Abstract: Raindrops on a Vernal Pond

Unable to perceive the shape of You,
I find You all around me.
Your presence fills my eyes with Your love.
It humbles my heart,
For You are everywhere.
~From the film The Shape of Water~

It was raining, but the rain never stops me. Out I went with my pink umbrella, up to check out the ponds in the Barrens. Before I got to the first pond, which is my favorite, I heard a raucous sound. It was amphibians, singing! Of course, I knew they'd stop as soon as I got there, so I took a short video of their song. Nothing to see in it but plenty of joy to hear!

And then I got to my favorite pond, and the rain was falling gently, and the colors were amazing, and the pond was getting full up; they all are. And I stood on its banks for way too long and took too many pictures, a lot of them variations on the theme of what you see above: raindrops on a vernal pond.

I have lots of fun creating water abstracts, and exploring the color and shape of water. This is how I do it, and you can, too. I walk to water. I pick a spot on the water surface that looks to have some promise, either by color or by shape or by motion.

I set the camera on super vivid, which is a super-saturation filter on my Canon PowerShot SX 60 HS. I zoom in to an interesting spot - zoom zoom zoom - and then I start taking pictures. After I upload my pictures (I'm using Photos on a Mac as my only editing tool), I often bump up the black point, saturation, and definition for even more va-va-voom.

When I got home, there was one more treat waiting for me from this visit to the ponds. As I watched the videos, I spotted my first turtle of the year! It was sitting on a log at the far end of the pond, just watching me! So this was a double bonus, okay, triple, for me:

*raindrops and reflections on beautiful water
*first amphibian song
*first turtle sighting

What a day! Now, in regard to a song for this day, it is so hard to choose. The song playing at the time on my little pink tunes box was actually, quite perfectly, Joan Jett, with the CCR hit, Have You Ever Seen the Rain. So I'll give you that one right off the bat. But here's one more for bonus points: Joe Diffie covering Keith Whitley's final hit, I'm No Stranger to the Rain.