photography, random thought, travel, writing

outside telluride

my friend bd and i pulled in to telluride mid-day saturday. sunny and 72 degrees. mountains all around. fantastic.

we got a bite to eat at smugglers, then spent the rest of the day at brown dog drinking full flavored ipa’s and watching the rangers beat the bosox.

i love telluride. i lived and worked here in the summer of 2000 with one of my best friends, john. and since then, i’ve been back more times than i can remember. but what i appreciate most about this part of colorado is the insane beauty.

so, i decided on sunday to take a short trip up to alta lakes to spend a solitary night in the high country of the san juans.

the road up is narrow, but stunning.

i found a perfect campsite, but this wasn’t it. i went ahead and made camp at this spot, which was really nice, but i chose it specifically because of the view.

as the sun dropped behind me, the light played a symphony with colors in ripples on the lake.

all of the afternoon fishermen left, and i was completely alone as darkness came. it reminded me of why i live for solitude in the wilderness:

it’s terrifying. but it’s also soul-washing. experiencing the primal fears that we in modern life have lost touch with, are essential to my sanity.

late at night, i shot a 1 hour exposure of the view from my tent…

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2009

film, film making, music, photography, random thought, travel

up on a mountain

here’s a quick preview of a new film i’ve been working on called the mountain. just like the other short films, it’s basically just moving versions of my landscape/ nature imagery, put to music… i’m still very new to this. i hope to grow and become more sophisticated in my attempts at filmmaking. but if you like this kind of thing, please check out the film chronos. it has provided great inspiration for me, and it is a fantastic example of how a film of this sort should look.

these particular clips were shot in telluride this past week. however, the rest of the film is shot in locations all over the world. locations include (or will include) big bend, wyoming, california, spain, lebanon, kenya, ethiopia, and hopefully many more.

i don’t plan to have the mountain finished anytime before the winter of 2010, but i’ll continue to release little previews like this one. let me know what you think…

thanks so much for watching!

music: “up on a mountain” by the welcome wagon

film, film making, photography, random thought, travel, writing

telluride

to me, experiencing winter in the mountains is like breathing for the first time. though i don’t remember my first breath, per se, i can imagine how bittersweet it must have been.

last week, i had the privilege to travel back up to telluride, colorado, with a great friend.

more to come… but for now, enjoy the scenery!