Basset Studios Nevada Landscape Photography …
As species we’ve lived outdoors for around eighty percent of our existence. Far more than we have indoors. So even in–or rather especially in–the modern world, our attraction to nature is instinctive. Visceral.
We are captivated by the world before us. Painters have always known the tricks to foster that emotional connection. Time of day. Time of season. Front light. Back light. Shadows. Subtlety of hues. I try to honor in my photography the legacy of those painters upon whose shoulders I stand.
Nearly all my Nevada landscape photography and nearly every one of my Nevada scenic panoramic images have been the result of intentionally studying maps, gathering gear, collecting provisions, figuring out food, shelter, water, transportation and fuel and heading out into the vastness that is the Basin & Range of Nevada. John McPhee wrote Basin & Range in 1982 and its one of my favorite books and Nevada has become my favorite place in the west. Not every destination and subject choice nor each composition created has the same chance of making it into my final selects folders. Experience, knowledge and wisdom are often a providential mix of ingredients and have provided me with the opportunity and tools to -on occasion- turn the ordinary into the extra-ordinary. Sure, atmosphere, light, compass, and location help too, along with sunrises and sunsets and just a little bit of particulate suspended high in the sky.
The thing we said in the days of film- f8 & ‘be’ there and don’t run out of film, that also applies to photography today. 99% of a great image is being in the right place at the right time, facing the right direction and having your camera. Luck is nothing more than opportunity meeting readiness. Effort and serendipity play a role as well and are often kind masters but sometimes can be cruel voices, especially when you yearn for home and a warm bed and the clouds and the light are amazing for the third straight day and you think to yourself, “how is this next set of compositions going to improve upon what I already have on the memory cards?” So I think to myself, somedays when fishing it is okay to let a ‘big one’ off your line and back into the water … its needed to propagate the species and ensure that there’ll be more for others and for you when you decide to return another day.