The Bog of Eternal Stench

It was a clear blue morning, and the sun was doing golden things to photographable objects, and I went back to Tumwater Falls for another go, and I learned the important lesson that early morning is not a great tme to photograph Tumwater Falls unless you like for things to be backlit.

But I was there, and I was determined to get a more colorful version of the picture of the calm pool and the fallen tree in front of the upper falls, figuring that clear sun would make greener grass than we got with the overcast sky.

I did not realize how very backlit the images were going to turn out to be, and I zealously snapped away, noticing how the light showed the mist created from splashing water near the falls. I decided to try to be creative, because, looking through my viewfinder, I thought that if I cropped out the actual falls so you didn't know they were there, it would look like a pool in a wooded area with no explanation for all of that mist, right? It  made me think of a scene from Excaliber or the deadly bunny scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail or the scene in The Princess Bride where they encournter the Rodents of Unusual Size or the Bog of Eternal Stench from Labyrinth. You know, a forest floor steaming thick mist for no good reason other than because the place is buzzing with enchantment.

My daughter Julia liked this image the best of all of them, and even though I didn't say anything to her, she too thought (independently) that this looked like a creepy ominous forest scene from a fantasy movie. She thinks it is so great that it should go on a wall just the way it is. I think that all of the color is sapped out of it because it is backlit in an unfortunate way.

In Photoshop I increased the midtone contrast almost as much as was possible and I adjusted the hue a bit and increased the saturation a bit more than that and came up with this version, which I think is better. It might perhaps fit the assignment of showing depth and drawing people into the picture because I think that the sparkling water at the front leads to the calm pool just above it, and we wonder what is beyond the fog. But that is kind of cheating, because I took this last week.