. Before this day, I had only seen kangaroo paw plants in the flower shop, never in its natural environment. The way the sun lit this flower up on this day mesmerized me.

And Crow, well, as you may know by know, Crow is a kindred spirit. I watched him with camera in hand and was happy that I was ready to catch him in action. If I had an SLR camera, the image would probably be sharper, but for now, this captures his movement and grace.