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Walking in the Forest


Walking in the Forest
Photo Information
Copyright: Francine Malo (NinaM) Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Note Writer [C: 566 W: 0 N: 1388] (4593)
Genre: Landscapes
Medium: Color
Date Taken: 2008-06-30
Categories: Mountain
Camera: Leica V Lux1
Exposure: f/10.0, 1/400 seconds
Photo Version: Original Version, Workshop
Date Submitted: 2008-07-03 18:18
Viewed: 459
Points: 30
[Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note
Hello everyone, today I am introducing you to the mountains as seen from the Regional Park at Ste-Béatrix. After walking all along the river, we climb a small hill and then walk on the edge. After a while there is a nice clearing with a wooden bench and you can just stop, rest a little bit and enjoy the scenery. Those are among the most ancient mountains and this area used to be an ocean. Don't ask me more than that, I know that the glaciers melted and formed an ocean. Now, it is hilly and very wild even though you have villages there and there.

The people came to colonize the area, they had to deforest whole spaces in order to build their houses and villages. Can you imagine the work these people have done? Without looking at such events in an ecological view, one comes to realize the hardship of these people and the strength and endurance they have endured. Those were tough lives and no time to complain... or dig into oneself and one's emotions.

The winter were very rude and cold and the summers are very hot and humid. And short. There are whole armies of black flies, also the flies we call "mouches à chevreuil", "deer flies", they are crazy and turn around your head until you go nuts... and they bite hard!

There are many species of moskitoes... I will try to find out how many. The black flies and the other ones we call "brulot" ("burns") are the worst. The brulots bite in the neck and a big bump grows... bloody sometimes and it's so itchy! Those forests are fantastic but a little unfriendly regarding the temperature and the biters you find in it.

In this big forest you find coyotes, brown bears, moose, wolves, foxes... Walking alone in it, in a bad weather, make you "feel" they are there, you can almost smell then. The forest is so strange, the evergreens don't have needles at the bottom of their trunks leaving whole dark spaces between them... with the soil filled with golden needles, no green grows because of the darkness.

Sometimes a patch is open at the top of trees and there you may find ferns and some small plants growing... sometimes a very young tree managed to get enough light to raise over the ground.

When I walk there I feel the earth is my home and the animals and wilderness are my brothers and sisters even though the forest is a dangerous place to live with many predators, harsh weather and the work involved to survive in it. Yet nature is where we come from, it is our blood and flesh, our "house". I feel home there. My body knows it and I also realize how far from it I had become because of work, of my culture, of the city life. Because of so many things.

To come back to it is to "return" to myself. Home. I didn't know it was such a wild place!

Francine
ISO 100
Saturation added, sharpened in Picasa
Resized in Lightroom, full frame
You can see a read maple leaf, beautiful clouds and this wave of green trees... it is so green because of all this rain.
writerscrawlz, Heaven, ramthakur, MMM, marhowie, eqshannon, maurydv, CeltickRanger, sranjan has marked this note useful
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Discussions
ThreadThread Starter Messages Updated
To eqshannon: ClearcutNinaM 5 07-13 07:25
To marhowie: Am I dreaming?NinaM 3 07-13 06:53
To writerscrawlz: Cutting the bottomNinaM 1 07-12 15:01
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Critiques [Translate]

I like the effect you've created: a big world that grows as we grow. The landscape here reminds me of a child as it grows year by year. Each year, something new is added, another layer, another experience, and another view of the way life is.

I love the clouds (actually, they make me want to eat a marshmellow...), the layers of landscape, and the brightly colored leaf. One thing I might suggest is to crop and start with the leaf; that is, start small and let it grow. Does that make sense?

  • Great 
  • Heaven Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 464 W: 84 N: 872] (3253)
  • [2008-07-03 21:58]

Salut Francine!

Je m'envole... et je plane au dessus d'un paysage sauvage, beau et simplement vert...

Les nuages m'accompagnent, une petite flêche rouge m'indique le chemin à prendre...

Je n'ai plus envie d'attérir, je voudrais continuer à ma baigner dans cet univers de rêve...

Je m'accroche... combien de temps vais-je tenir? Alors dépêche-toi à remettre ça! Je recommence volontiers...

:-)

Amitiés

Markus

  • Great 
  • Jamesp Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Note Writer [C: 1252 W: 0 N: 4842] (14380)
  • [2008-07-03 22:39]

Hi Francine

This is simply wonderful - such vibrant, rich greens - set off wonderfully by the single red leaf. Well seen and captured.

James

Francine, you are a poet at heart.
My, what a passionate expression of your love for nature in your wonderfully penned note!!
Your simultaneous juxtapositions in the form of effects of mosquito and other insect bites made me laugh out loud :0)!
No wonder nature comes at a price!

Beautiful vertical view of the wooded valley. The green of the dense forest here is so rich it makes that single red maple leaf stand out like a fierce flame.
Thanks for making my day with your picture and note, young lady!
Ram

  • Great 
  • PaulH Gold Star Critiquer/Silver Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1033 W: 26 N: 2998] (10820)
  • [2008-07-04 4:11]

Hi Francine,
you manage to put into words so eloquently what i feel about nature too :o) and an image as poetic to match them, the single red Maple is a great touch...what a deep view you found to show us. The only thing i would say, is that a grad filter may have helped balance the exposure a touch, keeping a bit more detail in those lovely clouds. But who cares when the views this good right?
tfs and have a lovely weekend
Paul
(i sympathise about the bugs too...they seem to love me!)

  • Great 
  • MMM Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Note Writer [C: 755 W: 0 N: 1515] (6928)
  • [2008-07-04 5:24]

Salut Francine
Bonne prise de vue.L'image est bien en focus et represente bien ce coin de pays.J'aime bien l'introduction de cette feuille rouge a l'avant plan.Bon texte également.
Merci Michel

Hi Francine,
Love the blue greens and comp with the single red leaf.
Beautiful sky too, great vertical framing :)
Thank You!
Howard

A movie you SHOULD rent...called "Clearcut" with Grahame Green. It is an old one and only on VHS I believe...but I have my own copy I bought. It brings your words to moving images in the sense of how we affect the woodlands of Canada as humans..and the way one Native North American indigenous felt and what he did...
Bob

Bellissimo paesaggio, molto bello il taglio compositivo verticale che crea la giusta prospettiva alla montagna e dà profondità all'immagine, rafforzate anche dalla macchia di colore della foglia in primo piano e dalle foglie in basso illuminate, mi piaciono anche la tonalità scura della vegetazione e i colori contrastati. Preferisco questa immagine dai toni forti e decisi a quella in WS di marhowie. Grazie e complimenti. Ciao Maurizio

  • Great 
  • joey Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1692 W: 242 N: 5589] (19849)
  • [2008-07-04 14:38]

This is brilliant!
The composition couldn't be better.
I love the back-lit autumn leaf :-)

Excellent work!

Joe

Dear Francine,
Beautiful verdant forest with outstanding image of red maple leaf. It vertical landscape has excellent sharpness & DOF. Probably addition of polarising filter could have done good to the clouds too. TFS.
Regards-Subhash

I like the narrative as much as I like the shot!You paint a lovely picture with words that only accentuate the picture!
Very well done, Francine!
Goldy

bonjour Francine

une très belle photo de paysage avec un excellent POV
et cadré verticalement, ainsi que excellent DOF,
dans ton image il y a 3 parties qui contrastent l'un avec l'autre,
la forêt dans les shadows, la forêt dans les mid-tones
et le ciel avec les highlights, et cette feuille en rouge-orange
est le coeur de cette belle image, TFS

Asbed

  • Great 
  • arfer Gold Star Critiquer [C: 2731 W: 0 N: 0] (0)
  • [2008-07-05 22:25]

Hello Francine

A beautiful look at the hills.
It reminds me of the area around Mont Tremblant where I spent summer vacations.
Excellent pov and dof.
The focus is spot on with vivid colour and detail.
Nicely done.
TFS

Rob

Salut Francine,
Très belle photo de paysage. cette photo fait rêver et donne l'envie de faire une randonné en forêt.
TFS,
Roger

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