Twelve from Thirteen

It’s that time of year again – the end of one year and the dawn of another. Time to reflect on another year of blogging. The statistics are the bare facts: 163 Posts and 479 images. Not forgetting an hour or two of work spent preparing, writing, viewing, sharing and thanking. What I do would not be worth the time or the energy without the support, encouragement and bonhomie of the blogging community. My sincere thanks to all of you who have inspired me through your work, and who have engaged with mine. I wish you all a Happy New Year and I Iook forward to seeing more from all your own individual visual journeys in 2014.

Picking twelve images from those I have posted during the past twelve months has been no easy task. So I made life a little easier by deciding that any image captured before the beginning of 2013 was disqualified.

My selection is based really on one criterion: inquisitiveness. In one way or another that trait lies behind every image shown today. One of the characteristics of the Art of Seeing is an inquisitive eye that searches out images.

The first is a classic example of that word. I was passing a church in London and said to myself: ‘I wonder what’s behind that door?’ I stepped through that door and the words ‘Oh. My. God.’ Seemed the only appropriate words for what I saw. ‘And I saw a Great Light’. Click on the link to read the post.

No 2 comes from Zermatt, of course. Most of you might think that riding uphill on a chairlift, some distance off the ground, would be a foolish place to get out your camera and shoot a few images. But it gives you the bird’s eye view and on days like this could you really resist the urge to shoot? Go to ‘Cabins and Chairs’.

No 3 was a new departure for me. Candid photography. Visual eavesdropping requires a bit of nerve. But this ‘discussion’ was too good to miss. The image was covertly taken. Read more at ‘The Conversation’.

No 4 is the most local image of the twelve – taken about a mile from where I live. Strange how after 37 years of living here I had never seen the possibility of this shot, nor tried an Infrared preset in Topaz. See ‘Fence Line’.

No 5 brings us to Spring. The season of regeneration. The beauty lies not just in Trees and Blossom and Flowers but also in the simple leaves of weeds. And what could be more unpleasant than Stinging Nettle. Grasp this in a few weeks and you will be well and truly stung. But hiding in the hedgerow, where the fresh new leaves are just unfolding it is a thing of beauty. More in ‘Luminance’.

No 6 is the one image in this set that is a bit of a ‘cheat’. This image was ‘captured’ in 2013 but it is actually a photograph of one of my old 20×16 inch exhibition prints from decades ago. To read more about this idea go to ‘Skiffs’ or click on the Print Archive category in the right sidebar.

No 7 brings us to the Bluebell Season. So easily a hackneyed subject. Each year I try something different and this, I think, is my best approach yet. Click on ‘Re-interpreting Bluebells’ to read more about this image.

No 8 takes us to the top of a Swiss Mountain. Where else would I go on holiday! To stand on the top of a high mountain is to see to the other side and beyond. Inquisitiveness personified. And what a day it was when I stood here and gazed into the far distance across range after range of hills and peaks. This shot comes from ‘The Allalinhorn re-visited’. A B&W conversion can be seen at ‘For the View’.

No 9. One of our regular visits to Ivinghoe Beacon yielded this very simple, minimalist landscape. It was inquisitiveness that drove me there to see how this field had changed from earlier in the year. For the background read ‘Ploughed Up’.

No 10. There is always a little dead time in the year as one season draws to a close and another one is yet to start. A time when I re-visit images shot earlier in the year with the idea of seeing what I can do with them. And so we are back to the Allalinhorn for a B&W conversion – ‘Descending’. How very helpful people can be without knowing it when they walk neatly down the horizon!

No 11. The year wouldn’t be complete without a visit to an urban environment. An opportunity to look everywhere particularly Up (getting a crick in the neck in the process), and delight in the interplay of light on the geometric lines of modern architecture. And this proved to be a superb site for Photography. For the full gallery go to ‘Interplay’.

And so to No 12 – the last shot has to be from Autumn. I chose something very simple and fiery in colour ‘Virginia Creeper‘. The fire is very evident, soon to die out into the greys of winter.

There are so many images I could have chosen instead. But these are some of my favourites. I hope you enjoy them. Some of you reading this may remember some of them from earlier in the year. For newer readers with time to spare do follow the links back to the original posts. And remember  – click on any image to see a higher quality enlargement.

And come back on Friday (Jan 3) for an important announcement. And now I’ve said that and published it I’d better get on and put the finishing touches to what you will see on Friday!