View allAll Photos Tagged obfuscation
© Copyright John C. House, Everyday Miracles Photography.
www.everydaymiraclesphotography.com
All Rights Reserved. Please do not use in any way without my express consent.
Ansel Adams has ben an inspiration to many nature photographers, myself included. Color elicits emotion, and while that is not a bad thing, there is something about just shape, form, texture, and tonality that gets at a sense of place color can obfuscate. In any case, I sometimes find that the image conveys what I see better when I convert to black and white. This is one of those images, on a cloudy day, an iconic scene in the Great Smoky Mountains.
... just grab a camera.
It went like this. Today's Smile on Saturday theme is the rather nice one of camera.
So what to do? Ideally, it had to be either a good photo or something different. Well, good photos aren't really me... What then?
Eeek. I had a Bright Idea... never a good thing; it really needs a health warning :) What about doing one of my axial rotation ICMs of the camera in the mirror?
The theory was that the camera would take itself and, if done well, the hapless photographer's image would spin around, suitably obfuscating (lovely word! :) ) their selfie imagey thingy...
As ever, the shortest word in that last sentence proved the most problematic.
If anyone tells you ICMs are hit and miss they lie. They are all miss unless both the wind, the stars, magic and serendipity are all going your way, and about as likely as an azurine moon in a month of Sundays.
So 90 shots later this is what we have. Thank goodness I was wearing a check shirt. I'm actually standing upright with the camera held out in front.
Thank you for taking the time to look. I hope you enjoy the image. Happy Smile on Saturday :)
[(Two) hand held in mixed lighting.
Developed in Photolab trying to rescue the camera from the blacks and the check shirt too while keeping smooth blurriness. Also colour work to get rid of the tungsten + daylight issue.
In Affinity sharpened with USM; white vignette.]
The clarity of air and sky this time of year fascinates me. Certainly not every day; clouds and mist abound as autumn dissipates. But then there are those spectacular days (more often just a few hours in a day) when the sun emerges and the sky and landscape go into high-def mode. There's an incredible feeling of purity and release. Its compounded for me after anything more than a day or so of continuous clouds. The return of brilliant sunlight as a tremendous lifting power to my psyche, much more so than in summer. In these moments I make a serious effort to get outdoors and bask in it, even in freezing weather. Such was the case recently in the skies above the village cemetery. What caught my eye was not the clarity so much as the partial obfuscation in the form of jet contrails thousands of feet above. Oddly they served to enhance the brilliance of the sky rather than dampen it. Down at ground level I found myself looking up at a very eroded 19th century gravestone. The texture of the stone was reflected in the fallen leaves, the bare tree limbs, and all the way up to the heavens above. The sky lent a sense of expansiveness and even grandeur. At the same time the contrails formed lines that reached back to the ground. I love when there's an integration of background and foreground like this. I lingered a bit after the photo, mesmerized with the scene. I contemplated the juxtaposition of airliners soaring over the graves of people born before such advancements were even imaginable, let alone commonplace and taken for granted.
From the website:
Add Color (Refugee Boat) (1960/2019) is an interactive installation conceived of by visual artist Yoko Ono. Upon opening, the work will be comprised simply of a boat placed within an empty space. The public will then be invited to paint their thoughts, ideas and hopes on the walls, floor and boat. As the installation progresses, messages will be written in support, contrast and literal obfuscation of one another, moving the space from visual calm to a layered visual chaos – a beautiful sea of color from afar, a more restless reality upon closer inspection. Freely imbued in this way with a multiplicity of thoughts, each time Add Color (Refugee Boat) is shown it both shares in the memory of past iterations, while taking on a life and a meaning of its own - acutely reflecting the time, place and people that come together to create it.
Crow deliberated
the unbegotten Creator
the maker
and portrayer
the right hand of forever.
Crow's own tongue spoke
"I was there
when Man lay sleeping
at the back
of your troubled dreams"
"I was there
when all was born"
"as you pulled life
from the barren dust
beneath my feet"
Crow glanced about
"You are he
who banished
the obfuscator
and allowed all
to progress"
"who grew weary
of being God
and allowed Man
to fool himself"
Crow paused...
"And I
find I must ask, "
"WHY?"
The Creator did not speak
did nothing to acknowledge
that Crow had spoken
no discourse
breathed forth
from his ashen lips
where only the wind sighed
no manner of answer
graced Crow's ears
Only the eyes
were upon Crow
Then it was,
in that extended moment
of eternal silence,
as the golden dawn
of the Creator's gaze
weighed crushingly heavy upon him,
did Crow momentarily choke
on his own prodigious epiphany
~ BG
Arachtober 06
My sort of magic! - I love the beauty of a scatterscape that just appears and finds me. This sort of photography feels somehow like foraging (which i love!) ...& then I get the privilege of being the one that shares it on Flickr & I like that too - like feeding the cooked mushrooms or berries to family and friends.
But i do realise that magic is definitely the wrong term for this and am reflecting on the word magic.
Complex/hard to understand/impressive stuff seems like magic. so easy for people to look at complexity and get sucked into magic/supernatural belief/conspiracy theories - In our current 2020 year this seems more than ever
I see so much misinformation/conspiracy theory/superstition/supernatural belief on twitter/facebook & it is depressing/alarming/hard to understand to me.
The scientific method is the tried and tested way to work out truth but it doesn’t actually come naturally to humans. We have to learn that it works & we seem to be disregarding it recently.
Anti-science, anti-authority, anti-state is rife and gives us covid-crazyness, antivaxxers, evolution denial, AIDS denial climate change denial and more.
It seems to me that the easier information/facts/informed commentary are to find, the worse people get at sifting and using it. & the more people feel it is ok to follow a narrative that appeals to their attitude rather than an evidence trail.
& so hard to tackle it and depressingly, whatever you say, "they" just find a “ah but..” to move the goalposts. I watch folks in twitter challenge and explain and then get ground down by obfuscation/abuse/certainty/making up "facts"
Have you ever heard of Brandolini's principle? (bullshit asymmetry principle)?
From wiki: "The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it." – in essence it so simple to say something wrong/provocative/misleading
but it is a massive effort to refute/disprove/challenge -
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini%27s_law
My sense is that all this 2020 distrust of expertise and science, the popularity of conspiracy theories and superstition/religion represent the the biggest threats to public health/environmental survival for our species and planet at present.
((most of the above based on a brief & unplanned email exchange about covid beliefs and mistrust in the middle of a very busy afternoon at work, this afternoon but it stayed in my head driving home this evening.))
Flickr is the crystallization of my stream of consciousness. I need to have that handy
Barry McGuire - Eve Of Destruction
Driving across the Maasai Mara this particular evening on the way back to the camp the sunset was beautiful. A line of impala could be seen softly silhouetted just below an obfuscated horizon. The slender figures of these delicate creatures would probably not render on a photograph. Suddenly, an off-road vehicle appeared, rambling across the plains and sending aloft a trail of dust behind it. The dust was set aglow adding highlights to the fiery horizon on this perfect Massai Mara evening and silhouetting the grazing impala. It was the perfect ending to a perfect day.
Suffering, in all it's varied forms, is what exactly?
A compounding of fractured soul, so matter-of-factly,
She said that He Himself said,
That surgery is an art gallery of faith instead
Masterpieces where health invariably decreases
Swan songs of broken hearts where love ceases
To enliven home truth's of carefree surrealism
One empty soul does not make another idealism,
Minimal is the grey day that paves the way for darkness
Looming on the horizon of unseen weathering blackness
A colossus of sky with the upper land
Nature the only card, saviour, and prophet to hand
Fear may only be a feeling, but the feeling is beyond fear itself
As they say, depression is expectant as we each try to find oneself
In the mire of news, be it the betrayal of the health of our citizens
Or just the assassination of natural resources wealth, that bloody well glistens
In the headlights and highlights of our obit we now live in memory alone
"A Song for Departure" plays upon the mind that cannot find adequate words to bemoan
The lack of attention paid to the well-being of Mother Nature, ageism spammed!
We are seeking the revolution for the revolving Earth whose door's are jammed
By the annual quagmire of festive exposure by all means time is spent!
Here by the grace of God, we breathe in life, in a place, in grace Heaven sent
It's tempting to stop reading, as it is to cease listening, turning a blind eye as well, why not?
But dare I say, it's nigh on impossible for very long to do the whole damned lot!
Mother Nature, She is suffering can't you see upon this obdurate land
We tune-in to be deceived, ghost hunters and faithful followers of a new kind of religious brand
Detect only what the illusion alludes to in the lost art of heart and soul
In part, life is already obfuscated with it's own toxins, we're the decade on parole
1988, 1998, 2008, I remember well, the future that is coming too soon
Here before tomorrow ever knows what to do with itself, we must find the answers to be in tune
Petty arguments wage wars within the minds of boys whose toys have been confiscated by ignorance
A belief of faith cannot be true if it sees red at every turn, nor can it bring hope for the children in whom we bestow what kind of continuance?
Benevolence is awaited with a youthful eagerness that has grown old waiting on the wings of fighters
Knives replace fists that substitute backs for tables in the cities full of such blighters
Intervention risks life and death for the removal of compassion brings the hooded underworld
That has now come up to grab society by the ruddy throat twirled
A society indeed, un-policed and unappeased the x-factor of fearless nerves
Can no longer meet with the supply, that which steals warns of what it serves
We're a breed apart though we never used to be and never should be
Walking tall when we should be down on our damned knees begging for forgiveness until we all finally agree
So the trepidant beggars of belief peaceably fly in the face of popular opinion,
For the standards of today will invariably fail the tests of time and ever-changing dominion
If you feel the force of scientific tribulation, will it numb the senses of tomorrow
Can the government's diet, passed fit for us all, sustain us through political sorrow?
If a smile should pass your face someday, cherish it's presence upon the lifestyle that forgot how to use it
Wear yourself well, but for the love of life we must address what does reciprocally befit.
by anglia24
09h55: 02/10/2008
©2008anglia24
This amazing bridge has a total length of 17 km and spans the Tejo river close to Lisbon. The image has been taken during an exceptionally wet morning and I frequently had to remove condensation water from the lens which was obfuscating the pictures.
a grounding experience for sure; and
what do you want to do next? in
drawing out the complexities of each side;
what keeps you fresh, its opposite exhausts?
what facilitates & magnifies the right vision,
and the wrong one frustrates the spirit?
welcome and farewell, beneath the veil.
dualities of yearning as well as doubt.
offsprings an obfuscated state of consciousness.
when nothing stands still, how you stand fully present?
not a present tense self who evades questions about the past.
can you create your Truth-maps? way for the -
dream-maps to be internalized into the narrative -
when naturally more value is given to connection, harmony,
respect, and to honour the truth transcending the moment.
an honest inquiry and a sustained attention to see,
how obstacles that also clarify the path;
character in how you move through the day...
character in solitude where reflective choices are made
character in fortitude where equilibrium precedes choice
and this thought-process takes great practice -
to see emotional texture in words and silences
in all of these gestures, never a deceit.
♦
Satsang - Communion with the Truth. Sarvopari Agnya:
निजाऽऽत्मानं ब्रह्मरूपं देहत्रयविलक्षणम्।
विभाव्योपासनं कार्यं सदैव परब्रह्मणः॥११६॥
_____________ | i
Rit avadti nathi; te shu je, Sachu che ne Dradh Vishwas
— HDH Mahant Swami Maharaj. 19 Feb 2023, Mumbai.
.
To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of the arts.
— Thoreau
I could be brown I could be blue I could be violet sky
...let me take this to mananam sukh... ek inch khasvanu nahi
Or it may be sundown. Which one it is I'm not allowed to say. In addition, the colors in this photo have been deliberately obfuscated in order to conceal the whereabouts of this most secret of top secret places.