2410_3011 Otter Basin

wild prairie man
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2410_3011 Otter Basin
2410_3011 Otter Basin

This is the first of two recent black and white landscapes. I shot others, but was not totally pleased with the outcome - it takes a little practice and effort to get in that groove, I guess. Used to do it all the time in the olden days of black and white film, but not so much in recent decades.

I was standing on a grassy bench overlooking Otter Basin on a sunny October evening - Halloween, in fact. This has become a tradition for me over the past decade or so, ever since the trick or treaters stopped making the rounds: one year I had 35 kids, the following year, four. Why? Maybe because there are only three houses on my block and it isn't worth the effort?

I realize, of course, that if I lived in a big city I might get hundreds or even thousands of trick or treaters. Maybe millions, who knows? But I haven't lived in an urban centre since 1991, so it's a moot point. I don't object to buying a bunch of junk food for them, here in this little prairie village, but if they don't show up I end up eating it myself, and that's really unhealthy. So every year on Halloween I head out with some plan for photography, and this year it was to shoot some black and white landscapes.

Why it's called Otter Basin I do not know - I've never seen an otter here, or anywhere in the park for that matter. (I did see a mink once, in the river...) Maybe historically there were otters. Or maybe it was wishful thinking.

Black and white, of course, requires a whole different mode of seeing. You can't fall back on the emotional appeal of colour. I love colour as much as anyone, but shooting b & w is a good exercise in using the basic building blocks of composition: line, shape, texture.

Photographed in Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2024 James R. Page - all rights reserved.

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Taken on: October 31, 2024
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Sets appears in:   • Best 2024    • The Classic Black and White Landscape   
Groups appears in:   • Monochromatic world    • A Better B&W Group    more » • Joy of Black & White    • Breathtaking Landscapes B&W and Color    « less
Camera: Nikon D850, f/22.0, 1/30 sec, 24mm, ISO 200 (more info) (hide info)
Camera: Nikon D850
Lens: TAMRON SP 24-70mm F/2.8 Di VC USD G2 A032N
Aperture: f/22.0
Exposure Time: 0.033 sec (1/30)
Focal Length: 24mm
ISO: 200
Exposure Bias: -1/3 EV
Flash: No Flash
Exposure Program: Manual
Exposure Mode: Manual
Metering Mode: Multi-segment
White Balance: Auto
Color Space: Uncalibrated
Software: Adobe Photoshop 22.5 (Macintosh)
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