I write a lot on this blog about making “your own images” and making use of color and the direction of light. Finding different ways of visually describing not only what something looks like, but what sort of mood or atmosphere accompany the subject and the time of day it was when you made the image.

Finding your own photographic voice.

With all that said, without any doubt, another part of photography, especially nature photography, is to accurately record certain subjects so people can know what they look like and visualize the purpose of the subjects existence.

Many years ago I was hiking with camera and tripod along the shores of Lake Michigan in Illinois. I came to a section of lake bank that was full of holes. Countless “little caves” in the bank.

Pretty soon a bird came to one “cave” and flew inside. Then at another hole another one flew out. I had discovered a colony of Bank Swallows. I eventually got a so, so shot of one posed on the bank, but I was happy in being able to record accurately what the bank looked like.

There is a time for capturing art, and a time for capturing information.

Crows and Grackles always seemed to me to be bird photographer’s least favorites subjects. I always welcomed everything to my camera lens.

This mirror image is that of a female Gadwall.

I loved making this image. Warm light and a reddish/brown field for a background allowed me to make this photo of a western Swainson’s Hawk. Wyoming was the location.

Some days are just worth getting up, and going out.

All birds are equal to my mind. Ring-billed Gulls and a blue sky.

Shadowy light, is not the sort that most flower photographers search for. Minimal, soft light, imparts the atmosphere that I always write about. Dramatic but understated at the same time.

Let us close today with a sign of the season. A two toned leaf and an old fallen log in the middle of a forest.

We only need to look. Look to every side, and above, and always look down. There are subjects everywhere.

Boy, not one vertical today!

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I know I write a lot about the Bible, religion, and God on these pages. At times I become a bit animated because I find things within some forms of Christianity that are not only false but detract and mislead good people who only want the truth.

I am not a biblical scholar and we do not need to be such in order to recognize truth. Unfortunately there are many religions, churches, ministries and internet preachers, that are false. They are far more dangerous to our Christianity than other religions are.

Non Christian religions that do not believe what Christians believe and they come straight out and say so. can be dealt with. We know where we stand.

False Christian teachers pretend to be with you, when they are not. They are insidious. They are at best incorrect, at worst, dishonest. Be especially cautious with religions who diminish Christ. They make Him less than God, when He is in fact God. The Trinity. The Triune God. That way genuine faith in what He did for us is not enough. That allows man to become god as they give you all of the humanistic rules you must obey and accomplish, to go to Heaven. In other words, you need them, not Jesus.

Heaven comes by true Faith in our Savior and then Salvation. We have much to do to please God but we are not capable of earning a trip to Heaven.

Everybody has the right to believe what they wish. We have the legal right to get it wrong, and/or to even lie about it. As long as you do not harm anybody in the process. That doesn’t mean that intentional wrong teachings or even wrong teaching through ignorance needs to be tolerated. Putting “religion” above simple Biblical truth is one of the reasons the world is in the state it is currently in. Misinformation about Christianity helps fuel what we are seeing in Israel and Gaza today. It is not just about Islam and Judaism. We are on fact dealing with two non-Christian religions. Judaism of course is linked to and was the predecessor of Christianity.

We live in a scary world but it is one that has been foretold of in the Bible. As scary as this world truly is, you can still gain solace from understanding the Word of God and its prophesy.

The verses below are meaningless without faith.

Romans 6:23
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

John 14:6
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me“

John 1:12-13. But to all who receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not the of flesh or man, but of God.

May God Bless,
Wayne