Return Not from the Dead

It seems that turning 50 has been a whirlwind of emotions and events, none really having to do with passing the half century mark.. Within the past 18 months my life has been a roller coaster ride (well, most of it low points with very few "wee" moments). Divorce, death (father critical injured then 7 months later dying, 14 yo niece dying suddenly 5 weeks after my father), buying house, moving (just within same town), sharing custody of boys, dating again after 25 years, finishing book project.. Really wish some of this had been postponed or never happened.. But that's life and you just push forward and keep on going.. In the vein of keeping on going, I am trying to start back up my teaching in 2010.. Along with taking on new photographic challenges (people, commercial, selling more fine art prints).. A new website (actually 3-4 sites) will be up and going within 2 months.. a new billcampbellphotography, a new billcampbelldigital, a photoshelter image licensing site, and a book site to purchase the Smoky Mountains Photographer's Guide and, when it is printed this fall, the Cumberland Trail book.

Thanks to all my faithful friends who have been concerned and emailing and calling.. I am surviving and 2010 will be a year of thriving, not surviving..

Bill

Our Community

I've just returned from the 14th annual NANPA Summit in Destin, FL. I know that I haven't been very active on this blog recently and wanted to explain a little bit of why. My personal life has been in turmoil for almost a year. We suffered through a father in law discovering cancer and living at home on hospice (us mainly, 24hours a day) for 6 weeks before he succumbed. It was very hard for me to watch him suffer, because he kept asking me to help me die, that he didn't want to suffer any more. And I could have, but didn't. 

Then an 18 yo son going through the angst of growing up. Deciding not to accept the academic and soccer scholarship offered him and moving out of the house to discover the world of waiting tables and making ends meet. I'm proud of him in that he at least is listening to his heart and not trying to please everyone else. He is smart and will eventually find his own way. But it's hard on parents.

And to top it all off, I am now about to join the ranks of one of the most common statistics in America. No, not overweight, but divorced. It has been an up and down struggle. Mostly down until recently. That's where the title of this blog comes from. My wife (very soon to be ex-) told some of our friends that she was worried about me and if I had any support. She has no idea how many friends I have.

During my darkest hours, I considered withdrawing and giving up photography and just working in the ER to exist. Then I told some of my best friends about this (most are in the photography community) and they called and supported me and convinced me that this wasn't in my best interest. So, I went to NANPA and got reminded that friends are always there when you need them and that life sometimes sucks, but not forever. I have even realized that this change is changing my entire direction in life towards my dreams of the past 15 years. My photographic endeavors have multiplied greatly and life on the other side is looking wonderful and not bleak.

And I owe all this to my friends. My community. I now realize that my community is composed of all those like minded souls who care about our world and environment and nature and want to have a part in sharing and protecting and loving this world we call home. It's all the other photographers, editors, publishers, printers, agents, naturalist that share a common bond. We all love to photograph or see the photography from beautiful areas but realize that it is not the photograph that is the final result, but what we carry away from the interaction with nature or our fellow man.

My life is now mending in a completely different direction than I ever thought. My photography seems to be central to this new direction (well, it was the direction I've been wanting to go for some time, but could never get on the right path). So, thank you to all who have stuck with me and you will be seeing much more here as I travel and expand my life and my work to display the passion that I have.

I especially want to thank four people who have been instrumental in helping me up from the bottom: Cheryl, Jamie, Rob and Jim. Without you, I know where I would be right now and it would be miserable. And to Tim Z, thanks for always listening. And Jere for being so concerned.

Now, get out there and make some great images, because that is what I'm going to be doing and sharing and teaching. All of you who have been waiting (rather patiently, i might add) for me to resume some teaching, I will be teaching for Great American Photo Workshops in April in the Smokies and for Horizon Workshops in October in the Smokies. I will be posting a more complete list as it comes available.  Thanks for all the emails from those concerned.

Parting note: one good thing about my divorce, it has given me inspiration to reclaim the physical part of my life and I am now back exercising regularly and have lost significant weight. So if you think it's me, but I look different, well you're looking at the me that I see in the mirror even when I'm overweight. It's hard for an athlete to see themselves as anything other than trim and in shape and that's where I am right now. No magic, just hard work and exercise and moderation in eating. And I'm back down to my college weight and feel GREAT.

Until next time---

Bill

Gifts from Above

Many times we overlook things close to us and don't see the beauty in our own yard. Our 15 yo son woke us up at 11:30pm to say he thought an animal was injured in our back yard. I had heard an owl hooting somewhere in the back yard earlier but didn't think much about it. The next morning, our 13 yo son told us that there was an owl up in the Tulip Poplar tree and had fought off an "eagle". Sure enough, there sat a Great Horned Owl about 15 feet off the ground. I grabbed my Nikon D2X and 200-400 and shot as I worked closer and closer. I noticed that it didn't try to fly away and finally noticed that it's left wing was injured. We contacted our local raptor rehab center (they're actually in town  http://creso.acs.ac/CRRC/CRRCMain.htm) and they came over and captured the injured male and are going to try to save him. While I was waiting, I managed to get a number of great images. So don't ever overlook what can be found in your own yard. God does provide us with wonderful opportunities close by when we are receptive.

Take time to explore your own backyard and don't get caught up in having to venture afar to create great images.

Bill

BCPB#6

At long last... Bill is back running his blog and photographing. This spring and summer has been a rather difficult time personally and this has greatly impacted my photography for a while. I am now starting to dig back out from the morass of difficult experiences and finding the joy in my photography. When I teach about the 4 components of creating a great photograph, component number 4 is conditions. We usually are thinking about weather (wind, heat, cold,etc) but I always finish with the thought that our emotional state can greatly influence our creativity. I experienced this full force this spring and summer, but things are starting to get more on an even keel.
Pellissippi State Technical Community College (where our oldest son has decided to go for the time being just out of HS) has a balloon festival every fall. I haven't been in about 12-13 years (back in the days of film) and was pleased that the festival was held on a weekend without away soccer tournaments (I coach and our youngest plays). I was able to shoot the "glow" on the opening night. If you read this today (Saturday Sept 29) the festival is still going on with tethered balloon rides. The weather and lighting is great. You might want to visit Clay Thurston's Photography booth in the Arts and Crafts section while you are there.
I will be posting much more regularly now. Thanks.

BCPB#5

Now that things are settling down a bit after NANPA (www.nanpa.org), I have worked some with a few of my light paintings from Joshua Tree. This is one of my favorites and larger views display the thousands of stars visible in this image. To bring out the number of stars, I had to composite one image derived in ACR (Adobe Raw Converter) for the stars and another image for the tree. Both were taken from the same RAW Nef file (Nikon RAW file). I then dragged one on top of the other and then used a layer mask to create the combination.

Light painting is not that difficult with digital, it just takes some practice. You will need fresh battery(ies), a flash light ( I use a Maglite with colored gels, a Brinkmann QBeam 2 million candle power spot with filters that come with it, and Streamlight Stylus lights for small work), a cable release with long exposure capability (I use a Nikon MC-20 with my D2X), camera and tripod.

Put your camera into Manual mode and set your aperature to your desired depth of field. Make sure that Long Exposure noise reduction is active on your camera. Choose a time (start with 1-3 minutes) for your exposure. It should be short enough to exclude whatever ambient light is around (or not if you want a different feeling for your image). Then paint with your light over your subject. Keep the light moving, otherwise you will get a hotspot where it lingers. Wait for your image to process. Check you painting technique on the camera's view screen and modify as needed. It will take some practice to use this technique, but digital makes this so much more fun than when we did it with film. The only drawback is not having REALLY LONG exposures with digital (I mean 1-4 hours at night for great star trails). I am working on ways to capture star trails with digital, but if anyone out there has any ideas, let me know. Until next time, keep shooting out there.

BCPB#4: More Lessons from the desert

NANPA Summit and Joshua Tree NP were my focus for last week. Our tour for NANPA into JTNP went well with Rob Shepperd, Jim Clark and myself. It was lot's of fun to share that area with other photographers and especially help them out in the evening learning about light painting. I'm hoping to get images back from everyone and create a slide show to demonstrate their creativity.
Speaking of creativity, after I thawed out a bit (it was 7 degrees F one morning in JT), I was exploring different ways to express the feeling I had being in the desert with the Joshua Trees. I decided to walk around with a 12-24mm Wide Angle lens and try different looks. I was walking around helping participants on our morning shoot when I thought about getting really close to the trunk of the Joshua Tree and shooting up against the blue sky. Blue sky is need for this kind of image so the "tree limbs" don't get lost in the sky. I was rather happy with this view of the Joshua Tree because it is different from most of the views you normally see.
NANPA was a blast and is scheduled of Destin, FL next year at the end of Feb/ beginning of March. I am proud to be a member and tell people that NANPA is like a family and every year I go to the Summit, my "family" gets bigger as I meet more people. This year was no different and I got to meet some really nice people and have more to put in my list of friends. If you get a chance, check out NANPA at www.nanpa.org.

I'll be posting a light painting from JT later this week and describing the technique.

Bill

BCPB #3: Lessons from the desert

NANPA is in Palm Springs, CA this year and I just finished leading a tour for the pre Summit with Jim Clark and Rob Sheppard. We scouted for a couple of days looking for the right location for 30+ people to shoot. I arrived to record cold in the CA Mojave desert with Sunday morning getting down to 10 degrees by the thermometer on my car. My personal goal was to find a way to represent the wild beauty of this Mojave wilderness that is rock and sand and Joshua Trees. Naturalist tip: Joshua Trees ( Yucca brevifolia) is actually a yucca and not a tree or cactus. It belongs in the Lily family which has surprised a number of people. I finally decided to do some light painting at sunset to show off the trees. Light painting is easy and fun and I will write about it later. If your interested in more light painting, go to Dave Black's website at www.daveblackphotography.com. I hope to take back some spectacular images to show to my family to make up for missing Luke's 14th birthday.

More later from NANPA. -- Bill