Taken in the old areas of Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston.
Head stones here go from the elaborate to plain and simple. What they have in common is the wear and tear of time.
Wandering here I always find something new, or maybe look at it a bit differently.
I had intended the water here to be white allowing the bird to be almost a silhouette.
Somehow a silver look slipped in, I went with it.
Soldiers Ground, on the front edge of Magnolia, was created because there was a pressing need for burial space. The cemetery was already here, however this land was still part of the Magnolia Umbra plantation.
While it was primarily for Confederate States military you will find Federal troops around, down the lane outside the CSA boundry is a commandant of West Point. A place of honor here was also set aside for a beloved ‘laundress’ with a southern brigade.
This is still private property, run by a preservation trust.
In Soldiers Ground
This is a very quiet and private place. The entire cemetery is large, but there are not many people around. Chances are the ones you do see have a camera.
Flags of all styles, periods, and various stages of decay are in this old civil war era cemetery.
This US flag was tied by threads to some wrought iron fencing.
Not sure, but I think this needs to hang somewhere.
Here is a 4 AM project.
The logical thing to do at that hour is pack a bag, a little coffee, and head out for sunrise and early marsh shoots. Today, it was 74 (F) degrees all night, this afternoon around 100(F).
DxO Filmpack software has a few features I wanted to try so I’m staying right here. Most people use NIK SilverEfex for B&W work, I do too. However Filmpack is owned by the same company and has similar tools.
These are from a Charleston 1800’s planters home. The perfect place for B&W.
I guess these are the happy home owners from 200 years ago.
The background was not very busy, an important item for me to go for black and white in wildlife.
I was standing around, talking with Ellen, and suddenly this guy flew by. That’s the whole story, nothing much to tell.
The last week or so I have been watching the locals (Alligators) and some of their odd behavior.
First, it’s May. Usually the height of gator friskiness. A male Alligator is not subtle, no soft music and flowers. In general they are not deep thinkers. Start a fight, dive under water, see what happens.
However look at the header photo, or the first image below. I think he’s whispering sweet nothings !
These photos were taken is a smaller marsh retaining pond. There were probably a dozen males and females right there. Not a single argument, no deep growling warnings.
Instead we had synchronized swimming.
The pair above even looked pretty comfortable with each other.
Note; there’s still nothing cuddly about them.
The waters surface seemed to lend itself to a monochrome photograph.
Wildlife can be very hard for me in B&W but the white space helped a lot here.
This one might look good larger and printed on metal.
