The featured image for October is something of a change from my recent geometric architectural studies.

The salt ponds that surround San Francisco Bay create a surreal landscape of shallow featureless wetlands, divided by low dykes that separate the areas of increasing salinity. Although salt discourages vegetation, it does support a rich fauna of brine shrimp and algae — and that acts as a magnet for a host of wetland birds such as these egrets I spotted lined up along one of the decaying wooden walkways that criss-cross the area.

Birdline

Click here to see the image in the gallery.

This is a landscape dominated by horizontal lines – the horizon, bridges, power lines etc. – so the evenly spaced line of birds fits perfectly with the aesthetic  of the local surroundings.

By the way, this is another of those images which looks as if it’s black-and-white …but it’s not. The haze has filtered out most of the color, but not all. This is exactly as it came from the camera!  You might not notice it unless you compared it with a true monochrome version, but then you’d see that the “color” version has a certain “spark” of energy which is lost with the removal of the subtle color.