Autumn Hike in Wisconsin

October 13, 2012 by 7 Comments
Autumn Walk XI

Let’s Take an Autumn Walk ©2012 Bo Mackison

A Colorful Autumn Hike in Wisconsin

One of the urban parks in Madison, Wisconsin – Owen Conservation Park – has a maze of hiking trails. There are dozens of paths, views of the city, prairie remnants, trails through hardwood forests, and a small pond for water fowl. The park seems specially designed for a colorful hike in autumn.

Autumn Walk VII

View Across the Prairie ©2012 Bo Mackison

Prairie view. Most of the golden-rods and asters – the last blooms in autumn – have now gone to seed. The prairie is filled with fluffs of white blowing seeds.

Autumn Walk III

Autumn Colors in the Woods ©2012 Bo Mackison

The forests, though small, have a fine variety of hardwoods. Maples, oaks, hickory are the predominant species, and together produce a fine color mix of yellows, oranges, reds and browns.

Autumn Walk XII

Leafy Shadows in Autumn ©2012 Bo Mackison

I love to hike when the sun is still low enough in the morning to cast leafy shadows on the tree trunks in the more open spaces.

Autumn Walk VI

Reds and Yellows in Autumn ©2012 Bo Mackison

Sumacs give the park’s open spaces a deep red glow. More whites in the prairie — fluffy seeds. Yellow ashes still have some of their leaves.

Autumn Walk V

Autumn Walk in the Forest ©2012 Bo Mackison

Another path through the woods and I’m back to the parking area.

Autumn Walk I

Owen Park Road ©2012 Bo Mackison

Even while leaving the park, there are so many trees in bright colors. I pulled along the side of the road a half-dozen times for that “one last shot.”

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Thankful for the opportunity for a nature walk today.

She is attending the Filter Festival in Chicago the week of October 15. Workshops, lecture series, gallery walks, portfolio reviews, and much more. But no opportunities for walks in the autumn woods.

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The Trees Speak of Connection

October 12, 2012 by 3 Comments
Olbrich Autumn Wonders - A World of Yellows

World in Yellow ©2012 Bo Mackison

Know that the tree is not just the form, it is not just a certain species the botanists’ talk about, it is an unknown god – so green in your courtyard, so close to you, beckoning you, calling you again and again. ~ Osho

My Connection to Nature

I often think that trees are the finest species on this earth. I love photographing flowers, grasses, natural landscapes. But there is something about the trees. In my part of the world, I am never far from some type of tree. There are usually a few trees in every yard, and large stands of trees in whatever direction I head from my home.

Grounded in the earth, they often stretch a hundred feet high, their tops surrounded only by sky when I peer at their crowns. I like being able to reach out my hand, rest my palm on the trunk of a tree, and feel a deep sense of connection to nature.

And I am happy that there are trees not only in my yard, and in my community, but I am also happy that there are trees even in downtown Chicago. I’ll be in Chicago next week. And I’ll be noticing the trees that grow there, even in the midst of a crowded metropolis.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Yesterday she finished the printing of two sets of fine art photography and today she is putting the final touches on the two portfolios.

She is attending the Filter Festival in Chicago the week of October 15. Workshops, lecture series, gallery walks, portfolio reviews, and much more. Opportunity awaits.

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A Pinker Shade of Pale

October 9, 2012 by 10 Comments
Olbrich Autumn Wonders - A Pinker Shade of Pale

A Pinker Shade of Pale ©2012 Bo Mackison

There is a huge amount of freedom that comes to you when you take nothing personally. ~ Don Miguel Ruiz

Where I am now in my photography process?

I have embraced the freedom to create for myself first, to explore while processing and printing my photographs, to make decisions about my creative process based on what feels right to me. The bonus? The discovery that all this freedom opens the door to further exploration, taking bigger chances, stepping into challenges I once considered an impossibility. This is FREEDOM!

And then there is the challenge of printing photography portfolios.

I look around my studio. I look at the photographs I’ve chosen for the two portfolios I am currently printing. Who knew printing photography portfolios required such intense concentration, that it was such an exacting science? I learn as I do, and re-do. When I look at the finished printed photographs, the fine art photographic paper so thick and luscious, it feels like a high quality watercolor paper. I can scarcely believe these are of my creation. I love the prints.

They speak to me. For now, that is enough.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She is assembling two sets of her fine art photography in classic print portfolios. She will be attending the Filter Festival in Chicago the week of October 15. Workshops, lecture series, gallery walks, portfolio reviews. Wow!

 

 

 

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Happy 5th Blog Birthday

October 8, 2012 by 20 Comments

 Happy 5th Blog-a-Birthday, Seeded Earth Photography!

I have posted nearly 1900 photos to my photoblog in the past 5 years.

I pulled out a sample photograph from each of the Octobers I have been photo-blogging. When I began in 2007, I was new to digital photography, new to computers, new to blogging. In short, I had a lot to learn. And learn I did by daily practice.

I hope you enjoy watching as my photography years go by!

Read until the end, there are details on how to enter for a give-away in celebration of my blogging birthday.

 OCTOBER 2007

pa182289.jpg

Double Yellows © 2007

Deep blue lake trapping
Reflection in calm waters
Double yellow orbs

Photographed just after sunrise on a calm mid-October morning at Indian Lake County Park in Dane County, Wisconsin.

 

OCTOBER 2008

Great Sand Dunes National Park

Great Sand Dunes National Park © 2008

We camped at the Great Sand Dunes National Park in southern Colorado in mid-October. I wanted to photograph the dunes at sunrise. The temperatures had dropped into the teens in the early morning hours and iced the sculptured sand, making the trek up the dunes rather easy. It’s much easier to climb frozen dunes than to sink, with every step, into soft sand…

 

OCTOBER 2009

Blue Pumpkin? Yep! © 2009 Bo Mackison

I would rather sit on a pumpkin, and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion. ~~ Henry David Thoreau

You tell ‘em, Mr. Thoreau. Can I join you if I choose a pumpkin on the other side of the patch?

 

OCTOBER 2010

Interior Room at Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel

Table for Two © 2010 Bo Mackison

This little room is in the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel, tucked just off the main lobby. The closed door, leading to a storage room, is quite short, and reminds me of an Alice in Wonderland portal. The stairs wrap around the room while allowing natural light to come in through the windows…

 

OCTOBER 2011

Changing Leaves

Changing Leaves © 2011 Bo Mackison

Everything in life is speaking, is audible, is communicating in spite of its apparent silence. ~ Hazrat Inayat Khan

In autumn, the colors of nature are what speak to me. They tell me to pay attention, remind me that what I saw yesterday or earlier this morning may well disappear into nothingness by noon. Autumn is the ultimate reminder that nothing remains the same, that change is a constant, that though we may hold treasures in our hands today, tomorrow our hands may be empty…

OCTOBER 2012  – Today’s post!

Autumn Oranges

Autumn with Orange ©2012 Bo Mackison

As I walked through Madison’s Olbrich Botanical Gardens this past weekend, I was happily surprised to see an art installation new to me – orange metallic cones near the bridge across Starkweather Creek.

What a joy to photograph! I love how the bright orange sculptures pop across the water, unexpectedly, and how the bright orange color complements the autumn background colors.

A favorite theme – a bridge crossing reflecting water – becomes even more appealing to me, with the sculptures in orange adding a sense of play to the setting. What an inspiring combination.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC.

I am offering you a birthday gift during this birthday celebration of my photoblog. Leave a comment below and I will choose one (by computer number generator) for the birthday give-away.

I will send an original photograph to the winner, The photograph, either an 8 x 10 or an 11 x 15, your choice, will be a photograph I currently offer, and will feature a botanical or garden scene. Please allow me to do the choosing for you! (Special requests considered… 🙂 )

I will pick the winner on October 16th (my birthday, too!) and post the winner’s name on the blog.

Thanks to all who visit. Without you, blogging would not be nearly as much fun.

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A Time for Every Purpose under Heaven

October 5, 2012 by 14 Comments
Wisconsin River Sandbars

Sandbar Fingers © 2012 Bo Mackison

Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares that will not withdraw from us. ~ Maya Angelou

It is autumn along the Wisconsin River.

The river is low, a result of the drought in spring and most of summer. August’s rains were not enough to fill the banks of the river. And so sandbar fingers stretch from shore. As far as I can see, peering from the bridge, there are sandbars edging from shore and sandbars rising from the river’s middle.

Trees across the river have changed their summer greens for autumn oranges and yellows, and soon, it seems too soon, the glorious autumn colors will change again. They will turn into autumn’s piles of crisped, brown leaves below bare branched trees.

Change. Nature manages its changes, coinciding with the seasons, recycling over and over. Nature responds to changes that aren’t cyclical on a yearly calendar also, ones that track over decades and centuries. Rivers overflow, flood the nearby lands and the nearest buildings and roads in river towns. Rivers run low, exposing land that is usually hidden from sight, once only the realm of underwater creatures.

To everything – turn, turn, turn
There is a season – turn, turn, turn
And a time for every purpose under heaven.
~ lyrics from Turn, Turn, Turn by The Byrds

It is autumn in my life, too. I walk through the yearly calendar’s changes. Month by month, I anticipate spring, summer, fall, winter. Sometimes I know what to expect. Some things are planned – a joyous wedding, a planned holiday with family, a special birthday. Some events are unplanned – a family member’s lost job, the death of a close friend, a change in a long-standing relationship.

Perhaps one of the most difficult is the aging of parents and the responsibilities that come with that change in family status. Elderly mothers and fathers are no longer the matriarchs and patriarchs in charge; middle-aged sons and daughters are no longer the ones that obey. Shifting responsibilities, shifting emotions.

Our lives follow similar patterns to those found in nature. The river runs low. Our energies run low. Sandbars are exposed, exposing that which had been underwater, out of sight, for many years. The status quo is disrupted. Secrets spill open, lives are altered. There is no taking back the time, no denying the newly discovered information.

The trees drop their leaves and only the gray skeletons remain. Some changes are short-term, like the bare limbed trees. Spring brings budding leaves; summer, a fully leafed tree. Flowers bloom, grass grows.

Sitting silently
Doing nothing
Spring Comes.
The grass grows by itself.
~ Zen Haiku

Some of nature’s changes take longer periods of time, like the deep river that will only stretch to its edges after many rains and deep snowfalls. Even then, there are subtle changes in its ebb and flow.

Some of the changes – severe damage to the earth from which it cannot recover in a many a generation’s lifetime or a death in a family – they leave a more enduring mark of change. Time passes. We adapt to the constancy of change.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She is searching for clarity amidst many changes.

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