Image of the Week: Maple Tree, Middlebury, Vermont, Fall 2007

I spend a lot of time thinking about ways to make my photographs say something different, something new. In the competitive world of photography, you have to make your pictures stand apart from others to get noticed, or you won't get the jobs. The catch is that many sacrifice the design of their image -- the layout, the graphic line, the form, the beauty -- on the altar of "pushing the envelope" or challenging the viewer's expectations.

But sometimes, you just have to work the cliché.

It's Fall in Vermont, and we're surrounded by trees screaming in orange, yellow, and red. It's the last gasp of the forest's exuberance until spring, and as two recently relocated Southerners, my wife and I are soaking it in.

It's hard to be in the midst of such scenery and not be driven to photography, so I've given in wholeheartedly. This week's image is, yes, a picture of a tree. But with the brash colors and dramatic angle, it's a little different than your run-of-the-mill tree photo.

We're saturated with pictures of majestic nature scenes; there's a lot of competition in that arena. To make a living in this racket, you have to "make it new" or you'll go broke. Just don't eschew the mundane simply because "it's been done to death". You never know when you might stumble onto something good.

Have questions, comments? Let me know what you think.

Technical Data

Maple Tree, Middlebury, Vermont, Fall 2007 was captured with a Tachihara 4x5 Field Camera and a Schneider 210mm ƒ/5.6 Symmar-S lens on Fuji Provia 100F. The exposure was 1/15 sec at ƒ/22.

Other Images of the Week