Painting With Light

“Concentration” © R.L. Herron

For the past month it’s happened to me again; another case of writer’s block on my blog. What do you write about when you don’t feel like anything new has happened?

It isn’t as though I’ve not done any writing in the past two months … I most certainly have. I just started building a web site, called Broken Glass, for my writing efforts.

I’m working on short-story number fourteen and have a great idea for turning some of them into a themed anthology.

I’ve entered several writing contests with new material and just began working on a 300-word online Flash Fiction Challenge. I also have extensive notes written down for another story idea that occurred to me on a recent sleepless night.

The stories in my head are endless. All it takes to write them is the resolve to do it. Yet lately when I’ve sat down to write on this blog nothing comes to mind.

Then I came across this photo (above).

It’s a picture of my grandson taken on one of his visits. He’s sitting on the beach at the lake, totally absorbed in his playing.

Some of the toys in the picture his father used on the same beach. It seems like eons ago sometimes. At other times it feels like yesterday. I like the photo, for obvious reasons.

I also like it for reasons that have to do with the “why” of this blog. I created “Painting With Light” in the first place to explore the creation of good images with a pen and a camera. I think this shot illustrates the strength of a good composition.

The main action of the image, my grandson, is placed in the bottom and left third of the picture. The angled line of the water leads your eye to the tree and the branches of the tree lead your eye back through the picture to the tiny swimmer’s buoy in the lake, which directs your eye back to my grandson.

Your eye is directed, probably without your conscious realization, through the whole image.

I purposely waited until there were no boats or beachgoers in the shot, to strengthen the image of a little boy concentrating on his play.

I didn’t leave him undisturbed, because I did the typical grandparent thing … calling his name to get him to look at the camera. But those images, as cute as I think they are, are not as strong as this one.

And funny thing … my writing block is gone.

This entry was posted on July 11, 2011 at 2:50 pm and is filed under Lifestyle, Non-Fiction Writing, Photography. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.