50.0

When I finally got around to processing this image awhile ago, I sent it to my usual gang of photographer friends for some harsh critique before I put it up on my website. One of my best friends in the world, Steve Turner, responded with "WHERE THE HECK WAS I WHEN YOU TOOK THIS???" The answer, which I supplied with smug satisfaction was: "About 15 feet behind me".

This elicited the response: "That's what I was afraid of".

You see, Steve is colorblind. I can't tell you how much I admire him for being out there, shooting landscape images where light and color are crucial to the end result. He amazes me with his talent, and is one of the finest shooters that I know. This admiration, however, does not exempt him from the ruthless harassing that I bestow upon all my friends. Mind you, I expect... nay.... DEMAND, the same in return.

So how did this happen, you ask? Well, as we hung around in this garden paradise waiting for the last tentacles of evening light to lick the underside of the considerable cloud deck that stubbornly possessed Logan Pass, it looked as if there would be no 'moment'. You landscape photographers know the moment. When the color paints the sky, and we all run around like crazy trying to find something composition wise to place in front of it. Then, lo and behold, it started to happen. Unfortunately, it was happening in a different direction than we had planned on. I might have uttered an expletive. Being colorblind, Steve relied on me to provide a description of what was happening, as all the clouds look grey to him.

"Is it going off????", he asked

"YES!" I screamed, and promptly pointed to the sky... 180 degrees in the wrong direction.

Once Steve was merrily firing away at the dark section of the sky that had no color, I grabbed my camera, took off the other way, and quickly grabbed a few frames of this scene before the color snuffed out.

Panting, we returned to check each others LCD's (you know you do the same thing). Steve, as usual, had a beautiful composition of a creek pouring into the valley with thick, grey, bland clouds spread out across the top.

"How does it look?" he asked. "Is there color in there?"

"Nailed it". I replied.

I'm sure that this story will generate my usual half a dozen "dislikes" because of my cold black heart.... and that's ok. I long ago gave up worrying about dislikes, views, votes, etc. But for those of you that don't know me personally, I should probably come clean. I would never do this to Steve. I love the guy, and would do anything I could to help him get a wonderful image, as I would with any of my friends. But I must confess that I DO tease him ruthlessly about the possibility of me doing this to him at any given moment. Trust me, he gives it right back to me.... which is why I love him.