03-02-2014 / Personal Visions # 4: New Horizons
New Horizons
I hereby present the fourth entry in the Personal Visions series: New Horizons.
Technical commentary:
To this day, this picture is still a case of study for me. I'll explain why in both sections.
Back when I took it, I couldn't make up my mind whether it should be in color or in black & white.
I developed a version in color and this one. Both have a stark difference between the overall tones they convey; the one in color is joyful and peppy while this one is more melancholic and dark.
For this entry, I reviewed both again and 4 years later, it still is the same case of how different is one from the other despite being the same picture.
I settled for this version because it reflects better my feelings at the time when I took the picture. There's also the fact that I will use this picture but with color in a project I'm working on, so I'm glad of the duality this photo has.
The black & white helps to enhance the ominousness of the tree in contrast with the clouds, which look silently the events beneath them.
If you look carefully, the bird is slightly blurred, which displays the movement that's so important in this picture. Because it is blurred, it will always be flying away.
The tree branches could be interpreted as trying to hold the bird down and prevent it from flying. Maybe they don't want him to go or maybe they want to tie it down and smother it.
But the bird has now left the main branch, it has made its decision and it's not coming back.
The post-processing part of this picture was relatively easy compared to previous entries. Capturing it was no easy task though.
I was at a nursery waiting for a relative when I spotted several flocks of birds flying overhead. They came in waves, some groups being larger than others.
The tree in the picture is a willow and I was right beneath it watching the birds pass when this image popped into my mind. I always take my camera whenever I go to the nursery because the beauty of plants and flowers is infinite and indeed, I have a lot of pictures from plants of that day.
I decided to give the shot a try but the results weren't optimal. I was capturing pieces of birds but not one in a complete form.
There was also the fact that the larger flocks had already passed and the ones left had few birds in them. I kept trying but I ended with pictures with no birds, just the willow and the sky.
At this point I decided to change tactics and engage the continuous shooting mode of my camera, but not the slow or medium speeds, I went full machine gun mode at 12 frames per second.
The birds must have figured out what I was doing (or maybe they thought I was hunting them literally) and they disappeared from sight. This meant I had to wait for 10 minutes looking upwards with the camera pressed against my face, not moving or blinking in order to be ready and also to not lose my framing of the picture.
At some point, a bird flying solo passed by and I was able to capture it in the shot you see here.
In the end, this picture is a result of both planning and serendipity because the bird ended up flying in a portion of the frame where it wasn't covered by the willow's branches or cut off, which is what I was going for. The fact that it had little space to do so and that we weren't exactly coordinated for this shot adds a layer of complexity in the capture process.
One of the things I'm most proud of is the fact that the bird ended up exactly between the tip of the branches, but close to the tree and not far away into the corner.
This is one of the most fleeting moments I've ever captured. Even though I was firing shots at 12 fps, there was only 1 shot that was exactly as I wanted and there was no way to repeat it.
If I hadn't been patient, prepared and with a clear concept of what I wanted, I would have completely missed the moment and I wouldn't be showing this to you.
I've never complained of the result I got and I never will.
Personal commentary:
The concept of the title of this picture came to me while I was looking at the birds fly by. I thought of the concept of flying to new horizons, different places and different times.
It wasn't until I got home that I saw the picture properly that I was able to coalesce the message of the picture along with the title.
All that got me thinking about how easily birds can move on from one place to another if they want to or if the situation calls for it and how humans have the same capability (we can't fly on our own but we can move to different places by all sorts of means) but we restrict ourselves of doing so due to a myriad of reasons: mental blocks, lack of funding, tied to certain people or things, personal considerations, fear, doubt, people talking you out of it or not letting you, responsibilities not easy to walk away from, maybe there is no need for a new destination or perhaps there is even a lack of destination to begin with. There are a lot of reasons why we don't do it.
Only a few dare to go look for new horizons while the rest is stuck at the same place.
The lack of movement can also apply to incidents within our lives; how we have to endure certain situations and for one reason or another we end up getting stuck on them, unable to move on.
There is no change or healing or improvement, just stagnation and decay on a slow or accelerated fashion, which doesn't help things at all.
Sometimes one has to let go. Sometimes one has to leave. Sometimes one has to accept things have changed. Sometimes one must cut the losses and move on in order to find a new horizon.
For me personally, this shot represented how I felt at the time regarding a relationship that didn't work out and I was having a hard time letting it go. When I captured this image, I felt so identified with it due to the message it's designed to convey.
4 years later, I had to do what the bird does in the picture with another relationship that ended abruptly and in much different terms than the first one. During that process, I kept looking a lot at this picture; both in printed and digital form, and used it as a way to move on with my life after what had happened. I told myself that I had to be the bird in that picture and find a new horizon, not to stay clinging to the same branch.
This is why this picture is still a case of study for me. It has never lost any significance or meaning for me due to those incidents that happened and both time it worked as a visual reminder that I had to fly away, that even though I tried to fix it, things weren't going to stay as I wanted them to. I had to change of location and also change myself internally.
This was the last picture I exchanged with one of my colleagues at the time. Due to several reasons, the exchange couldn't keep going and I also had to do what I did here: move on.
For far too long, I've grasped your branch
Maybe more than I should have
I held on to you through the green spring and the vicious summer
Through the quiet autumn and the eternal winter
But now, I need to let go
Maybe it's my fault your leaves withered away
Maybe it's your fault I no longer want to stay
All I know at this moment is I need to let go
I need to go away and fly somewhere else
To a better time, to a better day
I won't accuse you of wrongdoing
Neither will I deny my shortcomings
We both know what we did right and what we did wrong
I wish you recover your green leaves and maybe, with time,
The flower you once showed to me
But right now you need to go away
And blossom somewhere else
On a better time, on a better day
It's time we both find new horizons
Warm mornings during the winter
Quiet nights during the summer
It's time we both go away and reach someplace else
A better time, a better day
New horizons along the way
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