The Backroads Traveler: Georgia's Grand Canyon

 Providence Canyon, Stewart County. One of Georgia's seven natural wonders.

Providence Canyon, Georgia’s “Little Grand Canyon,” ranked as one of the state’s Seven Natural Wonders, is actually the result of poor farming practices and unchecked erosion. It simply has to be seen to be believed. Perhaps even more difficult to believe is that in 1859 the canyon was only a shallow gully.

There are several overlooks from which to view the canyon, most of which require some walking. One of the best, though, requires relatively little walking and is one of the first you come to, just beyond the restrooms. The state parks people, who should know, say the canyon is 150 feet deep. But it looks much deeper.

In addition to viewing the canyon, which is certainly worth the trip, the 1003-acre state park also offers picnic shelters, pioneer campsites, back-country campsites, 3 miles of hiking trails, and a 7-mile back-country backpacking trail. It’s open daily 7 a.m.–6 p.m. September 15–April 14, and 7 a.m.–9 p.m. April 15–September 14. As with most Georgia state parks, there’s no admission fee but a $5 parking pass is required. It's located west of Lumpkin in southwest Georgia's Stewart County.

Note the two front entrances at Providence Methodist Church.

When Providence Methodist Church was organized, around 1832, the congregation met in a log building on a site that is now between two of the canyons. The present building was erected in 1859, fortunately on a different site. At the time the church was built, the canyon was nothing more than a gully about five feet deep!

The church is not locked. You can go inside, but be respectful.   Laid out in the old style, there are separate entrances and seating for men and women. The pulpit area, pump organ, and pot-bellied stove are all as they were left by the last congregation.

Unfortunately, the state, which owns the land, has not done a good job of upkeep on the cemetery, where many Stewart County pioneer families are buried.

Adapted from my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia.

About the photographs: Both were made with an Olympus E-M5 digital camera and the Panasonic Lumix G-Vario 14-140mm lens.

Visit my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $4.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Photography and text copyright 2025 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     travel photography    digital photography     Olympus E-M5 camera     Panasonic Lumix G-Vario 14-140mm lens       Georgia's Natural Wonders     Historic churches     Stewart County, Georgia     Georgia State Parks

Fishing for a Living

 Poor man's fishing boats. Madras Beach, India.

Some people live for fishing. I have a nephew like that. But in much of the world people fish, not for fun, but for a living.

When I walked down to the beach at Madras at sunrise that January morning in 1992, I noticed several piles of oddly shaped logs just above the tide line. Within a few minutes, some young men appeared and began binding those logs together with ropes to form crude, boat-shaped rafts. They quickly launched their rafts through the surf, hopped aboard, stepped small masts and sails, and began fishing.

India, as 'most everyone knows, has some of the world's poorest people. These young men were not just fishing for fun or for a living -- they were fishing for subsistence. No sleek boats or powerful motors -- just rafts made of buoyant logs. Fishing the way their fathers and grandfathers and generations before them had fished.

 Lashing the logs together to make a boat.

Indians are some the world's most intelligent people, but are held back by a religious and political system that denies opportunity to many. When they come to a free country such as America, many thrive. But for the millions in India and many other countries, life is about subsistence.

About the photographs: Top -- Pentax 6x7, Kodak EPP film. Bottom -- Olympus OM2n or OMPC, Fujichrome 100D film.

Visit my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $4.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Photography and text copyright 2025 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    film photography     Ektachrome EPP film    Fujichrome 100D film     travel photography     Olympus OM2n camera     Olympus OMPC camera    Pentax 6x7 camera     India     Madras beach     Kodak     Indian people     primitive fishing     subsistence fishing

It's All about the Light

Radiologist at Emory University Hospital, Atlanta. The objective was to balance the supplemental light  with the illumination from the screens to create a natural look. The light source was a flash unit bounced into a white umbrella on the right side of the frame.

In commercial photography the indispensable skill is the ability to use light.

A landscape photographer working outdoors is pretty much stuck with the light that Mother Nature provides. Sometimes things can be improved a bit by moving around, finding another angle, or possibly coming back at a different time or even another day when the quality of the light is more favorable.

A journalistic photographer has to take the light as he finds it, although sometimes he may be able to supplement it with flash. The best journalistic photographers and some wedding photographers are almost wizards at making the existing light work for them.

The commercial photographer has to find a way to create the light he wants, when and where he wants it. In fact, this is the skill that separates the men from the boys in commercial photography, or perhaps I should say the successful from the unsuccessful. 

Good lighting doesn't just make the subject easier to see. It molds, reveals, and defines the form of things, differentiating between subject and background, bringing out color and texture, depth and contrast. Whether the subject is a portrait, a product, or a room interior, lighting is the key. 

The skillful commercial photographer has an arsenal of lighting tools and knows how to use them: large and small flash units, floodlights, spotlights, and LED panels, as well as umbrellas and softboxes to soften and modulate the light as the photographer chooses. He also knows how to use and supplement available light when it's available. And because so many situations create new challenges, photographic lighting is a lifelong learning experience.

As one old photographer signed himself, "Always fighting the light."

 This was an illustration for a printing company's advertising. I used a gold seamless paper background and put a floodlight above and behind the book.

 

About the equipment: For the radiologist, I used a Canon EOS 10D digital camera with the Canon EF 28-70L lens. The book was photographed with a Hasselblad 500CM film camera with an 80mm Zeiss lens and Fujichrome 100 film.

Visit my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $4.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Photography and text copyright 2025 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     digital photography    film photography     Canoon EOS 10D camera     Canon EF 28-70L lens Fujichrome 100 film     commercial photography    photographic lighting     Hasselblad 500CM camera    Zeiss 80mm f2.8 lens

The Unlikely Author

Renee Tipton a.k.a. Kim Jenkins. My daughter-in-law.

 Writing runs in my family. My father wrote voluminously on Biblical subjects. I have been writing scripts, magazine articles, ad copy, and books since the late 1960s. My son Rob, a professor of English at Georgia State University, writes perceptive political commentary and is the author or co-author of many books. His latest is "Shooting After Practice," an account of his thirteen years as a junior college basketball coach. (Now available at Amazon.com.) My oldest granddaughter is a fine writer and blogs at peachesandpotatoes.com. My oldest grandson once wrote for a newspaper. My second oldest grandson teaches marketing at Mississippi State and writes on the subject. 

But that's all on my side of the family.On the other side are some fine, very intelligent people, but none with any apparent literary inclinations. Kimberly, wife of my second son Don, surprised us all when her first book was an immediate success on Amazon.com.

Her approach to authorship is even more surprising. She is an accountant -- a numbers person -- and was not particularly interested in being a writer. Although she works with her husband in his business, she was looking for something she could do on her own that would provide long-term, sustainable income and would not require much hands-on involvement, such as online retailing, which would involve buying and selling, maintaining an inventory, and shipping.

Looking at the possibilities, she decided she could create small books, using Amazon's online publishing system. She chose gardening, a subject in which she had some expertise, did some research, wrote the text, then, through the Amazon system, found an editor and a designer to polish her book into publishable form. She utilized all the marketing helps the Amazon system provides and launched her first book, The Self-Sufficient Homestead Garden. She soon followed up with two more books on related subjects. All three are selling well. And she's working on more.

Kim's first three books. More in the planning stage.

About the photographs: The portrait of Ms. Tipton was made with a Canon EOS 5D Classic camera with the 24-85mm EF lens. The collage of her books was photographed with a Fuji X-T20 camera and the Fujinon XF 16-80mm lens.

Visit my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $4.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Photography and text copyright 2025 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     writing    book publishing     Amazon publishing     Renee Tipton      Rob Jenkins     gardening    Canon EOS 5D Classic camera    Canon 24-85mm EF lens     Fuji X-T20 camera Fujinon XF 16-80mm lens