Ridges and Tree                                                                                                                              Steve Dixon
Technical and Purchase Information

Camera/Lens: Arca Swiss view 210mm Nikkor
Format: 6x9
Film: 120 TMAX 100
Print Sizes Available:8x10, 11x14, 16x20


All prints are on double-weight fiber-based paper, archivally processed,
selenium toned, signed, and dry-mounted. Mats are archival quality and
acid free.  Actual print sizes may vary slightly.
This photo is the result of luck and persistence (or stubbornness).   Up early one morning, I rode the Parkway toward
Mt. Pisgah, looking for the sunrise (have I written this before?).  Sunrises and sunsets are always challenging to me
in black and white, as it's often the color that makes them interesting.  In black and white, there has to be something
else there.
I've driven that section of the Parkway scores, if not hundreds, of times and had never before noticed this particular
tree, standing alone just below the roadbed. I set up the camera quickly, excited by what I saw on the ground glass,
and quickly made the exposure.  The range of brightness between the tree and the sky was too great for N-1
development, so made one exposure for the sky, covered the top half of the lens with the dark slide, and gave the
bottom half another exposure.  In my excitement, I didn't let the camera settle after pulling the dark slide, and the first
exposure was blurred from the motion of the camera.  I did this not once, but three times.  I went home and
developed the film, and practically peeled the paint from the darkroom walls with strong language when I saw the
ruined negatives.
The next morning I went back.  In the meantime, a large woods fire in Tennessee had sent smoke into western North
Carolina, and it lay in the space between the ridges, which gives the photo an ethereal look it wouldn't otherwise
have had.  So, if I hadn't messed up the first batch, I would never have gotten the much superior photo the second
day.  There should be some deep meaning in that, but I don't know. Never give up?
Sizes
As most people seem to
prefer them, prices are for
framed prints, ready to
hang.  I use a very nice
matt black wood frame 7/8
of an inch wide, with a
white mat.  If you would
like to order unframed
prints, go to the
"Purchase" page for
pricing.