Sea Lions

For the past few years, I have concentrated on abstracts. Recently, I spent a few days at La Jolla Cove photographing the sea lions. At first, I processed the images in color. But the more I looked at them, the more the lines and forms of these remarkable creatures stood out. Color became irrelevant, and black and white seemed to be the best medium to display the moods of these beautiful wild animals.

Because they are wild, they shouldn't be disturbed. The closest I ever came to any of them was around 25 or 30 yards, and many of them were more than 50 yards away.

I freely admit to some playful anthropomorphism in this series. Our national park system would no doubt frown on this, arguing that any degree of "humanizing" a wild animal will end up endangering the animal. Thus, they give bears numbers instead of names. I suppose if I had 3 million visitors to my site, I would rethink this. Until then, I'll continue to have a little fun, without directly interfering with nature.