FOTO FRIDAY… Botany Bay

Happy Friday! For those of us who are still doing the 9-to-5 (or more), it’s a day to start letting go of the stress and hustle-bustle of another workweek, and to start getting ready for the bliss and fun of the weekend. I designated Fridays as “FOTO FRIDAY” for that reason, and, obviously, because it sounded catchy! Although, from time to time, I’ll be doing a Foto Friday post myself, I’m fortunate to have a best friend who is a phenomenally talented photographer – Theresa Rasumussen. Therefore, rather than bore you with my iPhone and Point-&-Shoot photos, I felt it better to treat you to true art – to images that capture LIFE, as seen through the eyes of a master photographer. Enjoy this introduction to Theresa, and the first, of many, photographic masterpieces to be featured on “The Life In My Years.”

ABOUT THERESA (BY THERESA):

I’ve always loved photography – loved capturing both moments in time, and landscapes, and I have boxes of photographs from years of taking photos. But, except for a photography class in high school, I had no formal training. There were no cell phones or digital cameras back then, so all photos were taken with “real” cameras, and you had to wait to see your images until they were developed. How the world has changed! My friends knew how much I liked photography, and they all got together and gave me my first digital camera for my 40th birthday. How I LOVED that camera! It was just a point and shoot (much larger than today’s point and shoots), but I was able to take photos of my daughter’s kindergarten class and give them to the teacher almost immediately. Shortly after, I bought my first “big girl” DSLR with removable lenses. I learned how to photograph sports (my daughter played volleyball), and to use my camera as it was meant to be used, rather than just in “automatic” mode. When my kids went off to college, I found myself with a lot of time on my hands, and joined what was then something new – Meetup.com.

There were all kinds of photography groups on Meetup, and I joined them ALL. My first Meetup was with a group called Timescapes. The leader, a wonderful photographer named Bernard Chen, knew that I had never used my camera on manual exposure, or shot any long exposure photography, so he volunteered to meet me before his workshop to show me how to use my camera. We met at Great Falls National Park at sunrise (my mom couldn’t believe I was meeting some strange man in a parking lot in the dark!), and he took us to a part of the river that we had to cross a fence to get to. (I don’t think the Rangers would allow that anymore – tragically, that river has claimed a lot of lives). It was a little scary, but exciting at the same time – I took the risk and leapt out of my comfort zone (as Ilene would say, ‘to add Life to my Years!). I ended up with my first real landscape/waterscape photo utilizing a long exposure. That photo ended up actually winning the Best in Show in the Scenic Virginia photography contest that year, over hundreds of other photos. I WAS SHOCKED – AND HOOKED! Since that day, I’ve taken several photography classes and workshops where I’ve traveled to amazing places like South Carolina, the incredible Blue Ridge mountains of North Carolina, and Glacier National Park, and rarely a day goes by that I’m not out taking a photo somewhere. I sometimes stop for sunrise on my way to work, go to a local wildlife area for lunch, and shoot sunset on the way home. Many of my vacations are photo-oriented now, and my husband is more than willing to get up in the middle of the night with me to capture the perfect sunrise.

Someone asked what attracts me to a scene. For me, it’s the clouds and the light. I see the world differently now – I can picture what the photo would look like as I look around me, and I think, when you start noticing the light and how it makes the world glow around you, is when you’ve become a “photographer.” This past year I’ve visited South Carolina, North Carolina several times, the mountains of West Virginia, the coast of Maine, Glacier National Park, and the Italian Alps (the Dolomites), Austria and Germany. I can’t wait to see what adventure awaits me next!

THE FEATURED IMAGE – BOTANY BAY

I took this photo on a small stretch of coastline called “Botany Bay,” less formally known as “Boneyard Beach.” It’s a strip of endangered coastline on Edisto Island, SC – about an hour south of Charleston. Careful planning is required for accessing the beach, since, at high tide, the entire area is covered and there’s no way to get back to the parking area! I visited with a photography workshop, and, at the time, there were two main trees left – the rest had been slowly taken by the sea. Shortly after I took this photo, Hurricane Matthew came through, cutting off access to the beach and taking the other main tree back to sea with it. This tree is now the ONLY remaining tree. The beach is littered with the scars of all the other trees that used to populate Botany Bay, giving photographers endless compositions using the stumps and driftwood that’s washed up on shore. The shells at Botany Bay are protected, and visitors are prohibited from removing them, so there are all kinds of small conch and other shells all over the beach – many of them hanging on to the branches of the driftwood that cover the beach. The locals call them “Shell trees.”

I do sell prints (on paper, canvas or metal) of my images, a few of which can be viewed on https://www.flickr.com/photos/theres126

If you have any interest in purchasing an image, send a message to me through the blog messaging, and I will get in touch!

Prints of this and other images are available for purchase.
Please CONTACT if you are interested!