The Majesty of Trees

Woman Spends 14 Years Photographing the World’s Oldest Trees

These incredible photographs honoring our Earth’s Ancient Trees were collected over 14 years by San Francisco California photographer Beth Moon.  She traveled the globe in search for the oldest trees and even ventured into the more remote locations.

“Many of the trees I have photographed have survived because they are out of reach of civilization; on mountainsides, private estates, or on protected land. Certain species exist only in a few isolated areas of the world.  For example; there are 6 species of spectacular baobabs, found only on the island of Madagascar. Sadly, the baobab is now one of the three most endangered species on the island.” (source)

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Unfortunately, one of the only reasons many of these trees are still alive is because they are out of the reach of civilization.  They are growing on land that is private, protected, or hard to travel too.  It is sad to think that nature has to hide its treasures to keep them safe from the greed of the world.

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Beth chose trees for her photos based on their size, age, and historical significance.  She did a lot of research before taking the photo’s which adds to their rich quality.

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“Beth Moon’s stunning images capture the power and mystery of the world’s remaining ancient trees. These hoary forest sentinels are among the oldest living things on the planet and it is desperately important that we do all in our power to ensure their survival. I want my grandchildren – and theirs – to know the wonder of such trees in life and not only from photographs of things long gone. Beth’s portraits will surely inspire many to help those working to save these magnificent trees.” – Dr. Jane Goodall (source)

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Nature is one of the most precious things we have left on this earth.  Trees, especially ancient trees produce huge amounts of life-giving oxygen while providing homes for animals.

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Humans have subtly moved further away from balance with nature over the past few hundred years.  If we don’t change our ways we will add to the destruction of these natural habitats and do damage that is beyond repair.

 

If we want to preserve these incredible sights for future generations we have to learn to live in harmony will all life.

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“It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest.” – Buckminister Fuller

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Renewable energy technologies are being discovered and improved every day.  Big groups are working to defund big oil and stop the deforestation industries in order to save these incredible trees.

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Humans all over the globe are waking up and realizing that big change is needed to save and preserve beautiful ancient trees such as these.

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If we look at our daily lives we are so wasteful as a species.  We produce so much trash and consume much more than we need.  Many things that we would assume isn’t related to trees actually add to the deforestation problem worldwide.

For example, 80% of all deforestation in the Amazon is for the beef industry. 

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Were you also aware that the rain forests are disappearing at a rate of around 6000 acres an hour.  That is the same as 4000 football fields worth of trees being killed every hour.  That is an insane amount of consumption of something that took decades or more to grow.

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Humans are the one’s causing the problem and we have the responsibility to solve it.  Two ways that you can start making a difference today is to spread awareness of the problem and make sure that you cut your consumer habits down as much as possible.

Research ways to start living in a way that is as renewable as possible.  Recycle, stop using plastic, cut back or completely eliminate meat, and make sure to get involved whenever you can with groups that are trying to change this world for the better.

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Perhaps with enough people we will hit the tipping point and start making this world a better place before we loose many of these priceless treasures.

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These images are just a small part of the wonder and treasure that this earth holds.  There are lessons in these enchanting trees.  Wisdom beyond our lifetime that will be priceless to future generations.

How we choose to honor life is very telling of our character and value as a conscious beings.

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We are making a difference in this world, I know it feels like only a handful of people are fighting this fight.  The truth is that thousands of people are waking up and demanding change every single day.

What it really comes down to is us.  We need to start demonstrating to the world what it looks like to live sustainable lives that are in harmony with nature.

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“I believe these symbolic trees will take on a greater significance, especially at a time when our focus is directed at finding better ways to live with the environment, celebrating the wonders of nature that have survived throughout the centuries. By feeling a larger sense of time, developing a relationship with the natural world, we carry that awareness with us as it becomes a part of who we are. I cannot imagine a better way to commemorate the lives of the world’s most dramatic trees, many which are in danger of destruction, than by exhibiting their portraits.”

FROM:     http://themindunleashed.org/2015/10/woman-spends-14-years-photographing-the-worlds-oldest-trees.html

Michael Shainblum’s Time Lapse Photography

A special thanks to Vice and The Creators Project for filming an awesome behind the scenes video and finally letting me tell my story about my learning disability and how art has helped me find my path in life.
You can check out the video here: youtube.com/watch?v=lxxV5mIcI9E&;

*The “3 Suns Rising” In 2 of the Milky Way clips are off shore oil rigs.*

“Into The Atmosphere,” is my tribute to the state of California and the beautiful deserts, mountains and coastlines that exist there. This video showcases a variety of national/state parks as well as less recognized natural areas. The video also focuses on clouds, fog and interesting atmospheric conditions. Although California is known for blue sunshine skies, seeing a colorful storm cloud over Half Dome or an incredible sunset at the La Jolla Coves is really a sight to see. The goal of this video is to show these environments in their best possible light.

Living in California all my life, I had as much time as I needed to really capture the essence and beauty it provides. This video was an ongoing project for about a year with an estimated 75,000 images taken, and about 12,400 made it into the 3.5 minute piece.

My Grandmother Alice Harpin passed away during the last two weeks of shooting this video. The film is dedicated to her memory. Without her and the love of my family this video would not have been possible.

To create this video there were many nights sleeping outside, and many days spent in the wild to embrace the environment and get to know the surroundings. There is a common misconception about Timelapse shooters that we quickly set up cameras and go sleep in the car for hours at a time, which is far from the truth. We are constantly hiking heavy equipment through dangerous areas and spending time camping in uncomfortable situations, I love it and wouldn’t trade it for anything else.

Some of the locations are Mono Lake, Anza Borrego Desert, Alabama Hills, Trona Pinnacles, Big Sur, Mount Laguna, Santa Maria, Yosemite, Gaviota, The Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, La Jolla Coves, Santa Ynez, the San Francisco Coast, and the Santa Barbara Mountains.

Directed and Filmed by Michael Shainblum.
To follow and see more of my work please visit:
shainblumphoto.com/
facebook.com/shainblum
facebook.com/shainblumphoto
plus.google.com/+MichaelShainblum
500px.com/Shainblum
twitter.com/shainblum
Motion controlled equipment made possible by:
Dynamic Perception:dynamicperception.com/
Emotimo: emotimo.com/

Song: Thomas Bergersen – Remember Me
Licensed by Extreme Music
extrememusic.com/

Lake Natron’s Mummies

Lake That Turns Animals to Stone? Not Quite

By Marc Lallanilla, Assistant Editor   |   October 02, 2013
rick-brandt
 The body of a flamingo on Lake Natron, as captured by photographer Rick Brandt.
Credit: © Nick Brandt 2013 Courtesy of Hasted Kraeutler Gallery, NY

Lake Natron in Tanzania is one of the most serene lakes in Africa, but it’s also the source of some of the most phantasmagorical photographs ever captured — images that look as though living animals had instantly turned to stone.

The alkaline water in Lake Natron has a pH as high as 10.5 and is so caustic it can burn the skin and eyes of animals that aren’t adapted to it. The water’s alkalinity comes from the sodium carbonate and other minerals that flow into the lake from the surrounding hills. And deposits of sodium carbonate — which was once used in Egyptian mummification — also acts as a fantastic type of preservative for those animals unlucky enough to die in the waters of Lake Natron.

Despite some media reports, the animal didn’t simply turn to stone and die after coming into contact with the lake’s water. In fact, Lake Natron’s alkaline waters support a thriving ecosystem of salt marshes, freshwater wetlands, flamingos and other wetland birds, tilapia and the algae on which large flocks of flamingos feed. Now, photographer Nick Brandt has captured haunting images of the lake and its dead in a book titled “Across the Ravaged Land” (Abrams Books, 2013). [Photos: Lake Natron Gives Up Its Dead]

Brandt discovered the remains of flamingos and other animals with chalky sodium carbonate deposits outlining their bodies in sharp relief. “I unexpectedly found the creatures — all manner of birds and bats — washed up along the shoreline of Lake Natron,” Brandt wrote in his book. “No one knows for certain exactly how they die, but … the water has an extremely high soda and salt content, so high that it would strip the ink off my Kodak film boxes within a few seconds.”

“I took these creatures as I found them on the shoreline, and then placed them in ‘living’ positions, bringing them back to ‘life,’ as it were,” Brandt wrote, referring to the way he repositioned the animals. “Reanimated, alive again in death.”

During breeding season, more than 2 million lesser flamingos (Phoenicopterus minor) use the shallow lake as their primary breeding ground in Africa. The flamingos’ nests are built on small islands that form in the lake during the dry season.

Lake Natron is one of two alkaline lakes in that area of East Africa; the other is Lake Bahi. Both are terminal lakes that do not drain out to any river or sea; they are fed by hot springs and small rivers. As shallow lakes in a hot climate, their water temperatures can reach as high as 106 degrees Fahrenheit (41 degrees Celsius).

The serenity of Lake Natron — and its flamingo population — are threatened by a proposed hydroelectric power plant on the Ewaso Ngiro River, the main river feeding the lake. As isolated as the lake is (it wasn’t even discovered by Europeans until 1954), there are no protections in place for the lake or its threatened flamingo population.

from:    http://www.livescience.com/40135-photographer-rick-brandt-lake-natron.html

Fire Rainbow in Florida

Amazing Photo: ‘Fire Rainbow’ Over South Florida

OurAmazingPlanet Staff
Date: 01 August 2012 Time: 04:35 PM
A "fire rainbow" over South Florida.
This “fire rainbow,” or iridescent cloud, was captured in a photo taken on Tuesday (July 31) over South Florida.
CREDIT: Ken Rotberg / WPTV

So-called “fire rainbows” are neither on fire nor are they rainbows, but they sure are stunning.

They are technically known as iridescent clouds, a relatively rare phenomenon caused by clouds of water droplets of nearly uniform size, according to a release by NASA. These clouds diffract, or bend, light in a similar manner, which separates out light into different wavelengths, or colors.

That makes them similar to rainbow-colored glories, which are also formed by diffraction, and also produce an oscillating pattern of colors ranging from blue to green to red to purple and back to blue again.

Although iridescent clouds have rainbow-like colors, the way light is scattered to produce them is slightly different. Rainbows are formed by refraction and reflection. When light is refracted, it is bent by passing through mediums of different densities, such as water or a prism. Reflected light bounces off a surface at an angle equal to the angle it hit the surface at. Diffraction, though, involves light waves being scattered into a ring-like pattern.

As with other iridescent objects, like peacock feathers, the color changes depending upon one’s position relative to the sun and the object.

Iridescence usually occurs in newly formed clouds. That appears to be the case here as well. According to the Weather Channel, these are pileus clouds caused by a fast-growing thunderstorm that shoved air into the upper atmosphere through a layer of moisture. This created a fog-like cloud that looks like a glowing dome atop the thunderstorm.

Iridescent clouds are not to be confused with circumhorizontal arcs, which form bands of color parallel to the horizon.

The phenomenon was captured in a photo taken on Tuesday (July 31) in the clouds over South Florida.

Editor’s note: The caption on the photo has been corrected. The photographer was Ken Rotberg.

from:    http://www.livescience.com/22043-fire-rainbow-photo.html

Dogs Doin’ The “SHAKE”

Sit. Shake a Paw. Now Just Shake.

By KERRI MACDONALD

Before she begins a photo shoot, the fine-art photographer Carli Davidson spends time getting to know her models.

“I have my dialogue,” said Ms. Davidson, 30. “I want to talk to them before I get a portrait so I get a sense of the person.”

Ms. Davidson spends very little time working with models of the “person” variety these days. The subjects of her ongoing project “Shake” are not perfect. They’re not entirely graceful. They tend to drool.

Since photographer and subject can’t necessarily converse with one another, Ms. Davidson plays with each one before its 15 minutes of fame. The shake, when it comes, is usually provoked by a squirt of water.

It doesn’t always work. Models can, after all, be divas. “It’s not something that you have a lot of control over,” Ms. Davidson acknowledged with a laugh.

Ms. Davidson grew up in New York. Two of her early jobs — working on a nature preserve and later as a photo assistant — have converged in her career. She majored in sociology at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., and interned at the Oregon Zoo in Portland, where she was hired to work with the zoo’s birds of prey.

But when she was injured in a car accident a couple of years ago, Ms. Davidson began making photos for the zoo, instead.

“Shake” is in its early stages. The series is an offshoot of a book project onpets with disabilities. While working on that, Ms. Davidson tested some new high-speed mono lights on a round-faced Bordeaux. “I uploaded the photos and I was cracking up,” she said.

DESCRIPTIONCarli Davidson

It would be remiss not to mention the project’s ugly duckling, a 3-week-old kitten that had yet to perfect the “shake” motion. But at this point, the work is fairly dog-centric. Ms. Davidson has 10 canine subjects lined up over the next month and a half. Among them: a corded poodle — pleasantly dreadlocked — and a bug-eyed pug, “just one of the most hideously adorable dogs,” she said.

from:    http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/16/sit-shake-a-paw-now-just-shake/?hp

Art, Activism, and Community

How Art Can Turn the World Inside Out

In Paris, Palestine, Peru, and beyond—guerrilla artist JR asks the people of the world share their faces to transform urban landscapes into stories.

JR's TED Talk Still photo by JR

Infamous “photograffeur” JR won the TED prize and a wish to change the world. What does he want to do? Turn the world Inside Out!

JR’s projects seek to challenge social preconceptions and bring communities together through radical acts of art. The Inside Out Project asks people around the world to use their personal identities to share millions of untold stories.

I wish for you to stand up for what you care about by participating in a global art project, and together we’ll turn the world…INSIDE OUT.” -JR, TED Prize

Learn More: www.insideoutproject.net

 

fr/     http://www.yesmagazine.org/happiness/how-art-can-turn-the-world-inside-out