Aerial Landscapes of Moss
On the rock to the east of the Chinese Cemetery are several depressions that fill up with water at this time of year. They are smooth glacial gouges into the bedrock, and in the summer are dry and of little interest. Now they have filled with clean water and are surrounded by flourishing moss, lichens, liverworts and the occasional blade of grass. My wife commented that the top photo looks like an aerial view of a forest next to a lake.
I agree; it could be taken over the Canadian shield with its vast granite lake-studded landscape carved and smoothed by the continental glacier. So, I edited some of the other photos from Saturday with this idea in mind. I think that the top one illustrates the idea best, but I really like the last one the the most; to me its a rock rimmed lake with a small bay and outflowing stream.
Probably in the late spring, before it dries up, mosquito larvae would confirm it as a lake, and that they avoid the outflow after rain. If they could speak.
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All images taken with 50mm/1.4 Canon lense on Canon 5DMkii. All taken at or very close to the nearest focal distance at f2.2, 1/8,000 sec, ISO640 (I had been taking pictures of dark subjects just before and did not adjust the ISO till I noticed that I was pushing the shutter speed to its limit).
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burnt embers 
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I love the first and last of this set, no visual clues to perspective or sense of scale. Just a thought, how would these work in black and white? It might not work, but I’m wondering if taking out the colour removes another clue, and fools us even more into thinking these are aerial shots?
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I think these are some of my best ones. I have not considered black and white, but I should give it a try. I did think that the colour, which mirrors that of large plants, was contributing to the illusion. As well as the colour of the “lake bottom” which I have seen on satellite photos quite often. I will give that a try sometime and see how it works out.
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Beautiful shots! They do indeed look like aerial shot. The third looks very much like the area around the fjords here
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I would love to see your northern fjords sometimes, they seem more like newborns, fresh out from under the ice (though in fact they are not). The BC fjords are mostly forested, though at altitude they are boggy with small trees.
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You got me. I thought this was an aerial view of, I dunno, Scotland or something. Amazing perspective.
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Hi Story – welcome back to my blog, I am a huge fan of yours so its nice to have you visiting. Scotland would work for sure. I have seen scenes like this on the rocky wind blown west shore of Gwaii Haanas in Haida Gwaii (formerly Queen Charlotte Islands) which is probably pretty close to parts of Scotland for this part of the world.
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I am a huge fan of yours so its nice to have you visiting.
Thanks, dear! I can say the same thing for you and your blog. 🙂
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beautiful images!
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Hi kati – thanks for coming by, and for your comment! Come back any time.
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This is superb 🙂 Had I not read the text, I would have thought it indeed is a lake surrounded by forest!
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Sakhi – thank you for coming to my blog, and commenting. I think there are some creatures that live on that rock that for them it is a forest, and lake.
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I really believed it a great aerial photo of some lake.. I was even thinking of asking if you own a plane or something 😀 Excellent perception 🙂 I will also try this idea someday.
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Suda – welcome to my blog – I am very pleased to have you visit. If I owned a plane I would take aerial shots for sure. I can look at good quality aerial imagery for hours on end. Its a fascinating perspective.
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That’s what I first thought, too. They look like full landscape shots. Very fun.
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Fun – that is exactly what I think. Thanks!
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These do look suspiciously like aerial photos! I like the way the color and texture dominates here. They’re like little landscapes. It never ceases to amaze me that anyone can find these treasures almost any where if they only look. You have that trained eye (and a 5D). It’s a good combination.
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Hi Ken – I agree that these are all over the place, if one looks. I think my eye is in training, not nearly where it needs to be yet. The 5D sure helps a lot, its been like a revolution for my photography having so many limits lifted. Thanks for you comment, as always.
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LOVE this set! We’ve got a bit of an optical illusion at work here, particularly with the first piece. Great finds and captures here, my friend!
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Hi Toad – glad that it works for you as well. In some ways it works best at thumbnail size. Perhaps I should have made them really small so that the first impression is stronger and then when people click they can see what is really going on.
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Super photos and my first thought was of the great north also! Well done!!!
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Thank you David – over the decades I have done a lot of work related flying over muskeg, rock and temperate rainforest in small planes and helicopters, but rarely have I been able to point a camera down in a meaningful way – sometimes to snap a picture of the location of a field camp for a slide show, that kind of thing. I rarely fly now, and never in an aircraft dedicated to my personal wishes, so maybe this will be a suitable substitute 🙂 I can stand above these small features all day if I want to, waiting for the light and a bug (= bear, moose, mtn. goat) to saunter across an open field or scale a cliff. It actually sounds a bit like a project.
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Gorgeous pics!
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Thanks Bridget. It would be really nice to have a bedrock outcrop in the garden, with natural pools in it. Instead I have soggy glacial clay soils in the winter, just a couple of hundred metres away from these outcrops. One of the reasons that property values are a million dollars higher over that short distance (the view and waterfront being the others).
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Simple wow! Fantastic work. 🙂
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Nandini – thank you so much.
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Awesome, at first glance these could so easily be images of tree topped massive cliff faces
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Hi Marcel – welcome to my blog, and I am really glad you see it that way too – sometimes its hard to know if other people will get that first glance effect, or if it’s just too personal. BTW, I have been enjoying your blog for a while now and look forward to your posts, I never know what you are going to have covered. One of my favourites is your digital palindromes.
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Thanks ehpem, I’m glad you enjoyed them – I think I like the idea behind digital palindromes because the images create their own images… at least in our minds 🙂
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I think you are right. Perhaps that is what is appeals to me about these “air photos” as well.
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