One day I was in the bathroom, washing my hands and with a quick glance down at the sink, I realized that the spacing on the cold and hot water faucet handles appeared to be about the same as one’s eyes. And at that moment I began imagining myself wearing the faucet on my head, almost like a pair of goggles. And I began to think about the symbolism of the water creating a feedback loop from the brain to the eyes and back into the mouth....
As I walked out onto the Campbell Creek trail, from the entrance near our house, there was a twittering cacophony of birds. The snow crunched beneath my feet, but the sound was no longer audible. I pointed my camera at the chokecherry bush, holding my breath for steadiness and to prevent moisture from my breath condensing on the now cold glass - the temperature was hovering somewhere just above zero degrees Fahrenheit....
Hi everyone. Here’s a quick sketch of a kingfisher that I saw a couple of weeks ago when it was about zero degrees Fahrenheit and most of the water was frozen. The cat tail pond, fed by warm runoff was open and active with ducks and this kingfisher. I saw him swoop down over the water several times to get minnows and other small fish. I spent about 10–15 minutes on this sketch, and the DaVinci Eye app made the whole process so much faster....
In midwinter, Anchorage’s Campbell Creek corridor becomes a lifeline for fruit‑eating birds. The trail entrance at Greenhill Way, where residential plantings meet native trees, often holds onto berries longer than the deeper forest sections. This overlap creates a seasonal buffet that draws in nomadic flocks like Bohemian Waxwings—sleek, masked songbirds known for their synchronized movements and soft trilling calls. When the fruit peaks in sugar and softness, waxwings descend in coordinated waves to feed, turning quiet branches into a flurry of motion....
I had a weird dream last night so I sketched it in pencil first, scanned it into Microsoft Paint and then added lines and colors, exporting the progress frame by frame into the animation above. The whole process didn’t take too long - in the morning I sketched while drinking my morning coffee and later on I spent about an hour and a half doing the animation. It’s kind of fun to do these!...
I got some more photos of some robins and dippers today along the Campbell Creek trail. Unfortunately I lost my glasses while crawling in the snow by the riverbank - let me know if you find them.
We were at the beach earlier this fall at Pt. Woronzof in Anchorage and came across a rather thick cable sticking out of the water. Here we see a thick braided copper cable with a flexible polymer insulation layer and an outer jacket. My guess is that this cable carried power over to Fire Island at one point in time. Then kids started throwing rocks at the piece of cable sticking out of the water and I managed to capture one splash right at the base of the thing… and I imagined it like a worm coming out of the water… because I really like Dune....
While out on a walk today, I saw a peculiar bird doing a little dance by the edge of the water and actually swimming down under water. Apparently, these birds are not all that uncommon, but it was my first time seeing one. A bird that walks underneath the water, the slate-gray American Dipper is North America’s only truly aquatic songbird I do not consider myself a birder or a bird person - but it is another reason to carry a camera with me and get outside....
I’ve recently been dabbling in digital tools as part of the creative process. Below are a few of examples of how I used photography and digital image processing to achieve something that I think feels a little different. Here’s some #pixel art from my walk today. I wrote a python script to pixellate a picture from my phone and remap the colors to a limited palette. I also used Microsoft Paint to manually add some of my own color....
Fall is a short, but magical time of the year. For this drawing I used a fountain pen with a bent nib - to be able to color in large areas at a time. The foreground is dark with detailed leaves and gradually transitions to light through a few ripples in the water with the trunks of a few trees. I would be lying if I said this was completely my original thought....