The Vastness
Photos of Clouds
I’ve noticed that photos of JUST clouds are sometimes not so great. Even if it is an amazing sunset – aiming the camera up at only the clouds just doesn’t work so well (generally). I can’t figure out why this is – but maybe you have noticed this too?
I think it must have something to do with having a sense of perspective and scale. Clouds with a horizon are better than clouds without a horizon. This seems to be a fairly arbitrary rule, but it does ring true, so perhaps there is something anthropological happening in that humans need to know the distance and magnitude of upcoming weather.
Daily Photo – The Vastness
I know that photographers generally are especially mindful of things and scenes around them, and I wonder if landscape photographers are especially mindful of clouds.
I look at them like a Native American preparing for a reaping of the maize. I’ve really come to understand and respect a wide variety of cloud patterns, even though there are a few configurations and situations that evade me. I really enjoy being able to predict cloud patterns for the next several hours. I’m not always right, but it is a fun game to play with myself.
These humid, windy skies in Virgin Gorda made for a tumultuous tableau. Everything would change quite quickly, so it was harder to predict several hours away. But I did have a good feeling about this time in particular…
I kept a few of the islands in the bottom of the frame so you could get a sense of perspective to see how huge the clouds actually were.
