Dying of the Light – Losing Daylight Saving Time

If you’re an outdoor photographer, the letters DST might be your nemesis. In the fall, in the northeast part of the United States, the switch from Daylight Saving Time (DST) back to “standard” time is when you run out of light early, an outdoor photographer’s worst nightmare. Since I photograph cemeteries (and most cemeteries are, for the most part, outdoors), it becomes more challenging to photograph them at this time of the year. Every once in a while I would stop by a cemetery on my way home from work to do some photography. Not so in the winter – its just too dark.

DST is the practice of advancing clocks during summer months by one hour so that light is extended in the evening hours, and sacrificing normal sunrise times. Which is fine, but I’ve always been too lazy to photograph sunrises anyway. (Sunsets, on the other hand, have been more my forte.) Spring forward, fall back, indeed. While it’s a documented fact that more outdoor photography is done during the summer months than in the winter (1), you may need to fall back on an alternate plan if you want to maintain your current outdoor photographic production during the months of waning light.

You notice the “dying of the light” (hats off to Dylan Thomas) around September – the days begin to get shorter. Then during the first week of November we’re off DST and back on standard time, the tripping point. It’s dark when you get up in the morning and its dark when you leave work. From here, there is a steady progression to the winter solstice (mid-December) as we continue losing our precious light. If you’re in the earth’s northern hemisphere, the winter solstice is the shortest day of the year.

Photography is all about light. We may not think of it that way, but given current imaging technology, photography depends on light to create an image. Film worked that way, and so does digital. The less available daylight, the less able we are to make daylight photographs.
 

Self-portrait of author at Point Lobos, California

The loss of light never affected me as much as it did during a trip to Point Lobos, near Big Sur on the California coast a few years ago. I took a break from photographing cemeteries and planned a side trip to Point Lobos State Natural Reserve. Within the park, on the coast below Monterrey, is the area with all the weird rocks where the famous photographer Edward Weston made many of his famous images (read more about Weston and view images here). I arrived late in the day as a fog rolled in. I barely had an hour’s light. As much as I was looking forward to being here, I was ill-prepared for actually making photographs. The beauty of the setting was overpowering. I lamely made some digital and some film images, while taking in the magnificent scenery. Every rock, every dead branch was glorious. It looked like nowhere else on earth. Which, I suppose, is why Weston spent so much time here. He photographed dried seaweed, dead logs, the surf, cypress trees, the beautifully eroded rocks - for years.
 

Point Lobos, near Big Sur, California

I realized, I think, as the day drew to a close, how Weston may have felt at the end of each day. When nature closes the curtain, it is almost like being robbed of something precious. You want it to last forever, this section of wild ocean shoreline is so captivating. It is also very difficult to describe WHY it is so spellbinding. If you’re an outdoor photographer and you appreciate form and shape, “Weston Beach” can be a wondrous experience.

The experience taught me a lesson, well, a few lessons, which apply to more than just photography:
 

1. Planning is paramount – too early is way better than too late, in the same way that over-studying for an exam is better than under-studying (if you want a good grade)

 

2. Be prepared – I was not expecting the very dim conditions, and I had only one roll of film.

 

3. Appreciate the scarce resources around you, e.g. light.

 

4. Allow yourself time to appreciate the beauty around you.

 

5. Nothing lasts forever (even cemeteries).





Author in a cemetery at night, illuminating with an L.E.D. panel light

So as we face days of limited light, how can we best take advantage of this precious commodity? (And it is just that, as conflicting as it may seem: a commodity we take for granted, like electricity, yet precious in that we would be lost with it. Without light, in fact, we would quite literally be lost!) Must we “rage against the dying of the light?” With all due respect to Dylan Thomas (and his wonderful poem, Do not Go Gentle into that Good Night), there are alternatives.

Fall at Mount Moraih Cemetery, Philadelphia

 

Rather than be upset about such a situation or allowing Mother Nature to grind your work to a halt, plan to do your photography in a different way. Maybe take a day off work to exercise your skills. As a way of stocking up, I got as much photography in as I could in the past few weeks. I took a bit of time here and there to photograph the autumn leaves at Mount Moriah, Woodlands, and Laurel Hill cemeteries (Philadelphia). If you shoot mostly black and white, this is a good opportunity to capture the colors of the season! Assuming you don’t actually become clinically depressed with seasonal affective disorder (SAD), there are steps you can take, like consciously planning to do other types of photography during this time of the year.

 

Artificially-lit mausoleum at night

What are some other options for photographers, the “painters of light,” when the resource becomes scarce? If you photograph cemeteries, there ARE some that you can enter at dusk, or even night. Too spooky?  Try your hand at night photography in other locations, possibly experimenting with both existing and artificial light. Try taking a day off work just to do photography or maybe  adjust your schedule to accommodate getting more photography done during limited daylight.

Here’s one of the things I did last year when Mother Nature got in the way of my plans:  I let her lead me to places I’d not explored in the past. I began photographing cemeteries in the rain, and the snow. I started two Facebook Group pages called Cemeteries in the Rain, and, you guessed it -  Cemeteries in the Snow, both of with were well-received. People from all over the world posted their photographs on these pages. Cemeteries in the Snow, in particular, struck a powerful chord with many people. Why? Possibly because the time of year it usually snows (winter) is the time of year with – you guessed it – the shortest days! Maybe other photographers benefited from some creative nudging at this low-light time of the year.

I write this blog a week or so into November, back on standard time. The days get progressively shorter as we work our way toward the shortest day of the year, the winter solstice (which will occur on December 21 this year, 2014). For outdoor photographers, its all good news from there on out! The days progressively get longer as the earth continues (hopefully) its elliptical orbit around the sun. So maybe part of our energy now can be spent planning to take full advantage of that greater amount of light in the future. The summer solstice in mid-June will be the longest day of the year! Don’t spend it indoors!

References and Further Reading:

(1)   I made that up about more outdoor photography being done during the summer months than in the winter - just wanted to see if you were paying attention.

 In Point Lobos, Where Edward Weston Saw the World Anew
 

4th Anniversary of "The Cemetery Traveler" Blog!

As I write this blog posting, I begin my FIFTH YEAR of writing The Cemetery Traveler! Can you believe that?!). I’ve posted 248 blogs in the past four years and I truly thank you for reading them! There will be a quiz at the end. (Actually, a few have been guest-written by friends, at my invitation, and I thank them for sharing their knowledge and experience!)

A few of the blogs had to do with two new Facebook pages I started, based on my experiences with the varied personalities taken on by cemeteries during the different seasons of the year. The first one I did was called Cemeteries in the Snow which was received with wild enthusiasm the world over! This was quite exciting and produced some amazing images, as well as expanding readers' awareness of the beuaty of a graveyard under a blanket of snow.

The next page I started at a friend's request, Cemeteries in the Rain. I thought it would be an interesting experiment. The page has a whole different feel to it, as the general idea of a cemetery in the rain is rather depressing! The page has had limited upload participation because, well, other than me, who would be in a cemetery during a rainstorm?! still, I am intrigued at how a cemetery landscape changes drastically with the seasons.

 

As a fairly prolific writer, I can’t help but share an ironic experience with you, which has to do with writing, and with me, specifically. A few months ago my wife and I took our four-year-old daughter to a “play date” at a local (Philadelphia) Quaker school to see if we might send her there for kindergarten. While the kids were off playing (and being evaluated), the parents were gathered in a separate room for chatties and snacks (and most likely also being evaluated, though more discretely). As about thirty of us sat there in comfy chairs listening to the speakers extoll the virtues of the school, the dreaded ice breaker was thrust upon us.

Daughter Olivia learning her "ABCs"

We were each given a slip of paper on which were typed different questions. We were to go up to a stranger and ask them our question. After the person answered, that person would ask you their question. You would then trade slips of paper and go find another stranger to accost. It was a way of learning about each other that was effective and sort of eye-opening. I was asked this question:

“If you found yourself on a desert island, what three things would you want with you?”

Now, dear reader, before you continue, I invite you to jot down three things that first come to your mind – what would YOU take? I’ll go off on some little tangent and then come back with my response. Then we will compare and contrast.

So it has been four years of writing The Cemetery Traveler and I am STILL working on my first book of collected blogs. Its not so much procrastination – life gets in the way when you’re busy planning other things. Occasionally I sit in front of my laptop thinking Jack Kerouac thoughts, having “... an awful realization that I have been fooling myself all my life thinking there was a next thing to do to keep the show going ....” (from his book, Big Sur). But the book has to come out. I want it. I think it would be well received.

Occasionally I get writer’s block, but that only lasts a few days at most. Because as you all know, down every road, there’s one more graveyard! And sometimes, beneath a graveyard lies yet another graveyard - I mean, literally. After all, this was how Rome, Paris, London, Seattle, and San Francisco were built – a layer of a new city on top of its buried predecessor. Still, we don’t think of digging further down into a graveyard and expect to find headstones and monuments. Yet this is exactly what is occurring at Mount Moriah Cemetery, in Southwest Philadelphia.

Face-down, fallen headstone in process of being resurrected

It's interesting how the gravestone excavation is proceeding here at Mount Moriah. The Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery, Inc., in their attempts to locate grave stones for plot holders and descendants, realized that many of the apparent "missing" stones are actually buried! For the past century, stones have fallen and been buried during ground subsidence, soil erosion, under layers of fallen leaves, etc. Stones buried a foot below ground are typically found with a steel poker driven into the ground. In this place of over 80,000 graves, the chances of hitting a buried stone are quite good.

Harry Houdini at Heller's grave (ref)

That's how the headstone of noted nineteenth century magician Robert Heller was located. The photo at the beginning of this article is me standing next to it. Directly above (in an early 1900s photo) is Harry Houdini standing next to it! The stone had been lying in the dirt, face down, for may years. Now it is upright, and the grounds around it have been cleared so people can visit. 

So my point (and sometimes I do indeed have one) is, that since there are stories within stories, graves below graves, I may never run out of subject matter! And as long as I can get around and travel to all these interesting graveyards, I am hopeful that I can do my part to keep the memories of the occupants alive. And I well appreciate you following my blog, if only to avoid being reproached by friends for an uncalled for lack in your graveyard education!

Now then, about the three things I would want with me if I found myself on a desert island - I responded, “A guitar, a very long novel, and my wife.” This in itself may be telling in some way. However, what REALLY got me thinking about my answer was the comparative answers of other people who were asked this same question. Some I asked personally, others I overheard in the room. EVERYONE else included in their list of three items some electronic device with which to communicate with the outside world! That never occurred to me! I found this to be ironic and hilarious at the same time, since normally, I cannot shut up. So I guess if I found myself on a desert island, after reading the book and playing the guitar, I might just talk my wife to death about cemeteries.