I've decided to go in a completely different direction for the next few days and get away from the usual city shots I post.

A few weeks ago I took a drive up to the Cheltenham Badlands, an area northwest of Toronto that has become eroded over many years, and is now nearly completely devoid of vegetation. The soil is very high in iron oxide which gives it a strong red-brown colour, with the occasional vein of green-white running through it. I've never been up there before and it's incredible to behold. Apparently I wasn't the only one interested in going up there that weekend and there must have been 200 people in this small area. More on that in a couple of days.

I shot all of the photos on Kodak Ultracolor 100 print film to get the most colour out of these hills, but my scanner couldn't capture all of the shadow and highlight details so I'm left with pretty flat looking photos that even Photoshop can't save. I was intending to show off these beautiful, Ansel Adams-style photos, but the film and/or scanner didn't cooperate. I took this photo in a somewhat different direction with the colour processing, but I love the simplicity of the patterns carved out by years of erosion.

comment by Gabriel Loeb on December 8, 2006, 9:23 PM

This is awesome. You've captured some extremely interesting textures here, and I love the way the white path leads your eye through the frame. Also, the way the light plays across the different slopes is quite neat. Great shot!

comment by Ashish Sidapara on December 8, 2006, 11:35 PM

Wow, love the patterns here .. great capture! Looking forward to more shots in this series.

comment by chantal stone on December 11, 2006, 12:48 AM

wow! the color, texture and patterns here are excellent! and even for (what you consider) a less than perfect scan, this image is brilliant...very well done, Richard!!

Sorry, comments closed.