Sea Archives - Mihaela Limberea

Favorite Photos: July 2023

2nd August 2023 Mihaela Limberea

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This is post 7 of 10 in the series “Favorite Photos”

This series contains my favorite photos processed in a particular month. Not my best photos, mind you, but the ones I liked best.

This is my favorite photo at the moment. I’ve finally bought a Lensbaby Velvet 85 lens, and I’m in love! This is the very first photo I’ve taken with it. It was meant as a test shot, and I didn’t have any expectations, Lensbabies using manual focus only thus a bit challenging, especially at large apertures – but look how gorgeous that Dahlia came out! Love, love, love it! I took a lot of photos yesterday but didn’t process them yet so, this one will have to do for now. Now I do have some expectations for the new photos, ha, ha!

Still life with a pink dahlia in a pink vase and two antique books

I’ve started experimenting with still-life photos and textures, which I quite like. I used my macro lens at f/2.8 for this photo and a couple of textures from 2 Lil’ Owls Studio. (Denise Love runs the studio, and her textures are gorgeous).

Close-up of a Dark Green Fritillary butterfly (Argynnis aglaja)

It’s butterfly and dragonfly season, and I’ve taken loads of photos. I didn’t have time to process any of them, save for this one, and that very quickly, mostly to test the new textures from 2 Lil’ Owls Studio. This is a dark green fritillary butterfly (Argynnis aglaja).

Portrait of a Kangaroo Island kangaroo (Macropus fuliginosus fuliginosus) standing in a green field

Yep, I’m still processing Australia photos. I came home with 20 thousand photos. Even after brutal culling, I still have plenty of keepers to process. I found this funny Kangaroo Island kangaroo (Macropus fuliginosus fuliginosus) at Stokes Bay, Kangaroo Island (South Australia). I always dreamt of photographing one on the beach, but no luck. Yet.

Two Eurasian lynxes (Lynx lynx) laying together

Northern lynxes (Lynx lynx lynx) rest after playing hard for half an hour or so. I photographed them and many other animals and birds at the Nordic Wilderness Center in Järvsö, some 300km north of Stockholm.

Did you know that these mini tigers can purr just like domestic cats? How cute?

Bonus: the stunning shades of blue and green of the sea on Kangaroo Island. The colors are so vibrant and captivating, it’s hard to believe they’re even real! These photos only start to capture the beauty and majesty of the ocean. I hope they can make you feel like you’re right there, soaking it all in.

I hope you enjoyed these photos, there are more to come next month.

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A Desert of Waves, a Wilderness of Water

13th September 2021 Mihaela Limberea

Photography

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Creative Process ICM Sea

It seems I talk a lot about my writing creative process on the blog at the moment – which is quite natural as I’m working on a book. So, today I wanted to offer you an insight into one of my recent photo projects for a change.

A few weeks ago, I dreamed about huge waves crashing thunderously on a rugged beach. The full moon, high in the pitch-black sky, illuminated an alien landscape.

No trees or shrubs, no dwellings, no boats. No people. No animals or birds (I knew this in my dream). An utterly deserted landscape, devoid of any life. Nothing but the huge rocks and the surf glittering like tiny diamonds in the moonshine. Nothing but the endless rumbling of the waves and the cold silvery moon. “A desert of waves, a wilderness of water” (Langston Hughes).

The dream made such an impression on me that it haunted me for several days. I couldn’t get that desolate landscape out of my mind. So, I did what any artist would do: set to work. I wanted to capture that landscape in my mind in a series of photos, and I knew it wouldn’t be realistic photos from the beginning. The atmosphere called for something else.

As luck would have it, we live by the sea. So every day, I would go down to the beach and experiment with ICM (Intentional Camera Movement). The light, the color of the sea, the clouds, they all factor in. I knew how I wanted the photos to look like; I tested different settings and motions; I learned patience. And got the photos I wanted.

As an artist, you’re always struggling to create the vision in your mind in whatever medium you’re working in, only to fail when you do – more often than not. But this was one of these dream projects where I didn’t fail. I love how the photos turned out.

You can see the rest of the photos in my photo gallery and buy prints in the online shop if you like them too.