Spring Trees, Hoffman Ranch, Ben Bolt, TX © Jay Goodrich

It was hard for me to choose an image for this month’s photo, probably because I am still recovering from the birth of our son Micah. I am not a queasy guy, blood, has little to no effect on me. I have watched numerous surgeries without even the thought of feeling uneasy. Yes I am probably a freak of nature and should have been a doctor, but that is an entirely different post. So it wasn’t that. I think that what I am recovering from is watching the woman that I love go through what she went through in order to have our son-6 hours of labor followed by an emergency c-section. Pain followed by enormous, uh pain. I feel for her and any woman for that matter. I wish I could understand one minute piece of how hard having a baby is, but I can’t. I was thinking of putting a photo of Micah up as the photo of the month, but that seemed a little too expected, Besides, he will probably have many in this blog later as grows and becomes one of my super models. Our leaves are just starting to bud here, so I did not want to put up another snow covered mountain image. Then I remembered that I had a backlit leaf/tree image that I took last month in Texas and that was what I wanted to highlight in this post-the delicate lime green crisp leaves that are so common throughout the world as winter gives way to spring. It is a sign of rebirth, and the newness that only happens once a year.

In this image, I am exploring the the use of line, form, and texture. I have been studying the work of the modern painter Jackson Pollock, and I want to incorporate his abstract style and patterning into some of my nature photography work. Although this image is not quite as abstract as something Jackson would have created, and the color pallet is a little subdued, it still possesses a familiar quality to me. I think it is hard to decide what makes an image a successful abstract, and to me that is the part of it that I long to achieve. It is true art – some may like it and others may not; it appeals to people on a very personal level, and that is why it appeals to me.

About the image: It was taken with a Canon 1D Mark III camera, 70-200mm f2.8 IS AF lens, Gitzo carbon fiber tripod. Then mastered in Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop CS3.