The weather reflects exactly how I feel today – grey, drab without any highlights… and since the mood in my photographs often reflects how I feel I think it’s the perfect day to hunt for a black & white photograph for my weekly x-frame image.
Very quickly I find this…
Yes, perfect, that reflects my mood today. Happy with my yield I head back to my computer.
On the way I walk passed a flower bed… pretty drab green colours and that purple flower begging for my attention.
“Okay”, I think “well, no harm done in taking one or two photographs here. But you flower must know that I won’t let you steal the lime light and let colour creep into my x-frame today. So don’t even get excited. Today, I am sad and grey and I want a black & white picture. Understood?!”
So I take a few photos, quite like the scene, I must admit and catch myself smiling.
While I insert the memory card into the card reader and start importing the photos my brain is already thinking about editing the purple in the flowers and a title and my moods starts lifting. Trying to stay true to my original mission, though, I take my wet brick photo and process it. Very quickly I move onto my purple flowers.Maybe I can still make a black and white photo but of this scene instead of the sad bricks?
Sometimes this can be an interesting approach but no matter how hard I try… in this case it doesn’t work. And the worst of all, now I also don’t like my initial black & white photo anymore. Now I need purple. It grabs my attention. Distracts me and feels good… and so, purple it is.
I use the brush tool to adjust settings like contrast, shadows and highlights, vibrance and saturation, clarity as well as sharpness of the flower in order to get the purple a bit more jumpy without affecting the rest of the image. For a few minutes I get lost in all the bits of purple and forget about my grey mood. It feels good. And I feel better.
Sad Day with Bits of Purple | Johannesburg, South Africa from the x-frame.tumblr.com series
Photography is a funny beast. It doesn’t make all the problems of the world disappear, no, but it is a powerful tool to distract and create joyful moments. And that’s priceless!
Next time you feel a little off centre, I recommend you pick up your light-capturing device and give your soul a bit of R’n R!
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