Tag: Design

A PHOTOS FOOTNOTE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Playing with my entry-level Kodak digital camera, I’ll have to admit, has been a lot of fun. And I hope you’ve been enjoying the results I keep posting here at the Barn.

But I’d never consider myself a photographer, especially after working with some of the best in the news business. After watching them cope with so many of the nuances of light- and shutter-speed adjustments in the days of negatives and film-processing, I can’t shake the awareness that this digital stuff is just too easy. (Well, I’ve written about feeling the same way about desktop publishing in comparison to the old Linotype craftsmanship back I started my journalism career.)

Yes, the real photographers today are still meticulous about getting everything right. They use tripods, slow-speed exposure, lens adjustments for depth and focus, and so much more. Whether to Photoshop an image later is a whole other discussion.

Maybe it’s in homage to their high standards that I’ve chosen (with rare exceptions) to compose or crop my pictures in the camera itself, using only the 5x zoom. Yes, sometimes the camera “sees” quite differently than I do at the time – color and light, especially, but I’ve chosen to stick with that rather than trying to “correct” it later. Art and crafts, after all, function best within limitations. Yes, too, my work is taken “on the fly,” rather than waiting hours for perfect conditions, the way a real photographer would do.

The bottom line? I’m getting fond of the funky results, even if some of the work of my former colleagues is so incredibly exquisite it often brings tears to my eyes. Never, ever, forget the gap between what they’re doing and what the rest of us are attempting with our cellphones and cameras these days.

~*~

Now, for an update: Our latest round of Christmas gifts brought me a new camera, a huge improvement, I must add, and one my elder daughter, in giving it a test run, almost didn’t return. I’ll admit, the Olympus is a lot of fun, even as I’m just starting to play with it.

But I must also confess, it still doesn’t change my perspective on the Real Photographers and the rest of us. Humility, then, in the face of brilliance.

SUNFISH ON A PAPER PLATTER

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

As I said at the time …

The image is simple enough, and direct: a sunfish transferred to paper, a child’s project in dull red poster paint. The specimen, found on a beach, measures fourteen by seven inches – larger than most of the fish caught back where I’m from, but nothing remarkable here. It has long, prominent spiny dorsal and pelvic fins (the anal fin’s much smaller), and a rather compact caudal, or tail, fin. While much of the scale pattern is apparent, it’s difficult to tell about pectoral fins. The gills and eye, however, are thick paint, and a band of dots runs most of the length of the body to the tail. The mouth, of course, is agape with a small, receding lower jaw. It’s the roundness of the profile that kindles my imagination – at least rounder than the way I would draw a fish or design a machine for the water. As soon as I acknowledge the underlying circle, it becomes drawn out, like a balloon pinched apart by two fingers.

Sometimes I picture a fish encased in a suit of mail armor, though I know that’s hardly the case. Rather, the intricacy of the interlocking exterior – like shingles on a house, rather than brick or stonework – fascinates my landlubber sensibilities. As I stare, the image becomes concave – the fattest part of the body, because of the scales, has the most openness, the least paint. Still, there’s no anticipation the fish will suddenly turn, either in attack or in flight.

I suppose that roasted over open flames or fried in a skillet, a meal might emerge. It’s larger than a typical trout, after all. The child behind the painting, however, now refuses to eat seafood of almost any variety.

The nature of fish is as mysterious to me as the array of the night sky, and to my mind far less mechanical than the knowledge of hooks, bait, spinners, and water depths prized by devoted fishermen. Jesus promised, of course, to make us fish for people, a far more elusive objective than any school underwater.

The paper itself has yellowed and crinkled, as I have.

LADY PEPPERELL’S CORNER

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
Classic symmetry.
Classic symmetry.
The mansion has four chimneys, rather than one, plus a porch looking toward the river.
The mansion has four chimneys, rather than one, plus a porch looking toward the river.

This “dower house,” a Georgian gem built in 1760 by the newly-widowed Lady Mary Hirst Pepperell, sits at a sharp turn in the road a mile from Pepperell Cove in Kittery, Maine. Through her Bostonian roots and marriage, she was one of the richest, most powerful women in New England.

The mansion faces a Congregational church built in 1732, the oldest house of worship still in use in Maine.

Across the road.
Across the road.

 

 

OLD PEPPERELL AND BRAY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment
A Palladian window stands over the doorway.
A Palladian window stands over the doorway.
And to think, the Pepperell mansion was once larger.
And to think, the Pepperell mansion was once larger.
Imposing, especially for its era.
Imposing, especially for its era.

With its shelter on the tidal Piscataqua River and proximity to the Atlantic, Pepperell Cove in Kittery, Maine, is a scenic marina these days, for both working fishermen and leisure-time sailors. It was originally a hive of shipbuilding as well.

The docks are reached by the lane beside Sir William Pepperell’s 1733 gambrel mansion.

It’s adjacent to 1662 John Bray house, considered the oldest surviving residence in Maine.

The oldest part of the Bray house is the two-story left section.
The oldest part of the Bray house is the two-story left section.

INSIDE THE MILLWORKS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
I can imagine living in one of the towers, as one central character does in one of my yet unpublished novels.
I can imagine living in one of the towers, as a central character does in one of my yet unpublished novels.
One to another.
One tower viewed from another.
You could go climbing the walls.
You could go climbing the walls.
Or head for the street.
Or head for the street.
The old floors are fascinating, reflecting years of use. Often, they're embedded with the impressions of grommets or other materials that fell in the course of labor.
The old floors are fascinating, reflecting years of use. Often, they’re embedded with the impressions of grommets or other materials that fell in the course of labor.
The pulleys and other details overhead can be just as intriguing.
The pulleys and other details overhead can be just as intriguing.
Summer relief, however inefficient.
Summer relief, however inefficient.