A frozen field shrouded in fog

By valo | Valo | 7 Feb 2023

Foggy, frosty, icy — and a bit wet

Some ten days ago, I was out for a walk on a very foggy day. Usually, my photos of fog are really bland and dull. I think this time, it worked a bit better. You can evaluate what I managed to capture.

I went to an area near a lake surrounded by fields which end up flooded at the end of winter, yet somehow all the extra water moves away, and grains manage to ripen during the summer. It was a surprising sight because winter is far from over.

I saw a cute small red house — most likely storing some agricultural equipment. It looked lonely, covered by the thick fog. What you see in the foreground is the frozen flood water. The lake that I mentioned above is several hundred meters away from the field.

If you turn your camera away to point towards the cattails, it truly looks like I was standing in front of a big body of water.

Turning 180 degrees reveals the fields behind. I wish I could modify the depth of field such that the plane of sharp focus follows the row of cattails. This is only doable with a tilt-shift lens, though. I don’t have one for my DSLR. A large-format film camera allows for this kind of tricks because the lens holder and bellows give room for going wild.

I have been to this area before, and I knew that there is a ditch between the walking path and the row of cattails. The ice was masking it well, and I had to watch my steps carefully. Still, I managed to reach them safely and take a few photos.

The ice was making loud cracking noises under my feet, breaking into big shards.

I wanted to capture the scale, so I picked the missing piece from above, and admired its translucency. On a sunny day, it would play with the sunrays in a lovely way.

The path towards the lake was also covered in ice. It was hard to tell where the ice ends and when it becomes too thin to carry a human. Obviously, it wasn’t deep, but I would prefer to keep my feet dry when the temperature is below freezing.

There were interesting patterns in the ice where your foot has been.

There were also other beautiful frozen textures. It’s amazing what beautiful abstract art nature can create.

Look what happens when I went wild with processing the photos.

Photo by the author, edited in Mextures

I also went for a contrasty black-and-white look.

Photo by the author, edited in Mextures

I made my way almost completely dry. Had I been more careful, I would have chosen somewhat sturdier ground.

The boats hadn’t managed to avoid the fate of the flooded fields, either.

I wonder why they are left by the pier without even being tied with a rope to it. I guess people rely on the thick reeds to prevent the boats from disappearing altogether.

Hopefully the owner manages to recover their boat…

The bird tower actually has an interesting construction. Usually, all bird towers look almost exactly the same, but this one seems to have received an artist’s touch. The crossing wood was a nice pattern to capture.

The wide-angle camera of my phone produced a funny-looking distorted image because of the round shape of the tower. I wish I had centred the squares better, though.