I was walking through the Ridges one day, in July of 2020. I was looking for birds, and my camera hung from a shoulder strap. It bounced as I walked. I heard the call of some warbler, stopped, raised my camera. Where was it? A flash of yellow, then nothing. I’d missed it.
When I started walking again, I heard a click. I looked down. My camera, bumping against my hip, had taken a picture.
Several times that month, I returned to the Ridges. Still looking for birds, of course, but with a spring in my step. Every few steps, another accidental.
These images aren’t particularly good, and I don’t like them as much as my other abstracts, but it’s an interesting concept nontheless.
I spent a lot of time walking with a camera. That’s how I take pictures: I go somewhere, I walk around, and I see what I can see. When I find something I like, I stop, wait, and maybe take a picture. As much as photography is my practice, so is walking.
These few images are a neat encapsulation of that idea. A product of the walk as much as a product of the standing still and waiting. Most photography is contemplative: you spend a lot of time looking closely at things, turning scenes around in your mind, composing, considering. These accidentals are dynamic. I don’t think they’re as visually interesting as my more contemplative work, but the movement in them, the joy tied up in the joy of a swift forest walk, of cedar boughs brushing your shoulders and dry twigs cracking underfoot, is something I always remember when I see them.
