My “Current” Favorite Photograph

My current 'favorite' photograph.  Aspens, Kit Carson National Forest,
New Mexico. (click to enlarge)

Since Autumn is, by far, my favorite time of the year, it may come as no surprise that a photograph made during the fall is currently my favorite image.

I don’t think I can say that I have an ‘all time’ single favorite photograph.  I do have some perennial favorites that have endured the test of time.  However, as I age my interests change, my photographic vision changes, I find new subjects and make new photographs, often resulting in a change of my selection of a favorite.  Also, as I look back into my photo archives, I’ll rediscover a photograph about which I had forgotten that evokes an emotion, brings back memories and allows me to remember a specific time, place and circumstance in which that image was made.  Sometimes one of those can become a ‘current’ favorite photograph.  I once wrote in my one of my posts “I Photograph To Remember.”  Unequivocally so.

This image is currently hanging on a wall in my home.  I look at it every day and relive the memory of making it.  It was made in 2018 in northern New Mexico in the Kit Carson National Forest.  

Why is my current favorite photograph?  I have no real explanation to answer that, it just is.  But attempting an rational answer, I'll surmise that it has to do with fall being my favorite season, aspens in the fall with their white bark and yellow/golden/orange foliage are one of my favorite trees, the mountains are my favorite places, the American West is my favorite place in the U.S. and my intention was to live somewhere in the Rocky Mountains throughout my adulthood.  I never was able to engineer the move, but I have visited and photographed as often as I could.  That's the best I can do for explaining why this is my current favorite photo.  It represents many of the visual and geographical things I value.

How did I discover it and what did it take to make it, you ask?  If you think it was made after hiking deep into the forest, I’m sorry to disappoint you.  I spotted the copse of aspens as I was driving along NM Route 64, on my way to Chama, NM to photograph the steam locomotives pulling historic rail cars at the Cumbres and Toltec Narrow Gauge Railroad.

As I drove past this little scene at about 65mph (105kph), I immediately saw it’s potential, applied the brakes of my vehicle, turned around, pulled safely off the highway and spent about 20 minutes photographing these beautiful aspens.  Then it was back on my way once again.

What camera, lens, special technique and editing process did I use?  Nothing extraordinary.  I used an Olympus E-M1 Mark III with the wonderful Olympus 12-100mm f/4 lens attached.  The focal length was 100mm (200mm FF equiv.), a shutter speed of 1/60 sec and aperture of f/8.  ISO was 200.  I had the image printed to 12” X 16”, then matted and framed.  It is beautiful.  The fine detail is visible, the tones are subtle and the colors hold perfectly.

As far as editing, just the usual stuff as well as some minor cropping, some lightening of the central tree to draw one’s eye to it, darkening around the edges to, again, emphasize the middle of the image and the cloning out of three split rail fence posts with barbed wire strung between them which were running through the background.  I actually didn’t notice the barbed wire fence as I photographed the scene (I should have) but when closely looking at the image during the editing process, I spotted it.  Could I have left it in?  Yes, but leaving it in would have introduced ‘the hand of man’ and, for this particular image, I wanted to convey only the subtlety of the light and natural beauty of the trees.

Do you have an all-time or current favorite photograph?  Does your ‘favorite photograph’ occasionally change?  What is it and why?  Let us know.

Join me over at my website, https://www.dennismook.com.  

Thanks for looking. Enjoy!  

Dennis A. Mook  

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