I’ve been spending too much time (considering I have work to do and taxes to work on) in the woods on snowshoes. As of Monday, there was still well over a foot of snow in the woods, but it’s melting fast.

Over the last 10 years, I’ve worked on this theme: the ice over the ground, revealed when the snow melts, is sparkling, full of leaves and bits of flotsam, completely magical up close. It’s not everywhere, just in some places. I used to have a good patch of it in my back yard in Lyme, and now there is often quite a bit of it along a trail in a very beautiful forest. This year though, the snow has been hanging on, and I don’t know if things are melting in the normal way. It’s so late for it to be melting. I’ve only found one patch to work, but I’ve spent hours at it over a couple of days so far this year.

One thing I realized that’s quite funny about working this patch of ice: it’s in a spot with a breathtaking distant view over rolling meadows, to distant hillsides and beyond. It’s all the more breathtaking because on the (long) walk that leads to it, the trail has been in trees for a long time. Then you get to the edge, and it is: “Wow!” It opens up. Life is more dramatic when it opens up suddenly. But the funny thing is that on Monday I went straight to work with this ice, and I didn’t even look up, I don’t think, for hours.

I don’t usually wax gear-head on this blog, but my newer gear is just so perfect for working with this subject. The Olympus 45/f1.8 and the 60/f2.8 macro are just so amazingly sharp and contrasty. I’ve usually worked this subject with a DSLR, which is tricky, because it’s hard to get enough depth of field. It’s flat, but not really quite flat. Things bump up or recede, the plane dips or pops. The Micro Four Thirds camera has just enough more depth of field if I stop down a bit, and like I said, these lenses are amazing. This is so contrasty out of the camera I should almost dial it back. Really amazing.

This print is available for sale here.