The Sky is Not the Limit; Your Imagination Is

Think you need to travel the country to get great photos?  Not so.  Start in your own backyard...where you live.  There is plenty to see and do.  Places you may know about, but tourists can't seem to find. You know, those off the beaten path spaces that you visit when you want to be alone.

If there isn't any of those to your knowledge, any location will do.   This local venue could've been seen and photographed numerous times but no one is viewing it quite like you.   We all see life through our own filters, lenses, and experiences so no two people will be alike.  They will look at the same photograph and see it completely different.  We are wonderful, unique beings!

Ocean View Pier, Norfolk, VA

Another angle, another effect of Ocean View Pier

Ocean View Pier at Night

Even as we learn and grow, what we observe may transform so a photo you took in the past, may show much diversity and contrast today compared to then.

Another tip:  photograph what you love and that love will shine through.  For me, the beach is a sacred space.

Crabbing at Sunset on Chix Beach

Whatever your pleasure is, it's there waiting for you.  What's taking you so long?  Go out and claim it whatever it may be!

The sun will never set exactly the same way or with the same colors.

Painting With Photos

"If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced." - Vincent Van Gogh

Growing up I wanted to paint.  I drew (or more accurately traced).  I photographed life.  I even wrote poems and short stories.  I wasn't short on talent, except I couldn't paint the way I imagined I would if I could.  I think some of my photography was born of that desire because many say my photos look like paintings.  I like it that way!

Bluebird Gap Farm, Hampton, Virginia

                                                  This wasn't my starting point, though.  It didn't occur to me to think maybe I could make my photographs look like paintings; they evolved that way.

Most of my life I snapped photos as they caught my eye....literally, thousands of them after the digital age arrived. Before that was film and, although it didn't slow me down, digital definitely sped it up allowing me more freedom to take unlimited photos.

Next came photo editing programs like Photoshop integrating my love of picture taking with my love of color and then the Holy Grail of photography, for me, exploded! Not only did our camera phones transform quickly before our eyes with higher and higher pixels and amazing quality

but the photo apps like Snapseed and Enlight created an easy avenue to transform your photos at the tip of your fingers with filters to provide you a ridiculously effortless way to improve on them.

Virginia

Jackpot!   Imagination meet reality!  Now I can take an already beautiful photo and add whatever strikes my fancy.

In this case, "my fancy" was another of my loves as I am a Rescue Volunteer.  

Voila!  There you go or perhaps more accurately...there I go!

Another lesson in all of this for me was...if you love something, do it!  Spirit, life, the universe...whatever you wish to call it...will lead you to the next step then the next and then the next for as long as you wish to go.  It may even go in directions you never even imagined if you are willing to go with it; after all, life is not a straight path.  It might not happen in the amount of time you have alloted; it might not even happen at all, but if you love it, you really won't mind. You'll be too busy having fun so go for it!

An enhanced photo of a statue in a garden.

You may even be transformed!