Some photographers are really excellent landscape photographers, or they do fantastic portraits, or animal shots, or macro shots, or…well, the list goes on. And then there’s me.
Like reading, like writing, like photographing, I love everything. I love to see the beauty in all photos no matter what subject a particular photographer loves to create. I can’t draw worth a darn, but when I played around with it, landscapes were my thing.
Crathes Castle Trees like soldiers standing tall and straight–a narrow blanket of golden leaves leaving a marching trail beneath them–shot from Crathes Castle upper floor window
But in photography, I love it all. The same with writing. I love to create Highland medieval romances, and English medieval romances, and wolf, jaguar, cougar and bear shifter romances, and psychic romances, and vampire romances, and romantic suspenses, as long as they have romance, mystery, intrigue, adventure, humor, and most have a body count.
My editor on my wolf stories said of my second book, “Your body count has gone way up.” That was my most successful book for a long time. lol
In my third book, I tried to be nice. Fewer dead bodies. Wasn’t half as successful. 🙂
But I love doing a mix of things. I couldn’t imagine not trying to capture a bee on a flower or a water droplet on a rose petal or a line of thunderclouds or a cougar close up or the vines growing on a castle wall or the North Sea pounding at the shore line beneath a Scottish castle or fall colors anywhere (because we don’t have much of it here), if I have the chance to do it.
Raindrops on a shrub at Crathes Castle
Water droplets on a plant at Crathes Castle
I love to capture life as I see it both in my writing and my photography, and so I guess that makes me eclectic. Maybe eccentric. But happy too.
Ancient stone wall, black and white cows, fall colors–Scotland
Shaggy Highland Cow and Fall colors reflected in the glassy river
This scene with the black and white cows could be from anywhere, except for the ancient stone wall in front. Can you imagine the Highlanders who built this wall so many eons ago? Why they built it in the first place? What they were protecting? I loved the cows, the hint of color in the foggy forest, but the ancient wall covered with moss and lichen the most. I love history and for writing and reading, I love it the most also.
I started writing jaguar Christmas, and I have the first 1,000 words! 79,000 to go! 🙂
Have a great day!
Terry
“Giving new meaning to the term alpha male where fantasy is reality.”
Connect with Terry Spear:
Website: http://www.terryspear.com
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/421434.Terry_Spear
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TerrySpearParanormalRomantics
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TerrySpear
Wilde & Woolly Bears http://www.celticbears.com
Ha! Totally understand! My biggest frustration comes when I see something that is absolutely stunning, but I can’t seem to “capture” it. I love landscapes and nature, but I seem to fail at getting decent shots of living things. Ah, well! Try and try again, right? By the way… Love the Highland Cow!
Oh, yes, I so agree!!! I often take pictures of animals, and get their tail end. lol But when I was visiting the zoo with my son in Omaha in July, I ended up getting fantastic, unbelievable shots of the cougar and jaguar. I couldn’t believe it. I’ve tried for years to get good shots of them and they were unreal. Same with koi in a pond at my local zoo. One day the light was just right, the fall colors beautiful, and some of the leaves had fallen into the pond, the picture couldn’t have turned out more beautifully. Which tells me, like with writing, we just have to persevere and sometimes it’s just chance and then we capture the essence of the beauty and all those previous attempts were worth it. Don’t you think?
I love the Highland Cow too! He was with a black one and it was so picturesque, nothing else for miles around. I hadn’t even noticed the fall colors reflecting off the river at the time. 🙂
Absolutely worth it! You can take 5,000 photos, but when you get that “one”; it makes the other 4,999 worthwhile. I feel like animals just know when you’re about to take their photo, so they just wait until you’re ready to snap it and move: sneaky devils. Children too. I swear, my niece would give Apollo a run for his money when a camera comes out.
I struggled with sunsets for ages until something happened last year sitting in a Scottish pub when I managed a gorgeous shot of the pinks, purples, and oranges in the sky along Knoydart. Like you, I was stunned it happened. Perseverance is a beautiful thing 🙂
Great post Terry! This needs a bigger like button. When I try to photograph my hounds I mostly get their back sides too, and their tails are so busy it’s just a blur. Animals can turn around in the time it takes to pull the trigger on the camera.
I love the stone wall, it is so very “permanent” looking. I think that is missing in our world today. Everything now is planned with built in obsolescence. It almost seems that when we have something new that we are already thinking of the next “new one”. Houses, cars, business buildings, everything. It is sort of comforting to me to see something that has stood for hundreds of years and no one has decided that it looked “old” or “ugly” or “out of date”. And I bet the cows do not care a bit if the wall is old, although sometimes they may wonder what is on the other side. lol
Ha-ha! On the hounds and their back sides. I had two comments on FB about why the Highland Cow fanny? LOL 🙂 She’s just showing off her beautiful tail. 🙂
I agree. And what I loved about Scotland was the beauty of the sameness in building structures. We have such a hodgepodge, it can be interesting, but too cluttered looking too.
Yes, the cows can’t reach through the grass to get the better grass on the other side. lol
But I agree. I love to think of the people that built those stone walls, the back-breaking effort that went into it, how they weren’t mossy, or lichen covered, but brand new. And now, centuries later, they still stand. The thing of it was the castle walls were so thick, they moderated the temperature too. Wouldn’t it be nice if we had homes that could keep us cool in summer and warm in winter like that? Just think of how much less electricity we would have to use. 🙂
Maybe it was the Scottish pub, or…the drink at the Scottish pub, T. Smithers. LOL 🙂 My puppies are great at sitting still for photos. Most of the time. lol