Peering In

I have to admit I was playing with shallow depth of field because I had just bought a fast 50mm lens.  I was looking for only the thinnest slices of focus and playing with that technique often at the expense of the image.  I believe, however, that when you get a new piece of equipment or learn a new technique that it is important to play with it in a kind of obsessive way as long as you can eventually pull back and find the best ways to use that technique or equipment.  I suspect that this image would have been stronger if I had allowed the beam and the bold in the foreground to remain in focus.  I do, however, really like the way your eye gets drawn into the frame.  There is a strong sense of depth and I find my mind wandering down that steel shaft into the frame to see what is hidden down there.  I like the indistinct, unknown nature of the photograph, we want to know, we want to see what’s there but we can’t.  It’s that tension that keeps us looking.

For a different look at this kind of farm equipment check here and here.​

-Russell Berg

Work

A 1930’s era hay rack leans into a prairie morning. Canon EOS XSi EF-S 17-85 at 17mm f/9.5 1/200 ISO 400

Cecil walked slowly from the field.  There was an ache in his shoulders, a special ache that only arrived during haying when 14 hours of pitching bundles up to the rack had slowed him to the point of exhaustion.  He turned and looked back.  The old hay rack was on its last legs and he would have to build a new frame for it.  He looked down and kicked at a clump of dirt in the stubble, it crumbled into dust.  It was very dry again this year.  It was at these times that he felt the weight of the responsibility for his family as heavily as the work that he had just demanded of his shoulders.  This was not going to be an easy year.  Cecil turned again and walked back towards his truck.

I took this photo at a 1930’s haying festival in north eastern Alberta.  The people at this festival demonstrate how their work was done in the ’30’s and I was reminded again of how hard the people who built this country worked.  I grew up on the prairies and my early life was permeated with farm culture.  They are a special breed and I feel honoured to have known many of them.

-Russell Berg