take a break

I'm exhausted from trying to keep up with the news and so at a little past 5:00 PM today I put down the newspapers and left for Chapoquoit beach.  There were still some people there and at the risk of offending them I set up my big lens on a tripod and started shooting.

There was a young mother with two kids playing on the beach that I really wanted to photograph, but she wouldn't let me.  That sort of rejection rarely happens, but sometimes it does.  I try not to take it personally, but it did hurt my feelings when she hastily packed up her kids and left.  It seemed like she thought I was a creepy old man.  Oh well.

An apparent mother-daughter pair walked out near me and the daughter went straight out into the water and started doing headstands.  I thought this image captured the feeling of late afternoon at the beach.  They noticed me taking the pictures (it would've been impossible not to) so I gave them my card and offered to send them a copy if they want one.

The trip to the beach did help to ease my news-overdose-induced anxiety, but I'm already feeling the need to open up the New York Times app and see what happened while I was offline.  It's become an illness of our present era.

Monte

I'm exhausted from trying to keep up with the news and so at a little past 5:00 PM today I put down the newspapers and left for Chapoquoit beach.  There were still some people there and at the risk of offending them I set up my big lens on a tripod and started shooting.

There was a young mother with two kids playing on the beach that I really wanted to photograph, but she wouldn't let me.  That sort of rejection rarely happens, but sometimes it does.  I try not to take it personally, but it did hurt my feelings when she hastily packed up her kids and left.  It seemed like she thought I was a creepy old man.  Oh well.

An apparent mother-daughter pair walked out near me and the daughter went straight out into the water and started doing headstands.  I thought this image captured the feeling of late afternoon at the beach.  They noticed me taking the pictures (it would've been impossible not to) so I gave them my card and offered to send them a copy if they want one.

The trip to the beach did help to ease my news-overdose-induced anxiety, but I'm already feeling the need to open up the New York Times app and see what happened while I was offline.  It's become an illness of our present era.

Monte

bluefish and stripers

This boy was at Chapoquoit beach with another boy (his brother?) and an older man I assumed was his grandfather.  After photographing them for a while I asked what kind of fish they were trying to catch. "Bluefish and Stripers" replied the grandfather.

This shot was taken at 1/400th of a second, which was fast enough to freeze the action of the boy while giving the fishing rod a nice motion blur.

You might think it is a boring picture, but where else, besides Earth, could I have taken it?

It is a moment in the life of a boy at a beach on a small planet orbiting a single star in one of billions of galaxies in what might be one of many universes.  Was something similar happening at the same time somewhere else in our galaxy? Our universe? Another Universe?  Maybe.  Maybe not.

Earth is a planet with beaches, people, bluefish and stripers.  Humans have searched the skies for centuries but haven't yet found another planet like this one.  Earth is special.  It's a keeper.  We should take note.

Monte

introductions

Out at Chapoquoit in the late afternoon today.  Lots of good people picture opportunities.  The beach was less crowded than I expected for Memorial day weekend, but it turned out to be just right.  There were people picnicking, fishing and walking with and without their dogs.

Jenny went with me and collected shells while I collected photographs.

The woman on the left of this picture is Mimi.  She noticed me taking pictures of her and started a conversation.  She turns out to be an artist, author, and a musician.  So many interesting people at the beach!

Monte

without a net

I walked onto Chapoquoit beach on an evening when there wasn't enough wind for the surfers and thought about bringing out my gear.  There were some people having picnics and others just out walking with their dog.  I was surprised at how out-of-place I felt without the surfers being there.  Setting up a camera with a big lens on a tripod looks reasonable when there are giant colorful kites flying back and forth across the shoreline.  I was sure it would look suspicious without the surfers.

When I finally did bring out the cameras this couple got up and started playing badminton without a net.  I took several pictures.

This one was not well-composed.  I don't like that I didn't get the woman from head-to-toe in the frame and I almost deleted it. But then I looked more closely at the shuttlecock captured a fraction of a second before its collision with the badminton racket.  It is 1/1600th of a second out of their whole life.  A frozen moment that wouldn't be remembered if my camera hadn't captured it. What would it mean to them if they could see it years from now?  What will their grandchildren think about them if they find this photograph, faded and forgotten, in a box in the back of a closet?

Of course, I'm making up a story about two people I don't know.  Maybe they aren't planning a life together.  Maybe they are brother and sister!  Maybe they just got married, but won't stay together long enough to have children or grandchildren.  I know as little about what the future holds for these two people as I do for myself.

Idyllic moments, like the one in this photograph, get scattered among all the other stressful and monotonous and unpredictable events of our lives.  We hope to have more of them. We plan for them.  But we can't escape the anxiety of knowing that, like this couple, we are living and playing without a net.

Monte

flip out

I took this picture on April 30, 2017.  I was at Chapoquoit beach looking for things to photograph and this young boy showed up and started turning back flips.  That was more than I expected and it was a lot of fun taking the pictures.

Monte

a good day

My latest video is a five-minute piece covering the past week in my life here on Cape Cod. It is posted here as a YouTube link:

pictures from the beach

This video is a story about photographing people and their dogs at my local beach, which is my version of street photography.Please subscribe to my YouTube channel - Monte Ladner - if you want to keep up with my latest videos.

Monte

scout

At Chapoquoit beach today to photograph the dogs.  A woman was throwing a tennis ball to her talented labrador, Scout, and I asked if I could take some pictures.  I was able to catch a few cool shots.

Monte

taking leave of our senses

Reading the news is stressful. This short video describes how I try to deal with keeping up with what's going on without getting too demoralized.

Monte

strapless ben

The Amazing Ben Stadelmaier kite surfing without a surfboard. He's unstoppable!

Actually, he had a board, but the board had no straps. I'd asked him to get some air so I could take some pictures and he obliged.  The board stayed in the water.

The thermometer in my car said it was 39-degrees F, but the wind was blowing pretty hard making it feel a lot colder. I don't know how these guys can get out in the water when it is so cold. They're either really tough or really nuts.

Monte

whining

Yesterday I posted a photo of a surfer at Chapoquoit beach and I whined a bit about how windy it was.  And it was windy.  But apart from getting peppered by blowing sand and salt-water it was actually a lovely evening, as this picture shows.

The good stuff is never free

Monte

on goofiness

I think this dog has a worthwhile lesson for humans.  I’ve seen him several times at the beach and I’ve always gotten a good laugh watching him chase the water back and forth.  He spins around and jumps straight up in the air and barks at the bubbles in the sea foam.  He’s just acting goofy, and it clearly makes him happy.

There’s an interesting article in this month’s issue of Rolling Stone magazine about how fear is used as a psychological weapon to influence people’s behavior, whether to get our vote or to get our money, or both.  Politicians use hate, fear and anger to sell themselves for a really simple reason – it works. We are quick, almost eager, to buy into the message that complex problems can be simplified to a single villain that bears the blame for everything wrong in the world.

In the lead up to the November elections we are being slammed by messages of fear and hate.  This is a self-serving, short-sighted tactic that is incredibly unhealthy for us as individuals and for our liberal democracy. The people doing it don’t care about the long-term consequences of their fear-mongering for the rest of us.

What can we do?

Our existence is tragically ephemeral and it seems like such a mistake to spend it being pissed-off at something or somebody.  As long as we are receiving messages of fear 24/7 from our television, radio, or digital devices we will keep sinking lower into the darkness of hate and anger.  Turn them off for extended periods of time and get outside and do something just for fun.  It’s even better if it involves being around lots of other people, especially a diverse group of people.  Get out and let go of pent-up angst by embracing your inner goofiness.

That’s my survival advice for the next few weeks.  I got it from the dog.

Monte

clouds and rays

Captured this photo of clouds and rays of sunlight at Chapoquoit a couple of days ago.  I was there specifically hoping to get some "stock" sky images to use in future projects.  It turned out to be a good evening for that.

Monte

kite surfer at sunset

This is an image of my friend Ben.  He loves the water.  The picture was taken at Chapoquoit beach - on two different days.  The original photo of Ben had a featureless gray sky in the background.  I was back at the same beach a few days later and captured an image of sunrays coming through heavy clouds at sunset, which is the same time of day I took the photograph of Ben.  I made a composite image with Photoshop.  Is that cheating?

Monte

kids at the beach

I was out at the beach this evening photographing the kite surfers and these kids asked me to take their picture.  I needed to take a different camera out of my bag and I didn't take enough time to properly adjust the settings.  The image is not as good as it could've been.

Monte