KAP connects us all - Topic: Shadows

Steve Eisenhauer       March 21, 2002

Kiteflying connects us to our world environment. Hook a string to some fabric and sticks, and feel the gentle pull or powerful rip of sun-generated winds. Stare at clouds and wonder at their shapes and movement. Kiteflying with a camera asks us to take this connection a step further: make a statement in a photograph that speaks in all languages. And shadow photographs are perhaps the most unique and revealing statement a KAPer can make.

I take a lot of photographs from airplanes, but find that haze and distance take away sharpness and character from shadows. With KAP's lower elevations the effect of atmospheric haze is minimized, although shadows are longest and most prominent only early or late in the day, when the sun is low on the horizon. So I still have to be concerned with horizon haze, evident on nearly every day of the year. But on about one day in a hundred, when the upper atmosphere humidity is extremely low, conditions are perfect for KAP shadow photography. The shadows then dominate, and the subject seems incidental.

This photograph, of an artist at his easel and a model sitting on the grass, was taken under good shadow conditions. Hazy "horse tail" clouds were drifting in and out from in front of the late afternoon sun. I picked a moment when the shadows seemed clearest. Since I don't like to digitally enhance photographs, to get really sharp shadows I will return again and again to this artist colony on the banks of the Maurice River in Millville, New Jersey. Perfect shadows are hard to find, but fun to look for.