Birch Tree

The Background

After many months of shooting beautiful photos of boring stories that weren’t inspiring me anymore, I decided to return to my first love, filmmaking.  Earlier in my career, I was the DP for a video production company shooting hundreds of documentaries.  The tools back then were great, but the image quality was never as good as photographs.  Though the tools available to me now were merely a 720p-capable Nikon, I figured the quality of the lenses and size of the sensor would be great for capturing something that I would like to look at.

The Concept

Vignette (vi·gnette) [vin-yet] – noun

1. 1. A decorative design or small illustration used on the title page of a book.
   2. An engraving, drawing or photograph shaded off gradually at the edges so as to leave no definitive line at the border.
   3. A decorative design representing branches, leaves, grapes or the like, as in a manuscript.
   4. Any small, pleasing picture or view
   5. A small, graceful literary sketch.

These definitions, when you think about it, are some of the most liberating reasons to make something beautiful.  What narrative story is needed other than to explore something wonderful placed in beautiful light.

There is an editing routine known as a “montage of attractions”, or, many views of the same object or subject.  This was what I planned to shoot.

The Execution